COMMENTARY: Do not get too excited about the good news for marriage rights because the troglodyte half of the Supreme Court has gutted a vital section of the Voting Rights Act. Celebrations by the LGBT community over two recent decisions by the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) strike me as misguided, disingenuous, and frivolous.
Sure, the odious DOMA (Defense of Marriage Act) has been struck down. And sure, the disgusting Proposition 8 in California is now no more. Both are good conclusions and both are worthy of grins, high-fives, and whoops of joy.
But these enlightened and uplifting pronouncements are relatively minor in the face of the other recent SCOTUS ruling, the one that eviscerated the Voting Rights Act (VRA). “Well, no,” say the professional liars on the right, “the VRA is still intact; only one teeny tiny section has been struck down.”
Yes, that is true, as far as it goes: Section 4 has been killed, the part of the VRA that required states with a history of racial discrimination to obtain pre-approval for any changes to their voting laws and systems. Unfortunately, without Section 4, much of the rest of the Act has now been reduced to a cruel joke.
The death knell to Section 4 is a huge shift because it will effectively allow the racism of the GOP to run rampant throughout any state whose legislature is in control of Republicans. With this one terrible blow, the voting rights of any minority group can be abrogated in the states of the Old Confederacy (South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, George, Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina) and those of their ilk (Arizona, Alaska, Kansas, Ohio, Oklahoma, etc.)
The results could be devastating to democracy because elections in those blood-red states will affect the composition of the House and Senate in Washington, not to mention keeping the forces of evil in control of far-too-many state legislatures and governorships.
“Far-fetched fear mongering,” say the rightwing nutjobs (so you know the reverse is true). But the effects of the error by the Court may be even greater than their blunder in the Citizens United fiasco that has turned our election process into a pay-to-play charade.
The GOP was already engaged in massive voter-suppression activities in many states and now their racist and homophobic forces have been unleashed to enact the biggest stamp-out-the-vote campaign in the history of our nation.
What might we expect in the near future? Fewer decent people voting, for a start, and more crypto-Fascists being elected to Congress. Think of it: with voter suppression now approved by the Supreme Court, we can look forward to another Rand Paul being elected to the Senate. Another Ted Cruz. More Lindsay Grahams and Mitch McConnells. Another Jeff Flake. Another Saxby Chamblis. Another John McCain. And on and on through the whole depressing litany of loons.
With racial profiling now backed by five justices of the highest court in the land, we can also expect more cretins elected to the House. A new Michele Bachmann. A new Allan West. Another Paul Ryan, Eric Cantor, John Boehner, Peter King, Louse Gohmert, Darrell Issa … (This list could get quite lengthy so I’ll spare you for now since anyone with a soul and an I.Q. above 70 is quaking from fear and loathing.)
If you care at all about a little concept called America, please just stop and consider the kind of crapstorm that’s about to descend on our nation. It’s not just the stupidity of having anti-science buffoons voting on matters of science. We’re about to see legions of anti-fact morons voting on legislation covering everything from monetary policy to defense to immigration to security to…marriage rights.
So, my dear friends in the LGBT community, your current revelries are going to be short-lived. Any merriment on the left should be wrapped up by now and every decent person should be hard at work attacking the forces of regression, obstruction, division, and dissention. In other words, we all need to be battling the GOP. Obviously, Republicans should never be elected to anything, but most especially not President because that office is responsible for the appointment of such human offal as Samuel Alito, Antonin Scalia, and Clarence Thomas as well as their sometimes-fellow-travelers, Anthony Kennedy and John Roberts.
Progressives, liberals, and all decent people: take heart, join together, and let’s get to work fighting the wrong of the Right. The struggle continues.
Copr. © by John Scott G and originally published on eNewsChannels.com – all commercial and reprint rights reserved.
