Middleboro Review and so on

  Earlier today, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that states can distort their congressional maps to disenfranchise voters of color if they say they are doing it for “political” purposes. In practice, this will mean that states can get away with flagrantly racist gerrymandering as long as they don’t specifically say they are doing it to affect people of color. The decision seems to suggest that racism is a relic of the past, that there is no connection between race and politics, and that  acknowledging  racial discrimination — not discrimination itself — is the real problem. That is absurd. Racism — whether couched as “cultural grievance” or more explicit — is central to Donald Trump’s political career and the entire MAGA movement. “Make America Great Again” has always been shorthand for taking our country back to a time when people of color and other marginalized groups had even less presence and power in our society. Of course race and politics are intertwined. The whole r...