Street Cameras, Crime, Government Incompetence, Civil Liberties, and Big Brother

I read Jarvis DeBerry's column this morning about the New Orleans City Government's incompetence in maintaining and monitoring Street Cameras that were installed with the goal of hopefully cutting down on violent crime in the City.

Suffice it to say that the cameras aren't working and people are getting killed right in front of them.

Even though many have questioned the usefulness of such cameras, the current outrage seems to be directed more at government incompetence in failing to make sure the cameras are working as intended more than it seems to be directed at the whole principle of having Big Brother snooping around neighborhoods.

I think it would be more useful to start framing the issue of non-functional crime cameras once again in terms of Big Brother civil rights violations, rather than perhaps in terms of a potentially good idea bungled by an inept City administration.

David Vitter and Some More GOP Hypocrisy

Louisiana's Republican Senator David Vitter seeks to prevent President-elect Barack Obama from carrying out his executive duties as Commander-in-Chief by trying to prevent Obama from closing down that stain on the honor of the US known as the detention facility at Gitmo. I have to admit that this really burned me up this morning.

On the CBS show "60 Minutes" Sunday, Obama said closing the detention facility, which has generated criticism from human rights groups in the United States and abroad, is "part and parcel of an effort to regain America's moral stature in the world."

But Vitter, who chairs the conservative Senate Border Security and Enforcement First Caucus, said it is not in the best interests of the United States to release detainees "suspected of engaging in terrorist activities."

"This is absolutely a path that we should not tread," Vitter said. "The detainees at Guantanamo are housed there because they represent a terrorist threat to America and, as activist judges continue to usurp our security measures through the judicial processes, we should lay the groundwork now to ensure that these individuals are not allowed to enter the United States."

Activist judges usurping our security measures? WTF! How 'bout pathetic activist legislators who continue to threaten our security by seeking to further ruin our badly damaged (possibly permanently so) human rights reputation throughout the world??? Gimme a friggin' break!

Some questions for Sen. Vitter: Where the hell were you when Bush/Cheney carried out the most brazen executive power grab in American history and made the most dictatorial claims of executive inaccountability to ANY other branch of government in prosecuting the War on Terror? What the hell did you ever do in your role as a "check and balance" against abusive executive authority in preventing the Bush Administration from asserting unchecked powers in wartime as Commander-in-Chief, powers to do whatever he wanted to do with impunity not only with prisoners at Guantanamo but with anyone he simply tagged as an enemy combatant? Including torture, indefinite detention, suspension of habeas corpus, ignoring the Geneva Conventions, etc. It's only now, when the prospect of Obama as President exercising his own rights and powers as Commander-in-Chief over Gitmo prisoner detention policy, that Vitter thinks the Legislature should usurp power that Vitter himself believes CLEARLY belongs to the executive.

Hey, Vitter, you want to play Commander-in-Chief? Then get your balls back from the hookers and run for President yourself. You and your fellow Republican legislators, who fell all over yourselves to defend the Bush administration's detention policies from any kind of legislative scrutiny, have ZERO credibility now. Give your President-elect the damn deference YOU argued is rightfully due the office. You sowed the seeds for this, you friggin' cynical hypocrite. It's your Frankenstein. Learn to love it. Learn to live with it.

Help Classify The Huck Behind The Upchuck

I've been thinking about where I fall out on the issues of the day and then wondering where it locates me on the ideological spectrum. On balance, I know I'm left of center; but there are some things I hold that some might say place me squarely right of center. Of course, I maintain that all of my positions make me a Liberal -- at least in the classical sense of the term. But, I'd like to get you involved in helping me to figure out my ideological classification. Let me try a little experiment. If all you knew of me were the following items, how would you classify me:

Some Demographic Data:
(1) I am 40 years old.
(2) I am a Southerner born and raised in New Orleans.
(3) I am a white male.
(4) I have a mortgage.
(5) I earn a modest, middle-class, mid-range 5 figure salary.

Some Educational Data:
(1) I attended private school literally my entire academic life.
(2) 70% of my education comes through private Catholic institutions, undergraduate college included.
(3) I am a college professor and administrator in an Area Studies Program (Latin American Studies, to be exact)
(4) My disciplinary formation is mostly in Political Science and International Relations.

Some Social Data:
(1) I am a Catholic Christian who pays close heed to the Social Justice Teachings of the Catholic Church.
(2) I am married for 15 years and am father to two young children (ages 10 and 6).
(3) Divorce is not an option for me. And I think divorce is the primary cause of the breakdown of the family.

Some Issues Data:
(1) I enthusiastically supported Barack Obama for President and am just thrilled that he will be our next President.
(2) I am pro-life in the fullest meaning of the term; but I do not support government involvement in deciding a woman's choice to terminate a pregnancy and I certainly do not think that abortion is a criminal behavior and do not consider abortion to be the functional equivalent of pre-meditated murder. I am categorically opposed to the death penalty. I generally tend not to support embryonic stem cell research when adult stem cell research offers similar promises for stem cell research breakthroughs. I oppose killing through warfare. I categorically and unequivocally oppose torture of any kind -- and this includes any kind of "enhanced interrogation techniques."
(3) I support gay marriage and I think of this as a civil right. I think the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy regarding gays in the military is an abomination and should be instantly repealed in favor of allowing gay people the right to serve openly in the military as a gay person. I think the Defense of Marriage Act and the Federal Marriage Amendment movement are inappropriate and unjust efforts to codify discrimination into our law and our constitution. And I oppose both.
(4) I don't like paying too much taxes. I have a sympathetic orientation to the idea of a "flat tax." But, I also understand and find a certain logic to the social justice and utilitarian arguments for progressive taxation.
(5) I generally think that local solutions to commonly-shared problems among local communities is more preferable to federal government solutions; but I think that the federal government does have an obligation to step in where markets don't or won't perform in meeting the basic needs of individuals, and particularly those individuals most marginalized by circumstance and environments over which they exercise very little control.
(6) I think healthcare is a fundamental human right, and that the state should ensure some kind of quality healthcare for all of its citizens, i.e. universal healthcare.
(7) I am pro-"amnesty," if not exactly pro-open borders, when it comes to immigration policy.
(8) I generally think unions are inefficient and corrupt; but I do believe in the rights and the justice of workers organizing and engaging in collective bargaining to secure greater shares of the profits that come from the fruits of their labor.
(9) I think the concept of "tenure" in academia is overrated and mostly unnecessary to protect academic freedom; but I believe 100% in academic freedom and the preservation of it.
(10) I support public charter schools, but oppose school vouchers that will allow public funds to pay for private school tuitions.
(11) I think the government has no business legislating morality and think the government should respect individual privacy.
(12) I absolutely detest government subsidies and bailouts of all kinds, especially the kinds that lead to new stadiums and concessions for professional sports clubs and their owners.
(13) I support free trade as long as it is fair trade, with fair trade being defined as trade which creates jobs that ensure living wages, which protects the environment, which strengthens labor protections and workplace safety, and which diminishes income inequality.
(14) I think Fidel Castro is a dictator and that Cuba is a repressive state. But I think Chavez, while tending towards expressing an inflated sense of self-importance that borders on megalomania, is essentially a legitimate democratic leader and whose government generally respects the basic freedoms of its citizens, including the freedom to criticize and dissent from the government. I feel the same way about Evo Morales in Bolivia.
(15) I think the Iraq war is a fiasco, that it should have never been waged in the first place, and that it ended up being a cynical exercise in privileging and enriching private defense contractors and subcontractors and big oil.
(16) I am a pretty ardent supporter of Israel, but I recognize that the Palestinian people have rightful claims that cannot be dismissed out of hand.
(17) I believe in stricter gun control measures. And I see absolutely no logical reason for certain types of weapons to ever be legal for citizens to purchase. Among those I would include automatic assault weapons. So, I support an automatic assault weapons ban.
(18) I think affirmative action policies were absolutely just and necessary when they were initiated, but I do think they are becoming increasingly irrelevant and unnecessary.
(19) I don't expect to ever benefit from Social Security; but I do not think that the system should be privatized. I support this and other social safety net programs administered by the government as a matter of justice.
(20) I support free markets, but I do not embrace the notion that markets always and everywhere produce optimal outcomes that benefit all. I believe that the government has not only the right, but even the obligation, as a matter of social justice, to maintain social safety net entitlement programs for those who are disadvantaged and penalized, through no fault of their own, by the free market model.

Well, that's enough to go off of for now. Use this and chime in your thoughts about where you would locate me on the ideological spectrum in the comments section.

Update on JHS Posting

Last Sunday, I put up a posting about a "mock funeral" supposedly being planned or promoted by Jesuit High School students.

My post came on the heels of what was a very emotional national election after a long, contentious, and sometimes vicious and uncivil political campaign. Because of this, and being caught up in this emotionally tumultuous moment, I perhaps was a bit precipitous in putting up this posting. Upon reflection, I regret having done so -- not because I think an event of the sort doesn't merit some exposure or that JHS and its students merit special exemption from public criticism, but really because I should have taken more time to investigate and find out more details about the incident. I heard something about a "mock funeral" in a passing conversation and, in the passion of the moment, just launched a posting off of that.

Since that time, I have learned more details about the incident and it is not what I made it out to seem. Apparently, it was just one of those passing, silly inside jokes that high school students do. There were no serious plans being laid and nothing sinister at all intended. And, frankly, I remember being a high school student and can well imagine all the foolish pranksterism that I more than likely engaged in, too.

In the end, I let my emotions get in front of my better judgment. No good journalist (and I've never claimed to be one!) would have ever put up a posting like I did without looking into the matter further. In fact, I am as guilty of sophomoric behavior in this regard as I chide the students of being; and I've got plenty more years on them and should know much better, too.

As an alum of JHS, I am proud of the school and value all the good that it offers its students. I should have done better by it. And Jesuit students are still, by and large, consummately honorable, good, and responsible young men. I should have done better by them.

Catholicism at the Tipping Point

As most people have probably heard by now, some 54% of Catholics voted for Obama. And many of us have very solid "pro-life" reasons for doing so. But the Catholic hierarchy and the reactionaries among them envision being "pro-life" in a narrow and singular fashion: "anti-abortion." Do they not realize that more innocent, already-born children die of malnutrition and preventable diseases that come with poverty? Do they not know that more innocent already-born children die of the secondary consequences of warfare? Where is the consistency and urgency in protecting these lives? Where is the outrage and the threats of eternal condemnation for those Catholics who vote for candidates who perpetuate unjust warfare, who support capital punishment, who embrace torture?

Sheesh! I've just about had enough of these self-righteous moralizers who circle the wagons around pedophile priests and who turn a blind eye towards the Church's social justice teachings.

Crap like this and this is enough to make me want to simply leave the Church. Feh!

The Wardrobe to Nowhere

It is just incredible that Sarah Palin feigns wonder at why her $150,000 plus wardrobe became such a hot-button item late in the Presidential campaign:

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin says she was puzzled by the amount of attention her wardrobe got at the end of her unsuccessful vice presidential run.

In an interview that aired on Fox News Channel on Monday, Palin said she neither wanted nor asked for the $150,000-plus wardrobe the Republican Party bankrolled.

"I did not order the clothes. Did not ask for the clothes," Palin said. "I would have been happy to have worn my own clothes from Day One. But that is kind of an odd issue, an odd campaign issue as things were wrapping up there as to who ordered what and who demanded what."

Seems we've heard this line of argument before. The last time the issue of profligate spending connected to someone or something from Alaska surfaced, it had to do with some outrageous "bridge to nowhere." And just like then, Sarah Palin, Maverick reformer that she is, said "NO" to that bridge to nowhere. Except that she didn't. And even after public outcry over that infamous earmark forced her to back off the project and claim she never really wanted it in the first place and that it wasn't her doing, she still kept the money.

Just like that wardrobe. She says she didn't order the clothes and she didn't ask for the clothes. Maybe that's true. But she sure as heck didn't say "NO" to them! She sure as heck didn't worry about the expense of them! And she sure didn't voice any concerns about it until it was brought out into the light of day -- until that particular "earmark" came out of the shadows. She goes around saying that the most she ever asked for now and then was a Diet Dr. Pepper. But she gobbled up every perq, benefit, and piece of campaign pork that was thrown at her without so much as a blink. Of course, we all know that Sarah Palin is not one to blink at things and likes to "plow through" open doors -- even if it comes across as a gross excess of feeding at the trough of others. If this woman is the future of the GOP, God help the GOP.

Jan. 20 Funeral for America???

[UPDATE: Sunday, November 16, 2008: 8:35AM: Please see my more recent updated posting on the subject.]

A symbolic funeral for America on Jan. 20, the day when Barack Obama becomes officially the 44th President of the United States? Sounds like something Sean Hannity or Rush Limbaugh might conjure up, doesn't it? But, wait ...

I heard that such mock funeral plans are being laid locally by some very unlikely folks: students at Jesuit High School.

WTF?!?!?!

Now, I am an alum of JHS and I have to say I was shocked to hear this. The JHS of today, at least from what I can tell, is a radically different place as far as politics and ideology than when I was there. In a recent version of the school newspaper, The Blue Jay [which is regrettabley unavailable online], the senior class was polled on their preferences in the Presidential election, and more than 70% of those polled chose McCain/Palin over Obama/Biden.

Listen, I'm all for free speech and for students making whatever kinds of protest plans that they want; but planning a mock funeral for America when Obama is inaugurated? That's just too much. If this ever comes to pass, I promise that I'll personally stage my own little protest at the High School and hold up my own little protest sign on the corner of Carrollton and Banks. And I hope the local press sees fit to cover what would be an embarrassing display of anti-Patriotic "free speech" at the school.

Because I was disturbed by this news, I have thought a good bit about this over the past 24 hours. And my ponderings have left me to conclude two things about this: (1) These students must be shaped by a home environment that is extremely hostile to Obama and which sees politics through the lenses of ideological polarization, which leads to (2): the divisiveness of our politics over the past 16 years that I think has poisoned the well of a unified country.

All the more reason to be grateful that Obama is in the White House. God knows that our country needs desperately to escape the Dick Morris/Karl Rove, Clinton/Bush poles of poisonous politics. And I hope some folks with authority at JHS can talk some sense into the sophomoric behavior of these foolish kids.

Precinct Performance Updates

On election day, this past Tuesday, I gave some data on two Louisiana voting precints: Ward 14 / Precinct 13A, which represented the Tulane University campus resident student crowd; and Ward 14 / Precinct 25, which was my voting precinct. I thought it might be of interest to show you how these precincts turned out.

Ward 14 / Precinct 13A
Registered Voters: 2,889
Total Votes Cast: 1,238
% Turnout: 42.85%
Votes for Obama/Biden (% of votes cast): 931 (75.20%)
Votes for McCain/Palin (% of votes cast): 279 (22.54%)
Votes for others (% of votes cast): 28 (2.26%)

Ward 14 / Precinct 25
Registered Voters: 545
Total Votes Cast: 279
% Turnout: 51.19%
Votes for Obama/Biden (% of votes cast): 217 (77.78%)
Votes for McCain/Palin (% of votes cast): 60 (21.51%)
Votes for others (% of votes cast): 2 (.71%)

How do these precincts compare to Orleans Parish and Louisana State averages? Here's the comparative data:

Orleans Parish
Registered Voters: 278,759**
Total Votes Cast: 146,287
% Turnout: 52.48%
Votes for Obama/Biden (% of votes cast): 116,042 (79.32%)
Votes for McCain/Palin (% of votes cast): 28,041 (19.17%)
Votes of others (% of votes cast): 2,204 (1.51%)

State of Louisiana
Registered Voters: 2,908,342**
Total Votes Cast: 1,959,085
% Turnout: 67.36%
Votes for Obama/Biden (% of votes cast): 781,574 (39.89%)
Votes for McCain/Palin (% of votes cast): 1,148,015 (58.60%)
Votes for others (% of votes cast): 29,496 (1.51%)

**These numbers come from voter registration data in the Louisiana Secretary of State's Office as of 10/17/08. This means that the actual number of registered voters as of election day (11/4/08) was likely somewhat higher, which would make the turnout percentages statewide and in Orleans parish a bit lower; and this would be consistent with the statewide reported turnout rate of about 66%.

Thought of the Day

The difference between conservatives and liberals following an electoral defeat can be summed up accordingly: Liberals brood and make empty threats to leave the country; Conservatives brood and stock up on guns and munitions.

What To Do About LA Congressional District 2

A while back on my blog, when I posted my election recommendations, I hinted at a surprise, party-discipline-breaking pick by The Huck Upchuck for Congressional District 2 -- even if Helena Moreno might have won.

I thought I was going to be pushing the envelope among the progressive NOLA Blogosphere in revealing my choice, but Oyster beat me to the punch! Dang! The early bird catches the worm!

Oyster came out and endorsed GOP candidate Anh "Joseph" Cao. He pointed to Cao's impressive biography as part of the reason to like him. And that's true. I agree with Oyster on this point. But, even still, that's not reason enough for me. I generally take these campaign website biographies with a grain of salt because they always put the best face forward, embellished for effect, on these things. And so, while I was impressed, I was also not fully convinced. Until I had the chance to test Cao directly. Let me elaborate ...

Recently, I was part of organizing a Candidate forum for Congressional District 2. This forum took place on Tuesday, October 28. The focus was on issues of importance to the Latino community. I moderated this forum on behalf of the collaborating organizations who put the event together: Tulane University's Stone Center for Latin American Studies, Puentes New Orleans, and the Louisiana Association of Nonprofit Organizations. Four of the six candidates showed up: Helena Moreno, one of the two remaining Democrats in the race; Anh "Joseph" Cao, the Republican candidate; Jerry Jacobs, an independent; and Gregory Kahn, the Libertarian candidate. William Jefferson, the current incumbent Democratic candidate, did not participate. He simply ignored our repeated invitations. And Malik Rahim, the Green Party candidate, was fighting off an illness.

There's a lot to say about this event; but I won't say too much. The only point I want to make here is that Joseph Cao did exceedingly well as far as I was concerned. The questions posed to the candidates at the forum dealt with immigration reform, language access, health care, housing, and education. As an immigrant himself for whom English was, and is, a second language, Joseph Cao's answers to just about all of the questions posed were extremely progressive -- I thought even more progressive than Helena Moreno's answers. Cao supports comprehensive immigration reform and he does not think a security first policy is appropriate as a rational and feasible and even humane approach to the issue; he supports the DREAM act that would allow undocumented children of immigrants the rights to temporary (and perhaps permanent) legal status; he supports legislative initiatives that would provide access to information and documents in the native languages of non-english speaking peoples; as a lawyer himself, he has an impressive knowledge of federal immigration and citizenship laws; he supports bi-lingual education and was personally instrumental in establishing a language immersion public charter school in New Orleans east in the Vietnamese and Spanish languages; and he projected a commitment to the principles of social justice in ways that one would simply not expect of a Republican. Of course, Cao holds positions that I disagree with, but he was certainly not dogmatic and ideologically rigid in his demeanor and in his stances. He, frankly, struck me as sincere, honest, and very open to many different viewpoints. At a very fundamental level of character and temperament, he came across to me as the conservative version of Barack Obama.

Because I look very closely at candidate positions that affect the Latino and other immigrant communities, Cao's positions impressed me. And his partisan identification just doesn't worry me. I think he will be a fair and good representative of the diversity of New Orleans, I think he will be honest and responsible with the public trust, and I just don't think he will let the lure of the power of politics change what I think is his fundamental humility as a public servant.

So, hold your hats, folks, given the choices we have before us this election cycle, The Huck Upchuck is breaking with party discipline and is not only endorsing the Republican Party candidate,

Anh "Joseph" Cao,

for Congress, but is doing so unreservedly and enthusiastically.

[UPDATE: Apparently something is wrong with Cao's website. Hopefully that will be fixed soon. But the "url" in the links above was correct.]

[UPDATE 2: I just spoke with Mr. Cao and he informed me that he has a new website - http://josephcaoforcongress.com/. I've updated the links above accordingly.]

[UPDATE 3: It goes without saying that my endorsement is strictly my own personal endorsement. It does not reflect the preferences of any other individual associated with the October 28 Candidate Forum, nor does it reflect any official endorsement by any of the organizations that co-sponsored the Candidate Forum.]

The Warrantless Blogtapping Program

BLOG UNDER SURVEILLANCE: Right Wing News
Issue: John Hawkins' Schizophrenia on Race

I appreciate conservative blogger John Hawkins' gracious congratulatory posting regarding Barack Obama's victory. It must have been a bit painful for him to write, so I give him credit for doing so. However ...

I can't simply let slide what I still see as a conservative myopia and schizophrenia, if not hypocrisy, regarding the subject of race in America. Here's the relevant part of what Hawkins wrote in his posting linked above:

Although I would have certainly preferred to have John McCain in the White House, it will at least be nice to finally see a black American become President. Conservatives have been saying America isn't a racist nation for a long time. This proves we're right. Conservatives have been saying that we don't need Affirmative Action in this country. This proves we're right.

And yet, in his very next posting, Hawkins had this to say about race:

In other words, despite the staggering advantages the Democrats had in this election, including a candidate who undoubtedly drew in millions of black voters who wanted to pull the lever for the first black President and millions of other voters gripped by white guilt, it only led to a shift of about 4% of the American public from the Republicans to the Democrats.

I've written about this before. And it just keeps surfacing. Doesn't Hawkins see the contradictions in his positions? On the one hand, he keeps propagating this notion that America is not a racist nation, while on the other hand explaining Barack Obama's success and victory to racist behavior. Does Hawkins not see that he takes pride in finally being able to "see a black American become President" without noting the irony that it wasn't his vote that helped make this happen? What should one make of that? Doesn't Hawkins recognize that, if it's Barack Obama's election to the White House which is the evidence that we are not a racist country, it stands to reason that the folks who actually voted for him and put him there are the ones that represent the actual proof of this claim? Doesn't he see the irony that when he claims Barack Obama's election as "proof" that conservatives were right that America is not racist, he is essentially saying that this proof is not being provided by conservative who voted against Obama, but rather by those who actually voted in a way that made this happen?

I can't tell you how many times I've left comments at Hawkins' blog defending and supporting Obama without once mentioning (or even thinking about, for that matter) the color of Obama's skin, only to have been accused of being racist simply for supporting Obama. For some conservatives, it is inconceivable that a white person would vote for Obama for any reason other than his skin color. They are fond of calling this "white guilt," and then they have the gall to say that I'm the one stuck on the slavery and Jim Crow past of America because I support the "black" guy! Whatever. Suffice it to say that my experiences on Right Wing News comment boards illustrates this conservative schizophrenia regarding race in America perfectly. ...

You know, I had a kind of epiphany last night when looking at the crowds and the environments surrounding both McCain and Obama's speeches at the end of the evening. Unlike what Sarah Palin claimed on the campaign trail, the "real" America, in all of our wonderful diversity, was on display in Chicago. And just a small, narrow, and fundamentally non-diverse slice of America was on display in Arizona. It was the same at the Conventions. For good or bad, that's just the way it is. But for Republicans, if they don't find a way to harness the growing diversity of America and make some kind of intellectual argument framing this diversity in the context of a principled conservatism, more and more states are likely to be turning blue in future years. Virginia, North Carolina, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada -- they're not flukes, but rather a sign of a growing diversity in the context of our national unity. And John Hawkins, for all his sincere effort really to embrace and be part of this diversity in his recognition of the importance of an Obama victory in this regard, is still caught up in the contradictions of a context where race is a recognized, important, and significant aspect of identity, but where this difference is celebrated and not seen as a matter of divisiveness. Hawkins just can't seem to get beyond his "black and white" understanding of race in America. By this I mean that Hawkins can't envision an America that sees and embraces race (and other identity markers, for that matter) as meaningful, but which also doesn't necessarily see discrimination in this. For Hawkins, being "color-blind" means denying race at all levels of social meaning. And yet he himself simply cannot take his own advice and get beyond seeing the meaning in race. So, he's left holding to that schizophrenic practice of being a rhetorically "color-blind" conservative who is never actually "blind" to color and who, instead, always sees something insidious in ascribing meaning to race all the while he does precisely that.

Right Wing News = Wrong Wing Nut

Way, way back in June of 2006 I posed a question to conservative blogger John Hawkins of Right Wing News, which he answered on his blog. Here's the post which contains my question and Hawkins' answer:

Q&A Friday #43: Will Obama Be The First African American President?

Question: "And do you think Obama will be this country's first African American president?" -- huckupchuck

Answer: I'm of the opinion that the first black President is likely to be a conservative Republican who pulls in a big chunk of the black vote without turning off the rest of the country by being in favor of Affirmative Action, reparations, racial set-asides, and all the other noxious black policies Democratic pols seem to feel obligated to support.

I wonder how Hawkins is feeling today about being so wrong back then.

And As It Ends, So It Begins

President-elect Barack Obama.

Powerful, profound moment.

I am so grateful to be alive and to have had the chance to participate in this moment.

I am also so full of emotion right now that I can hardly think.

When the dust settles, we all of us end up in our own little corners of our world, our homes, feeling a bit small and insignificant in the end, carving out a silent space to absorb the full impact and meaning of it all.

It is almost too much to bear.

God bless this great country of ours.

Louisiana Ward 14 / Precinct 25 Stats

This is my Ward/Precinct. Some data:

Total Registered Voters as of 11/2/08: 545

Breakdown by race:
White: 231
Black: 279
Other: 35

Breakdown by Party:
Democrat: 340
Republican: 89
Other/Independent: 116

Number of Registered voters who had already voted by the time I got there at 8:15am: 89

Percent of Registered voters who had already cast a ballot as of 8:15am: 16.33%

This doesn't include the number of early voters.

What this means for the election:

McCain = Toast; Obama = President

Louisiana For Obama! Yes, We Can!

Louisiana Ward 14, Precinct 13 A - 2:15PM Update

This Ward and Precinct is the one located in the University Center on Tulane's campus. Here's the Ward/Precinct Marker:


















Some data on this Ward/Precinct from the Louisiana Secretary of State's Office:

Total Registered Voters as of 11/2/08: 2,889
Total Democrats Registered as of 11/2/08: 1,272
Total Republicans Registered as of 11/2/08: 470
Total "Other/Independents" Registered as of 11/2/08: 1,147

What the lines looked like at 2:15PM, some 4 hours after my first photo:


















What this means for the election:

McCain = Toast; Obama = President

Tulane Students Rise To the Occasion

As a native New Orleanean and a professor at Tulane University who teaches on civic engagement and politics, as well as Latin American Studies, I've been observing Tulane student attitudes towards civic life for the past 7 years. So I think I have a pretty good read on where students are with regard to voting attitudes and behavior. In general, Tulane students, who are generally affluent, have been mostly apathetic (except for my students, of course!); but this year is markedly different. Example: I am also a DJ for the University Radio station (WTUL 91.5 FM) and I do a classical music show from 6:00am-8:00am on Tuesday mornings. When I showed up on campus for my radio show this morning at about 5:30am, I noticed a line of students already forming outside of the University Center, which is the campus student union, where three voting machines were set up and ready to open at 6am. By the time I left my radio show at a little after 8:00am to head to my office for work, the line was still long. I went home to vote [see previous posting] and returned to my office at the University shortly thereafter. At 9:30am, I had a scheduled meeting with a student who told me that he had just come from voting and had to wait in line for about an hour. I was just incredulous. So, I went over the University Center again right after our meeting was over (about 10:00am), this time with my camera in hand, and found the line still stretching down McAlister Drive. (Photo below) It was about 50 people deep, nearly all students, and all in great spirits. I'm attaching a photo of this line. Inside the building, there was another line of about 20 voters, one of whom included one of my students from my 11:00am class! If I had to guess, about 95% Obama supporters. I would have asked the precinct volunteers what was the current tally on the total number of voters since the polls opened at 6:00am, but they looked much too harried to be bothered, so I left well-enough alone. I'm telling you, something unprecedented is happening. I can't wait for the Louisiana shocker that sends the Pelican State's 9 electoral votes to Barack Obama!

The Hucks Send Obama to the White House

The Hucks went together down to the voting station in our neighborhood's local public elementary school right after I got home from my radio show at about 8:15am or so. There are about 7 or 8 precincts set up in the school's cafeteria. The lines were larger than I had ever seen before, except for my precinct, which is among the smaller in the city. My wife and I were able to vote right away. And we each took one of our daughters in the voting booths with us. We proudly cast our votes for Obama. And then I asked someone to take our family picture in front of our voting booth after the deed was done. (See below) Cheesy, I know. But I just had to mark this moment with my family in some way. I know that memories for youngsters fade over time, and I want my daughters to know that they were there and were active participants when history was made.

VOTE

OBAMA



YES, WE CAN!

Anatomy of Rightwing Schizophrenia

John McCain's campaign has been accused of being erratic, disorganized, and dysfunctional. And it has been. It is probably one of the worst campaigns the GOP has run for the Presidency in about 35 years. Indicative of the campaign is the attitude of the Rightwing base. They have also been all over the place, disorganized, and dysfunctional. They have swung like John Kerry's 2004 flip-flops from moments of disgust with McCain, to moments of embracing McCain, to moments of resigned fatalism. Let me show you an example of what I think has been typical of the schizophrenic Rightwing base.

John Hawkins is a conservative blogger who has a pretty popular site called Right Wing News. I have been following this blog for many years now and I can say with a fair degree of confidence that I understand John Hawkins fairly well. Hawkins is also a regular columnist for Townhall.com. Over this past election cycle, Hawkins has been as erratic about McCain as McCain has been as a candidate.

On February 1, 2008, when it looked like McCain might just sneak out the GOP nomination, Hawkins wrote a Townhall column entitled: "Why You're Going To Vote For John McCain In November And Like It!" Granted, Hawkins was being a bit facetious with this title and really showed very little love for McCain in this piece, but his point was that Republicans should hold their nose and vote for McCain as the least bad of the options. He reiterated this position in a follow-up posting on his blog later that same day. And so Hawkins called Republicans to be good party militants, even in spite of all of McCain's recognized minuses as a potential candidate.

Then, not some four months later, on May 23, Hawkins wrote a post on his blog called: Why I Will No Longer Support John McCain For President. In this posting, Hawkins wrote:

Put very simply: John McCain is a liar. He's a man without honor, without integrity, who could not have captured the Republican nomination had he run on making comprehensive immigration a top priority of his administration. Quite frankly, this is little different from George Bush, Sr. breaking his "Read my lips, no new taxes pledge," except that Bush's father was at least smart enough to wait until he got elected before letting all of his supporters know that he was lying to them.

Under these circumstances, I simply cannot continue to support a man like John McCain for the presidency. Since that is the case, I have already written the campaign and asked them to take me off of their mailing list and to no longer send me invitations to their teleconferences. I see no point in asking questions to a man who has no compunction about lying through his teeth on one of the most crucial election issues and then changing his position the first time he believes he can get away with it.

Moreover, I genuinely regret having to do this because I do still believe the country would be better off with John McCain as President as opposed to Obama or Clinton. However, I just cannot in good conscience cast a vote for a man who has told this big of a lie, for this long, about this important of an issue.

That being said, although I cannot back John McCain, encourage others to vote for him, or contribute any more money to his campaign, I'm not going to tell you that you should do that same thing. What McCain has done here is a bridge too far for me, but others may not have as big a problem with being told this sort of lie. That's their decision.

Furthermore, I will defend John McCain when I think he deserves to be defended, excoriate Barack Obama and/or Hillary Clinton at every opportunity, and I will continue to stand behind the sort of Republican candidates who actually deserve conservative support. But, what I will not do is vote for John McCain in November.

In a follow-up posting later that same day Hawkins explained himself further:

But personally, I think that there has got to be some kind of line in the sand that these politicians cannot be allowed to cross. In McCain's case, he lied about the single most important issue in determining many people's votes, is the Republican Party's nominee only because he told that lie, and now he has publicly shifted positions in a way that reveals he was lying the whole time -- and he did so before the election. Here's a man who has so little respect for conservatives that he doesn't even feel compelled to wait until he's elected to reveal that he wasn't telling them the truth about an issue they care desperately about.

If we're willing to put up with that, is there any line that he can't cross and get away with it? If McCain shifts on a dime tomorrow and says that he's only going to appoint pro-Roe Supreme Court justices, are conservatives just going to say, "Well, I'm not happy but he's still better than Obama." If he decides that the war is too much of a liability for him in the polls and he's just going to pull out like Obama and watch the country collapse into genocide, would that be Ok, too? If those things were to happen, I'd hope the answer would be, "No, that isn't OK with us."

It would be one thing if McCain ran on these issues and won the nomination anyway. At least then, you could say, "I'm not happy, but we have nobody to blame but ourselves because we knew exactly what we were getting." But, when the man doesn't even have enough respect for conservatives to follow through for a few months on one of the key promises he made to get the nomination, what message does it send to other Republicans? How far are they going to go if McCain doesn't pay a price for egregiously lying on an issue that is this important?

That's why, despite the fact that I think having McCain in the White House would be preferable to having Obama or Clinton in there, I cannot support his candidacy. Sometimes, the price you have to pay to keep your side in power is just a little too high.

Yet almost four months later, Hawkins reverted back to his original position. In a September 8, 2008, post entitled: "Why I Am Now Supporting John McCain," Hawkins wrote:

As RWN's regular readers already know, I have been a harsh critic of John McCain for a long time and back in May, I wrote a post called, "Why I Will No Longer Support John McCain For President." That post was widely linked and was probably why I was blackballed from the Republican National Convention.

However, I've been wavering on my "non-vote" in the 2008 election for a while. That's not because I've warmed up to McCain; it's because of my concerns about Barack Obama.

...

Despite the fact that I have a lot of differences with John McCain, I am going vote for him and I would encourage you to do the same. Whatever else you may say about the man, he is capable of handling the presidency and his election will teach the Left more about common decency than any mere words ever could.

And now, when he's not trashing George Will for writing a much milder critism of McCain than Hawkins had done months before, Hawkins is going around telling others why they should vote for McCain, too.

[ASIDE: How's this for some rich irony? Hawkins writes in this nasty little rant against George Will:

I'm sick and tired of these prissy jackasses and Beltway bubbleheads who put a higher priority on getting on the Colbert Report or MSNBC than winning the election.

How did we end up with all these primadonnas and divas in the Republican Party who are looking to get a few extra minutes in the spotlight at the expense of the country and everyone else in the conservative movement?

You're not happy with McCain, Bush, and the Republican Party? Well, join the party, pal. Do you think the last few years have been fun for the rest of us? If you can't act like a professional and suck it up until the election, then you're either in the wrong profession or the wrong party.

Either way, I'm not going to tell you to shut up, but I will tell you publicly that you can kiss my *ss.

Ahem! I wonder if, upon reflection, Hawkins thinks ruefully of himself as a "prissy jackass" for issuing a declaration of his intention not to vote for McCain back in May?]

Anyway, with regard to directing others to vote for McCain, Hawkins suggested in a Townhall column published on October 31, 2008, some Thirty Reasons To Vote For John McCain and even shared his own voting experience with his readers on the same day in a posting entitled: "I Voted Today..." At the end of this post, Hawkins wrote:

PS: Yes, I voted for Palin and McCain and I hope you do, too.

It's no wonder the McCain campaign is schizophrenic, bitter, and dysfunctional. Just look at the state of base conservatives these days as reflected in the anger, dysfunction, and contradictions of John Hawkins and you'll understand why.

Conundrum for Christianists: Jesus on Halloween

This story, about a middle-school boy sent home from school for dressing up as Jesus for Halloween, was priceless. Why priceless? Because of the conundrum it poses for Christianists.

Unless you've been hiding under a rock, you're probably aware that Christianists have been gnashing their teeth, rending their garments, and lamenting to high heaven the intolerance of school officials towards personal displays of Christianity at public schools. From wearing a cross necklace to invoking the Christian God in commencement addresses, Christians have complained about the persecution of Christian students at public schools by efforts on the part of school administrators to protect the separation of church and state. So, here we have a young boy dressing up as Christ and heading off to school. And what happens? He gets sent home because his outfit was deemed "offensive." But here's the question: Offensive in what way? Was it offensive to church-state separation advocates because it brought Christian symbolism into the school? Or was it offensive to Christians because it was a Halloween costume and mixed Jesus in with all the other ghouls, witches, clowns, and pirates?

I tend to agree with Oyster, to whom I owe a hat tip for pointing me to the story, that this kid should be able to dress in whatever costume he wants to as long as he's not violating public nudity laws (i.e. tarzan costumes and/or speedo swimsuits) or advocating messages of violence or hate (i.e. KKK hoods or NAZI swastika uniforms). In this case, he was well clad and wasn't advocating any hateful messages. So, I say, especially on a day when costumes are encouraged, that he should have been left alone. But I'm very curious to hear whether Christianists who think that dressing up as Jesus on Halloween is blasphemous and offensive would agree. Let's see how many of these god-fearing, righteous folks, who complain about unfairly persecuting Christians for displaying symbols of Christianity in public schools, come to this boy's defense. One would hope so, if these folks really do believe in protecting religious speech in public schools; but I'm not holding my breath.