I'll start this article by first barfing into my shoe (guess I don't have the stomach for politics ... even blogging apparently)
Even President Obama got hot under the collar with this recent backasswards Senate vote (his first rejection since the "Nuclear Option") even issuing a strongly worded statement about how wrong they got it.
Here is a story with many angles on it. A major part revolves around a many decades old but still hotly debated topic, the Mumia Abu-Jamal trial. There is certainly much that can be debated about his trial and how it intersects with the nomination of the extremely qualified candidate, Debo Adegbile, to lead the Civil Rights Division at the Department of Justice. Apparently that is exactly what the Fraternal Order of Police hoped for when, through race baiting, they made it the central issue of his confirmation vote.
While I am disgusted by the outcome of the Senate vote I certainly welcome a renewed debate about the Jamal trial: the suppression, concealing and tampering of evidence, the fourth person on the scene, the racially charged nature of the trial, the inconclusive ballistics tests, and of course the elephant in the room ... is he even guilty?
Yes there is much that can be written about this issue. Today's show of Democracy Now! touches on some of the many sides of this story.
However in perhaps simpler but no less effective terms Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) makes several powerful points and brings us back to the issue at hand (full video linked in Atlantic article):
If you are a young white person and you go to work for a law firm ... and that law firm assigns you to a pro bono case that defends someone who kills 8 people in cold blood ... my advice is you should do that ... because if you do that, who knows, you might wind up to be the Chief Justice of The Supreme Court. However if you are a young black person and you go to work for the NAACP legal defense fund and they assign you ... to appeal a case of someone who committed a heinous murder ... they ask you to sign onto an appeal ... the message said today is don't do it because if you do it, in keeping with your legal obligations, then you will be denied by the US senate ... we have a terrible double standard ... shame on this senate .... Shame on the Fraternal Order of Police.
-- Excerpts from Senator Harkin's speech on the Senate Floor
[edited for brevity by the author]
In my opinion the meat of this powerful speech (and I liberally paraphrase all but the last point):
1) We live in an unjust and racist society with double standards that play out regularly in all aspects of life including VERY prominently in politics
2) Republicans are duplicitous a**holes
3) 7 Democrats are even worse
4) Shame on the Fraternal Order of Police
who did this? Well in addition to every single f*cking Republican we get these gems of the "Democratic" party:
Sens. Bob Casey (D-PA),
Chris Coons (D-DE),
Joe Donnelly (D-IN),
Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND),
Joe Manchin (D-WV),
Mark Pryor (D-AR) and
John Walsh (D-MT).
[note: Reid voted no on a procedural vote to allow for the possibility of bringing the vote back to the Senate floor in the future]
It makes me more then a little sick to think how hard Democratic supporters in these states (and many other states) worked as well as the work of activists and bloggers on Dkos to get these people elected. This is a major slap in the face and shows the complete lack of spine.
Lets make these so called dems pay and show that good decent people in this country have more power then the thugs in the fraternal order of police.