Is Charleston Burning?

 Is Charleston burning? No! 
Why not? Well, I submit it is because Christians in the South, both black and white, love each other and they love Jesus. They are wise enough to not react to outside agitators and not burn their own town. And, to a certain extent, Blacks in the South, still know their place. 
But, there has been major progress in the South. Dr M L King said "the South will solve its race problem long before the North." In the South Blacks and white have lived next to each other forever, and most white babies were suckled by Black nurse maids. And Sunday morning is no longer the most segregated time of the week. 
It is inspiring and encouraging to see the mutual respect that white and Black Christians show each other. The memorial service at Emmanuel AME was beautiful to watch. Black and white Christians singing and praying together. 
God is love. His truth is ever lasting and His mercy endures forever. Bravo Charleston. You have shown the world that Love is stronger than hate; Black and white Christians can live together in peace.
People are praying for racial accord in a city that built its initial fortunes on slavery and has been shaped in part by racial tension and violence since its founding in 1670.

Charleston Appeals for Unity as Services Honor Shooting Victims

Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church reopens; parishioners and civic leaders vow to build racial accord

Worshipers gathered at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, S.C., for the first Sunday service on Fathers' Day, June 21, 2015, since a shooting rampage there killed nine people.(Above: The Rev. Norvel Goff at the slain Rev. Clementa Pinckney’s empty seat. Photo: David Goldman/Press Pool Photo: AP)

(First, among the nine victims was The Rev. Clementa Pinckney, 41: A state senator and the senior pastor of Emanuel, he was married to Jennifer Benjamin and the father of two children, Eliana and Malana. He was a 1995 graduate of Allen University and got his master's degree at the University of South Carolina in 1999. He served in the state Legislature starting in 2000; The Post and Courier says black fabric was draped over Pinckney's Senate chamber seat on Thursday. I believe Senator Clementa Pinckney was the real target of the assassin. The other eight were collateral damage designed to coverup a political assassination.)

CHARLESTON, S.C.— Community leaders and parishioners across this historic city vowed on Sunday to build racial accord in the wake of last week’s killings of nine black members of an African-American church, allegedly by a white man.

Hundreds filled the pews of the historic church in Charleston, South Carolina.

"The doors of the church are open," declared the Rev. Norvel Goff during prayers. "No evildoer, no demon in hell or on Earth can close the doors of God's church," he proclaimed.

They sang hymns, prayed and remembered the nine church members shot to death Wednesday night during Bible study.

One of the victims was the church's pastor, the Rev. Clementa Pinckney. His seat behind the podium was shrouded in black cloth and uniformed police officers were present in the side aisles. 

Overcoming evil with faith in God was a theme throughout the service.

"It's by faith that we are standing here and sitting here," Goff said. "It has been tough. It has been rough. Some of us have been downright angry. But through it all God has sustained us."

But as church bells rang and black and white parishioners prayed together at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, the site of the attack, and at other houses of worship, signs of how challenging that will be were apparent.
At Emanuel AME, a rapturous and racially diverse crowd packed the church, dancing, singing hymns and shaking tambourines to show that the killings could not shake the resolve or faith of one of the oldest black churches in the nation.
Churchgoers lined the walls and crowded the balcony in bow ties and three-piece suits. Hundreds of people stood in the streets, near speakers, to listen to the service. Numerous police officers guarded the proceedings, and teams of grief counselors were on hand.
“A lot of people expected us to do something strange and break out into a riot,” the Rev. Norvel Goff said from the pulpit. “Well, they just don’t know us. They don’t know us because we are a people of faith.” He praised the city for responding with love and compassion.
The minister also vowed to pursue justice for those slain. “We’re going to be vigilant, and we’re going to hold our elected officials responsible to do the right thing,” he said, calling for justice for “those who are still living in the margins of life.”
Charleston built its initial fortunes on slavery and has been shaped in part by racial tension and violence since its founding in 1670. The first shots of the Civil War were fired here, and much of its robust tourist industry plays to notions of a genteel antebellum South, a gentility that was propped up by the institution of slavery.
Over the past few decades the city has changed dramatically, with major companies relocating to the region and upscale shops and vogue restaurants dotting the downtown.
Large banners appeared on some buildings after the shootings, urging racial harmony. An interracial rally was planned for Sunday evening across the Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge, a dramatic span that dominates the city skyline.
Yet outer neighborhoods and nearby communities are impoverished, and many say racial tensions fueled by economic disparities and other issues linger beneath the surface.

As congregants left the church, a large, mostly white crowd greeted them by singing the song “Amazing Grace,” a show of support that brought tears to many peoples’ eyes as they stepped into the hot South Carolina sun.
A little more than a mile away, about 150 parishioners, almost all of them white, gathered for Holy Communion at St. Michael’s Episcopal Church, one of the oldest parishes in the city. Both George Washington and Robert E. Lee once prayed at this ornate church, built in the 1700s, and Charles Pinckney, a signer of the Constitution and a prominent slave-owner, is buried in the adjacent graveyard.
Alfred T.K. Zadig Jr., the 47- year-old rector of St. Michael’s, said he was having dinner only a block away from Emanuel when the shooting took place Wednesday night, and the tragedy made him realize how little connection he had to the city’s black churches.
“I did not know one single person in that church,” said. Mr. Zadig, who has been St. Michael’s rector for eight years. The church now is committing itself to building a relationship with Charleston’s black churches, including contributing money to help Emanuel and inviting members of Emanuel to preach at St. Michael’s, the pastor said.
(By Cameron McWhirter, Josh Dawsey and Mara Gay)

The nine people who were killed in a mass shooting at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, S.C., on Wednesday have been identified by the authorities.
The group of six women and three men had come together for a weekly Bible study meeting. The man who is suspected of killing them is now in police custody.
The Nine Victims are:
(1) The Rev. Clementa Pinckney, 41: A state senator and the senior pastor of Emanuel, he was married to Jennifer Benjamin and the father of two children, Eliana and Malana. He was a 1995 graduate of Allen University and got his master's degree at the University of South Carolina in 1999. He served in the state Legislature starting in 2000; The Post and Courier says black fabric was draped over Pinckney's Senate chamber seat on Thursday. I believe Senator Clementa Pinckney was the real target of the assassin. The other eight were collateral damage designed to coverup a political assassination.

In 1996, at 23, he was elected to the South Carolina House of Representatives, the youngest Black person ever to win such a seat.

Four years later, voters elevated him to the state Senate.

Pinckney became even more influential through his work as a legislator, pushing several causes -- like recently advocating for legislation to make police wear body cameras, believing it would protect lives, according to his cousin, state Sen. Kent Williams.

According to local media reports from the time, Rev Pinckney attended a vigil in North Charleston in the aftermath of the shooting of Walter Scott, an unarmed Black man by a white police officer.
Walter Scott’s fatal shooting by Officer Michael Slager was captured on camera by an eyewitness, and Rev Pinckney emphasized the significance of that video to the public’s perception of the case. Slager has been indicted for murder in the shooting and is awaiting trial.
Rev Pinckney led calls for mandatory police body cameras, and rallied the public to show their support.
"I think that if my colleagues will be moved by the fact that other people are moved by the need for body cameras, and also that there will be persons that will give testimony as to why body cameras are important,” he said.
“Body cameras help to record what happens. It may not be the golden ticket, the golden egg, the end-all-fix-all, but it helps to paint a picture of what happens during a police stop."

Following the shooting of Walter Scott by a North Charleston police officer in April, South Carolina state Senator Clementa Pinckney stepped up on the Senate floor to speak in support of legislation that called for the establishment and implementation of guidelines for the use of body cameras by the state’s law enforcement officers.
Pinckney, the pastor at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, was one of nine people killed in a shooting at the church on Wednesday night.
“Today, the nation looks at South Carolina and is looking at us to see if we will rise to be the body and to be the state that we really say that we are,” Pinckney said in April, adding that Scott’s death had created a “yearning for justice” across the country.
Scott’s fatal shooting by Officer Michael Slager was captured on camera by an eyewitness, and Pinckney emphasized the significance of that video to the public’s perception of the case. Slager has been indicted for murder in the shooting and is awaiting trial.
Pinckney compared those who would be skeptical of allegations that an officer shot an unarmed man in the back multiple times to Jesus’ apostle Thomas, who is described in the Bible as refusing to believe that Jesus had risen from the dead until he could see and feel Jesus’ wounds himself.
“Like Thomas,” Pinckney said, “when we were able to see the video, and we were able to see the gunshots, and when we saw him fall to the ground…and to see him die face down in the ground as if he were gunned down like game, I believe we all were like Thomas and said, ‘I believe.’”
“We have a great opportunity to allow sunshine into this process,” Pinckney told his colleagues, “to at least give us new eyes for seeing so that we’re able to make sure that our proud and great law enforcement officers and every citizen that we represent is able to at least know that they will be seen and heard and that their rights will be protected.”
The legislation, which gained bipartisan support, passed and was signed by the governor on June 10.
“I think that speech is what made the difference in that bill passing,” said state Senator Kevin Johnson.
Johnson, one of the legislation’s sponsors, said Pinckney delivered “almost a little sermon” that swayed some people who were on the fence about the bill and silenced some of its critics.
“That’s just what Clem was good at,” he said.
Johnson said Pinckney’s death will be a huge loss for the legislature, noting that he worked well with members of both parties and he knew how to bridge the gap between them.
“He’s one of those guys that everything he said made sense…You don’t find people like that just every day,” Johnson said.
Johnson said Pinckney genuinely cared about other people, and particularly about those in the state’s rural and small communities.
“He was the kind of person we need more of,” Johnson said.
Pinckney’s cousin, political commentator Armstrong Williams, called him a “peacemaker” in an interview with NewsChannel 8’s Bruce DePuyt Thursday.
“Clementa as a boy always wanted to be a preacher,” Williams said. “Politics was not something that was on his mind.”
Williams said Pinckney ran for the state legislature because people in his congregation kept encouraging him to do it, and because he saw that not enough was being done by politicians about the issues that concerned his community.
Pinckney was elected to the state House of Representatives in 1996 at age 23, and he was elected to the Senate in 2000.
“It was not something that he wanted to do,” Williams said, “and he decided to run and he won, and he made a huge difference. This guy was loved and respected on both sides of the aisle.”
“And yet, life gone for no reason at all,” he added.
(2) Cynthia Hurd, 54: According to the Charleston County Public Library, she was a 31-year employee who managed the John L. Dart Library for 21 years before heading the St. Andrews Regional Library. A statement said Hurd "dedicated her life to serving and improving the lives of others." The system closed its 16 branches Thursday to honor Hurd and the others who died in the shooting. County officials also say the St. Andrews library will be named for Hurd.
(3) The Rev. Sharonda Coleman-Singleton, 45: A pastor at Emanuel, she was also a speech therapist and high school girls track and field coach, both positions at Goose Creek High School, according to her LinkedIn page. Jimmy Huskey, the school's principal, called her "a true professional ... [who] cared about her students and was an advocate for them." Her son, Chris Singleton, is a baseball player and student at Charleston Southern University. Coleman-Singleton also had two younger children, writes the Post and Courier.
(4) Tywanza Sanders, 26: He was a 2014 graduate in business administration from Allen University in Columbia. Lady June Cole, the interim president of Allen University, described him as "a quiet, well-known student who was committed to his education." Known as Ty, he had worked in sales at department stores such as Belk and Macy's.
(5) Ethel Lance, 70: She had attended Emanuel for most of her life and worked there as a custodian, as well. From 1968 to 2002, she worked as a custodian at Charleston's Gaillard Municipal Auditorium. The Post and Courier quotes a former colleague as saying, "She was funny and a pleasure to be around. And she was a wonderful mother and grandmother."
(6) Susie Jackson, 87: Lance's cousin, she was a longtime church member.
(7) Depayne Middleton Doctor, 49: The mother of four sang in Emanuel's choir. She had previously directed a community development program in Charleston County. In December, she started a new job as an admissions coordinator at the Charleston campus of her alma mater, Southern Wesleyan University. SWU President Todd Voss said: "Always a warm and enthusiastic leader, DePayne truly believed in the mission of SWU to help students achieve their potential by connecting faith with learning. Our prayers go out to family and friends. This is a great loss for our students and the Charleston region."
(8) The Rev. Daniel Simmons, 74: Simmons survived the initial attack but then died in a hospital operating room. He had previously been a pastor at another church in the Charleston area.
(9) Myra Thompson, 59: She was the wife of the Rev. Anthony Thompson, the vicar of Holy Trinity Reformed Episcopal Church in Charleston.

An Independent Judiciary Checks An Imperial Presidency

THE IMPERIAL PRESIDENCY

Obama amnesty takes another hit in court

Judges affirm injunction against executive order-driven program

President Obama announces his executive action on immigration Nov. 20, 2014

A panel of three judges on the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a lower court’s order halting President Obama’s executive action delaying deportation for up to 5 million illegal aliens.
The 5th Circuit denied a motion to stay the injunction and narrow its scope because, determining the government is unlikely to succeed on the merits of its appeal.
The opinion said the government’s action “makes aliens who were not otherwise qualified for federal public benefits eligible for ‘social security retirement benefits, security disability benefits, [and] health insurance under Part A of the Medicare program.’”
“Further, ‘each person who applies for deferred action pursuant to the [DAPA] criteria … shall also be eligible to apply for work authorization for the [renewable three-year] period of deferred action.’”
Such procedures would allow illegal aliens to “‘obtain a Social Security Number,’ ‘accrue quarters of covered employment,’ and ‘correct wage records to add prior covered employment,’” the opinion said.
It warned that should the program ultimately struck down, the illegal aliens who participated would have benefited improperly.
The injunction, the judges said, preserves the status quo.
“Under the injunction, DHS can choose whom to remove first; the only thing it cannot do is grant class-wide lawful presence and eligibility for accompanying benefits as incentives for low-priority aliens to self-identify in advance,” the court said.
The ruling Tuesday, 26 May, upheld the injunction issued by U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen.
His preliminary injunction in February said: “The United States of America, its departments, agencies, officers, agents and employees and Jeh Johnson, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security; R. Gil Kerlikowske, commissioner of United States customs and Border Protection; Ronald D. Vitiello, deputy chief of United States Border Patrol, United States Customs and Border Protection; Thomas S. Winkowski, acting director of United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement; and Leon Rodriguez, director of United States Citizenship and Immigration Services are hereby enjoined from implementing any and all aspects or phases of the Deferred Action for Parents of Americans and Lawful Permanent Residents.”
Hanen later refused a government request to lift his order halting Obama’s DAPA program.
The appeals court ruling marks a huge setback for Obama’s strategy of giving millions of Democrat-leaning illegals a pathway to legal residency, Social Security numbers and other benefits, including critics say, voting rights.
David Limbaugh’s book chillingly documents the destructive “transformation” of the United States — get “The Great Destroyer: Barack Obama’s War on the Republic”
The case was brought by 26 states, led by Texas.
The judge released documentation of what he described as the government’s misleading statements, the Los Angeles Times reported.
Hanen’s ruling followed tense exchanges in court between government lawyers and the judge. Hanen had expressed frustration with the government for failing to inform him that officials had given deferred action to 108,000 applicants shortly after Obama announced his plan in November.
“The court expects all parties, including the government of the United States, to act in a forthright manner and not hide behind deceptive representations and half-truths,” Hanen wrote.
Attorneys for the 26 states are arguing Obama’s executive action causes “irreparable harm” to their local interests.
WND reported Hanen ordered, at the time, the government to explain why federal officials had approved tens of thousands of three-year exemptions between Nov. 24, 2014, and Hanen’s injunction.
Hanen’s order, Feb. 16, did not block a 2012 plan that offers amnesty to those who were brought to the U.S. illegally as children.
But that program doesn’t provide for three-year exemptions, only two-year exemptions. The new exemptions are part of the administration’s November orders, which are the subject of the current case.
The Texas case was joined by Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who has a similar case before a federal appeals court in Washington, D.C..
Hanen’s order faulted the Obama amnesty plan because officials failed to comply with the Administrative Procedures Act.
Meanwhile, Obama, according to the Washington Times, told a Miami crowd he would move ahead with his executive action on immigration and vowed his administration would become even more aggressive in the weeks and months to come.
A filing from attorney Larry Klayman of Freedom Watch noted Obama said: “This is just one federal judge. We have appealed it very aggressively. We’re going to be as aggressive as we can.”
Wrote Klayman: “The Obama administration is continuing to signal not only its disagreement with the court’s order, which is its right, but beyond that its non-compliance with the court’s order.”
The Texas lawsuit was filed when the states suddenly faced massive new demands for public services such as schooling and health care from foreigners who previously had been subject to deportation.
Hanen granted a preliminary injunction that prevents the government from enforcing the Obama administration’s immigration orders. The ruling also confirmed WND’s exclusive report that, contrary to popular perception, the order to delay deportation was not an executive order by the president. Instead, it was a memorandum issued by Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson at Obama’s direction.
Klayman even noted that according to a Weekly Standard report, Obama was threatening “consequences” for federal employees who followed the judge’s order instead of the amnesty memos from Johnson.
That report quoted Obama saying: “Until we pass a law through Congress, the executive actions we’ve taken are not going to be permanent; they are temporary. There are going to be some jurisdictions and there may be individual ICE official or Border Control agent not paying attention to our new directives. But they’re going to be answerable to the head of Homeland Security because he’s been very clear about what our priorities will be.”
He continued, “If somebody’s working for ICE … and they don’t follow the policy, there’s going to be consequences to it.”
Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., at the time described the administration’s action as “another program that has not been authorized by law.”
“There’s been no sense at all by President Obama, the Department of Home Security [Secretary] Jeh Johnson, the Democratic members of this Congress, no concern about the employment prospects of lawful immigrants, green card holders and native-born Americans,” Sessions told the Times. “The first thing we should do is be focusing on getting jobs for Americans that are unemployed. Are we going to keep Americans on welfare and benefits while we bring in more and more foreigners to take jobs when we’ve got Americans ready and willing to take those jobs?”
Sen Ted Cruz, R-Texas, also raised the issue of compliance with the court order.
“Violating an unambiguous federal court order by defying its instructions to cease and desist a particular activity would represent a significant breach of your authority, and would be an escalation in abuse of our separation of powers,” Cruz wrote to administration officials. “For a president and his cabinet to telegraph intent to violate a federal court order requires additional scrutiny from Congress.”
But administration officials were unabashed in their intent.
The Washington Times said Cecilia Munoz, White House domestic policy director, addressed the issue: “It’s important to put [Hanen's order] in context, because the broader executive actions are moving forward. The administration continues to implement the portions of the actions that the president and the Department of Homeland Security took, which were not affected by the court’s ruling.”
Even Obama himself said, however, he couldn’t grant amnesty alone.
House Speaker John Boehner has listed 22 times when Obama has made such statements.
For example, in October 2010, Obama said: “I am president, I am not king. I can’t do these things just by myself. … I’ve got to have some partners to do it. … If Congress has laws on the books that says that people who are here who are not documented have to be deported, then I can exercise some flexibility in terms of where we deploy our resources, to focus on people who are really causing problems as opposed to families who are just trying to work and support themselves. But there’s a limit to the discretion that I can show because I am obliged to execute the law. … I can’t just make the laws up by myself.”
WND also reported when yet another a federal judge in Pennsylvania declared the amnesty unconstitutional.
“President Obama’s unilateral legislative action violates the separation of powers provided for in the United States Constitution as well as the Take Care Clause and, therefore, is unconstitutional,” said U.S. District Judge Arthur J. Schwab.
The judge noted Obama “contended that although legislation is the most appropriate course of action to solve the immigration debate, his executive action was necessary because of Congress’ failure to pass legislation, acceptable to him, in this regard.”
“This proposition is arbitrary and does not negate the requirement that the November 20, 2014, executive action be lawfully within the president’s executive authority,” the judge wrote. “It is not.”
(By Bob Unruh, WND)

Webster Smith's Former Attorney, Ronald Machen, Was A Good Man, Once

                                       

The Obama Administration’s latest gift to Lois Lerner, the former IRS tax-exempt chief, came recently when U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Ronald Machen informed the House of Representatives that he would not file charges on its formal contempt citation against Ms. Lerner. This absolution, which shields Ms. Lerner from a grand jury probe, came on Ronald Machen’s final day on the job. Then he pulled a quick disappearing act.

                                                            (Ronald Machen)
To review the Facts:
Ronald Machen is no stranger to high profile cases, and he has taken his share to the U.S. Supreme Court.

He represented former Coast Guard Academy cadet, Webster Smith in his efforts to overturn his 2006 court-martial conviction.
(https://www.amazon.com/author/cgachall.blogspot.com)


    (Lois Lerner)
 If Americans know anything about the IRS it’s that it accepts no excuses, and so they trudged wearily on Wednesday, April 15th, to pay their taxes. That’s in notable contrast to the free passes that keep flowing to the tax agency’s most famous former employee, Lois Lerner.
Ms. Lerner was summoned to the House on May 22, 2013, to answer questions about her role in the IRS’s politically biased review of Tea Party nonprofit group applications for tax-exempt status.
She began her testimony with a statement recounting her career, reprising the scandal and proclaiming her innocence. She ended by saying: “I have not done anything wrong. I have not broken any laws, I have not violated any IRS rules or regulations, and I have not provided false information to this or any other congressional committee.” Only after she offered this long defense did she claim her right not to incriminate herself by citing the Fifth Amendment, refusing to answer questions.
House lawyers determined that, in making that statement, Ms. Lerner had forfeited her right to remain silent. The House on May 7, 2014 held her in contempt of Congress and sent the citation to Ronald Machen.
The law clearly explains that the U.S. Attorney’s only “duty” “shall be” to “bring the matter before the grand jury for its action.” Mr. Machen instead sat on the contempt citation for 11 months, and on March 31 sent Speaker John Boehner a letter explaining he ha unilaterally decided not to investigate Ms. Lerner.
According to Ronald Machen’s rationale, Ms. Lerner’s statement made only “general claims of innocence” that did not forfeit her Fifth Amendment rights to refuse to answer questions. To reach this conclusion, Ronald Machen had to willfully ignore that Ms. Lerner, in her statement, rebutted specific accusations against her.
“[M]embers of this committee have accused me of providing false information when I responded to questions about the IRS processing of applications for tax exemption,” she said, before claiming she had never done so. Those accusations had been detailed to her in a letter from former House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrel Issa, eight days before she testified.
Ronald Machen also had to ignore that Ms. Lerner had prior to her House appearance voluntarily met for an interview with Justice prosecutors. As the Heritage Foundation’s Hans von Spakovsky has noted, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals in its 1969 Ellis v. U.S. decision found that “once a witness has voluntarily spoken out, we do not see how his protected interest is jeopardized by testifying in a subsequent proceeding, provided he is not required to disclose matters of substance which are unknown to the Government.”
Since Ms. Lerner had already disclosed to the “government” (prosecutors), she lost her privilege to clam up before Congress. And we’d note that after her House stonewall, she again chose to speak in an interview with the Politico website. Ms. Lerner wants the right not to answer questions except when it suits her public-relations purposes.
In any event, the job of making these legal calls belonged to a grand jury—not Ronald Machen.

                                         (Eric Holder with Ronald Machen)

Then again, this is the prosecutor who in an exit interview with the National Law Journal about his tenure touted his allegiance to Attorney General Eric Holder, describing him as a “tremendous mentor and a tremendous friend.”
After Ronald Machen’s performance in shielding Ms. Lerner from the consequences of her actions, Mr. Holder would no doubt return the compliment. The handling of the IRS scandal is a blot on both of their careers. 
(Source: wall Street Journal Opinion, Apr15, 2015)

Driving A Nice Car Can be A Drag, If You Are Black

There’s No Such Crime As ‘Driving While White’

The shooting of Walter L. Scott in South Carolina prompts the question:
When is the last time you heard of a white man in a Mercedes-Benz being pulled over for driving with a broken taillight?

It has probably happened somewhere, sometime, but there’s a better chance of your car being hit by a meteor.
Getting shot dead during a minor traffic stop also isn’t a prevailing fear among white males in America, no matter what type of vehicle they own.
Scott himself didn’t imagine he was going to die when he was pulled over. Unfortunately, he happened to be a Black man driving a Mercedes, which is what got him noticed. He was behind on child-support payments and probably didn’t want to go to jail.
Something happened at the scene, Scott got Tased and then tried to run away. Officer Michael Slager fired eight times, hitting the unarmed 50-year-old in the back. The killing was caught on cellphone video by a bystander.
Slager told the dispatcher that Scott had snatched his Taser, but the video shows the officer dropping an object that looks just like a Taser near Scott’s handcuffed body. Slager has been charged with murder and fired from his job.

The shooting was shocking to watch, as the whole world has, yet the sequence of events leading up to it is sadly familiar to Black men in this country. They can’t afford to drive around as carefree as us white guys.
In September, a South Carolina state trooper shot and wounded another unarmed Black motorist after pulling him over because he allegedly wasn’t wearing his seatbelt.
I’ve got white friends who rarely buckle up, yet I don’t know of one who has been ticketed for it, or even stopped and warned. Maybe they’re just lucky.
The Black comedian Chris Rock uses his Twitter account to record his traffic-stop encounters. In a recent seven-week period, he was pulled over three times (once as a passenger).
It’s possible he and his friends aren’t very good drivers. It’s also possible they’ve been targeted merely for “Driving While Black,”(DWB) an unwritten offense that still exists in many regions of the country, not just the Deep South — and not just in high-crime areas.
The odds would be fairly slim for a Black man driving a luxury car not to be pulled over at least once on a road trip between, say, Utah and North Dakota. Even in a ’98 Taurus he’d need to be watching the rear-view mirror for blue lights.
Generalizing about traffic stops can be problematic. The numbers often spike in certain neighborhoods at certain times of day, and a small number of officers can account for many incidents of racial profiling.

Still, the evidence that it exists is more than anecdotal.
Using a “Police-Public Contact Survey,” the U.S. Justice Department analyzed traffic stops of drivers aged 16 or older nationwide during 2011, comparing by race and weighting by population.
To the astonishment of hardly anyone, Black drivers were about 31 percent more likely to be pulled over than white drivers, and approximately 23 percent more likely to be pulled over than Hispanic motorists.
A series published by the Washington Post in September reported that minority drivers had their cars searched (and cash seized) at a higher rate than white drivers. That jibed with the Justice Department’s conclusion that vehicle searches occurred substantially more often when the driver wasn’t white.
Another unsurprising fact: Compared to other races, white drivers were most likely to get pulled over for speeding. Black drivers were statistically more likely to be stopped for vehicle defects or record checks.
Which is what happened to Walter L. Scott in North Charleston.
Never in almost five decades of driving have I been pulled over for a busted brake light or a burned-out headlight, even though I’ve had a few.
It didn’t matter whether I was in a Dodge, Oldsmobile, Jeep, Ford, Chevy or even, for a while, a Mercedes SUV.
The only thing I’ve ever been stopped for is, like many impatient white people, driving too fast.
And every time a police officer walked up to my car, I knew exactly why he or she wanted to chat with me. It was no mystery whatsoever.

That’s not always the case for a Black man behind the wheel of a car in this country. This is not just a perception; it’s a depressing reality.
If it had been me or Matt Lauer or even faux Hispanic Jeb Bush driving that Mercedes-Benz in South Carolina, Officer Slager wouldn’t have stopped the car. Not for a busted taillight, no way.
Which prompts another question: How long can this go on?
(Carl Hiaasen is a columnist for The Miami Herald. Readers may write to him at: 1 Herald Plaza, Miami, FL, 33132.)
Photo: Redjar via Flickr

How to Win a Social Security Disability Claim? Find The Right Judge.

Disability Claim Denied? Find the Right Judge

Nine percent of the judges who hear appeals grant benefits 90% of the time, costing taxpayers tens of billions.

 

To all parties involved in a trial, the slam of a gavel should indicate that justice has been served. Unfortunately, this is often not the case with Social Security Disability (SSDI and SSI) appeals. A system designed to serve society’s vulnerable has morphed into a benefit bonanza that costs taxpayers billions of dollars more than it should. The disability trust fund will become insolvent in 2016, and Congress would be wise to begin much needed reform.
A disability applicant whose claim is rejected during the Social Security Administration’s (SSA) first two stages ( before State Disability Determination Services)  can appeal the decision to administrative-law judges (ALJ). These judges must impartially balance the claims of the applicant against the interests of taxpayers.
Over the past decade judicial impartiality has declined significantly, as many administrative-law judges uncritically approve most claims. In 2008 judges on average approved about 70% of claims before them, according to the Social Security Administration. Nine percent of judges approved more than 90% of benefit requests that landed on their desks.
Do nine out of every 10 applicants appealing denied claims need societal support? There are reasons for skepticism. The data show that judges who are generous in granting benefits are consistently generous over time—which is suspicious, since each year they should hear a random set of new cases. The more discerning judges—those who award benefits less than 90% of the time—are more unpredictable from year to year.

(Photo: Getty Images/Illustration Works)

If the judges with award rates topping 90% are removed from the data, the rate of denial increases by 2%-3% annually. That amounts to 98,000 claims from 2005-11. Assuming an average lifetime award of $250,000, taxpayers would have saved $23 billion over those six years had the worst judges left the bench. If we lower the threshold to exclude judges with award rates north of 85%, these savings increase to $41 billion.
Former Social Security Commissioner Michael Astrue, who took office in 2007, made much-needed changes. Incompetent incumbents saw their influence diluted by new judges drawn from fresh candidate lists. Judicial decisions are now randomly reviewed to ensure that the court remains impartial and fair to taxpayers. Judges were limited to hearing 1,000 cases a year (the figure has since been lowered to 700), and individuals are allowed only one disability application at a time.
Mr. Astrue’s reforms have produced good results. In 2011 judges with award rates exceeding 90% heard a mere 4% of all cases, a 63.6% decline from 2008. But Mr. Astrue’s term expired in 2013, and these changes can easily be undone, either intentionally by future administrators, or unintentionally as bad habits slip back into the system.
His program to increase accountability and judicial turnover should be made permanent. Congress should also institute 15-year term limits for judges, who currently enjoy lifetime tenure, to ensure that fresh legal minds are joining the stale judicial aristocracy. A term of a decade and a half is long enough to insulate judges and prevent undue political influence.
The system faces a huge backlog, made worse by claimants who play adjudication roulette, filing and then withdrawing appeals in hopes of drawing a generous judge. Congress can limit this gamesmanship by allowing only one application per claimant in a three-year period. Because judges must marshal more documentation for a denial than an approval, they have an incentive to grant benefits to keep the system chugging along. The agency can fix this by further limiting the number of cases each judge must decide to 500 from 700.
The system is further complicated because even if a claimant has legal counsel, the judge must advocate on the claimant’s behalf. This dual role should be ended. Most claimants—85%—now have third-party representation. These professionals should be held responsible for getting supporting materials into court expeditiously and completely so the record can be closed in a timely manner.
Even under better legal rules, judges will still face rigid and outdated guidelines for granting benefits. The framework they must follow—known as the Medical Vocational Grid (known as The Listings)—is formulaic to the point of senselessness. For instance, the bar to benefits approval is lower for someone who doesn’t speak English, on the theory that it is difficult to find a job without the language. But that English rule is also applied to claimants from Puerto Rico, where the language of business is Spanish.
These guidelines (in The Listings) also do not give due consideration to actual labor market experience, dictating a looser approval standard for someone with only a high-school degree, even if the person has succeeded in the labor force for decades.
The framework (of The Listings) was developed in the late 1950s, for the previous generation’s workforce, and hasn’t been updated since 1978. Decades ago workers ages 50 or 55 might have been considered retiring, but this is no longer generally the case. Novel job-training programs also make it easier than ever for workers to move into new fields and make up for low levels of education, and new disability criteria would account for these changes.
These solutions would begin to deliver meaningful reform to Social Security disability awards. They can restore dignity and efficacy to a troubled system.
 (BY Mark J. Warshawsky And Ross A. Marchand, March 8, 2015) 
(Mr. Warshawsky is a visiting scholar at the Mercatus Center of George Mason University and a former member of the Social Security Advisory Board from 2006 to 2012. Mr. Marchand is a first-year economics graduate student at George Mason University.)

Brian Seel 45 minutes ago

Yet another data point to support the idea that the safety net should be completely privatized (with our dollars returned to us and taxes lowered so we may support and do the work).

The way you make calls in these cases is with people, in their community, sitting and talking to these people.  Don't make it a faceless claimant identified only by a social security number.  Let them sit in front of their neighbor, who not without compassion, also will get to know them, but also will know that there is a call center 2 miles down the road that is hiring.

The only incentive bureaucrats ever have is to keep the dollars rolling out the door.  It's how we got in this mess in the first place.  

Bill Wald 27 minutes ago

@Brian Seel Before FDR and SS the safety net was completely privatized. Many old people without a family who could/would care for them starved or froze to death in the winter. That's why SS was started.

These days many American would rather pay to have feral cats sterilized and released than to contribute cash money to help homeless and/or foster children. Many foster children in the US are functionally "homeless." So are many children theoretically with homes.

For the first million years, humans knew the difference between their food and their pets. These days, many Americans don't know the difference between food, pets, and children.

Brian Seel 13 minutes ago

@Bill Wald @Brian Seel Bill, there is a difference between a privatized safety net in a nation without two pennies to rub together (the Depression era America you speak of) and the wealthiest nation in the history of the world.  Point #1.

Point #2 would be that the system is already far more privatized than you realize.  I've done volunteer work for years with the poor.  The first question you always ask them is what state aid they are receiving.

Inevitably, when budgets are tight, Democratic governors turn off the spigot (they just don't tell you).  I saw many, many legitimate hard cases who the state lacked the werewithal to help and were it not for private charities would have frozen to death.

Point #3, the world of restricted charity you describe is precisely a function of two things.  One a government that claims to be caring for everyone (a lie).  Two, a world where the average taxpayer sends half their income to the government.

Change the paradigm, change the behavior.  

bruce miller just now

@Bill Wald @Brian Seel
Bill, this article is about fraud and abuse, not denying benefits to people who need them.
Aren't you even a little bit offended by the notion of a government that takes the cash of hard working Americans to dispense it to people who submit fraudulent disability claims?

Joseph Lorenzo 1 hour ago

Stacked deck. So lets see: we have the plaintiff, his attorney, the judge who also acts as the plaintiff's attorney on one side and the taxpayer, who is not represented by anyone and not even there, on the other side. Why would anyone be surprised by such a high number of reversals? What I would like to know is how fraudulent were the cases whose appeal was denied?

TOM PAINTER 2 hours ago

Take from the Medicare payroll taxes whatever it is that actuaries say could be Social Security Disability's portion and use it to pay into private disability insurance plans, parceling out Social Security beneficiaries randomly to dozens of insurance companies; with no other revenues or "subsidies" for the program going to them.  I doubt they will long permit the present fraud that is taking place.

David Lenihan 3 hours ago

This raises the question....Is it possible that judges are being bribed by attorneys to approve cases?  You decide.

Henry Lyczak 3 hours ago

The whole 1-800-(I can get you a piece of something for nothing) lawyer circus has got to end.  It is facilitated by lack of adult supervision in our judiciary.  The law is what I interpret it to be based on my own biases.  Of course, Congress could help by writing laws that are clear and specific.  But then, they could not go back to campaign contributors and tell them each got what they paid for.

murray veroff 4 hours ago

These disturbing stories indicate that members of congress must also be members of the press. The latter knows and discloses so much more than members of congress. Sad.

david berliner 4 hours ago

A bounty system should be created to claw back false claims.

Gregg Larson 4 hours ago

So much for an independent judiciary.

Robert Stewart 4 hours ago

That people are willing to accept a disability income instead of working and advancing their incomes is blowback to Piketty's thesis.

Bill Wald 49 minutes ago

@Robert Stewart I know a middle aged person with a Ph.D  who has been on disability for 20 years because of arthritis but can walk their large dog every day.

Mark Weidmann 4 hours ago

People seem to not realize that the disability system is an insurance system. All the beneficiaries pay into the disability system through reductions in their pay checks during their their working lives. When they become disabled from working, they are supposed to receive the disability benefits. Anybody working I. The system knows that far too many people who should get benefits are denied, then the other way around. There is nothing in this article that indicates otherwise.

Kevin Brandon 4 hours ago

What a joke. The sheer magnitude of the increase in disability awards defies all probability.

Duane Brosky 4 hours ago

@Mark Weidmann Disability has become the income of last resort under this administration.

Kenneth Gimbel 6 hours ago

It would have been informative to learn what percentage of those applying for disability benefits were rejected thus prompting them to resort to administrative law review. Is the system set up to withhold benefits regardless of their merit?  Before insinuating the worst, the author should have presented a complete picture of the process.

Tom Taggart 6 hours ago

@Kenneth Gimbel Peripheral contact with the system indicates to me that most applications are denied initially, but then granted on appeal. When the appeal is granted, applicants get "back pay" for about 18 months.  Typically, the attorney representing the applicant on appeal gets 20~25% of this award.

Tom Wallace 7 hours ago

There can be no argument that this country needs a solid safety net for those that are less fortunate.
However, we now have a hammock instead of a safety net. That, in the end, removes the needed safety net as there are simply not enough resources to go around.
It's basic economics and very few are taught basic economics, or so it seems.
Tom W
Working today so others don't have to

Mark Weidmann 4 hours ago

Problem is the field of economics is an intellectual disaster. Starting with false and empirically unverified assumptions about people and the world, the field of economics then reasons to incorrect, mistaken, and empirically uncertified conclusions. Your statement is in the same vein.

John Pound 3 hours ago

@Mark Weidmann We have an $18T national debt & the SSA says disability program runs out of money in 2016.

Which part of that is empirically uncertified conclusion?

KEVIN BURNS 14 hours ago

Is it perhaps time to change from a single judge to a jury?  Allow a panel to tune in via the net and give a quick thumbs up or thumbs down.

John Yungton 7 hours ago

@KEVIN BURNS  Can anyone currently getting disability be on the panel?

KEVIN BURNS 3 hours ago

@John Yungton @KEVIN BURNS
NO.

Thomas Yasin 2 hours ago

@KEVIN BURNS -- Juries are notorious for giving away Other People's Money.

JAMES WADDELL 16 hours ago

There is rampant fraud in both the Social Security and the Veterans' Administration disability programs and both systems need to be reformed.

That being said, I do believe there should be different standards based on education.  If you are a high school dropout capable of only manual labor, a back injury that would be a minor inconvenience to an office worker may be totally disabling to you.  

Charles Stehney 16 hours ago

Detroit Free had a brief story and a link to the Michigan County Disability Database.

Rural Counties and Detroit's Wayne County are reporting higher disability than the national average.  This isn't disability.  This is economic parochialism with Judges trying to bring money back to their local citizens.  Milking Social Security until it collapses.

JAIRO PUENTES 17 hours ago

Congress should review the selection of these judges an establish more rigorous standards for disability claims. As a doctor, I see many people who are on disability and work as landscapers or for a family member to evade reporting earnings. There is too much fraud in the system

John Yungton 7 hours ago

@JAIRO PUENTES  You could view Congress's salary as another form of disability payments, just from another purse pocket.

Mark Weidmann 4 hours ago

The standards are already very rigorous.