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Kerry lied, racist style

I wonder what the reaction would have been if Trent Lott made the same comment.
 
Originally posted by CBL4
You posted a link to an interesting article. According to it black women aged 18-24 are 83 times as likely to be in college than jail. Black men are 2 1/2 times as likely.

Clearly this high rate of incarceration is not due to being black. Nor is it do to being male. It is only the combination of being black and male. The questions are "Why?" and "What can be done about it?"
Click to expand...

High rate of incarceration for black males.

Why?

Conviction for commiting a crime punishable by serving time in jail or prison.

What can be done about it? About it, not much. To prevent it or reduce the incarceration rate for black males in the future?

Hope that black males commit less crimes punishable by a prison term.

What is the purpose/motive/benefit/reason for stating these kinds of statistics? Who is promoting "political correctness" beyond comprehension, and creating a social environment where it is taboo to use simple words because they might 'exclude' or offend someone because of their race or sexual preference? Who is promoting and teaching our students about DIVERSITY, and that all people from all cultures are equal and should not be discriminated against based on their appearance, race or gender?

I know who! The same people who, after spouting diversity and acceptance, are the ones who then can't resist the act of publicly stating the whopping differences in some statistical area between two or more groups differentiated only by...you guessed it... their race, gender or minority status.

The issue is and should not be about how to lower the incarceration rate of black males. It is about how to lower the incarceration rate, period. After all, there are no differences between races and cultures, right? Then please stop trying to convince the world of this fact by showing us all the striking differences, categorizing by race, culture and gender.
 
michaellee wrote:

"The issue is and should not be about how to lower the incarceration rate of black males. It is about how to lower the incarceration rate, period. After all, there are no differences between races and cultures, right? Then please stop trying to convince the world of this fact by showing us all the striking differences, categorizing by race, culture and gender."

Lowering the incarceration rate is certainly AN issue, but why should it be THE issue? Perhaps fixing whatever is making the prison figures so unbalanced would lower rates overall.

Would we advise medical researchers to ignore the fact that a certain disease is showing up in little blonde haired blue eyed children at an grossly disproportionate rate?
Then why tell people to stop showing the world that 13% (much less if we zoom in to focus on younger males) of the US population is showing up in prison at an alarmingly disproportionate rate? That isn't the only issue either, but it could be an important part of the overall picture.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

corplinx wrote:
"I think occam's razor solves this dilemma. In general, police don't go around arresting innocent people and then making up crimes they did.

While you have to be a psyhic to find that special case, you can rest assured that your atypical prisoner is guilty.

You live near memphis, be grateful you live near a city where the majority of perpetrators are not caught and of the ones who are, only a fraction ever serve jail time. "

I'm not big on conspiracy theories in CJ either, but as mentioned above, there is something way out of balance with the end result.
I live dead center in Memphis, and have patrolled far worse areas (waterfront in a major East coast city), so I'm not discounting crime, but I also view the impartiality of the system with the same skeptical/jaundiced eye that has endeared me to so many of the partisan posters (of all stripes) here at JREF.
;)
 
The beef is probably more with the court system. Mandatory sentencing, 3 strikes, heavy handed drugs laws. When there are stiffer sentences for crack and lesser sentences coke (which is more expensive and more of a rich persons drug) it rasies an eyebrow towards the fairness of the justice system.

Lets not forget the ability to afford counsel is also a big factor.

Marthas Stewart gets sentenced today. Will she see any jailtime??? Somewhere else in an american courtroom some doofus who got caught dealing X one too many times is probably getting a 3strikes life sentence.
 
corplinx said:


I think occam's razor solves this dilemma. In general, police don't go around arresting innocent people and then making up crimes they did.
Click to expand...

Actually, in my experience the explaination for the big statistical difference (I think the racial issue is a red herring and the real issue is class - the trailer parks aren't exactly ahead of the 'hood in this regard) is not so much that innocent poor people wind up in jail, rather that the guilty rich people do not.

You are right that in general police do not make up crimes. Ther are however, especially in rural areas, going to look a lot closer for actual crime in poorer areas.

Then at the next step they are more likely to charge those that are less likely to be connected (somebody's son and so forth).

Then, the poor people on average get worse lawyers (with some exceptions, like me ;) )

Even if convicted, the rich are more likely to get probation. Many observers are predicting that if Kobe is convicted he will get probation. You think some poor bastard would get that break when convicted of a violent sex crime?

This of course is also helped along by the fact that poor people commit more crimes, but there is also an aspect that the law is somewhat inherently biased against the poor in that the law is to protect property (something the poor do not have).
 
Money and status are huge factors.

A 22yr old well off white college student gets busted with some cocaine. His family swoops into court with some big shot lawyer.

A 22 yr old black factory worker gets caught with the same amount of coke. He gets into court and is given an overworked public defender.

Who thinks their cases will end up the same??? My guess would be that college kid basically walks cause we dont want to ruin his bright future by marking his record with a drug offense.

Factory guy, probably wont be so lucky.
 
Tmy said:
Money and status are huge factors.

A 22yr old well off white college student gets busted with some cocaine. His family swoops into court with some big shot lawyer.

A 22 yr old black factory worker gets caught with the same amount of coke. He gets into court and is given an overworked public defender.

Who thinks their cases will end up the same??? My guess would be that college kid basically walks cause we dont want to ruin his bright future by marking his record with a drug offense.

Factory guy, probably wont be so lucky.
Click to expand...

Right, except that you could flip the races and it wouldn't make much difference. Also, I think the major difference is that it is less likely that the college student gets busted in the first place since he has less day-to-day contact with police.
 
corplinx said:

I think occam's razor solves this dilemma. In general, police don't go around arresting innocent people and then making up crimes they did.
Click to expand...

What!?!?!? You bastard!!! That's exactly what they did to OJ!!! :mad: :mad: :mad:





(For the humor impaired - :D )
 
Even if they are guilty, don't you wonder how this could happen?

They committed crimes?

That maybe there isn't something seriously wrong happening here.

Yes, it's seriously wrong to commit crimes.
 
michaellee said:
Originally posted by CBL4


High rate of incarceration for black males.

Why?

Conviction for commiting a crime punishable by serving time in jail or prison.

What can be done about it? About it, not much. To prevent it or reduce the incarceration rate for black males in the future?

Hope that black males commit less crimes punishable by a prison term.

What is the purpose/motive/benefit/reason for stating these kinds of statistics? Who is promoting "political correctness" beyond comprehension, and creating a social environment where it is taboo to use simple words because they might 'exclude' or offend someone because of their race or sexual preference? Who is promoting and teaching our students about DIVERSITY, and that all people from all cultures are equal and should not be discriminated against based on their appearance, race or gender?

I know who! The same people who, after spouting diversity and acceptance, are the ones who then can't resist the act of publicly stating the whopping differences in some statistical area between two or more groups differentiated only by...you guessed it... their race, gender or minority status.

The issue is and should not be about how to lower the incarceration rate of black males. It is about how to lower the incarceration rate, period. After all, there are no differences between races and cultures, right? Then please stop trying to convince the world of this fact by showing us all the striking differences, categorizing by race, culture and gender.
Click to expand...

Well put. This highlights the general hypocrisy of the "diversity" crowd.

I also take issue with the "black-on-black" crime statistic. The underlying assumtion of which seems to be that black-on-black crime is somehow worse than black-on-x crime. Why not treat all races and crimes commited by them as equal?
 
Everyone commits crimes, some big, some small.

**Not** everyone goes to prison, and it certainly isn't because the system makes it too hard to get convictions.

Every cog in the CJ system introduces an increased chance of error or *some* sort of bias, leaving us with an end result that the prison population doesn't match up to what a representative sample of 2 million people should look like.
 
Tony said:


Well put. This highlights the general hypocrisy of the "diversity" crowd.

I also take issue with the "black-on-black" crime statistic. The underlying assumtion of which seems to be that black-on-black crime is somehow worse than black-on-x crime. Why not treat all races and crimes commited by them as equal?
Click to expand...

I dont think the point is black on white crime is OK. The point is that black on black implies the crimes are happening within the community by people from the community. How can the community improve if its hurting itself??

The concearn over the stats is aboutrletting people get away with crime, its about breaking destructive patterns.
 
I think the question of whether the people in jail are guilty or not is just a ploy to avoid the tough questions:
1) Why do black males commit so many crime compared to other groups?
2) What can be done about it?
Bill Cosby blames the parents and tried to shake them up with a speech. Other people blame racism or schools or society or the media etc.

I tend to think it is mostly parents. Since we cannot (or at least should not) make tests for becoming parents we need to help the kids when their parents do not. Headstart seems to moderately effective. It tries to make people better parents. That is the ideal solution but it is not enough.

My local school district came up with an interesting plan to get children educated earlier. In 2001, 94% of the 1st graders did not know the alphabet. In other words, the children were hopelessly behind academically before they even got to school. The school district put teachers in pre-schools. In a couple years, the rate dropped to about 70%. Still horrible but much better.

This was a plan that accepted the fact that the parents were failing the kids and did something about it. It's not ideal but it is a start.

BTW, this is not only a racial issue. I live in a majority white town that has been declared "blighted" by the federal government. I see bright babies turn stupid through a combination of neglect and being in abusive settings. They are being trained for a life of poverty and crime.

CBL
 
Every cog in the CJ system introduces an increased chance of error or *some* sort of bias, leaving us with an end result that the prison population doesn't match up to what a representative sample of 2 million people should look like.
Click to expand...
If the justice system were to take into account a defendants race, or cultural status, or the like at sentencing time, would this lead to a more representative incarceration rate? Or is this already the way courts and judges dole out sentences?

I have the misfortune of viewing the justice system on two very different levels. First, and most common, I see and read the statistics that seem to show how the poor, minority status defendants end up with a public defender who doesn't care, thus receiving a prison term, while well-to-do white males in their 40's with the fancy lawyers get the proverbial slap on the wrist. This is accepted by most as the way things occur, and appears to be backed up by the incarceration statistics. However, those statistics go flying out the window when someone you know, like a family member or close friend, gets caught in the wheels of justice.

My brother, Tony, is a white male, 44 years of age, upper middle class working type, with no prior criminal record. In October of 2002, while driving home from work, he decided on a whim to stop at a local restaurant/bar to watch Monday Night Football and drink a few beers. Bad decision. Tony is and never has been a drinker, only drinks beer, nothing stronger, and gets buzzed on just one or two. In other words, he should not have been driving even if he consumed only 1 beer, let alone the 6 or 7 he was later estimated to have had while watching the game. So, the game ends, Tony jumps into his brand new pick-up truck and heads south toward home, 10 miles away, on the local two lane highway. This is the last thing he remembers of that night.

For the family of the woman who was driving north that same night on the same road at the same time as Tony, and for my family, that is when all of us became first hand participants in the justice system. According to the police reports, Tony's truck went across the northbound lane, onto the northbound shoulder, and as a northbound car approached, Tony's truck started to cross back towards the southbound lane. The two vehicles, each traveling 65 mph, crashed head on without either driver aware of the impending crash, as no skid marks were found, nor was any evidence of brakes being applied ever found.

The woman driving in the northbound lane was killed instantly, while Tony, as happens in so many crashes involving drunk drivers, somehow survived the impact, and although suffering critical injuries, has now recovered to a point where he can function normally, i.e.. he has the use of his arms and legs, and is able physically to return to work.

We all read and hear about innocent victims being killed by idiotic drunk drivers. We all express our anger towards the drunk, and sympathy for the victim's family. So laws are passed that supposedly deter people from driving drunk. In Tony's case, which occured in the state of Hawaii, the statute covering his crime was 'Vehicular homicide", a Class C felony, described as driving a vehicle while legally intoxicated and causing the death of another person. This is exactly what Tony had done. Yet the case took on different meaning for the DA, as the victim in the case, Carol, was a loving wife and mother of 10 children.

So the DA does not file charges of Vehicular Homicide against Tony. Along with the lesser charges of DUI, innattentive driving, and crossing the double yellow line, the DA instead charges Tony with the crime of Manslaughter, a class B felony. Yes the same Manslaughter charge that murderers sometimes plea down to.

Without question, Tony was guilty of driving drunk, and causing the death of a woman, leaving her husband and ten children without their mother. He deserves to be punished for his actions, although not intentional, he must take responsibility for getting behind the wheel of a vehicle drunk.

So how did the system mete out justice in Tony's case?
Tony had no prior criminal record. He hired an upscale attorney. He is a white, upper middle class working male. Before the case was brought to court, and after Tony's recovery for 3 months in the hospital, he voluntarily went into an alcohol recovery program. He has not drank since the tragic day. So, in court, the DA sticks to his guns and does not offer a plea of any kind. The Manslaughter charge stays. Tony and his lawyer, using their money and status as white males, end up deciding to plead guilty.

Tony pleads guilty, not to a lesser charge, but guilty to Manslaughter. So my family is thinking that Tony's lawyer knows what he is doing, after all he is guilty, but pleading guilty to the highest charge without some kind of sentencing agreement in hand? On sentencing day, all family members are present, and some speak before sentencing. The probation department's report on Tony has been submitted and read by the judge. Tony stands in court, remorseful and apologetic, admitting his guilt and understanding he deserves punishment.

Now I read all the time about rapists and murderers being convicted, sometimes for the second time, receiving sentences sometimes as low as 3 to 5 years. The average sentence in the US for conviction of 2nd degree murder is 15 years, serving 7 years. The average sentence for rape is 6 years, serving 3. So, with all attention to the judge, he sentences Tony to 20 years. A mandatory 20 year sentence. Boy, the hands of justice turned back time in this case. Or am I wrong? Where are all the cries of severe punishment because Tony is an upper middle class white male with a big-wig attorney?

So I take the overall statistics with a huge grain of salt. Once something hits home like this, all that matters is the individual case, at least to those that the case has an actual affect on. Statistical pundits, purveyors of diversity, and all the ACLU lawyers on the planet will not be knocking down the walls to break Tony's story to you.
 
evildave said:
And there are how many people in Jail in the US? 2,078,570

http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/prisons.htm

At midyear 2003 there were 4,834 black male prisoners per 100,000 black males in the United States in prison or jail, compared to 1,778 Hispanic male inmates per 100,000 Hispanic males and 681 white male inmates per 100,000 white males.

Cross-race charts...
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/glance/tables/cpracetab.htm

Year White Black Other
1997 3,429,000 2,149,900 113,600

Egads, according to these numbers, blacks, with about 15% of the population, are 40% of the prison "system" population.
http://www.census.gov/population/www/documentation/twps0056.html

A bit of a disproportionate number.

http://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid=2003034


So, one more side-trip, back to census data for blacks, 18-24
http://www.census.gov/population/www/cen2000/phc-t08.html
Table 3. Black or African American Population, by Age and Sex for the United States: 2000

3,804,437 * .31 = 1,179,375

1,117,200 blacks, age 18~24 in college
2,149,900 blacks (total) in prison system

Need an 18~24 black total to be comparable... but then after about 15 minutes of groping for the exact thing from a government site, lost interest, etc.
Click to expand...

So, in fact, Kerry might have meant 'in proportion to the black population in general'. Liberals do use this sort of arguing to estabish their point, after all (for example, in Aus it's pointed out that more Aborigines are non-drinkers than whites. HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE? Well, we are talking about as a percentage).

So, in fact, it may not have been a lie after all, but a case of omitting a qualification. But don't let that distract Nie from his spray.
 
michaellee said:
Now I read all the time about rapists and murderers being convicted, sometimes for the second time, receiving sentences sometimes as low as 3 to 5 years. The average sentence in the US for conviction of 2nd degree murder is 15 years, serving 7 years. The average sentence for rape is 6 years, serving 3. So, with all attention to the judge, he sentences Tony to 20 years. A mandatory 20 year sentence. Boy, the hands of justice turned back time in this case. Or am I wrong? Where are all the cries of severe punishment because Tony is an upper middle class white male with a big-wig attorney?
Click to expand...

You know the "justice" system in this country is fuct when people get 20 or more years for accidentally killing someone or selling drugs, but people who murder and/or rape only get 6.
 
michaellee said:


Tony pleads guilty, not to a lesser charge, but guilty to Manslaughter. So my family is thinking that Tony's lawyer knows what he is doing, after all he is guilty, but pleading guilty to the highest charge without some kind of sentencing agreement in hand? On sentencing day, all family members are present, and some speak before sentencing. The probation department's report on Tony has been submitted and read by the judge. Tony stands in court, remorseful and apologetic, admitting his guilt and understanding he deserves punishment.

Now I read all the time about rapists and murderers being convicted, sometimes for the second time, receiving sentences sometimes as low as 3 to 5 years. The average sentence in the US for conviction of 2nd degree murder is 15 years, serving 7 years. The average sentence for rape is 6 years, serving 3. So, with all attention to the judge, he sentences Tony to 20 years. A mandatory 20 year sentence. Boy, the hands of justice turned back time in this case. Or am I wrong? Where are all the cries of severe punishment because Tony is an upper middle class white male with a big-wig attorney?

So I take the overall statistics with a huge grain of salt. Once something hits home like this, all that matters is the individual case, at least to those that the case has an actual affect on. Statistical pundits, purveyors of diversity, and all the ACLU lawyers on the planet will not be knocking down the walls to break Tony's story to you.
Click to expand...



He pled guilty. If the sentence was mandatory what the heck did they think would happen? Actually I just looked it up. According to Hawaii law the judge had no choice.

From your telling of it, and I must emphesize that I may not have the complete and objective facts, the real scandal here is not the 20 years so much as it is that the lawyer must have been wearing a ski-mask.

Or at least a clown suit.
 
Suddenly said:




He pled guilty. If the sentence was mandatory what the heck did they think would happen? Actually I just looked it up. According to Hawaii law the judge had no choice.

From your telling of it, and I must emphesize that I may not have the complete and objective facts, the real scandal here is not the 20 years so much as it is that the lawyer must have been wearing a ski-mask.

Or at least a clown suit.
Click to expand...

Never hire a lawyer wearing Okanui shorts in Hawaii during Big Wednesday.
 
Drunk driving cases bother me. The ones were the passenger gets killed.

The other week there was one case in the news. The families were letting this guy have it at sentenceing. It pissed me off cause the "victims" were his buddies who were in the car. They were all getting drunk celebrating someones b-day.

They hopped in the car knowing he had been drinking. I say they are just as cullpable as the guy driving.
 
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