Sam and rimrocker, The Federal Government was desegregated beginning in 1948. When was it segregated?
:grin: from Josh -- LightSpeed WalkBack They used to say that folks evolved once they got on the Supreme Court. But I'm not sure we've ever seen the kind of evolution Rand Paul's undergone over less than 24 hours. Let me try to summarize. 1) I don't support the Civil Rights Act but I personally abhor discrimination. 2) I would not support any effort to repeal the Civil Rights Act. 3) I believe in the Civil Rights Act and the constitutional power to enforce it. 4) If I would have been in the Senate at the time I would have voted for the Civil Rights Act. Any guesses on number 5? --Josh Marshall
1787. What does this have to do with anything? THere's pretty much nothing defensible, from either an economic, social, political, or moral background about the state's authority to keep racism out of commerce or public life. It wasn't really even THAT controversial then, isn't now, and there's not really anything to do but either laugh or feel sorry for the Randster for ham-fistedly trying to adopt it into some bizarro conception of "Austrian economics" and then making clownish statements that even people back in the 1880's knew were a bad idea, and which proved to be a bad idea over the next 80 years.
Unfortunately, this is pretty much complete and utter BS propagated by years of rewritten history. Slavery's cause was politically expedient for the union, but it was never a moral underpinning. Lincoln himself was the first president to recognize Liberia as an independent nation, simply because he considered the option of deporting all africans from the US as a "final solution" should an uprising occur - an idea that can be traced all the way back to Jefferson.
Sorry weslinder, your viewpoint here is totally unsubstantiated and, frankly, just a horribly supported libertarian fantasy.
And the LP was negative seven years old (even though he's not a member). Do they and their ilk really need to dog the Civil Rights Bill and put Abe Lincoln at the bottom of their President's list to be ideologically pure in 2010?
It is instructive watching Paul and in this case Weslinder twist themselves in knots tryinging to square the circle so they can maintain the faith..
Sam, you gotta stop typing because your hands must be smoking! Haven't seen a beat-down like that here in a while. Merciless brutality. I assume your keyboard has melted and you need a new one. Just wow!
MADDOW: Do you think that a private business has the right to say we don't serve black people? PAUL: Yes. I'm not in favor of any discrimination of any form. I would never belong to any club that excluded anybody for race. We still do have private clubs in America that can discriminate based on race I've read through this thread, not having made it past the first half page, earlier, and I am astounded at some of the responses in defense of Mister Paul. The excuses literally turn my stomach. Make any excuse you like, and Paul's response to, "Do you think that a private business has the right to say we don't serve black people?" is still "Yes." I'll repeat that... he said yes. Perhaps if some of you were old enough to have experienced racism as blatant as I witnessed back in the 1950's, some sanity might have prevailed, instead of sickening excuses made for a man that should have been spanked as a child for believing such things, rather than obviously encouraged. "Whites Only" restrooms, Blacks sitting in the back of the bus, restaurants Blacks were not allowed to eat at, open use of the word ****** by business owners in everyday conversation in front of customers, along with widespread use of the word by people you passed on the street. That and a lot more. Experience that and then come back here and defend Randal Paul, racist or dumb ass.
Not to get into the argument, but is it currently illegal for a business to only serve a certain race or sex?
I can't go back and experience that myself, but I'll do my best to continue the conversation with the knowledge and experience I do have. My question to you is: Do you think that an individual has the right to say that black people are inferior? I assume the answer is yes, since most of us support freedom of speech even when the speech is vile and wrong. And if that's the case, why is that answer different than Paul's answer?
for one saying something about someone is different then say not giving them the real rights that matter. but it sucks because the same person that says a black person is inferior could be the same person that wont give the job to a black person with the same qualifications just because of there race.
There is a difference between stating a racist thought and acting on it. Your right to free speech does not trump a minority's right to a job or service. The same reason you aren't allowed to punch someone in the nose just for being "an inferior black person," or gay, or whatever. You can say it, you just can't break the law based upon it.
Really? I generally think the part about blacks = 3/5 of a person, and being imported here in chains to serve as slaves - did a pretty good job of effectively segregating blacks from whites in the early days of the republic in a practical sense.
Hate speech can be damaging, too, just not to the degree that discrimination in private business can be. Certainly the examples are different, but are they really so different that some might celebrate the freedom of speech but show outrage at somebody who wants to extend the freedom to private business practices?
