The defeat of Democratic primary winner, India Walton, in the Buffalo, NY mayoral race reveals why staying in the Democratic Party is futile

I did not do a deep dive into the Buffalo, NY Mayoral race after India Walton shocked corrupt Dem incumbent Mayor Brown in a primary earlier this year. However, I wanted to understand how Brown beat Walton, and read up on Ballotpedia, which broke down endorsements and money. It shows there was no Republican candidate and only write ins after Walton. Had the usual bromides for unity after a primary been stated, Walton would be mayor. Instead, most elected Dems in Buffalo or the county suddenly decided unity was no longer operative, and backed Brown. Worse, so did the majority of unions who have the most members and most money. Add to that all three newspapers backed Brown, as did the business interests, which knew Brown was going to continue getting them public funds at the people's expense. The money result was Brown raised twice as much money and used free broadcast and newspaper media to promote himself. 

This is American politics in a nutshell, and why people-oriented activists should strongly consider ending their involvement with the Democratic Party and, if anything, focusing on further development of movement politics. The information in this Ballotpedia website is devastating to me.

UPDATE AND MORE EVIDENCE FOR WHAT I AM SAYING:

Irami nails the politics of pain management, which is Nancy Pelosi in a kente. Irami's analysis of the WaPo charts in the Virginia Governor's race, which ended with corporate Dem McAuliffe's dreadful loss, to show how the class divide among white folks, male and female, explains what is really what is driving our politics. Too many of our voting white folks, mostly older, have already embraced fascism. I am not sure they can be rescued from their desertion of class solidarity, but I know the Democratic Party leadership stands most effectively in the way of that project to bring back those white working class voters to the Democratic Party. And here is the chart Irami cut and pasted to make clear his analysis. The numbers for some or no college white men and women are devastating. Any Democratic Party voter who does not cry over this is part of the problem. We are supposed to be the workers' or labor party. The Party is controlled by corruption, by wealth, and by power. And the Republicans are, too, but speak in a strong voice for cultural resentment, and private power against a world no longer understandable, and use effective media advertising style marketing. Meanwhile, the Dems just punch left and down against their base, and put down workers and the poor from a cultural snob position.

Sigh. 

Dave Chappelle's "The Closer" is problematic, but is intended to be so

Last night, I finally finished watching the Chappelle special, named "The Closer." As with Chappelle's previous Netflix special, "Sticks and Stones," progressives, liberals, and non-Trumpists, are revealing their poor comprehension levels and are too quick to harshly judge Chappelle based upon a few lines in an hour long show. This is not to say Chappelle doesn't fall into JK Rowling's transphobia in two particular lines he uttered, and it is not to say that Chappelle is somehow so wise as to make for no criticism of his assumptions behind his humor. What makes Chappelle's argument or arguments particularly problematic is his continued conflating of trans people with white trans people, though, at least in two or perhaps three points, he acknowledges there are black trans and black gays and lesbians.  However, he does so in a way that deflects from his continued basing of the jokes and comedic insights that highlight "trans" or "LGBTQ" when he is talking "white trans" or "white LGBTQ." I was so pleased when Chappelle finally said, and I paraphrase, "Hey, I am not really talking about trans people or the alphabet people.  I'm talking about white people!"

On the positive side, Chappelle's comedic commentary moves us toward Irami Osei-Frimpong's great points in Irami's video and FB commentary*--and the video is worth watching all the way through, especially if one watches the Chappelle special. At some point, we white folks, whether we are straight, cis, LGBTQ, or otherwise, have to understand what drives the frustration of Chappelle, Irami, and other sharp minds (Adolph Reed, Jr. comes to mind), which is how these oppressed communities, still largely white, getting civil rights protections ends up diluting and even undermining the ability of African-Americans to overcome the far more systemic and violent racism they continue to endure as Americans. And in fact these "alphabet people," when they feel normalized into society, reify white settler-colonial patterns as they say things, "Well, I'm gay, but I'm against raising the minimum wage," as if there are no gays or lesbians in service sector jobs who are being exploited. Or they still utter grandma style racism towards blacks. 

But, wait!, you may say. It is not a zero-sum game. Oh, sorry, but it often is.  And if we white folks of any ethnicity, any gender, any sexual orientation or status, don't acknowledge that, we better check that level of privilege. It is sad to admit there is a zero-sum game against black people in various real life situations. Here are two quick examples: (1) A white employer would rather hire a white lesbian or w white trans man or woman than a black man. (2) A white neighborhood will be more welcoming to a white gay or trans couple than a black family. Etc. 

Got that, my fellow white and semi-white folks? Look carefully at those two examples again.

Irami's video also makes powerful points beyond Chappelle, starting with these two points: (1) the history of lynching often involved, as part of the lynching process, castrating black men, so there was a psycho-sexual murder going on, and (2) scientists of the time were often enlisted to "prove" black men are prone to rape white women in order to support that castration (same source link). Irami then enlightens us about the rate of black men becoming women being twice the rate of black women becoming men and wonders, late in his video, whether a black man wants to become a woman in fact wants to really become a "lady." If so, that black man is confused because he is actually saying he wants to be white, and doesn't understand how disrespectfully and horribly black women and women of color have been treated and continue to be treated.  It is part of Irami's overall point about white feminism being at best uncertain allies, and often aligned against black people's progress.  And that point needs to be understood as a way in which "intersectionality" can expose limits in particular oppressed group's level of oppression, and where they are themselves fine with oppressing other oppressed groups.

It is important to recognize, when discussing Dave Chappelle's recent specials, is that Chappelle is primarily after mischief, intending to needle and provoke people in a Lenny Brucian way.** Nearly every time Chappelle said something that would warm a liberal's or progressive's heart, he followed it with a punch line designed to expose pretzel logic, or play to a cultural conservative's point of view--while still being anti-cultural conservative.  In attacking Chappelle, liberals and progressives sound not too dissimilar to conservatives who suddenly love Chappelle for "owning the libs." Most of those conservatives saying that are not even watching Chappelle, and miss out on why their new hero is not who they think he is. They simply see how upset liberals and progressives are and think, "That must mean Chappelle sees what we see! Yay!" Meanwhile, libs and progressives are outraged for Chappelle playing into conservatives' arguments, when he is actually making fun of most, but not all, of those arguments. 

Chappelle ultimately wants us all to see how our moral logic of tolerance, anti-sexism, and anti-racism can turn in on itself, and sometimes miss truths of how those in minority communities can themselves become oppressors. That was most exemplified by his semi-long joke about the actual black man in the antebellum South who ended up owning and mistreating (terribly) black slaves of his own. This is why one must treat Chappelle's hour long monologue as an essay, and not a series of random bits. If one just turns off the tv when thinking "That is enough of that crap," and doesn't watch all the way through to hear his story about Daphne Gorman, then one misses an important contextual explanation for what Chappelle is after beyond mere mischief.

What has been highly amusing to me is how Chappelle's two "Jew related" jokes are not being discussed in most social media. I won't spoil the jokes, but I jumped for joy, and with laughter, as Chappelle hit Jewish Zionists square in the face on both occasions. I stopped the video not long after the first joke, when Chappelle said to a shocked audience member, "Don't worry, it's gonna get a whole lot worse," and said to my wife Chappelle is going to provoke anyone and everyone on purpose, and will continue to "go there" till it hurts. Chappelle was indeed just warming up. I should note Chappelle's "Jewish" jokes did the same thing he was doing with the trans and LGBTQ communities, where he did not stop and say, "Oh, I only mean Jewish Zionists, and maybe Christian ones, too." Nope. He just said "Jew."  As I say, it is Lenny Brucian in that he is demanding the audience figure out the subtleties--and even question themselves whether they laugh or were outraged.  

Chappelle called the show the "Closer" because he is definitely dropping the mic at Netflix--and he physically and defiantly dropped his mic at the end of the hour plus show. Yes, I wish Chappelle would understand the role political-economy plays in what he is saying (i.e. how racial stratification was a key element in the development of capitalist hegemony). If he had better understood political-economy, I believe it may have tempered his worst and least defensible lines--both sadly in the context of the JK Rowling situation (saying he was on Team TERF and that there are only two sexes at least.*** However, as usual, the outrage against Chappelle remains based upon some seriously low comprehension levels in our entire discourse. Overall, Chappelle may still make it easier to understand what Irami and others are saying, though I am the first to admit those voices--and mine--are not heard such that the outrage from the progressive left and joy from the petulant right drowns out the potential for enlightenment.

_______________________________

* On FB, on Oct 12, Irami introduced his video stating: "America likes its Black males without nuts. That looks like a lot of things, including the 6' 2" dude who stoops and whispers because he doesn't want to appear threatening. It also looks like castrating Black folks like George Washington Carver."

** I wish Lenny was right that if we all used the n-word as an everyday statement, then it would lose its ability to demean and hurt.  He wasn't.  It was a hope circa 1961, but, in 2021, we unfortunately know better. It is noteworthy how much Chappelle used the n-word in his "Closer" show, in a way that brought the late Richard Pryor to mind. However, later in life, after touring Kenya, Pryor said he would no longer use that word as he saw how destructive it is as a word that undermines African-Americans' positive sense of themselves. Chappelle loves irony, as did Pryor and Lenny Bruce. However, their irony was based in their hope for a better world that has not yet arrived. Chappell, meanwhile, seems to have ingested their hopeful, ironic observations, but has done so in a manner that reifies the ironies into established ways of thinking that may ultimately be destructive to future hopes.

*** In Chappelle's defense, he did acknowledge biologists can tell us about hermaphrodites and other situations in biological understanding that go beyond total male and female, though, again, that is a dodge designed to throw us off his intentional conflating of trans with white trans, without saying white trans, or even whether there can be progressive, anti-racist white trans people.  Again, though, I think people need to acknowledge African-American pain and frustration here as the LGBTQ and trans communities get to straight America's heart more deeply and faster than black Americans have ever gotten to white people's hearts.

A fascinating study of health care in each state reveals familiar patterns

See this article and interactive map showing how each state ranks in health care overall, based upon cost, access, and outcomes.

First, it is not surprising to see how the southern States (and states that contain citizens who wish they were Southern, i.e. OK, AZ, NV, WY) tend toward the worst in health care cost, access, and outcomes. It is also great the article emphasizes these states all exhibit a hostility toward expanding Medicaid. 

Texas, though part of that ideology, was still a shocker to me because major corporate media are always touting how wealthy it is and such a great place compared to that evil, awful "socialist" California. Here is the comparison: Texas overall 39 of 50/cost 45 of 50/access 42 of 50/outcomes 36 of 50. California overall 23/cost 38/access 16/outcomes 17. 

New Mexico is better than people here in New Mexico think: overall 28/cost 16/access 30/outcomes 36. The reason New Mexico is better than Texas in terms of all three categories is because there is an expanded Medicaid here and a more liberal politics that helps guide people to doctors and hospitals. However, in New Mexico, due to not having enough doctors in poor and rural areas, access and outcomes are not what they should be in a decent society. To the extent this lack of access and outcomes occurs in any of the more urbanized and populated areas, it is because there are still not enough docs taking Medicaid there. In contrast, there are much more doctors in CA willing to take Medicaid in largely poor areas, and so access and results are better. 

That leaves Texas, which probably has great medical care if one is well off or in a steady, good paying job is in Houston, Dallas, Austin, and San Antonio, but it begins to get pretty awful right about Lubbock, and falls off the cliff thereafter. And from what I know of professionals in Texas, many don't take Medicaid and an increasing number don't take Medicare, as they have enough rich people who have supplements to be choosey with.

To me, the most intriguing ranking numbers come from Utah. It ranked overall at 24, but it then had the weirdest rankings: cost 23/access 47/outcomes 4. What it shows is if you are not Mormon and you are a proletariat, you are screwed. And likely you are young, and won't remain there, so the outcomes are still only reflecting how insiders are treated. That's a guess, but based upon enough sociological reading over the years regarding Utah. 

But, yeah, maybe if a disgruntled Californian is not wealthy, going to Texas is not such a great idea. Yes, there is no income tax in Texas, but the property tax rates are more than double of CA and NM. Plus, with the way Texas politics operate, there are still enough people who would rather elect idiotic grifters for governor, such as the current idiotic grifter, Abbott. Say whatever you want about NM, but if one has to leave CA for a place with inexpensive land values, I'll take the Land of Enchantment over the Lone Star State any day.

You may wonder why these states with bad outcomes are really so hostile to Medicaid: As I explained to a former head of the CMA, the reason Republicans won't pay higher reimbursement rates is because that is a way to ensure the program does not meet people's needs and sows frustration. It lets poor white people comfort themselves into believing government will never work for them, and the only reason those "Democrats" want Medicaid is to serve darker skin people. Initially, the doc didn't believe me, but when he went to Sacramento and sat down with various Republican politicians (he was, at least at that time, a Republican himself), he realized I was correct. He remains a dear friend who, now retired, always took Medicaid patients as a civic duty, even when his accountant would tell him he would lose a little money for each treatment of those Medicaid patients. 

I shake my head at the complacency of people who don't want to move to a single payer system right now. And I mean it. Right now.

We lost the war against Afghanistan the moment Jimmy Carter armed the mujahideen

It is awful how the corporate media perceives what is happening in Afghanistan. Yes, just over 2,300 American dead. How many Afghans, though? Wiki keeps a list and it is over 111,000. 111,000. What was the reason the US invaded Afghanistan? To go after bin Laden in the wake of Bin-Laden's attack of the US on 9/11/2001. However, the Taliban was not behind the Al=Queda the 9/11/2001 attack. It was a bunch of Saudis led by a guy the US used to arm, and whose family the US had close ties: Bin Laden. Within a year, though, George Bush (the Second) admitted he no longer thought about Bin Laden as he and Cheney lied the nation into a war against another nation, Iraq, that had nothing to do with the events of 9/11/2001. 

When did we lose this Afghan war? One can better say we lost the war the moment Jimmy Carter decided to arm Muslim fanatics who were opposing a secular regime in Afghanistan the Soviet Union (Russia and satellites) had decided to prop up in Christmas season of 1979. The few who read this blog know about the photo that circulates on the Internet of young women at the U of Kabul from the 1960s and 1970s. However, most Americans don't know the story of Afghanistan's king voluntarily giving up power in 1973, a civilian national assembly created with many who were secular, and how the US did not care a fig about promoting that in the 1970s. The Soviet Union, which had a border with Afghanistan, sure did. And while its own designs were largely imperial, they knew it was proper to ensure a secular, modern society that valued women should be promoted. I am so old I remember supporting the Carter idea--at least until around 1984, when I saw an interview on tv with a village or regional mujahideen leader (I thought it was Dan Rather, but now don't believe so), and shuddered, because the guy said, after they kicked out the Soviet Union, they would turn against the US, as we were all infidels, essentially. It is too long to remember exact words, but I remember my own reaction: Oh my God, Alexander Cockburn, the left wing and marginally pro-Soviet journalist was right. These guys are 14th Century minds and the US is giving them 20th Century weapons to start a holy war. 

Yes, I am hoping the US can take as many people out of Afghanistan who trusted us. You know, maybe more than we did as our invented state of South Vietnam finally collapsed in April 1975. But, I see no point in any further American involvement. And here is the final ironic point: The US is really not leaving as we think. Trump and Biden are the same here. Both wanted to replace US troops with mercenaries, the privatized military Clinton had a dream about, Bush II-Cheney deployed in Afghanistan and Iraq, Obama further developed ties with, and Trump cemented. What Chomsky says about US foreign policy remains true: There is a continuity of policies designed to prop up the American Empire, whether the policy is moral or not (mostly not), and whether it is strategically advantageous or not (the US does bad things that don't work to ensure other places where we do bad things continue to work; that is how we continued killing Southeast Asians for multiple decades). 

Nobody on corporate media cable "news" will say any of this, or say it in any understandable way. Anyone who principally relies on corporate media cable "news" is angry, frustrated, and sad--yet unable to comprehend what has actually gone on for the past 35 years, and not able to understand how what happened with US intervention in Afghanistan is part of an overall imperial strategy. Oh, and historically, as at least more know due to social media, the Brits had invaded Afghanistan twice in the 19th Century, staying the first time for 20 years before bugging out, and then a shorter time about twenty years later. Then, the Soviet Union spent a decade there before bugging out. And now the US for twenty years. What Afghan rebels then, more recently, and now do is continually shift alliances that ultimate wear down and confuse invaders. They seem so simple, but they are not simple-minded. What is different now is the Islamic fundamentalist militancy, and how destructive they can be with modern weaponry courtesy of, well, the US. Great job, leaders. Great job. But, the soldiers who are especially right wing will be blaming Biden because they can't remember politics from last week, and can't remember Trump wanting to bug out, and don't know some of their friends are with the mercenaries that will be pushed in or remain if there. And have no idea what the hell I am writing about.

How the corporate media mass produces people such as Ronald Brownstein

Ronald Brownstein is precisely the type of commentator the corporate media mass produces. His take in The Atlantic should only be read with a critical eye capable of translating the elitist bullshit and misreading of the moment, as well as past history. For those who thought Julian Castro was a progressive, start here:

"Sawyer Hackett, executive director of People First Future, the political organization founded by Julián Castro, expressed that view when he told me that in 2022 and 2024, 'it is going to be tough [for Democrats] to run on a message that these people are too dangerous … to be in charge while simultaneously saying, "Hey, look what we’re getting done with the Republicans, Washington still works, look at this infrastructure deal we got done."' He added: 'We’re propping these things up as an example of a functioning Washington while the Republican Party is just moving to the right and becoming more extreme.'" 

Sawyer Hackett? What, no Hispanic, Julian? That is on top of the horrible assessment here. People want action more than bi-partisanship. And as people have learned what was in the corporate partisan (bi-partisan in media parlance) bill, they are outraged. Oh, but Brownstein's framing gets worse. Here is the very next paragraph:

"The scale of biden’s agenda has drawn justifiable comparisons to Franklin D. Roosevelt and Lyndon B. Johnson. But in his posture toward the opposite party, Biden’s model seems to be a very different former president: Dwight Eisenhower. Like Eisenhower, Biden is largely positioning himself as an elder statesman who has transcended the partisan fray. A promise to unify the country has been a central pillar of Biden’s messaging since he first announced his candidacy. And he’s rarely looked as happy as he did in late June when he stepped onto the White House driveway, surrounded by senators of both parties, to announce the tentative deal on infrastructure spending."

This is awful history on top of an awful present understanding. How is Biden's agenda like FDR's or LBJ's when Biden has already reneged on almost every substantive promise? And where he won't facilitate or participate in rallies that go after recalcitrant senators, such as Manchin or Sinema? Does anyone honestly think FDR or LBJ would let Manchin and Sinema rule the roost as they have since January 2021? As for Eisenhower, I wish Biden was Eisenhower on domestic policy, at least, as Eisenhower vetoed defense bills and was clear about pushing for a real infrastructure program, the Highway National Defense Act. 

What explains Brownstein's framing other than personal corruption? It is not as if Brownstein is bribed with a paper bag of money. No. It's just about his being placed into the Wise Man chair in elite DC connected circles. He is groomed as the new David Broder. It is a corruption of status and access, and, among the NY-DC-LA set, personal celebrity. He knows what he is saying is wrong from a historical perspective at least, and is pushing a courtesan or mandarin narrative for the present moments. In Brownstein's relative youth (he is 63), he worked for Ralph Nader--so therefore, he KNOWS. What is so extraordinary how he, and these other courtesans and mandarins, can blithely walk by the climate disaster, and not think of their children--and continue to push bi-partisanship and incrementalism.

Moving on from the Democratic Party to the Movement for a People's Party

In the wake of the Nina Turner defeat, and win for corporate power, in Ohio's 11th Congressional District this week, I have finally had to take heed to my own misgivings about the Democratic Party across most of our nation. And this morning, a friend, on and off FB, reminded me of a Joe Biden ad that sent a very nasty implication that anyone supporting Medicare for All was insulting Joe Biden's dead son, Beau, who had the best health insurance in the world, unlike most Americans. When reading the article explaining the language used in the ad, and not merely watching the ad, the online magazine Vice makes a persuasive case Joe Biden meant precisely that.  I am now ready (though I have given $50 or so last year) to join others in building the Movement for a People's Party.  I agree with Brie Joy Gray it may be better for progressives to run OUTSIDE the Democratic Party, as it is clear the party powers would rather have a compliant nothing (I watched a debate with her and was struck by how dull and uninformed she was), and corrupt, Shontel Brown, in Congress than an empathetic, intelligent, and exciting Nina Turner. And if someone wants to say "spoiler," then try to explain the progress made when each Democratic Party administration and Congress follows a further right wing Republican one. Ten years ago, it was Max Baucus, Harry Reid, and for awhile Joe Lieberman who blocked the progress.  Today it is Sinema and Manchin.  It is part of a game of finger pointing and virtue signaling--all while doing next to nothing to move our nation to where even the majority of Americans want.  

The argument "We have to save the Supreme Court" has been lost. The current president campaigned on a public option last year and, once elected, promptly broke that promise.  Biden won't take action on student debt except at the margins of those who went to truly fraudulent college-businesses. His moves on climate change are hardly sufficient. Etc. To say, "Well, Trump was and is worse!" does not get us anywhere policy-wise. It is, instead, more of a debating point--and one I agree with, but that is now no longer enough. Too many progressives and liberals who said they would work to push Biden "left" have been AWOL, or worse running interference for Biden and progressives in Congress as if they were celebrities and this was an argument which Kardashian we like least or best (Don't ask me which one as I don't follow them, and they all seem awful).

The Democratic Party's brand is toxic in so many States, and Biden's administration is not making anything better in that regard.  This is not simply a matter of public policy but of strategy. The strategy of voting for lesser evils continues to fail as the Republicans move further and further right into outright fascism, white supremacist nationalism, and unhinged conspiracy theories.  

Yes, I can still maintain my hope that the Dem Party in NM may become an exception, as has Nevada's Dem Party.  But, for at least 40 states, that is not true at all. My advice is to give to the Movement for a People's Party for them to get on the ballot in those states, and to come out for rallies for movements, whether it is BLM, climate change organizations, student debt relief, M4A, etc.  Change is more in the streets than at the ballot box, as Dems insist on their failed neo-lib strategy, and saying the Republicans will regain control of the House and Senate in 2022. That is not only an abdication of leadership, but a failure of policymaking--as again, a strong voice from the party on issues Americans are either ready to embrace or have already embraced would strengthen Democratic prospects. But, no corporate Dems have shown they would rather lose than win with Bernie type policies.  So, I have decided it is time--again--to say two can make that strategic move. 

Change means moving beyond the political duopoly known as Democratic and Republican Parties. And no longer worrying about being a spoiler.  The corporate Dems have spoiled their own beds, and it is time, as Seward, Chase, and Lincoln did in the 1850s, to move to a new party away from a party that was feckless and hopelessly divided. 

Critical Race Theory begins with analyzing the contexts of Brown v. Board of Education (1954)

Irami nails this point in ten minutes (he starts out saying two minutes, but realizes it is gonna be longer). To me, it is less about saying something that frankly sounds silly to me--"We are now going to do 'critical race theory'"--than it is about teaching history with multiple layers of information, and with a strong recognition that one must use context and factual analysis as tools to evaluate historical trends and events. In other words, no flabby thinking, and no simple answers--while, on the other hand, one may make historically sweeping judgments based upon a rigorous analysis. Here is my earlier commentary on "critical race theory."

Contrary to what Irami may or may not have intended, in his discussion of Brown v. Board of Education (1954) and how Bell rightly saw the important historical contexts that led to that decision, I can actually make an argument that Chief Justice Earl Warren was, at least in part, motivated by morality, and his own guilt atonement for his role as CA Attorney General in locking up Japanese-Americans in the early part of 1942 in WWII (One sees this in the great bio Jim Newton wrote of Warren; a great biography, I may add). It does not negate at all the arguments Derrick Bell made, and Irami summarizes, about the context in which the US Supreme Court ruled in Brown v. Board of Education in 1954. It is simply that there can be an internally motivated moral reasoning that led the justices to behave as they did in that moment. 

More specifically, I can also argue about the moral effect of the decision, which I did to an old WASP lawyer who was mediating a case I had in San Luis Obispo, CA around 1996 or so. The mediator had been a new lawyer in the early 1950s, and had been a young associate at the law firm where John W. Davis was a leading partner. Davis had been a long-time right wing, pro-racist policy senator, and a failed Democratic Party presidential candidate in 1924. He was also a highly respected and seasoned trial lawyer who had argued over 50 cases to the US Supreme Court, and was arguing the Board of Ed's position in the then-Brown v. Bd of Ed. litigation. Davis was arguing the US Supreme Court must continue to defer to southern legislatures in enforcing segregation laws, and the court had no business interfering with state legislatures' decisions in that regard. The mediator said said he had an opportunity to speak personally with Davis during the litigation, and saw the original briefs for the school board as they were being prepared for submission. He said Davis told him the argument was ultimately one that demanded the US Supreme Court respected the limits of judiciary, and avoid burdening courts to have to oversee such broad policymaking, counting how many of each race were in each school's classes,  and how to actually judge equality across equipment, buildings, books, and personnel. As we know, he added, the courts did get bogged down, and the use of the phrase "all deliberate speed" became a ready excuse for many bad judges, and some good ones, to delay justice--and we know, he also added, justice delayed can become justice denied. The outcome, too, by the 1990s, had been many schools eventually returned to heights of segregation by race--mostly because the courts did not have the courage to challenge racist housing patterns, for starters. The old mediator, and by then retired lawyer, said all of this, and with a sigh, said, Maybe old John Davis was right after all. 

I smiled, and replied as follows, again paraphrasing after 35 years have now passed from that conversation: I said, I get the idea about judicial limitations--and agree with what was happening and been happening, as I just finished at the time Jonathan Kozol's Savage Inequalities, released a few years earlier in the decade, specifically 1991. However, I said part of the law's power is moral. Brown v. Bd of Ed, I said, is a decision which had a strong moral basis, which then gave emotionally based moral protection to those engaged in peaceful protests, something the protestors did not have before. Without Brown, the Southern State governments--and the Klan, local police, and local businesses--could no longer use the law as a moral judgment, i.e. phrasing what they did, including their illegal acts of violence, within a framework of upholding and maintaining "tradition." After Brown, these officials were suddenly on the moral defensive, and now had to deal with individuals having federal rights that gave moral authority to those rights. I then said, if you look at the early 20th Century, before Brown, there had been strong civil rights agitations and movements, but they were easily vanquished and repressed, often with violence that those committing the violence thought they were committing in the name of upholding traditional values, which, though the tradition was racist, nonetheless had a moral imprint based upon the law and community standards. After Brown, however, the civil rights movements were strengthened because Brown's import now required, or at least empowered, federal judges to overrule state laws that discriminated, and, most important, hold state officials accountable to ensure protection of individuals' federal rights, including a right to an equal--not separate and unequal--education, etc. 

The old lawyer, when I finished that response, sat back, and smiled. He then said, and I can only paraphrase from so long ago, That is the greatest response to John Davis I have ever heard in all my years. He added he wished Davis could hear that himself, as he thought even Davis would be impressed with the response. He added, in his own experiences with Davis, he wondered if Davis was really racist, which, at that time, I was not in quite the position of personal knowledge of Davis to refute (However, subsequent reading would have allowed me to do that, too). He noted Davis died not long after the decision, and Wiki tells me it was in 1955, meaning less than a year later. I remain very touched by the good faith of the old lawyer in recognizing an argument he had not considered, and how he did not go to his ego to try and refute the point with glibness or clever cynicism, which are hallmarks of bad faith argument litigating. He recognized the moral basis for racial equality, the moral basis for integration and helping people directly who had been harmed through societal norms, and believed in the legal formalism that requires good faith attention to context, as opposed to the Chief Justice Roberts "I'm just an umpire calling balls and strikes." No, Chief Justice, not even the umps do that with any true precision, and such a statement belies so many levels of reality as to be ultimately in bad faith. Hence, CRT is necessary to test and expand understanding against a too often shallow formalism.