Why is Whoopi Naive?

In case you didn’t catch it, Senator John McCain was on the view the other day, and in a discussion of Supreme Court justices and the import of appointing strict constitutionalist judges Whoopi took the opportunity to make a wise crack about having to worry about being a slave again. Not like there’s been slavery here since 1865, but more on that in a minute. She put on quite a show of being flustered by that thought, and John McCain graciously ceded the point.

What else can you do without seeming boorish in the face of such blazing ignorance? (or such carefully crafted theater…)

Whoopi seems to think it was the Supreme Court that stopped slavery, however it was not. It was Republicans, and some War Democrats  who put the future of the country ahead of party, you know Whoopi, war Democrats like Joe Lieberman. Together with President Lincoln they ended slavery in the United States.

The first step was issuing the two part Emancipation Proclamation — it was one of those dreaded Executive Orders that the extreme left and right always condemn nowadays; if Dennis Kucinich and Ron Paul were around back then they probably both would have been calling for impeachment of President Lincoln.

The second part of ending slavery since executive orders are sometimes impermanent was ammending the Constitution of the United States of America, adding the thirteenth ammendment. Doing that ended slavery for all time here. It was followed by the fourteenth ammendment that secured the rights of the ex-slaves, and the fifteenth ammendment that ensured their right to vote. Now since all of the ammendments are part of the constitution, what part of strict constitutionalism is Whoopi in fear of?

I mean doesn’t she want judges who interpret these ammendments strictly? If there weren’t a long history of judges doing just that we could still have shades of slavery today in some states, I guess strict is a good way to interpret the constitution when it comes to individual rights.

What part of the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth ammendment doesn’t Whoopi get? Is this really naivete, or is this calculated political posturing and hysterical theater? I guess Whoopi’s the only one who can tell us which it is: just ignorance or just theater.

Thirteenth Ammendment:

Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime where of the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Section 2. Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Fourteenth Ammendment:

Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
Section 2. Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such State.

Section 3. No one shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

Section 4. The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.

Section 5. The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.

Fiftteenth Ammendment:

Section 1. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.
Section 2. The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Wasilla Public Library on Sarah Palin: No banned books … EVER

On the left they are trying to paint Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska as a warmongering end-of-days rabid Christian dominionist, and one of their sallies is to say that she tried to ban books. I happen to know who and where the Christian dominionists and rabid Christian Identity movement people are since we’ve been actively fighting them over their attempts to get creationism into public schools. (See here.) I can tell you that Governor Sarah Palin is not one of them.

If you look at the records of asks to ban books (and the Wasilla Public library records them all,) there aren’t any from Sarah. Here’s the table of requests, and the actions the library took from their records:

If this is the best the left can come up with, they better get ready to weep November 3rd.
Resources: PDF file Link in Wasilla