- Quickdraw McLaw
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Trial By Peers
- Law
- Posted on 6 years ago
Institutional racism is part of the fabric of our lives. It's unnoticed, ignored and tolerated. The "questions" about Mr. Ford's arrests during college and paying his taxes demonstrate the problem. Many in our society made mistakes in their youth. He's clearly past that now some 20+ years later. Many of us have IRS issues. He's paid his bills. It's time to move on. His life experience put him where he is now. He was effective as Democratic Leader of State Senate. He's involved with, not just on paper but with time and effort, several charities. He's a valued member of our community. Institutional racism is a powerful system of privilege based on race. The privilege is perpetuated by seemingly innocent questions. Check yourself. Don't be racist.
Same fact pattern. Mr. Ford is a white man. Same responses on this blog. Institutional racism? Posters are being critical because of his prior criminal history and failure to pay back taxes. Mr. Ford wants the public to vote him in as the number one law enforcement agent in the state. Perhaps posters are holding him to a higher standard for the position he seeks. Not because of his race. If it is racism, you will have to show that the posters would not be critical of a white candidate with the same background.
Racist, you are incorrect. People are questioning Ford's character. They have a right to. He is running for office. Find a new theme. This one is tired.
I guess his opponents are racist, because they are running against Ford.
9:15 – I don't understand.
Assume a person is genuinely and actually not a racist but decides based on his or her own analysis to vote for Ford's opponent. And suppose that in making his or her analysis the person takes into account Ford's tax liens and arrests. Does the vote for Ford's opponent make that non-racist voter a racist?
Wouldn't that kind of be like fascism?
9:15am. It is common knowledge that running for political office means that a candidate's past is thoroughly looked at and any "bad" stuff is dredged out. The higher the office one is running for the more digging is done. As 9:37am points out if a white candidate would face the same ridicule for past issues then it is not racism simply because the candidate happens to be a minority. For instance we have seen character attacks on Leavitt's qualification as a potential jurist due to his past criminal case in the Leavitt/Graham JP race.
Now how relevant is this "new bad info"? That is for each voter to weigh and it may have none, some, or major impact. A potential voter may look at his current work/character and decide it outweighs the negatives of his past/semi-present or it could be vice-versa. But to suggest that it is racist for a voter to ask questions or have legitimate concerns about a candidate's past in making a voting decision is just wrong.
I don't like Oprah, does that make me racist? No. I don't care about people's race. You are allowed to like who you want to.
Did anyone care about Laxalt's DUI when he ran for AG or now that he is running for Gov? I think it is fair to question Ford on his past, but it is also true that white candidates get softer treatment. Don't believe me? Just think how a black candidate would have been treated with DT's past? Can you imagine how the public would have reacted if a black candidate was caught on tape bragging about "grabbing" women by their genitals without their permission? I am confident that individual would have zero change of winning a presidential election.
I cared about W's coke problem, I cared about Lacalt's DUI, and I care about a candidate with tax liens. Dr. Ford does not have my support.
I worked with Aaron at Snell. Just no thanks.
I think the other context here is that the GOP as a whole (both nationally and Nevada) frequently runs campaigns based on explicit or implicit racism. Laxalt signed Nevada onto anti-immigration legal challenges that had little-to-nothing to do with Nevada's actual interest. And his unofficial running mate Roberson is constantly dog-whistling about Democrats being "pro-felon" and "pro-sanctuary state" (as a criminal defense attorney, boy do I wish that were actually true).
In a vacuum, maybe "Aaron Ford did some crimes" wouldn't be a racially charged attack. But on a state and federal level, "be afraid of minorities" is a consistent theme in Republican campaign messaging. The attacks on Ford fit into that theme very well.
Meh, "institutional racism" is just another refuge for scoundrels, political and otherwise.
—
“The belief in the power of "institutional racism" allows black civil rights leaders to denounce America as a "racist" society, when it is the only society on earth-black, white, brown, or yellow whose defining public creed is anti-racist, a society to which black refugees from black-ruled nations regularly flee in search of refuge and freedom. The phantom of institutional racism allows black leaders to avoid the encounter with real problems within their own communities, which are neither caused by whites nor soluble by the actions of whites, but which cry out for attention.”
― David Horowitz, Hating Whitey and Other Progressive Causes
@8:27; I think your comment about DT is more an indictment of the voters than even about him himself. It is not that the information was hidden and wasn't broadcast from the highest mountains. The media and the Clinton campaign talked about it constantly. Rather, for reasons that, other than he was the only real alternative for voters that decided they didn't want Clinton, the issue was ignored by the voters. That's on the voters, not just a knee jerk explanation of racism or sexism, or any other ism.
3:09, "real problems within their own communities, which are neither caused by whites nor soluble by the actions of whites."
So are you saying centuries of slavery followed by a century or so of Jim Crow haven't set the black community in this country back? I get the whole pick yourself up by the bootstraps thing, but then you probably wax philosophical about the importance of the family unit in our society. So then guess how you can oppress a people. Split up their families and deny education. For centuries. So yes, if a group of people have their families systematically torn apart over many generations and are denied any semblance of education under threat of violence, then that will have real impacts "within their own communities."
To say "OK, you're now free so catch up to us, but most of you don't really know who your relatives are, let alone your parents, and you're starting with zero wealth and the laws will be overtly stacked against you for the next century," is absolutely setting a people up to struggle. And yes, it was caused by white people. PS, I'm a cis white man.
Damn cises.
Old man here: I've noticed in my lifetime that it's usually those with the worst secrets that hypocritically judge these types of things, I won't be voting for Mr. Ford for other reasons but "c'mon man," give the guy a break for 20 years ago
I went to college in the 70s. I had at least 4 interactions with police and campus security. Each time I was given a verbal warning and released without any record. I turned out fine.
In the 80s the catch and release method of policing was changed. My youngest brother was caught at the same school in the mid 80s with an open container on campus. He got an appearance ticket and a misdemeanor criminal record for possession of alcohol under 21 years and having an open container of beer.
I agree with 9:22AM. Who cares about youthful indiscretions in the early 90s? I'm not voting for Ford because of his affiliation with the Eglet machine. I don't know if I can support Laxalt's lackie replacement either.
Criticism of an African American candidate should not automatically be attributed to racism. Ford is running for Attorney General. Perhaps his youthful indiscretions can possibly be overlooked. But, as an adult, the candidate has demonstrated a measure of financial irresponsibility by failing to timely pay his taxes and may very well have been less than forthcoming on his application to the Bar (apparently his "explanation" is no longer available to review). Is this really who we want as our State's chief law enforcement officer?
I'll be voting "none of the above" for both AG and governor. Nevada.
I don't blame you. I am looking third party for governor. I am also supporting Tao. Looking at candidates outside of my party for the best candidate.
"may very well have been less than forthcoming." So another way of saying you don't know shit.
Look, I don't really have a dog in this fight, I think both candidates would be satisfactory while neither have really shown much for me to get excited over. I basically equate the Ford attacks here to the Cadish attacks. They reek of either campaign staff or hyperpartisan fanboys trying to manufacture conversation on certain topics. That's it. Yes, some posters probably have some additional racial animus, but I do think he'd be getting similar attacks if he were white. The difficulty is the attacks in this context can be a dog whistle to others.
Cadish is not Ford. Ford supports Cadish. That is the only correlation Although I would not be bragging about a Ford endorsement. I would distance myself.
Eglet is an Elissa Cadish and Ford connection. Follow the money.
I think the reason some people have suspicions about him maybe not disclosing his run-ins with the law is that he very well may not have passed the character and fitness test if he had disclosed everything fully. It's not proof, but it's hardly wild speculation.
Tire thieving, public intoxication, and failure to appear? He would have gone through. We have attorneys with less-then-savory backgrounds, including grand theft auto. This was small potatoes then, and it's small potatoes now.
Obviously he did disclose, and if he disclosed one or two arrests, it would be pretty stupid not to disclose all, particularly if they were all in the same state. I've had a couple of friends with minor criminal issues in their past, and I can tell you that the character and fitness review is pretty extensive and bordering on the ridiculous.
I don't vote for people who don't pay taxes, Ford. Tax liens are pretty bad.
I was admitted to the bar a few years ago, and had a DUI a few years before that (right before I got into law school). I disclosed everything to the Bar, and I didn't have any problems passing the character and fitness evaluation. It was only one DUI (unlike Ford), but it was also only six months before I started law school (unlike Ford). So overall I think it was a comparative level of problem for the examiners, which is to say it wasn't.
So it definitely can happen that the Bar is willing to overlook past indiscretions. I'm not a bar examiner myself, so I don't know whether that happened with Ford or not. But a lot of people seem willing to jump to the most negative possible interpretation, and I think that's where the allegations of racism come in. Nobody just jumped to assuming that Adam Laxalt lied to the Bar about his DUI, and it wasn't even an issue in his AG campaign; but Ford gets treated differently? It seems quite plausible that's because he's black and Laxalt isn't.
He absolutely gets in after fully disclosing those priors.
That is bullshit. I had to pay a past due bill in full before I could sit for the bar. A bill. This jerk, Ford, gets in with 4 arrests. Smells like racism to me.
I had a friend who filed bankruptcy while attending law school. The Nevada State Bar upheld his admission and he had to hire Bill Terry to finally get his ticket, after spending thousands of dollars in legal fees.
Anyone who has "worked" with Ford, knows the guy does not actually work. He is strictly a politician. Eglet apparently puts up with Ford's lackadaisical attitude toward the practice of law because he reaps some benefit. Snell got fed up.
Eglet is woke af