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Anyway, Trump’s whining over the naked attempts to deny him the nomination underscores the media’s misplaced priorities when it comes to reporting the real tragedy of Republican voter abuse—one that has gotten some attention, especially and thankfully on this site, but nowhere near the amount it should in the MSM, given how important and reprehensible it is. I am talking about systematic efforts by the GOP to throw impediments in the way of minority voters, poor voters and young voters simply trying to cast their ballots.
This is a scandal of gigantic proportions. The Republican Party has done a plethora of heinous things over the years to the poor and powerless, but to actively prevent people from voting may be their cruelest and most shameful achievement yet.
In no way should this be a partisan issue. It strikes at the very heart of our democracy where, it should go without saying, every effort must be taken to make voting easier. And yet the media don’t seem to be particularly exercised about voter suppression. Why? I think it is because it doesn’t fit the template of scandal the media love to report.
Think about it. One of our two major political parties has long been dedicated to subverting the democratic process. You could almost say that voter suppression and manipulation is hard-wired into the modern Republican Party—from the early 1960s, when William Rehnquist, then an attorney and Republican activist and later Supreme Court chief justice, was accused of patrolling Arizona polling places and intimidating black and Latino voters; to the 2000 Supreme Courtcoup d’état awarding the election to George W. Bush by denying Florida voters their choice; to the Supreme Court gutting the Voting Rights Act in 2013 by invalidating the provision that required certain jurisdictions to get federal approval for new election laws.
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