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drokhole

(1,230 posts)
Fri Jun 24, 2016, 01:45 PM Jun 2016

The Cynical Sit-In (Jacobin)

The Cynical Sit-In (Jacobin)
The congressional sit-in was not just cynical political theater — it was for a deeply reactionary cause.

It’s the season of political antics and this time around, the Democratic Party refuses to be outdone. House Democrats, led by civil rights godfather John Lewis, have staged a sit-in to allow for votes on gun control legislation. Earlier in the week four such measures were rejected, including a bill sponsored by California senator Dianne Feinstein which called for expanding the “Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment,” known more commonly as the “terrorist watchlist.” The entire watchlist has more than eight hundred thousand names on it, far more than the “no-fly” sub-list with sixty-four thousand names. Feinstein’s legislation called for a weapons ban to be applied to the entire list.

So while Democrats were also pursuing legislation calling for stricter background checks and a ban on assault weapons, the focus of their protests have coalesced around a demand to bar people who have been placed on the “terror watchlist.” The failure of Republicans to act on gun control legislation is a curious breaking point for the Democratic Party. House Democrats have endured the political recalcitrance of the Republican Party without protest on any number of issues that affect millions of Americans.

Where have the sit-ins been to protest the continued cuts to social welfare? Where have the congressional protests been to demand affordable housing or a public option for healthcare? Where have the sit-ins been to demand an end to police brutality and mass incarceration?

(snip)

But the Democrats have resorted to Republican dirty tricks to spur interest and support in the 2016 presidential election by relying on racism, xenophobia, and fear as their rallying cry. The Democratic Party has never been more cynical. In the aftermath of the horrific tragedy of the Orlando massacre, House Democrats are exploiting people’s genuine fear to strengthen the country’s security state and to further justify the “war on terror.” In fact, as more evidence comes to light, it appears that the shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando may have had nothing to do with any terrorist network.

(snip)

This database is not composed of people convicted of a crime or even formally charged with one. It is secretly generated and so arbitrary that even sit-in leader Representative John Lewis found himself inexplicably on it. In a 2014 letter addressed to Homeland Security, Lewis complained about the absence of due process to remove oneself from the list. Lewis correctly noted that the no-fly list “provides no effective means of redress for unfair or incorrect designations.” We should call it what it actually is: a mostly Arab and Muslim watchlist. If we accept that such a database — for which there is no formal or legal process to be placed on or removed from — is justified then we are sanctioning the institutional harassment of brown people who the US government arbitrarily charges with “suspicion” of terrorism.

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