Newsflash: Indiana Voter I.D. law struck down

Indianapolis, Indiana--In what's going to be a blow to the right and the GOP, Indiana's voter I.D. law (P.L. 109-2005) requiring registered voters to produce a photo identification at polling places, while at the same time not requiring similar standards for mail-in votes, has been reversed unanimously as violating Indiana's State Constitution by a three member Court of Appeals of Indiana, it has been struck for now. Apparently Mitch Daniels and his Secretary of State have reading comprehension problems.

The appeals court found that the first ruling by the trial court upholding the law was in-error on the judge's part.

In-person voters are required to show a photo identification to prove who they are, but there are no requirements for an affidavit from mail-in voters. The ruling cited "inconsistent and partial treatment favoring absentee voters who choose to mail their votes" as the primary reason for its decision.Backers of the law said it curbs voter fraud. Those against the law contend that it keeps poor, older and minority voters from casting ballots. ("Court Throws Out Indiana Voter ID Law," Fwix.com, 09.17.2009)

Yes, Governor Daniels, someone who would stand to benefit from the poor, elderly, and minority voters being disenfranchised in elections has a major problem with the appeals court ruling and has called it "preposterous." I'm sure he knows that most of Indiana's homeless are veterans, the majority of them having served in the Vietnam war. Support our troops, pig, scarface. To disenfranchise minority voters is the real golden goose.

If anything, the bill had the subtext of being an "anti-nigger" bill and one decidedly against the poor and the vulnerable. But that's what a wolf does--goes for the stragglers, the weakest. Interestingly, the ruling cites an incident that occurred here in St. Joseph County:

...Further, the League alleged that in Marion County alone in the 2007 municipal election, 32 persons who submitted provisional ballots never produced a qualified form of identification and therefore their votes were not counted, despite the fact that “[m]ost of those voters had voted for several years at the same location.” (Appellant‟s App. p. 6). Additionally, the League alleged that in St. Joseph County, 12 nuns were not permitted “to cast a regular or provisional ballot” because they did not have the required form of identification. (Appellant‟s App. p. 6). In Count II, the League contended that the Voter I.D. Law conferred a privilege upon voters voting by mail-in absentee ballot because those voters did not have to comply with the identification requirements. (No. 49A02-0901-CV-40)

The nuns were eventually allowed to vote to put out the PR fire. Yes, they're going to appeal this ruling to the Indiana State Supreme Court, but I wouldn't be surprised if their own form of "judicial activism" fails.

Will that dissuade them? Nothing dissuades their ilk and their brand of anti-Americanism. After all, if you ask anyone, the majority of African Americans don't vote Republican and never will. However, right now, the GOP is the party of racism, the party of the extremist fifth columnist and theocratic and plutocratic fascism. Thank the League of Women Voters of Indiana and Indianapolis for this victory, let's hope it holds. To be sure, they're going to keep on fighting.

The question I have is: what business does a standing governor of a state have in leading the charge for an appeal to an appeal that so clearly violates the state constitution? At best, all they can attempt to do is to illustrate that there was improper procedure in the judicial process, the decision, and that it was decided incorrectly. That would be a technicality that won't even address the actual basis of the decision itself, but Daniels and the moronic Indiana GOP are crying like Baby Huey, so get the brat a pacifier, and quick. Who's going to file the appeal to the appeal? Whoever that is should be looked at very, very carefully, and that would be Daniels and company. Did I mention that Daniels has no charisma and a scar on his left-cheek and served as an economics adviser to George W. Bush in his first term? That advice must have been gangbusters, things are great in Indiana. He must have gotten that scar during his time as a collections man for organized crime, like Don King.

Look at most of the photos, he favors his right side...but we knew this. Crook. At least the consortium that bought the toll road he sold lost their asses over Madoff. What a C.R.E.E.P.

"Court Throws Out Indiana Voter ID Law," Fwix.com, 09.17.2009: http://fwix.com/share/18_39209107e0#

The ruling striking down Indiana's voter I.D. law: http://www.in.gov/judiciary/opinions/pdf/09170901par.pdf

Why do they hate the Jews, why do they hate immigrants and minorities?

WWW--This, of course, is my own humble opinion regarding why Jews, Blacks, other minorities, and immigrants are so hated by rednecks and nouveau nativists whose own ancestors were subjected to the same generations ago or even recently: because many in these groups have retained some semblance of their original culture, while those who "hate" or are "suspicious" of them in-the-main, do not, they've been Americanized.

The United States is the most business-dominated nation state in human history. We are constantly bombarded with propaganda that's routinely called "advertising" which has not only decimated traditional cultures here at home, but has essentially resulted in near cultural genocide in other nations that came under the sway of American commercialization in the immediate aftermath of WWII. America was the "last man standing" at the end of the Second World War. Traditional empires like the French, British, Belgian, & the Dutch (among others), were on-the-ropes after the war, it being their crazed attempt to dominate the Continent, meaning each other. Germany was a latecomer to the game of empire, hence Hitler's drive to create a Germanic one, one that we all know failed. Who taught him to do that?

In America and it's captive postwar markets, television and other media played a tragic role in the dumbing down of foreign populations in countries like Italy, France, Germany, and so on. Had the Marshall Plan never happened or had it failed, it's likely that Continental Europe would have gone to the far left, something that certainly wouldn't have been the end of the world. Aid came at a price: American dominance of the domestic markets of "captive" nations, a reverse-side to the rhetoric of the Cold War, but one thatwas just as true as its obverse. When that didn't always work, proxy armies were created under the umbrella of NATO in an overarching program called GLADIO, and they were essentially comprised of criminals, Nazi-collaborators, racists, anti-Communist extremists, and other cuddly people. In other words, counterinsurgency, repression. So much for the invisible hand of the marketplace...

But what really did the job of killing the heart of most cultures under the sway of American-style capitalism? That's right, it was television. Regional dialects vanished; people's diets degraded; wage-slavery, already a problem before the war, became virtually ubiquitous; cultural attitudes and viewpoints became more narrow; the partisan resistance and its memory were quelled; and people throughout the world basically became greedy consumerist slobs like many Americans were during the Cold War, and are today. The medium is the message alright, and that message is submit or die, or perhaps "conform, buy, or die." Not only is this a pathetic message, but a peculiarly millennial and American one transmitted by clerks with too much power, American businessmen and investors. America was never the savior of the world and never will be.

The same destruction of culture has occurred domestically, but it hasn't been total. What's one of the number one problems of our youth at any given moment? The lack of an identity, and the search for a new one, or moves to create one where one no longer exists. In the "eternal" (not looking so eternal anymore, thank God) consumer model, we inhabit a timeless present with no beginning and no end, just the now. That's also called "death," and it can only be a road to cultural death, and ultimately, the death of the species.

To hate Jews, Blacks who have retained some of their original culture or reinvented themselves, creating a new one, or hating immigrants and other minorities, then, is a subconscious admission that you have no culture, that you're a hollow man. The reality is that those who are racist in the modern world aren't just expressing classic anthropology, they're expressing that they want what these so-called groups want: an identity. They're the wretched of the earth, and these are the vagaries and dysfunctional behaviors of the oppressed. If they keep it up, they'll kill us all.

"Twilight time" at Ford, with a dose of hope and wisdom

So I took my grandfather's old--old?!--2000 van cruiser to the dealer down the road for a recall fix (you don't want to know, but it includes the cruise control and the vehicle bursting into flames, even when it isn't running) early this morning, and it was almost what I expected: no customers, employees sitting around in the waiting room with me (cute girls!), salespeople and other staff walking around trying to look "busy" when it's obvious there's no way in hell that's going to be possible, and a few other of the depressing sights and sounds one might imagine walking into a car dealership in America these days.

Mind you that I took the van in just to have the recall work done, gratis (FREE). As you might expect, I waited while they did it and one the big-shots in the garage came back and asked if I wanted the whole-enchilada--check the brakes, blow out the transmission fluid, check the battery, change the oil, wash the van, kick the tires, etc., etc. . Naturally, I had my trusty credit card in-hand, the damage (to my finances) was going to be impressive, and it was!

After what seemed like at least a two hour wait (not bad), they were done with everything, no hassles, no worries. It felt great to finally have all this done, like a good early-morning dump, both invigorating and a little exhausting, but satisfying and a relief. Now, my van wouldn't suddenly burst into flames spontaneously on the highway or in our garage where it could spread to the house, maybe taking-out a few lawn chairs in the backyard, a squirrel, and maybe an errant opossum. That'll learn 'ya.

Ask any working-class American one of their greatest sources of frustration and anger besides their job or their boss, and they'll immediately home in on their car or truck. Frequently, it's an American-made vehicle like mine, a hand-me-down. For decades and decades--even back when Henry Ford was alive--the auto manufacturers were told by the public, by consumer advocacy groups, the government (but not much here), and everyone with a pulse, to make cars that were safer, more affordable, durable, got better gas mileage, and required very little maintenance. I know, I know--people need jobs, and I'm not going to begrudge that, but why not pay everyone properly? Wasn't that Henry Ford's idea?

Wasn't he an authoritarian nut, a Nazi-supporter? What does that make the latest brew of CEOs who have placed themselves on the extinction list as a class? They haven't believed that Americans should be paid a living-wage, never mind being able to actually afford their products. I know, that whole "logic" thing. The real problem, as usual, is the American obsession with work and the work ethic, a dysfunctional authoritarian division of labor, and greed. This no longer works...so?

Even the new president is overly-obsessed with work and it's a little worrying; but I feel assured that reality of current events is going to change him and his assumptions as it changes everyone else. More work is not always the answer, but a rethinking of productivity, wages, and the division of labor are. True, there is much work to be done getting a sustainable energy policy and economy (the same thing, really, something our intelligent president understands), but what after that? How will work be divided-up? Are we to tolerate more of the same old, same old regarding the policies of employers?

The president appears to be on the same page as working-class Americans here in his vocal support of the right to unionize, the right to collective bargaining that's implicit to a healthy democracy. This is all about the social contract, or what the Republicans and errant Democrats have debased it to. For every recall, every death caused by design-flaws done at the behest of profit and shareholders, and corporate executives, and for every breakdown that could have been avoided but was part of "planned obsolescence," the social contract was violated and discarded again and again. This was the fault of ownership and management, not the UAW, not any union, and not necessarily the consumer, although we have to make an exception with the SUV.

As I was signing the papers for the repairs and maintenance, a very smart, wise Black man shook his head in a chair across from us: "Yeah, Ford isn't going out of business...at least not right away. You know, if they would have just made cars that--maybe they wouldn't look great--didn't cost so much, but got good mileage and didn't need so much maintenance." He was an employee of the Ford dealership. His supervisor did nothing to contradict him, nothing at all. We all agreed, and I had a great talk with this man about the heart of all of this. Call me crazy if you like, but I've always had a greater rapport with Black Americans--they call it as they see it.

But today, at Ford, things have changed. Decorum has changed, and people are tired of towing-the-line for the big-shots, tired of keeping up appearances when it doesn't matter. I'd write that we need to do this and stop holding-our-tongues with employers when things no longer work, but that time passed long ago. Now comes the time to "fix" things, a time of incredible opportunities for working people...if they decide to be those squeaky-wheels that get oiled. We have an opportunity to rollback authoritarianism in the workplace like never before. If we fail to try we'll only have ourselves to blame.

Our children and their grandchildren will also blame us. They will be right. We can make things better, it's just a matter of will, the jaded-be-damned. Get moving, get organized.

George W. Bush: Last white president?

I'm stealing this joke from a friend:

F: "Everyone's talking about how Obama's the first Black President, but not the fact that George W. Bush is the last white one."

Me: "Why's that?"

F: "Because, once you go Black, you never go back..."

Congratulations to President Obama, now please make us all proud. And thanks George: you gave us a more nationalized economy, expanded the powers of government to help and assist the needy, and paved the way for a Black president. I know it was a mistake, but that counts too.

"Lohan refers to Obama as 'first colored president'"

New York, New York (not the Scorsese film, silly)--She's at it again: Lindsay Lohan has stuck her foot in her mouth, and not her new g-friend's. You know, she's 22, and she's in the spotlight. How would your youth look if it was on billboards, televisions, in print, DVD, downloads, celebutante rags, and all the others forms of media?

And she didn't choose this, her parents did. They made her be a child star, just like Fatty Arbuckle's did. I assume they ripped-her-off too, because what's family for in America, after all?

Look, she blogged about her sincere support of Barack Obama on her own personal blog, it's OK, calm down. Have some dip (thanks George Carlin), relax.

There was a time--and for some there still is--where referring to a Black American as "colored" was a far cry from what the rest were calling them--namely, "niggers." It's shameful, all of it, I know. I can assure many readers out there that the Amish still use this term when referring to Black people, but they hate most all outsiders whom they refer to as a bloc called "the English" (English-speakers).

She meant well, but it came out very-very wrong. People make mistakes, like getting tit-jobs. This is getting down to human anthropology here, it is what it is, but I don't think Lohan meant anything derogatory by it, she's just young and naive, and apparently gay for now. Great, now many Black Americans are really gonna hate her now...did I mention that she has poor taste in friends? That too.

"Open Letter to Senator Barack Obama," by Ralph Nader

November 4, 2008 www.votenader.org www.officialnaderstore.com

November 3, 2008 Open letter to Senator Barack Obama Dear Senator Obama: In your nearly two-year presidential campaign, the words "hope and change," "change and hope" have been your trademark declarations. Yet there is an asymmetry between those objectives and your political character that succumbs to contrary centers of power that want not "hope and change" but the continuation of the power-entrenched status quo. Far more than Senator McCain, you have received enormous, unprecedented contributions from corporate interests, Wall Street interests and, most interestingly, big corporate law firm attorneys. Never before has a Democratic nominee for President achieved this supremacy over his Republican counterpart. Why, apart from your unconditional vote for the $700 billion Wall Street bailout, are these large corporate interests investing so much in Senator Obama? Could it be that in your state Senate record, your U.S. Senate record and your presidential campaign record (favoring nuclear power, coal plants, offshore oil drilling, corporate subsidies including the 1872 Mining Act and avoiding any comprehensive program to crack down on the corporate crime wave and the bloated, wasteful military budget, for example) you have shown that you are their man? To advance change and hope, the presidential persona requires character, courage, integrity-- not expediency, accommodation and short-range opportunism. Take, for example, your transformation from an articulate defender of Palestinian rights in Chicago before your run for the U.S. Senate to an acolyte, a dittoman for the hard-line AIPAC lobby, which bolsters the militaristic oppression, occupation, blockage, colonization and land-water seizures over the years of the Palestinian peoples and their shrunken territories in the West Bank and Gaza. Eric Alterman summarized numerous polls in a December 2007 issue of The Nation magazine showing that AIPAC policies are opposed by a majority of Jewish-Americans. You know quite well that only when the U.S. Government supports the Israeli and Palestinian peace movements, that years ago worked out a detailed two-state solution (which is supported by a majority of Israelis and Palestinians), will there be a chance for a peaceful resolution of this 60-year plus conflict. Yet you align yourself with the hard-liners, so much so that in your infamous, demeaning speech to the AIPAC convention right after you gained the nomination of the Democratic Party, you supported an "undivided Jerusalem," and opposed negotiations with Hamas-- the elected government in Gaza. Once again, you ignored the will of the Israeli people who, in a March 1, 2008 poll by the respected newspaper Haaretz, showed that 64% of Israelis favored "direct negotiations with Hamas." Siding with the AIPAC hard-liners is what one of the many leading Palestinians advocating dialogue and peace with the Israeli people was describing when he wrote "Anti-semitism today is the persecution of Palestinian society by the Israeli state." During your visit to Israel this summer, you scheduled a mere 45 minutes of your time for Palestinians with no news conference, and no visit to Palestinian refugee camps that would have focused the media on the brutalization of the Palestinians. Your trip supported the illegal, cruel blockade of Gaza in defiance of international law and the United Nations charter. You focused on southern Israeli casualties which during the past year have totaled one civilian casualty to every 400 Palestinian casualties on the Gaza side. Instead of a statesmanship that decried all violence and its replacement with acceptance of the Arab League's 2002 proposal to permit a viable Palestinian state within the 1967 borders in return for full economic and diplomatic relations between Arab countries and Israel, you played the role of a cheap politician, leaving the area and Palestinians with the feeling of much shock and little awe. David Levy, a former Israeli peace negotiator, described your trip succinctly: "There was almost a willful display of indifference to the fact that there are two narratives here. This could serve him well as a candidate, but not as a President." Palestinian American commentator, Ali Abunimah, noted that Obama did not utter a single criticism of Israel, "of its relentless settlement and wall construction, of the closures that make life unlivable for millions of Palestinians. ...Even the Bush administration recently criticized Israeli's use of cluster bombs against Lebanese civilians [see www.atfl.org for elaboration]. But Obama defended Israeli's assault on Lebanon as an exercise of its 'legitimate right to defend itself.'" In numerous columns Gideon Levy, writing in Haaretz, strongly criticized the Israeli government's assault on civilians in Gaza, including attacks on "the heart of a crowded refugee camp... with horrible bloodshed" in early 2008. Israeli writer and peace advocate-- Uri Avnery-- described Obama's appearance before AIPAC as one that "broke all records for obsequiousness and fawning, adding that Obama "is prepared to sacrifice the most basic American interests. After all, the US has a vital interest in achieving an Israeli-Palestinian peace that will allow it to find ways to the hearts of the Arab masses from Iraq to Morocco. Obama has harmed his image in the Muslim world and mortgaged his future-- if and when he is elected president.," he said, adding, "Of one thing I am certain: Obama's declarations at the AIPAC conference are very, very bad for peace. And what is bad for peace is bad for Israel, bad for the world and bad for the Palestinian people." A further illustration of your deficiency of character is the way you turned your back on the Muslim-Americans in this country. You refused to send surrogates to speak to voters at their events. Having visited numerous churches and synagogues, you refused to visit a single Mosque in America. Even George W. Bush visited the Grand Mosque in Washington D.C. after 9/11 to express proper sentiments of tolerance before a frightened major religious group of innocents. Although the New York Times published a major article on June 24, 2008 titled "Muslim Voters Detect a Snub from Obama" (by Andrea Elliott), citing examples of your aversion to these Americans who come from all walks of life, who serve in the armed forces and who work to live the American dream. Three days earlier the International Herald Tribune published an article by Roger Cohen titled "Why Obama Should Visit a Mosque." None of these comments and reports change your political bigotry against Muslim-Americans-- even though your father was a Muslim from Kenya. Perhaps nothing illustrated your utter lack of political courage or even the mildest version of this trait than your surrendering to demands of the hard-liners to prohibit former president Jimmy Carter from speaking at the Democratic National Convention. This is a tradition for former presidents and one accorded in prime time to Bill Clinton this year. Here was a President who negotiated peace between Israel and Egypt, but his recent book pressing the dominant Israeli superpower to avoid Apartheid of the Palestinians and make peace was all that it took to sideline him. Instead of an important address to the nation by Jimmy Carter on this critical international problem, he was relegated to a stroll across the stage to "tumultuous applause," following a showing of a film about the Carter Center's post-Katrina work. Shame on you, Barack Obama! But then your shameful behavior has extended to many other areas of American life. (See the factual analysis by my running mate, Matt Gonzalez, on www.votenader.org). You have turned your back on the 100-million poor Americans composed of poor whites, African-Americans, and Latinos. You always mention helping the "middle class" but you omit, repeatedly, mention of the "poor" in America. Should you be elected President, it must be more than an unprecedented upward career move following a brilliantly unprincipled campaign that spoke "change" yet demonstrated actual obeisance to the concentration power of the "corporate supremacists." It must be about shifting the power from the few to the many. It must be a White House presided over by a black man who does not turn his back on the downtrodden here and abroad but challenges the forces of greed, dictatorial control of labor, consumers and taxpayers, and the militarization of foreign policy. It must be a White House that is transforming of American politics-- opening it up to the public funding of elections (through voluntary approaches)-- and allowing smaller candidates to have a chance to be heard on debates and in the fullness of their now restricted civil liberties. Call it a competitive democracy. Your presidential campaign again and again has demonstrated cowardly stands. "Hope" some say springs eternal." But not when "reality" consumes it daily. Sincerely, Ralph Nader

Playing the Dozens: Your momma, your poppa, and your greasy-greasy grannie.

--Yo momma is so fat, when she jumped into the air she got stuck.
--Yo mama's so ugly, when she looks in the mirror, the reflection ducks.
--Yo mama's so ugly, well.. look at you!
--Yo mama's so ugly, she looks like you.
--Yo mama's so ugly, she could only be Yo mama.
--Yo mama's so ugly, they filmed "Gorillas in the Mist" in her shower.
--Yo mama's so ugly, they push her face into dough to make gorilla cookies.
--Yo mama's so stupid, she got stabbed in a shoot-out.
--Yo mama's so stank, that her shit is glad to escape.
--Yo mama smells like hot ass on a cold day. (from pimpdaddy.com)

1982: my eighth-grade year in our blunderful educational system in America. This was when there was a lot of court mandated school busing (due to Brown vs. the Board of Education, 1954), and our school was no exception. In the case of my experience, all of the rich kids from Jefferson School got bused to our crappy little Edison Elementary, away from much better teachers and resources. The reaction of many Jefferson parents--most of whom were doctors, lawyers, business owners, etc.--was incredibly vocal and racist.

When their kids came to our school, they'd boxed-up some of those resources, while shunting the rest of us away from them. This escalated when we all went to the same high school, where you basically had two separate educational-paths that kept most all of us from having a decent learning environment (while the rich kids got an excellent one). I can remember skipping-classes to go home and read something relevant, and it was common for us to be taught the same thing year-after-year! But they couldn't do it with every required class, either at the elementary level, or high school.

That was when the fun began, and we'd pillory the lone punks and the jock-stragglers. Our school had more Black and poor kids (like myself), and Edison could be seen back in the 1970s-1980s as a dumping-ground for lousy teachers, so-called administrators, and "problem students" (meaning "not white," or from poor or "broken-homes"). The best part of all this was that many Black kids got to go to the better Jefferson!

But many of us "problem children" stayed at Edison, both Black and White. The mix of White rich kids, poor White, and poor Black kids was pretty explosive, with most of the Jefferson kids constantly complaining at how they were getting shafted at our shitty school. Well yeah, welcome to our world assholes.

Every morning--it seemed--there was a major fight between Blacks and Whites when everyone was getting off of the buses, and it was repeated when they got back on at 3 PM. Almost all of the fights surrounded the waiting-time at the buses. The racial tension wasn't just palpable, there were parents coming out and yelling racial-epithets at Black students, their children doing likewise, and the Black kids sending it right back at them (and more stinging).

You had Polish-American students (an extremely racist group at this time in Michiana), Hungarian-American (a little better), Irish-American, all the WASPs, and me and my little brother (German-Czech-American). Where did we fit in? Nowhere really, but most of the Black kids knew we were getting shafted too, so we got treated better by them. To this day, I can say Black people have generally treated me and my family better than White America ever has or ever will.

Naturally, President Reagan, the GOP, and even many Democrats in Congress were opponents of both providing adequate funding for predominantly-Black schools, and mandatory busing as a cure for that lack-of-funding. We heard tales of the single-parent Black families (headed by mothers) being the cause of Black poverty, and other such ridiculous arguments. It was all just racism and racist-assumptions about Black Americans.

It was this kind of racist wrongheadedness that created the need for mandatory crosstown busing, and yet what he really wanted to give Black Americans was nothing. He just couldn't get away with it at that time. Reagan was truly a horrible human being, and he wasn't alone in his racism, it was (and is) still deeply-rooted in White mainstream thought. What was so exhilarating about all this busing though is that we got to have first-hand experience fighting those lily-white motherfuckers from Jefferson in every possible way.

There was some real unity between groups of us Black and White kids who fought these scum. The fights were verbal and physical (I'm not one to duke, so I had to use my wits). It was literally a front-line class war that had all the shades of race and class that typify the American experience. Of course, there were sell-out Blacks who were already bourgeois-types before all of this, but the worst ones were the White sell-outs who were basically working-class--the suck-ups, the sycophants, and the social-climbers. All of us Black and White kids would endlessly attack these morons and ass-lickers. The best way was by-insult: Playing the dozens (also known as cutting or snaps).

Compared to the Black kids, I wasn't shit at this, but they were ingenious in their comebacks. You couldn't top them, it was impossible. How could you? They invented the dozens, it comes from West African traditions. It's older than old. The rich kids couldn't cope with it at all, until the lure of sports hypnotized everyone, and George Lucas united a divided nation (snicker). However, the fights continued into High School anyway, and the real divisions never went away. Playing the dozens was frequently the prelude to a fight, but it was also a way to avoid all of that. As brutal and vulgar as playing the dozens is, it's more civil than kicking someone's ass.

And so, J-7 is really a part of this tradition: I'm belittling people with power because there's no choice in the matter. One of the best approaches to taking-down the abusers of power is to confront them and denigrate who and what they are, it works. There is a tradition of this in our own history, and Black Americans are a part of this, they more than compliment it.

From the Ranters' written attacks on the monarchy and the aristocracy, to the Levellers and Diggers and their communalism, from the pamphlets during the run up to the American Revolution, to the Abolitionists, the rise of the unions, to the attacks by cartoonist Thomas Nast on Boss Tweed and Tamanny Hall's corruption, reviling and mocking power works.

NEA (National Education Association) school integration timeline: http://www.nea.org/brownvboard/integrationtimeline.html

Your home for the dozens: www.pimpdaddy.com

The Ranters (brief histories): http://www.exlibris.org/nonconform/engdis/ranters.html
http://www.british-civil-wars.co.uk/glossary/ranters.htm

The Profoundly Racist Moynihan Report (1965): http://www.blackpast.org/?q=primary/moynihan-report-1965