Board rejects 'whiteman' ballot language from Milwaukee candidate

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel ^ | July 21, 2010 | Jason Stein and Patrick Marley

[TheOldLady]

Yes, she can probably have anything she wants on the ballot in the Motor democrat-caused-slum City.

[a fool in paradise]

Board member Thomas Barland, who voted to allow Griffin to make the statement, said he thought it was not obscene and "not racial." But Roxanne Dunlap of Sussex, a citizen attending the meeting, told the board that she found the statement offensive and believed that a white person making the opposite statement - "not the black man's bitch" - would be sharply criticized.

Well that's because that's DIFFERENT.

[Mr. Silverback]

Ms. Griffin should take her parents to court for saddling her with that spelling of a beautiful name.

[Mr. Silverback]

Somebody has to decide what goes on a ballot or there really would be anarchy.

That doesn’t mean this woman was properly or improperly treated, it just means that election boards do work that is essential to democracy. This year in my county there were some candidates removed from the primary ballot. One guy had a whole sheet of signatures done in one person’s handwriting and another only had to get 37 signatures to get on the ballot but had so many signatures from outside her district of 3,400 people that she couldn’t even handle that. No “allowers,” that felon and that incompetent end up on the ballot and possibly controlling the business of a county of 50,000 people for four years.

That said, I think they should put her statement on the ballot. One of the great things about free speech is that it makes it much easier to spot the idiots.

[gorush]

I agree that someone must choose how to print the final ballot and certainly fraudulent cases must be excluded, but deciding how a candidate may use their allotted 5 words (independents only) should not be within their control. Something stinks here.

[Mr. Silverback]

The panel is wrong, but I doubt there’s corruption. It’s not like they shut down a candidate who crusaded for marriage or smaller government or put “God Bless America” in their statement. They ruled against someone who put forward something blatantly racist.

[gorush]

I just don’t see how that should be up to them. So it’s racist, the voters should know.

[upsdriver]

State elections officials narrowly rejected a Milwaukee Assembly candidate's attempt to run with the slogan "NOT the 'whiteman's bitch' " under her name on the ballot.

A bitch, nonetheless.

[gorush]

Maybe if Robert Byrd had been allowed to tout his KKK membership he wouldn’t have been elected so many times, maybe not, but who’s to say?

[SharpRightTurn]

“Ieshuh Griffin: NOT the ‘whiteman’s bitch’ “ under her name on the ballot.”

Then who’s bitch you be?

[Mr. Silverback]

OK, no offense, but I’m wondering why you appear to be responding without reading.

I did not say it was OK that they stopped her. I said that suspecting them of some sort of corruption (”Something stinks here”) isn’t warranted because the statement is so blatantly racist.

They shouldn’t censor it, but there’s no evidence that they did so for any reason other than opposing racism, or any reason to suspect it. If you have some, tee it up.