I once saw a posting on facebook that said that “I don’t lose friends because of politics; I lose friends because of morals. The first time I saw that posting I thought it was funny. Over the past year though it has become less funny and truer. Most of the people I hang around with have similar morals that I do. Let’s face it. Voter suppression and racism are not political issues they are moral issues. Voter suppression is meant to do just what it says. Stop people from voting. When a mostly party of White Politicians does it you have to call it what it really is. Racism!  

As I have stated in more than one posting I used to lean Republican. It wasn’t until Newt Gingrich’s Contract with America did I start looking a little differently at the Republican Party. On the surface it was a good sounding piece of work but I just had an uneasy feeling that we were going to start going in a direction that I did not think was good.  What I saw was as a power grab to weaken the scandal ridden Presidency of Bill Clinton. It was meant to divide and divide it did in my opinion. They flipped both Houses, Congress and the Senate and in-turn led to the taking of the White House in 2000 even though Bush was not the popular chose of the people. It weakened a Democratic President and then helped make Bush a too powerful President that led us into two unfunded wars that we still do not have a solution for. But the one thing that wasn’t written in the Contract, that was clear to me, was the fact the Christian right was going to force it will upon the Republican Party.  To this day not everyone is welcome at the Lord’s table and voter suppression just shows it.

The White Southern Church has historically been racist.  The bible was used to justify the enslavement of a whole race of people and just feed into the White Supremacy movement that we still have today. The Southern White Democrats that left the Democratic party because of civil rights would become the foundation to the white supremacy of the Republican Party today. I live through all of this. My youth was shaped by the images of the Bloody Bridge, the riots and the assassination of King. I know what racism is. It is not something that you can just say “I am no longer going to be a racist”. It is something that is imbedded into you during your youth and can stay inside you all your life no matter what you outside appearance might say. I have a Black friend who is an Episcopalian Minister. I had a few conversations with him on race and I always described myself a recovering racist.

We live in a digital age that we can get all the information that we can digest in a matter of seconds. I can communicate with not only people in our own country live, but also around the world. With all this technology why in god’s name are we making people wait in line for 8hrs to vote. We have all this technology but you don’t trust it? This technology that controls our nuclear arsenal? This technology that our military is dependent upon to keep us safe? You don’t think that is technology is not safe enough for voting but is safe enough to keep us safe from world destruction? What technology can do is make it harder for you to suppress people. Technology can help or hinder the fight against racism. It can be a tool of misinformation or a tool for the truth.

I have written many times on tweeted that voter suppression and racism go hand in hand. Racism is not just against blacks. It is against any minority. Black and Latinos take the brunt of it but all people that are not white face some form of racism almost daily. Voter suppression is only part of the problem. Its purpose is to keep the racists in power. I know that you will tell me that I am not being fair, that not all Republicans are racist or white supremists. It seems to me when it comes to suppressing the vote the Republicans vote with one mind. When I was a young boy my mother use to always tell me that I was as only as good as the company I keep. That is where the morals come in. I do not lose friend over politics. I lose friends over morals. That is why I will always be an Independent. What are the morals of your political party?