Black ex-congressman speaks truth about racial ‘groupthink’ on voter ID

By David McElroy · October 26, 2011

As a U.S. congressman, Artur Davis parroted the party line about the evils of voter ID. Now that he’s out of office, though, he’s suddenly able to admit the obvious — that voter ID is a reasonable step to prevent fraud.

While Davis was a congressman, he needed the support and co-operation of the black Democratic political establishment, so he took the expected position by claiming that voter ID was an evil scheme to prevent blacks from voting. The argument has never made sense, of course, but things aren’t required to make sense when you’re playing the race card.

In a column in an Alabama newspaper last week, Davis admitted that voter ID is a good thing and says he’s changed his mind. Remarkably, he admits that he was just repeating what was expected of him:

“When I was a congressman, I took the path of least resistance on this subject for an African American politician. Without any evidence to back it up, I lapsed into the rhetoric of various partisans and activists who contend that requiring photo identification to vote is a suppression tactic aimed at thwarting black voter participation.”

Predictably, Davis’ past allies are apoplectic that he’s telling the truth. In fact, the chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus speculated that it might mean Davis is considering becoming a Republican. Obviously, it’s not acceptable to tell obvious truths if you want to be accepted by members of this “club.”

It’s not just blacks or Democrats who play these dishonest games, of course. The political system we have encourages pandering to the passions of ignorant people and it encourages going along with groupthink in order to be accepted. Telling the truth and encouraging honest discussion of the obvious is one of the unforgivable sins in modern politics.

Politicians are required to say what voters want to hear. They’re required to say what the leaders of various pressure groups want to hear. They’re not allowed to think for themselves. They’re certainly not allowed to tell the truth.

People frequently blame politicians for the problems faced by this country and others, but people are looking in the wrong place for blame. If you’re a part of the system, you’re to blame. If you’re one of the ignorant ones supporting politicians who make promises that are impossible to keep, you’re the one giving them the incentive to do that. If you’re one of those who keeps participating in the system simply to vote for “the lesser of two evils,” you’re not helping, either, because you’re helping to give legitimacy to an immoral system that produces worse and worse results.

It’s only by opting out of the system that we can quit thinking in terms of “red vs. blue” and start having honest discussions of how different groups of us can live with different sets of rules — as we choose. Those who stick with the existing system are permanently stuck with the dishonesty and groupthink of the mainstream.

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If you have problems with high blood pressure, I’d like to encourage you to consider making serious changes to your diet. There might be some people who don’t have any choice but to start taking prescription medications for high blood pressure, but I’d like to tell you that I have completely eliminated my issue by eliminating all sugar and almost all carbohydrates. (A couple of months ago, my blood pressure hit 185/144, which was dangerously high — considered stage 3 hypertension.) By completely changing my eating habits, I’m down 22 pounds and my blood pressure is now in the “ideal” range — without taking any medication. In addition, I sleep better and I have more energy. Getting away from the sugar-laden mess that we generally refer to as “highly processed food” has been a life-changer for me. Now my challenge is to avoid slipping back into old habits — by eating in the dangerous ways that almost everyone in our society has come to see as normal.

When I first heard about this, I thought it must be satire. When I discovered it was real, I was appalled, but I still thought it must be a one-time thing from some nutty activist. But it turns out it’s the latest bit of pandering to a bunch of far-left activists who believe that a man can become a woman if he decides to claim he’s a woman. As everybody knows, men have prostate glands. Women do not. Period. End of story. Men can get prostate cancer. Women cannot. But political activists are so eager to pretend that a man claiming to be a “trans woman” is really a woman that they are insisting that “women” be included in public health messages about the issue. This is nothing but political virtue-signaling. If you’re a man, you know which parts you have. You know that you ought to be screened. Nobody is made any safer by dragging far-left gender ideology into simple medical reality.

Every time someone tries to tighten requirements around the use of absentee ballots, I hear screams from Democrats and others on the political left that such efforts are nothing but “suppression of black voters.” These protests have never made sense to me, especially because it’s never been a secret that absentee ballot fraud goes on all the time in certain areas. (Everybody knew it when I worked in politics.) The people who engage in such fraud are rarely caught — often because the local political establishment approves of the crime — but a Democrat who won a primary election in Clay County, Alabama, last year has pleaded guilty to this sort of cheating. Terry Andrew Heflin was running for a place on the Clay County Commission. He was caught ordering seven absentee ballots in the names of various voters and sending them to his post office box — after which he used the ballots to vote absentee for himself seven time. Did he have other people cast additional fraudulent ballots? We’ll never know. But in a primary in which he was able to win with only 141 votes, it wouldn’t take many fraudulent votes to change the election. The next time you hear “civil rights activists” claim that it’s just “voter suppression” to hurt blacks which is at the root of efforts to stop this fraud, remember Terry Heflin. If you care about fair and honest elections, ballot security and voter identity should matter to you.

A state legislator in Maine has been stripped of the ability to speak in the state Legislature — and her votes are not being counted on legislative issues — all because she made a truthful social media post. Rep. Laurel Libby (R-Auburn, Maine) opposes allowing boys to compete against girls’ teams in school athletics and she’s become known for making an issue of it. On Feb. 17, she posted on Facebook about a recent example that she found outrageous. She posted side-by-side photos of a boy named John who competed last year in a state track event and won fifth place against other boys two years ago — and a photo of the same boy (now called Katie) who won first place in the same event this year against girls. Whether you find this outrageous or not, Libby is clearly being honest and truthful about the objective facts of an issue of public importance. But the state Legislature censured her. Democrats decreed that she could not speak in the House and that her votes would not count on legislation — until she apologized for the outrage of telling the truth. She refused and her constituents have been unrepresented in the state House since then. The people who promote this ideology are out of touch with reality and won’t rest until they force the rest of us to join them in this delusion. But even if you agree with “trans” ideology, you should be appalled at this heavy-handed attack on political speech.

The late Steve Jobs was at the center of our culture’s transition from analog to digital. He co-founded Apple Computer. He led the team that revolutionized personal computing with the first Macintosh. As CEO of Apple, he led the development of the iPhone and later the iPad. You would think the children of such a man would be surrounded by technology. But Jobs and his wife Laureen didn’t let their children use iPads. Their home had few screens of any kind. Even though Jobs spent most of his time developing and selling Macs and iPhones and iPads, he was home with his wife and children for dinner when he was in town. The family ate together at a simple wooden table in their kitchen — and there were no digital devices or focus on popular culture. Instead, he’s said to have guided his family toward deep discussions of art, philosophy and education — with no iPads to be found. If the man who guided the development of such products chose a different path for his own children, does that suggest that his digital experience taught him that children need human connection, not screens? And does it suggest the possibility that we might be better off if we made the same choice for our families?

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