So then was the Government overstepping its authority by violating the 10th Amendment in emancipating slaves?

So is Rand Paul a racist? No, and it's irritating to watch his out-of-context quotes -- this and a comment about how golf was no longer for elitists because Tiger Woods plays golf -- splashed on the Web to make that point. Paul believes, as many conservatives believe, that the government should ban bias in all of its institutions but cannot intervene in the policies of private businesses. Those businesses, as Paul argues, take a risk by maintaining, in this example, racist policies. Patrons can decide whether or not to give them their money, or whether or not to make a fuss about their policies. That, not government regulation and intervention, is how bias should be eliminated in the private sector. And in this belief Paul is joined by some conservatives who resent that liberals seek government intervention for every unequal outcome.

But Paul never settles down and to make the argument. Rachel Maddow repeatedly raises lunch counters, and it would have really pleased me if Paul had just made the case for private sector discrimination. Frankly, I can see the outlines of the argument and am not totally unsympathetic to it. Indeed, I think there's a beautiful justice that's visited upon the random politician who, to this very day, is routinely exposed as belonging to a white country club. There's a kind of social sanction in that embarrassment that I don't think the law can bring. (That said, I trust the people who were actually there more than my own abstract theorizing.)

But what about red-lining? Does Paul know anything about blockbusting? Does he think banks should be able to have a policy of not lending to black businesses? Does he think real-estate agents should be able to discriminate? Does he think private homeowner groups should be able to band together and keep out blacks? Jews? Gays? Latinos?

I find this strangely intriguing.

No, this is fundamentalist Christians at their worst, and the actual conservatives in Texas are too scared to stop them because of the votes they'll lose. These people aren't conservative in any kind of ideological way, they're bat-shit crazy reactionaries. Revising history is the antithesis of what an actual conservative stands for. If you truly believe that it's necessary to understand the lessons of the past in order to move forward, as I, and most actual conservatives do, you'd agree that this is an incredibly dangerous abuse of political power. This shit has to be stopped at all costs.

Red Headed Sluts.

The blood of Kevin Hart's cutter's victims?