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we're just trying to score political points (and in truth, that would be exactly right)
thats not to say that Allen shouldn't be roundly beaten for it, but that can occur without doing something like censure.
Mad Wombat
by FleetAdmiralJ on Tue Aug 15, 2006 at 05:18:53 AM PDT
I'm usually the one around here urging caution when other people say "damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead, let's go in guns blazing!"... But Jesus on a pogo stick! A United States Senator just called a young American the French synonym for nigger!.
Censure is the politically and morally right move, and I don't think we should shy away from it just because it might make us look mean.
I could care less how it looks (though actually I think it is good politics for us to do this), Allen needs to get the worst kind of smack down he can get, and it needs to be an institutional one, because this isn't just an issue of what's acceptable in politics, it's an issue of what's acceptable from our institutions of government.
I Am Hussein and So Can You
by Goldfish on Tue Aug 15, 2006 at 05:23:48 AM PDT
[ Parent ]
in the senate, you'll find that senators that get censured virtually always either have a) broken the law or b) have made repeated egregious ethical violations
http://www.senate.gov/...
The things senators have been censured over:
by FleetAdmiralJ on Tue Aug 15, 2006 at 05:30:44 AM PDT
About Joe Mccarthy, who was censured for making rash and unsubstantiated accusations that ruined a number of people’s lives. While I don’t mean to suggest what Allen did is in any way of the same magnetite as Mccarthy, I would suggest that when a Senator makes statements that of indisputable moral repugnancy or recklessness, that there is precedent for the use of censure.
This is not acceptable behavior from a United States Senator. Censure is an legitimate option.
by Goldfish on Tue Aug 15, 2006 at 05:37:20 AM PDT
mccarthy is listed as thus on the page:
Charge: Abuse and non-cooperation with the Subcommittee on Privileges and Elections during a 1952 investigation of his conduct; for abuse of the Select Committee to Study Censure.
he was the "non-cooperation with an investigation" one
by FleetAdmiralJ on Tue Aug 15, 2006 at 05:40:20 AM PDT
I had heard the censure had to do with statements he had made, but I guess that was incorrect.
by Goldfish on Tue Aug 15, 2006 at 05:41:19 AM PDT
may have been about his statements. however, the censure was over not cooperating with that investigation
by FleetAdmiralJ on Tue Aug 15, 2006 at 05:45:24 AM PDT
many censurable actions and words related to this country's continuing struggle to afford equal rights, including a failure to enact a national law against lynching,is justification enough to add racial demogoguery to the list of censurable offenses.
Basically, the question you're asking is, "Are racial slurs from the mouths of government officials serious enough for censure?"
We may finally be at a point when the answer is "Yes!"
Why does John McCain hate kids?
by Fasaha on Tue Aug 15, 2006 at 05:37:24 AM PDT
We've reached that point.
by Goldfish on Tue Aug 15, 2006 at 05:39:22 AM PDT
considered censurable.
Censuring is basically like saying "ok, you really fucked up this time and pissed off everyone in the senate"
also, one thing to consider is that he wasn't acting in his role as senator when he said it (he was acting in his role as candidate). If he had said something similar on the senate floor, it would be considered much more egregious since it would come much closer to disrespecting the senate which, when you get down to it, virtually all censure resolutions that have been successful are about.
by FleetAdmiralJ on Tue Aug 15, 2006 at 05:44:36 AM PDT
One of whom is a person of color, would feel that Allen "really fucked up this time and pissed off everyone in the senate." I would hope the other Senators would be pissed off.
And as far as successful, it doesn't have to be successful to punish Allen for his jackassery, though I would very much like it to be. But really, I'll be happy with a news cycle with everyone in the media saying "Allen" "racaist" and "censure" as many times as possible.
by Goldfish on Tue Aug 15, 2006 at 05:50:49 AM PDT
should be censured, but promoting racism is not just any old wrong action. This country fought a civil war over an institution founded on racial division, and I would think that in 2006 we might be at a point where government officials could be held accountable for trying to drive the country back to practices and mores that we have struggled mightily to abandon.
This is not just any old conduct. It's fundamental to American identity. We don't need senators who envision America as a white nation.
by Fasaha on Tue Aug 15, 2006 at 06:02:48 AM PDT
wide narrow
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