I took a stroll over to the dark side Tuesday night — a visit to conservative blog?The Daily Caller. I was referred there after I read a brilliant piece by Salon’s Simon Maloy about the right-wing freak-out over liberal activists who are encouraging voter registration in Ferguson, Missouri following the shooting of unarmed teen Michael Brown. The outrage has resulted in a week of protests that have revealed an alarming level of police overreach. As Maloy put it, the efforts of activists and community leaders to try to encourage people to use their vote to have a say in their representation is “drawing howls of outrage from conservatives and Republicans.”
From Salon:
For conservatives and the local GOP, this is apparently unconscionable. ?If that’s not fanning the political flames, I don’t know what is,? the Missouri Republican Party executive director Matt Wills told Breitbart News. ?I think it’s not only disgusting but completely inappropriate.? Again, this is in response to a voter registration drive in a majority black community.
Mr. Wills added this:
?This is not just a tragedy for the African American community this is a tragedy for the Missouri community as well as the community of what we call America,? he said. ?Injecting race into this conversation and into this tragedy, not only is not helpful, but it doesn’t help a continued conversation of justice and peace.?
Awwwwwwww isn’t that sweet, that?the Missouri Republican Party executive director is?so concerned for this slain young African-American man?
SHUT UP!!!
Ahem, excuse me. I digressed.
Voter registration for #Ferguson residents is at the QT & the crime scene. SIGN UP. Get on the juries, choose your leaders. #MikeBrown
— April (@ReignOfApril) August 17, 2014
in front of the makeshift memorial where Mike Brown was killed, they've set up a voter registration table #Ferguson pic.twitter.com/Puj339x9o6
— Jessica Lee (@BusquedaJess) August 16, 2014
Ferguson residents are grossly underrepresented in their city government. Ferguson is 67 percent black, but?five of the six council members and the mayor are?white.
Let’s go further with this. Ferguson currently has 54 police officers. Three of them are black. Do you think this doesn’t matter? Hmmm….well out of 5,000+ traffic stops in the last year, 600 of the people stopped were white and 4,600 were black. That seems a bit disproportionate, doesn’t it?
All of this?makes Mayor James Knowles statement of early Tuesday seem completely ludicrous. He said: “There’s not a racial divide in the city of Ferguson.”
Oh really?
From ThinkProgress:
If you compared the racial makeup of Ferguson, Missouri’s population as a whole to that of its government, it would be easy to mistake the city for an enclave of Jim Crow. Although nearly 70 percent of Ferguson is black, 50 of its 53 police officers are white. So are five of Ferguson’s six city council members. The mayor, James Knowles, is a white Republican.
Ferguson has played this well and it’s not coincidental. The?Ferguson City Charter?requires that the “regular city election be held annually on the first Tuesday following the first Monday in April,” and the elections are “held in odd-numbered years.” Why is this significant? Because of what we already know: less people show up to vote when there are no state or national general elections going on.
So yeah….the right wing is a little miffed that there may actually be an upset to their perfect little arrangement. Let’s see what Patrick Howley?from The Daily Caller had to say.
Jesse Jackson and other liberal activists are rolling out voter registration efforts as part of a coordinated left-wing push to sign up voters during the wave of violent protests engulfing Ferguson, Missouri in the aftermath of the Michael Brown shooting.
Racial activist and former Democratic presidential candidate Jesse Jackson met with St. Louis clergy Monday to plan a formal Ferguson voter registration drive.
Liberal activists ? including from the George Soros-funded Center for Constitutional Rights ? have promoted voter registration booths at multiple locations in Ferguson, including at the roadside memorial marking the spot where Brown was shot.
Rev. Jackson understands, as we all do, that the only way that people in Ferguson will be properly represented is if they turn out at the polls. From St. Louis Post-Dispatch:
“It has to change,” [Jesse] Jackson said about the lack of minorities on Ferguson’s police department and local governance.
“Five thousand new voters will transform the city from top to bottom,” he said.
It’s not about exploiting Michael Brown’s death. It’s about Ferguson’s citizens taking back their power.?It is about them — and every other city in America — saying “ENOUGH!”
From a CNN editorial by Emory University law professor Dorothy A. Brown:
?Elected officials don’t have to care about black citizens as long as they don’t fear them at the ballot box.?Every member of the city council who has sat by silently while citizens were treated like second-class citizens should be voted out of office; Michael Brown’s death must result in one of the largest voter registration drives in the history of the state of Missouri. That would be a lasting legacy for such a senseless and untimely death.?
As Rev. Al Sharpton said: “Michael Brown’s gonna change this town.”
Want to know more? Go in-depth at Salon or ThinkProgress. There is a video from The Daily Caller below.
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Tiffany Willis is the founder and editor-in-chief of Liberal America. An unapologetic member of the Christian Left, she has spent most of her career actively working with ?the least of these? and disadvantaged and oppressed populations. She’s passionate about their struggles. To stay on top of topics she discusses,?like her?Facebook page,?follow her on Twitter, or?connect with her via LinkedIn. She also has?a?grossly neglected personal blog?and a?literary quotes blog that is a labor of love. Find her somewhere and join the discussion.
