This story is just plain psychotic.

MACON, Miss. -- Lean, lanky and a fast-talking blur of perpetual motion, Noxubee County Democratic Chairman Ike Brown has roamed the political landscape of eastern Mississippi for 25 years with one clear aim: electing Democrats who are really Democrats.

Brown has no time for moderate white Democrats who might get elected but who would then support Republican policies. "To hell with 'em," Brown says of people he calls "Dixiecrats." "They're not doing me one bit of good."

Brown's lawyer, Wilbur Colom, says he is simply "a tough politician." But the U.S. Justice Department says Brown's take-no-prisoners brand of politics has crossed the line into discrimination against white voters and candidates.

The Justice Department has launched a landmark lawsuit against Brown -- the first time the federal government has used the 1965 Voting Rights Act to allege racial discrimination against whites.

The Republican White House's racist disenfranchisement of minority voters has reached a new low:

The Justice Department has barred staff attorneys from offering recommendations in major Voting Rights Act cases, marking a significant change in the procedures meant to insulate such decisions from politics, congressional aides and current and former employees familiar with the issue said.

Disclosure of the change comes amid growing public criticism of Justice Department decisions to approve Republican-engineered plans in Texas and Georgia that were found to hurt minority voters by career staff attorneys who analyzed the plans. Political appointees overruled staff findings in both cases.

The GOP has relentlessly attacked every Democratic power bloc; union members, senior citizens, and minorities have been targeted by the Republican Party's pursuit of a one-party electoral system, a move predicated on the fact that eliminating the competition is easier than stealing elections by vote-rigging.

[cross-posted at And, yes, I DO take it personally]

first we have condi doing some fast talking...

European foreign ministers said Thursday that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice had assured the NATO allies that the United States does not allow torture of terrorist suspects and respects principles of the Geneva Conventions on the treatment of prisoners of war.

[...]

Rice "addressed the principles that guide United States policy with regards to respect for international law," Belgian Foreign Minister Karel de Gucht said.

Rice assured the U.S. allies "that at no time did the United States agree to inhumane acts or torture, that they have always respected the sovereignty of the states concerned and even if terrorists are not covered by the Geneva Conventions, they have still applied the principles governing those Geneva Conventions," de Gucht told Belgian RTBf radio network.

remember in 2003 when democratic state legislators high-tailed it from austin to albuquerque to prevent a vote on the texas redistricting plan...?

   While Texas Senate Democrats remain in New Mexico, their counterparts managed to get some work done in Austin.

    Passage of the map remains far away from a full vote, especially since 11 Texas Democrat senators say the hospitality in Albuquerque, N.M., suits them just fine.

    The Democratic legislators say they'll stay in New Mexico until Republicans and Gov. Rick Perry take the redistricting issue off the table, and said they're prepared to remain out of state up to 30 days, the maximum length of a special session.

remember THIS part...?