All you really need to know about the hypocrisy evident when your skin color is factored into law enforcement.

I will be the first to admit this, having a national discussion about a piece of clothing is ridiculous.

Except when it is taken as justification for targeting a kid for death.

And that is the problem. Wearing a hoodie doesn’t make you a gangbanger.

Women going out on the town in a short skirt aren’t looking, much less asking to be raped as many conservatives argue.

Wearing a head scarf doesn’t make you a terrorist. And sorry to the Juan Williams of the world, traditional Arab garb shouldn’t automatically make you suspicious of someone.

I made the argument the other day that if every oppressed African-American teenage boy joined the Fruit of Islam and marched around in impeccable suits with equally impeccable manners, I *guarantee* that would make the Geraldo Rivera’s of the world feel a LOT less safe.

So, no, it isn’t the clothes, it is all about the cretin making a judgement based on the clothes. Or, more to the point, often projecting their own bias more easily because they think they can blame a piece of fabric.

Let’s turn it around. Every cop who beat Rodney King was wearing a uniform and a badge and was white. Should that have resulted in open season on white LA cops? No, that would have been wrong.

Every Supreme Court justice who denied Florida their votes in 2000 was a white guy. Should every white federal judge been thrown against the wall and shot for treason? No. That, too, would have been a false judgement against a lot of innocent people.

So why is rape justified over a hemline or dipping bodice? Why is a guy who killed a kid packing Skittles allowed to be both free and still carry the murder weapon?

This keeps happening, and the response continues to be muted. Outraged, yes, but we try to trust the system to make it right.

However, if it keeps occurring, someone is finally going to decide to hell with the system and use the same flawed logic that gets kids like Trayvon Martin killed. I don’t welcome it, I hope it does not ever happen, but people will not let this continue to happen to their communities.

Right now you’ve got the young wearing Guy Fawkes masks in parody, and some of the same folks wearing hoodied in solidarity.

Right now they are just symbols. Let us hope they stay that way.

One of the truly annoying things about Minnesota Public Radio is that they will publish anything, even when they KNOW the folks they are quoting are lying to them.

Happens damn near every day on their new mid-morning show, but they slap each other on the back for being open-minded even as listeners – and donors – plead with them to be journalists first and foremost.

Such is the case with this story about the outfit known as ALEC, who go out of their way to write laws that conservatives pass, almost always without altering the “proposal” they are handed. Hell, I’m not even convinced they read more than the talking points.

Currently, ALEC is pushing “Voter ID”, which here in Minnesota is going to a ballot initiative because our governor is smart enough not to disenfranchise the elderly, poor, disabled, and college students to “solve” a problem that (I think) only affected .00002% of the last election. I may be plus or minus a zero there, but basically the solution will affect about 40% of disabled Minnesotans and stop a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of potential illegal votes.

Who is on the side of democracy here?

ALEC and the NRA and other odious cretins are also behind the “kill anyone you please” laws in the news of late. In Florida it is the original “Stand Your Ground” law, that allows folks to get out of their car, walk up to a teenage kid whose color you don’t care for, and kill him because you feel threatened by a bag of Skittles.

Here in Minnesota it is called the “Castle Law”, which allows you to declare a pup tent an extension of your house and to shoot anyone who comes near it. No, I’m actually not making that up.

This, too, is up for election here in Minnesota this fall. If it isn’t in your state, it probably will be soon.

For those keeping score at home, a current-to-today list of Romney gaffes.

I am sure there is more to come.

I really hope they post the video to this commentary but it is still worth a read.

How hateful do you have to be to slander the Girl Scouts? I mean, I have my problems with the leadership of the Boy Scouts being bigots but haven’t heard about the Girl Scouts denying rights to people.

And that is all this is, conservatives using a Bible to justify pure hatred of others who want to be inclusive. In this case it is a transgendered seven year old kid. Or some ties to Planned Parenthood. Or just the fact they hate women of all ages.

It does not matter. Using your church because you’re too chicken to say you hate and fear anyone or anything different than you just makes you a coward.

And cowards lose the fight. Always.

Personally, I find it both reprehensible and embarrassing that it is apparently legal to get out of your car, stalk a kid because you don’t like his skin color, and then shoot him dead.

You can open up all the grand juries and the FBI can come riding into town, but that is a legal act in the state of Florida, 2012 years after the Age of Christ.

Here is a very moving reflection on the state of black men – and the racism they face – that I heard earlier today.

And here is an observation from a white person trying to understand, and knowing they will never face the things so many people in this nation, and this world, know instinctively. People hate you solely for how you look.

When I was a kid, they were trying to pass the Equal Rights Amendment so that women had the same rights as men. It did not pass, though things did start to look better over the years. Personally, given the way of the world, what the heck would it have hurt to pass it?

Turns out it is needed more today than when I was a wee one. Republicans got one last good gasp in the 2010 elections and they aren’t about to let it go to waste. All over this nation, they are trying to strip the vote from the elderly, minorities and college students with “Voter ID” laws, trying to “fix” vote fraud that a) only exists in a mere fraction of 1% of incorrect votes, and 2) would not be solved by IDs as many of the “illegal votes” are felons who are still under the impression that time served makes them a citizen again (sorry folks, not in THIS country) and who already have IDs.

Then there is the constant assault on women. Even tangential things, like assaulting professions women are predominantly in – like the arts and teaching – are pretty heavy handed. When beauty and learning aren’t given credit, what is left but to go back to our caves?

So there is the hate of the “other”, the hatred of civilization.

But to tell women you will insert objects into their bodies just because you want to? To make her submit to propaganda and to make a difficult situation worse in the case of potential abortion? To deny the pill or contraception and then wonder where all these pregnant ladies came from? For no good medical reason? Because shaming a woman who wants to think and decide for themselves gets you hard or something?

I don’t get it.

I won’t side with it.

And, frankly, I don’t understand anyone who would go along with this. No, really, what the hell is the motivation? And don’t hide behind a Bible. Why shame women? Why hate them? Why try to assert authority over others? Why deny rights to those you do not agree with?

Why?

The Southern Miss band did themselves no favors last week, looking both racist AND stupid in trying to slur a Puerto Rican player on the Kansas State team. This follows their state “leaders” passing a bigoted law and days after the state endorsed the beliefs of Rick Santorum.

But it is great that America gets to see what the South is like on national television. They have spent the past 150 trying to refight the Civil War, trying to oppress Blacks, Women, and now Latinos.

I would hope incidents like this finally build to an outrage that tells these people that their ideas hold no value, are not American, and they should be shamed to face their hatred and bigotry.

I would hope that.

Unfortunately we are not going to call them out for it, they are going keep thinking it, believing it, and expressing it. In time, however, it will fade to background noise as demographics and education chip away at their, truly, Lost Cause.

In other news, more racist anti-Obama bumper stickers.

If I shook my head at all of this, people would think I was having seizures.

This should not be happening in this country in the 21st century. Seriously, what the hell is wrong with these people. Oh, and if you want the BuzzFeed list of FB comments, click here.