USDems.org & MattD

[dhyatt]

Since Matt's name is floating around as a possible candidate for the Fall's election, I thought it fair to give him a plug for a website he started (if you're reading this, I already have a 'plug' for mine :-) ).

Check out http://usdems.org and find out why Matt and others are proud to be Democrats!

[MattD]

Thanks Don!! :-D

I am in the Institute of Political Leadership (IOPL) right now. One of the assignments is to give a 10-minute speech on "Why I am Proud to Be a (fill in Rep, Dem, Indy, Lib). This will be the EASIEST homeworkd I've ever done!

The website again is: www.usdems.org www.usdems.com www.usdems.net

[johnb]

May I offer you some ideas?

Be proud because:

1- your party was founded by a white supremacist and a slave owner.

2- your party created the Jim Crow laws to enforce segregation and keep power for itself.

3- your party employed the Ku Klux Klan much like the Nazi Party employed the SA, to terrorize and supress it's political opponents.

4- your party, to this day, still has a fixation with race and quotas.

5- your party's elder statesman in the US Senate is the only KKK Veteran in Congress and he was a 'Grand Kleagle' at that.

6- your party kept power in NYC through the corrupt Tammany Hall organization, rigging elections and terrorizing opponents through violence and intimidation.

7- your party still runs Chicago, Philadelphia, and a host of other major cities much the way the PRI ran Mexico; fraudulent elections and institutionalized corruption.

8- your party hasn't had a new idea since the New Deal.

9- your party was ready to surrender to the Soviet bloc by 1975.

10- your party seems to believe the only good soldiers are dead American ones.

11- your party is still ready to try to appease the Islamofascists.

'nuff said.

[pallostan]

your party hasn't had a new idea since the New Deal.


civil rights? Democrats' support put the solid south in the Republican column--though, of course, Republicans don't care about race, right?

[Cathy]

This is what Redevelopment, TIF, and Smart Growth has done to So.Cal:

SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
by Patricia R Pothier

Why am I proud to be a democrate? There isn't enough room or time to explain. Living in southern California, with fuel prices the highest in the nation, rent out of control, schools, libraries, roads, all very low on the totem pole, the homeless suffering on the streets, friends with aids worried about their medical, the elderly with housing-medical and financial problems.. the students who's tuition has spiraled out of control and might have to drop out of the state colleges.. I'm proud to be a democrate , because I know that with the BIG administration change, things can, and will get better.

And BTW, with all this talk of the Southern Dems and Republican Party history, I was wondering if a good Southern Historian like Johnb could enlighten me about the story of the "Red Shirts" and which party was in control when the 1959 Annexation Statutes were written. Is there a connection between the Civil Rights Laws and a Legislative reactionary attempt to keep the 'power elite' in control of the masses?

Cathy

[johnb]

Cathy,

With all the actions of groups such as the NAACP demanding corporations take "responsibility" for the actions of firms they acquired decades ago when those firms owned slaves or used slaves as collatoral over 150 years ago one has to wonder why no one is protesting what the Donkeycrat party did.

In reference to your question:

The Red Shirts were mounted Democratic Party military clubs in South Carolina determined to end Reconstruction and put the Donkeycrats back in power.

http://itw.sewanee.edu/reconstruction/html/docs/redshirts.html

Instructions to Red Shirts in South Carolina, 1876

[Excerpts]

1. That every Democrat in the Townships must be put upon the Roll of the Democratic Clubs. . . .

2. That a Roster must be made of every white and of every Negro in the Townships and returned immediately to the County Executive Committee.

3. That the Democratic Military Clubs are to be armed with rifles and pistols and such other arms as they may command. They are to be divided into two companies, one of the old men, the other of the young men; an experienced captain or commander to be placed over each of them. . . .

12. Every Democrat must feel honor bound to control the vote of at least one Negro, by intimidation, purchase, keeping him away or as each individual may determine, how he may best accomplish it.

13. We must attend every Radical meeting that we hear of whether they meet at night or in the day time. Democrats must go in as large numbers as they can get together, and well armed, behave at first with great courtesy and assure the ignorant Negroes that you mean them no harm and so soon as their leaders or speakers begin to speak and make false statements of the facts, tell them then and there to their faces, that they are liars, thieves and rascals, and are only trying to mislead the ignorant Negroes and if you get a chance get upon the platform and address the Negroes.

14. In speeches to Negroes you must remember that argument has no effect upon them; they can only be influenced by their fears, superstitions and cupidity. Do not attempt to flatter and persuade them. . . . Treat them so as to show them, you are the superior race, and that their natural position is that of subordination to the white man. . . .

16. Never threaten a man individually. If he deserves to be threatened, the necessities of the times require that he should die. . . .

29. Every club must be uniformed in a red shirt and they must be sure and wear it upon all public meetings and particularly on the day of election.

30. Secrecy should shroud all of our transactions. Let not your left hand know what your right hand does.

[johnb]

Is that yet another reason for Donkeycrats to be "proud" of their party?

This wasn't the actions of individuals, this was a concerted party effort by the party organization itself. This was an institutional / organizational effort on the part of that political party.

It would be ignorant to conclude Wachovia bears some responsibility for the actions of the Georgia Bank and Railroad Company back in 1845 just because Wachovia later bought a company that bought a company that bought the assets of the defunct Georgia Bank and Railroad Company when the acitons of the original party were legal at that time. However, it is legitimate to conclude that the current Donkeycrat Party bears responsibility for the actions of that same party in 1876 when the Party acted to seize and retain power within the state for the next 125 years. What financial obligation should the Donkeycrats be assesed for disenfranchising black voters through Jim Crow? True the state governments did pass the laws, but those governments were part and parcel property of the Donkeycrat Party. Blacks, poor whites, and anyone not in the Party was effectively denied representation, enfranchisement, and in many cases due process because of that control.

It is amazing isn't it? Makes me proud to NOT be a member of that party.

[Brent]

30. Secrecy should shroud all of our transactions. Let not your left hand know what your right hand does.

Wow, that one's not unique to the Red Shirts, is it? :wink:

[Cathy]

Johnb!

Thank you for that history! I kind of figured you would have that info in your encyclopedia of facts.

So.. what about the 1959 Annexation Laws question?
I have heard some claim that as a reaction to the imminence of the Civil Rights Laws being enforced, the 1959 Annexation Statutes were an attempt to keep some control over the poor blacks and poor whites and help to keep them divided.

Do you think there is anything to that?

Cathy

[StanN]

JohnB said,

However, it is legitimate to conclude that the current Donkeycrat Party bears responsibility for the actions of that same party in 1876 when the Party acted to seize and retain power within the state for the next 125 years.

That statement is as ridiculous and extremist as the NAACP's position that today's corporations bear responsibility for treating slaves as property 200 years ago.

The concept of inherited guilt has been used over the centuries to justify every sort of narrow minded bigotry and racial and religious prejudice imaginable.

It is instructive and useful to understand history as a warning of the evils and misdeeds we do not want to repeat. Nor would I deny some impacts of history and tradition survive. But to imply some historic incident controls our actions and decisions today and that there is some ethical and moral stain from those actions that taints any individual today just justifies todays bigots and extremists.

stan

[johnb]

Stan,

Heritable guilt is riduculous when we are speaking of human beings, ie, the sins of the father do not pass the guilt on to the son. However, I have to differ with you when the party in question is not a human being, but a legal entity such as a political party or corporation or even a government.

The US government paid restitution to the Americans of Japanese decent who were imprisoned in relocation camps during WWII. Was the US government of 1995 somehow immune to the guilt created by the actions of the US government of 1942? True the faces were completely different, but it was the organ itself, the US government that created the wrong and hence the guilt. One needn't go back nearly that far to indict the Donkeycrat party, they were still fighting integration and full political enfranchisement of blacks as recently as the late 60's and early 70's.

Is the Communist Party in Russia now suddenly pure as the driven snow and immune from the moral/ethical stain of the gulag? How about the KKK?

[johnb]

Cathy,

Interesting question. What the intent of the laws may have been I don't know at this time. What I do know is that in places like Chicago and LA such laws weren't needed.

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3945/is_200104/ai_n8931972/pg_3

As early as the 1920s, Los Angeles had an Anti-African Housing Association promoting restrictive covenants and black exclusion in central areas of the city.

In August 1949, for instance, two black families moved into a two-flat building in the Park Manor section on Chicago's south side. Neighborhood whites harassed, stoned, and terrorized the newcomers, burned crosses, and tried to torch their homes. On one occasion, a mob of about 2,000 whites gathered outside the building chanting "we want fire, we want blood," while police stood by silently. Many policemen lived in the same neighborhood, and the head of the Park Manor Improvement Association, which led the fight to keep blacks out of the area, was also a policeman. In the wake of these incidents in 1949, white resisters in Park Manor organized the White Circle League - its chief purpose, to "keep white neighborhoods free from negroes."

Interestingly enough the Realtors Association at the time was quite vigorous in promoting the use of restrictive racial covenants to prevent blacks from buying property in "white" neighborhoods.

Would such groups have thought to use Zoning laws as a means to condemn black residential neighborhoods for, I don't know, freeways or other "public" uses? The evidence would seem to indicate yes they would.

It's an odd situation. On the one hand Zoning laws applied on the basis of the race of the property owner are labelled "racist" and rightfully so. However, the folks at UNC get overheated and label the use of Zoning and Annexation based upon financial concerns "racist" and refer to places such as Southern Pines as practicing "racial apartheid". As if there were any other kind ever practiced. It's a very much a damned if you do use race but oddly enough damned if you don't use race scenario as well.

http://www.law.unc.edu/PDFs/RacialApartheid.pdf

Is it "racist" to annex in cases where annexation would be a net loss for the munincipality in terms of tax revenue 'gained' versus the expense of annexing? I cannot see how. Even the use of objective, ie race neutral, standards cannot please some folks.

I would be hesitant to make the charge but I believe your suspicion is probably correct.

[Cathy]

Thanks John.

I'm old enough to believe the stories of racism in the cities all over the Country, just as bad as anywhere in the South.

I was just hoping to find someone who was born and raised here that might have a memory of the what might have been the back room intent of the changes to the Annexation Laws and if there was any validity to what I have heard. I wasn't even thinking of the Pinehurst bruehau.

I just thought it was curiously inflamatory of Ellis Hankins to make a reference to "Red Shirts" when he compared citizens against forced annexation at the Town Hall Day Rally to "Red Shirts of the past, who weren't very nice people". I knew it was an inflamatory reference for the Municipal officials, but did not know anything about what he may have been referring to.

Your explanation does help me understand it a bit better.

Cathy

[johnb]

Hankins was being an *** on several counts.

1-The Red Shirts existed in the Reconstruction era in South Carolina.

2-The Red Shirts existed to drive the Republican/carpetbagger governor out of office and install their own man, Lt General Wade Hampton (Cavalry Corps commander, Army of Northern Virginia) in office as governor.

3-The Red Shirts existed as the armed muscle of the Donkeycrat Party in South Carolina much like the Republican/carpetbagger regime had it's equally secretive Union League/Loyal League organization. There was plenty of mutual attempts at intimidation, ballot box fraud, and such to go around. The Red Shirts won because they were natives and more numerous than the carpetbaggers.

How Hankins could draw a parallel between that situation and anything going on with annexation today is a feat of intellectual gymnastics requiring the use of large quantities of self-administered intoxicants.

[StanN]

JohnB,

So if inherited guilt applies to political parties what say you about this history? Are today's Republicans guilty as charged?

INDIANAPOLIS -- The chairman of the Republican Party on Thursday renounced the GOP's racially polarizing "Southern strategy" of the late 1960s, under which Richard M. Nixon used such issues as desegregation and forced busing of schoolchildren to woo white voters and win the presidency.

Republican National Committee chief Ken Mehlman made the comments in Milwaukee at the annual NAACP convention, which has had an uneasy relationship with the Bush administration.

President Bush has declined to attend the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People convention every year he has been president. On Thursday he spoke instead to a black business and cultural convention in Indianapolis, telling thousands of conventioneers that his initiatives had led to historic gains for blacks in education, home ownership and small business-ownership.

Mehlman, speaking before the NAACP, said Republicans had been wrong to try to make use of racially divisive issues.


WHAT IS THE 'SOUTHERN STRATEGY'?
The Southern strategy refers to the focus of the Republican party on winning the White House by securing the electoral votes of the Southern states.

WHO HAS USED IT?

BARRY GOLDWATER: As the Republican presidential candidate in 1964, Goldwater emphasized what he called "states' rights." For instance, he opposed the Civil Rights Act of 1964, saying it was an intrusion of the federal government into the affairs of states. The stand was popular in the South, but whether the tactic was specifically designed to appeal to racist Southern white voters is a matter of debate.

RICHARD NIXON: In 1968, Nixon, with the aid of South Carolina Sen. Strom Thurmond, ran on a campaign of states' rights and "law and order." As a result, every state that had been in the Confederacy, except Texas, voted for either Nixon or Southern Democrat George Wallace, despite a strong tradition of supporting Democrats.

RONALD REAGAN: In 1980, Ronald Reagan kicked off his campaign by making a speech in support of states' rights at a county fair in Neshoba County, Miss., where three civil rights advocates were murdered in 1964. Reagan went on to make a speech praising Jefferson Davis, the president of the Confederacy, at Stone Mountain, Ga., site of the founding of the modern Klan.

OTHER CAMPAIGNS: The Willie Horton commercials used by supporters of George Bush and strategist Lee Atwater in 1988 also may have been such an appeal. Other examples include the 1990 re-election campaign of Jesse Helms, which attacked his opponent's alleged support of "racial quotas."

TODAY'S STRATEGY: Leaving aside all questions of race, Republicans continue to modify the Southern Strategy. As racism became less politically palatable, it was augmented by divisions based on other cultural issues such as abortion, school prayer, and guns

[johnb]

Not being a Republican myself Stan you're not likely to get me irritated or embarrassed by highlighting alleged wrongs of Republican politicians.

Mehlman, speaking before the NAACP, said Republicans had been wrong to try to make use of racially divisive issues.

True, but the thing you are trying to gloss over here is that while individual GOP candidates may very well be guilty of doing what Mehlman says, there was no gang of GOP armed thugs lynching blacks to supress black voting now was there?

As well, legitimate issues, such as states rights, does not make the proponent of protecting the 10th Amendment a racist. To suggest, as you are doing, that Goldwater is a racist is ridiculous.

It is also interesting that you wish to use the Horton matter against Republicans when the guy that first tarred and feathered Michael Dukakis with it was none other than Al Gore in the Donkeycrat primary. Is Al Gore a racist Stan? That was a crime control issue and the problem was Massachusetts had a permissive probation law, a law signed by a prior, Republican governor. The fact that Dukakis was soft on crime does not mean Bush or Gore were racists for highlighting that fact.

You are going to employ the Donkeycrat strategy of equating "racism" with "anything Republicans do" Stan. You're too far partisan to be objective.

You would have a point *IF* the GOP had behaved as the Donkeycrat party behaved. They didn't and you don't.

[Rono]

How Hankins could draw a parallel between that situation and anything going on with annexation today is a feat of intellectual gymnastics requiring the use of large quantities of self-administered intoxicants.

From a Southern Heritage web site.

The Red Shirt Name

During reconstruction, the campaign many of the Democrats, especially those in the rifle clubs, were attired in red shirts. For that reason, it is frequently referred to as the "Red Shirt" campaign. This custom was said to have originated after the Hamburg affair when most of the members of the Sweetwater Sabre Club and others, indicted for murder and conspiracy to murder, were en route to Aiken to arrange bail. It was suggested that though assembled as prisoners, they should wave the bloody shirt as a token of defiance. Accordingly the materials were purchased and the shirts made by the ladies in Aiken. The red shirts were again worn on August 12 when Chamberlain spoke in Edgefield; they became a distinguishing uniform of the Democrats.
How some suggest it came to be, the first history of the waving of the bloody “Red Shirt”

Here is a Quote by Republican US Senator Oliver P. Morton from Indiana in 1866: (please also note that Morton change from a democrat to a republican )

“Every man who labored for rebellion in the field, who murdered Union prisoners with cruelty and starvation, who conspired to bring about civil war in the loyal states ... calls himself a Democrat. ... Every wolf in sheep's clothing, who pretends to preach the gospel but proclaims the righteousness of man-selling and slavery; every one who shoots down negroes in the streets; burns negro school-houses and meeting-houses, and murders women and children by the light of their own flaming dwellings calls himself a Democrat” Morton took to the floor of the US Senate, as an example, a bloodied shirt he stated came from a beaten and murdered Louisiana African American.

By this, Morton used some of the most powerful contemporary imagery available at the time, and by most historical accounts, it is the first recognized “waving of the RED (bloody) shirt”

The speech was clearly designed to enflame partisan passion.

It is my understanding that Lt General Wade Hampton and company, reportedly questioned the authenticity of Morton’s bloodied shirts and adopted the Red Shirt as a uniform in mockery of Morton’s claim

So how is it that, the aristocracy of the south (or power that was in the hands of the rich,) was predominantly democrats at that time? In other words …the rich plantation owners were indeed democrats. Since when are the democrats of today the party of the power/rich?

Today we have the rich aligned with the Republicans and the NAACP aligned with the democrats. It is clear that the partisanship then is different than now. Or is it?

Very cleverly, the term “Red Shirt” or the “waving of the bloody Red Shirt”, can and still is used on both sides of the partisan isle to enflame partisan passion. There are still many headlines accusing each side of "waving the bloodied red shirt"

In his presentation to the Town Hall attendees, Mr. S. Ellis Hankins commented on the fact that people at our (the www.StopNCAnnexation.com group) rally were wearing “red shirts” and he suggested that they were similar to "Red Shirt" groups from the past that "weren't very nice people": Remember he was speaking to a group that has a clear democratic majority. The very democrats that he leads are “not very nice people?” Or the invasion of the modern day “republicans” the carpetbaggers, not very nice people?

John, as one who proudly flies the Taylor Battle Flag, perhaps you can explain to me, these quirks, and especially when the issue of the Pinehurst, Southern Pines non-annexation of the poor black areas was most recently raised. (Which incidentally has been blocked time and time again by way of Hankins and his followers, the DEMOCRATS, the majority here in North Carolina!) You obviously see that I do not side with majority of democrats on this issue, but the issue of a Red Shirt I do not believe, and Hankins apparently does not either, belongs to solely the democrats, southern or otherwise.

I conclude that the smoke and mirrors of partisanship, both then and now and the banter of whose waving the bloody red shirt is just that…partisanship. I say just follow the money…and as Paul Harvey say’s , it always tells “the rest of the story” While you may want Dutchman Downs annexed, I think you will agree that money is what drives the rest of the annexation issue. (and most other political issues for that matter)

Rono.

[johnb]

You obviously see that I do not side with majority of democrats on this issue, but the issue of a Red Shirt I do not believe, and Hankins apparently does not either, belongs to solely the democrats, southern or otherwise.

It belongs to a party Ron, a party that married a motive (racism) with a tactic (political terrorism) in order to achieve power. The players inside the party may very well change as time goes on but when the party continues to act in the same fashion there is an institutional guilt there. You want to blame "rich people" because you're a half-assesed socialist and see people with money as the source of all evil in the world.

You, as a Democrat, want to reject the guilt of your party because it looks bad on you. What members of a political party may do is one thing, what the party itself does is something else. Wilbur Mills is a great example. Democrat Congressmen gets drunk, drives around town and gets stopped by the DC cops one night and lo and behold he had a hooker in the car with him. That means NOTHING to any other Democrat in the world except his wife. When the Cook County Democrat Party engages in ballot box tampering/election rigging through it's precinct captains across the city of Chicago that is something quite different.

Hankins is engaging in hyperbole when discussing the issue of annexation in Moore County. He cannot be taken seriously. If we say there must be objective standards for government action we need to define what those standards are. Am I not right in believing you don't want to be annexed because of the cost that would be assessed to you in the form of the hook up fees for the utility lines? The city seems to believe annexing your neighborhood makes sense financially, ie, they can nail you for the hook up fees and make out like bandits on the property taxes. Frankly, they're right, you guys are well off, you might not like it but such is life. They're not annexing you because you're white, they're annexing you because of your high property valuations. When Moore County uses objective standards like that Hankins wants to claim they're racist. The properties in question are of low valuation and the people in them are not well off financially.

*IF* Southern Pines was controlled by some racist elite seems to me they would annex those neighborhoods, hand the same bill to those people they give everyone else when annexed, and start collecting the property taxes. The inevitable result is that the people on fixed incomes would be the first to sell and leave followed quickly by everyone else that couldn't or wouldn't want to pay higher property taxes, higher water and sewer bills, and whatever other fees/assesments Southern Pines inflicts on it's residents. Net result is that a developer would pick those properties up for a song since it's be difficult to find other buyers for small lots with utility hook up fees being assessed. The developer will knock the houses down, reformulate the lots and put a few high dollar homes up there. All with city water and sewer of course. Wealthier residents would move in and in the end the black population of Southern Pines is not increased at all. *IF* Hankins were right the easiest way for these alleged "racists" to get rid of the blacks living in the area would be to annex them. He makes no sense.

[StanN]

JohnB,

The issue of race and the associated issue involving class, have had a long history in the U.S. and both major political parties have been involvd...and are still involved to this day. If you ascribe to one party the guilt for this you are also ascribing to Christians the guilt for the inquisition, or to the whites of today the responsibility for the mass genocide (bigger even than the holocaust) involved in the forced transport of blacks from Africa to slavery in the West or to Germans for the holocaust.

I think all of that is so much ********!

We are all free to act today according to our own conscience and free will.
We need to stop using history as a means of inflaming passions. History reveals our past glories and our past shame. Are we mindless puppets that we need repay history? I don't buy it.

stan

[johnb]

If you ascribe to one party the guilt for this you are also ascribing to Christians the guilt for the inquisition,

No, that guilt belongs to the organization that perpetuated the inquisition, the Roman Catholic Church. The last pope, JPII, made a point to actually apologize for it. Not that it did anything for the victims, but that he forced his church to acknowledge it's past sin. That is how you address these matters, not by denying, hiding, or attacking.

A few years ago the Southern Baptist Convention came out and apologized, as an organization, for it's role in splitting American Baptists in the years before 1860 and it's role in supporting the institution of slavery. Again, it doesn't help the victims as they're all dead, but they acknowledged the sin of the organization and did not deny it, hide from it, or attack anyone over it.

I think all of that is so much ********!

Of course you do. You're a Democrat and you want to believe your party is on some mytical moral high ground and you cannot consider or accept that your party did some very evil things in the not too distant past in order to acquire then keep political power. Keep in mind the topic of this thread, you guys want to claim credit for FDR, LBJ, the New Frontier, the Great Society, the New Deal, etc... and that's fine. If you want the credit for past accomplishments be prepared to should the blame for past sins as well. If your party is supposed to be free from the stain of the Red Shirts you cannot accept the credit for the New Deal. You get the good and the bad compadre. Let's not be hypocritical.

Are we mindless puppets that we need repay history?

No, but intellectual honesty demands we not pretend that history is something other than what it was. The Red Shirts, et al, didn't do what they did just for the fun of it.

[johnb]

"Why I am Proud to Be a (fill in Rep, Dem, Indy, Lib).

One thing I would hope most people could say with a straight face is that they're proud to be a member of an organization that takes responsibility for its actions.

What I'm seeing today though is that that is not the case.

[Wuptdo]

I wonder if this is MattD's other website? (Or a least bookmarked) :D :

http://dontblamemeivoted4kerry.com/

The way this thread is going, make me think of this famous quote by the 20th Century's best philosopher:

Human beings, who are almost unique in having the ability to learn from the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so."
Douglas Adams, "Last Chance to See" (1952-2001)

Wuptdo B-)

[Cathy]

Johnb,

I just want to clarify one thing about Hankins.
He was not the one to call Southern Pines racist for not annexing. He defended the municipality for NOT annexing for fiscal reasons.
The Civil Rights Center and the Cedar Grove Institute were the ones saying it was racist.

The annoying thing to me about him taking that position is that the League is one of the frontline groups who disseminate the PR BS lines for cities to use when they justify annexing higher tax bracket areas.

If calling the tax lucrative areas "freeloaders" doesn't get enough traction, they trot out the race card of "white flight" (ignoring the racial and ethnic diversity of the target area) and then "you guys need to be taken off of your environmentally unsound septic systems for the good of the whole community" BS line, and the "orderly growth" argument. And the last is ludicrous as the cities continue to reach out for "satellite annexations".

In the case of the Southern Pines "doughnut hole" (another argument conveniently used when it suits them) areas, why have these arguments suddenly become non-existent? Why is it suddenly more important to say that the municipalities are acting in fiscally responsible manner by refusing to absorb these areas?

The hypocrisy is so thick it is disgusting, and the fact that they get away with it is because each area where there is an annexation issue remains isolated from each other and difficult to compare side by side in the court of public opinion.

When the arguments used to annex lucrative areas is suddenly ignored when the areas to annex are poor, or predominately black, it is hard to ignore that there MAY BE an element of racism going on. But I tend to think it has more to do with money.
I feel that the Pinehurst case is a Hobson's Choice for the victims. Annexation will make their cost of living go up, it may drive them from their homes, but if the muni's are going to use the above arguments to annex when it benefits them, then they should be required to take in poorer areas at the cities expense.

When Hankins made the reference to "Red Shirts" to paint the opposition with, I think he was feeling desperate in the face of a rising organized backlash to the money grabbing scheme for the Municipalities.

Cathy