Regarding the United State’s drop to #47 on their list, the report states that the US “owed its fall of 27 places to the many arrests of journalist covering Occupy Wall Street protests.”

Which puts us behind my homeland the Czech Republic (#14), Niger (#29), Papua New Guinea (#35), and El Salvador (#37), among others. Hey, at least we beat Haiti, Timor, and Iran!

Here are some quotes that struck me:

“One in three young African American men is currently under the control of the criminal justice system – in prison, in jail, on probation, or on parole – yet mass incarceration tends to be categorized as a criminal justice issue as opposed to a racial justice or civil rights issue (or crisis).” Pg.9

“What is key to America’s understanding of class is the persistent belief – despite all evidence to the contrary – that anyone, with the proper discipline and drive, can move from a lower class to a higher class.” Pg.13

The rest are here:

“As described by Tom Watson, a prominent populist leader, in a speech advocating a union between black and white farmers: “You are kept apart that you may be separately fleeced of your earnings. You are made to hate each other because upon that hatred is rested the keystone of the arch of financial despotism that enslaves you both. You are deceived and blinded that you may not see how this race antagonism perpetuates a monetary system which beggars both.” ” Pg.33

“The War on Drugs proved popular among key white voters, particularly whites who remained resentful of black progress, civil rights enforcement, and affirmative action. Beginning in the 1970s, researchers found that racial attitudes – not crime rates or likelihood of victimization – are an important determinant of white support for “get tough on crime” and antiwelfare measures.” Pg.53

“Once a person is labeled a felon, he or she is ushered into a parallel universe in which discrimination, stigma, and exclusion are perfectly legal, and privileges of citizenship such as voting and jury duty are off-limits.” Pg.92

“Although the majority of illegal drug users and dealers nationwide are white, three-fourths of all people imprisoned for drug offenses have been black or Latino.” Pg.96-97

“[R]ates and patterns of drug crime do not explain the glaring racial disparities in our criminal justice system. People of all races use and sell illegal drugs at remarkably similar rates. If there are significant differences in the surveys to be found, they frequently suggest that whites, particularly white youth, are more likely to engage in illegal drug dealing than people of color. …[T]he very same year Human Rights Watch was reporting that African Americans were being arrested and imprisoned at unprecedented rates, government data revealed that blacks were no more likely to be guilty of drug crimes than whites and that white youth were actually the most likely of any racial or ethnic group to be guilty of illegal drug possession and sales.” Pg.97

“[B]lack men have been admitted to state prison on drug charges at a rate that is more than thirteen times higher than white men. The racial bias inherent in the drug war is a major reason that 1 in every 14 black men was behind in 2006, compared with 1 in every 106 white men. …One in 9 black men between the ages of twenty and thirty-five was behind bars in 2006.” Pg.98

“The [Baldus] study found that defendants charged with killing white victims received the death penalty eleven times more often than defendants charged with killing black victims.” Pg.107

“The widespread and mistaken belief that racial animus is necessary for the creation and maintenance of racialized systems of control is the most important reason that we, as a nation, have remained in deep denial.” Pg.178

“Our understanding of racism is …shaped by the most extreme expressions of individual bigotry, not by the way in which it functions naturally …when it is embedded in the structure of a social system.” Pg.178-179

“Mass incarceration has nullified many of the gains of the Civil Rights Movement, putting millions of black men back in a position reminiscent of Jim Crow.” Pg.187

“Studies have shown that joblessness – not race or black culture – explains the high rates of violent crime in poor black communities.” Pg.204

• They implement racial and economic segregation in one of the most integrated school systems in America: Wake County School District in North Carolina. (With the financial backing of a wealthy Libertarian.)

• They ban books (and remove them from classrooms in front of students) that discuss Chicano history and culture, as well as race, ethnicity and oppression in general in Arizona.

You may recall that we have former Tuscon School District Superintendent Tom Horne (supported by his local Tea Party) to thank for this mess.  His legacy is being dutifully carried forward by current Superintendent John Huppenthal, “who threatened to withhold millions of dollars if TUSD didn’t terminate the nationally acclaimed [Mexican-American studies] program immediately.”

Then Tuscon school administrator Lupita Garcia comes out and actually says: “This country is called America, okay? And they study US history. If you were to go back to Mexico… you would study Mexican history.”

• They remove mention of racial minorities and critique of wealthy whites from history books in Tennessee.

Here is some of their actual curriculum criteria:

“No portrayal of minority experience in the history which actually occurred shall obscure the experience or contributions of the Founding Fathers, or the majority of citizens, including those who reached positions of leadership.”

Also:

Fayette County attorney Hal Rounds, the [coalition of Tennessee Tea Party's] lead spokesman during the news conference, said the group wants to address “an awful lot of made-up criticism about, for instance, the founders intruding on the Indians or having slaves or being hypocrites in one way or another.

• And how can we forget that last year, Tea Party affiliates in Texas attempted to edit out the word “slavery” from their textbooks and replace it instead with the term “Atlantic Triangular Trade“.

IMDB has this to say about this 1999 film:

Tough Guise systematically examines the relationship between pop-cultural imagery and the social construction of masculine identities in the U.S. at the dawn of the 21st century.

Here is Part 1:

Thanks to Johnny and a shadowy figure known as Shenanigans for tipping me off.

-Honore de Balzac, 1799-1850

Here’s a real question a real White Dude posted, of all places, to my Facebook page:

Why should illegal immigrants have rights?

Thanks for making it easy for me, White Dude! Because all human beings have rights. Done!

You can discover this mysterious concept in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The word “universal” is a helpful hint, confused White Dude!

For further clarification, let us examine the issue. Permission to stay and work in America indefinitely is extremely hard to come by, and will take years, possibly more than a decade, to come by, if ever. But usually, one’s status as an American national or a national of another country is arrived at by dumb luck: whose womb we happened to pop out of. Official permission to stay in America is not granted on a basis of merit. It is granted by luck of birth, and sometimes it is granted to people with enough money and influence to get around the rules.

There are many, many legitimate reasons why someone not born in America would like to live and work here. These reasons are amply examined in many places on the interweb, and I do not feel like reinventing that wheel here.

So, White Dude, unless you believe that dumb luck is a good method for determining who gets human rights and who is treated less than human, let’s play it safe and remember that all humans have rights.

Also, White Dude, never call a human being “illegal” in my presence again, mmmkay?

From Barclays Capital via Rawstory:

“Our Skyscraper Index continues to show an unhealthy correlation between construction of the next world’s tallest building and an impending financial crisis — New York 1930; Chicago 1974; Kuala Lumpur 1997 and Dubai 2010.

“Yet often the world’s tallest buildings are simply the edifice of a broader skyscraper building boom, reflecting a widespread misallocation of capital and an impending economic correction.”

Being PRO-CHOICE means that you believe individual women should be free to make their own reproductive choices, which may include birth control or abortion or having any number of children. You believe each woman should make her own choices, even if you do not personally think abortion is right, and/or you would never make that choice for yourself.

Being PRO-LIFE means you believe women should NOT have certain reproductive options (abortion, perhaps emergency contraception, sometimes even all forms of birth control). You do not believe individual women should be able to make their own choices based on their beliefs, instead you wish to outlaw abortion and/or certain other reproductive options.

If a politician says they are “pro-life”, they are clearly communicating that they wish to end abortion rights, and maybe some or all birth control rights as well.

Or, for example, a devout Catholic could be completely against abortion, but yet still be pro-choice because they do not want to prevent all women from making their own decisions based on their own beliefs.

One position is about increasing freedom, and another is about reducing it. Just so’s we’re all clear on that

-Republican Georgia State Senator Judy Manning

And nobody stopped him or called the police.