Eric Holder Gets Tough on Voter Laws

Eric Holder is the worst of the worst AGs. The dude should be out on his can over Fast and Furious, and he's long epitomized the administration's culture of corruption. Now he's arguing that to look the other way amid blatant voter fraud is a "moral imperative." Right. Give me a break, you crook.

At New York Times, "Holder Signals Tough Review of New State Laws on Voting." (Via Memeorandum.)

And at Power Line, "OBAMA ADMINISTRATION COORDINATING WITH LEFT-WING GROUPS ON VOTER FRAUD?":

Democrats want felons to vote, because an overwhelming majority of them will vote Democratic. They want illegal aliens to vote for the same reason. And they want loyal Democrats to vote more than once where they are able to do so. Where there is no voter security, these abuses will increase. So, either through legal rulings or through intimidation, the Democrats want to disable the states from protecting the integrity of the ballot box. It appears that Obama’s politicized Department of Justice will be in the forefront of this effort.

California Indian Tribes Eject Thousands of Members

This is fascinating.

It's a common story line --- there have been lots of reports of tribal members being cut loose for lack of lineal documentation. But this report at New York Times is particularly interesting. The Chukchansi Indian Casino is up near Fresno. My wife likes to go out there when we're in town.

See, "In California, Indian Tribes With Casino Money Cast Off Members":

COARSEGOLD, Calif. — The six-page, single-spaced letter that Nancy Dondero and about 50 of her relatives received last month was generously salted with legal citations and footnotes. But its meaning was brutally simple. “It is the decision by a majority of the Tribal Council,” the letter said, “that you are hereby disenrolled.”

And with that, Ms. Dondero’s official membership in the Picayune Rancheria of the Chukchansi Indians, the cultural identity card she had carried all her life, summarily ended.

“That’s it,” Ms. Dondero, 58, said. “We’re tribeless.”

Ms. Dondero and her clan have joined thousands of Indians in California who have been kicked out of their tribes in recent years for the crime of not being of the proper bloodline.

For centuries, American Indian tribes have banished people as punishment for serious offenses. But only in recent years, experts say, have they begun routinely disenrolling Indians deemed inauthentic members of a group. And California, with dozens of tiny tribes that were decimated, scattered and then reconstituted, often out of ethnically mixed Indians, is the national hotbed of the trend.

Clan rivalries and political squabbles are often triggers for disenrollment, but critics say one factor above all has driven the trend: casino gambling. The state has more than 60 Indian casinos that took in nearly $7 billion last year, the most of any state, according to the Indian Gaming Commission.

For Indians who lose membership in a tribe, the financial impact can be huge. Some small tribes with casinos pay members monthly checks of $15,000 or more out of gambling profits. Many provide housing allowances and college scholarships. Children who are disenrolled can lose access to tribal schools.

Continue reading.

Some in Congress want to give the federal courts or the Bureau of Indian Affairs the authority to rule on what in many cases are tribal expulsions based on blatant greed.

I have a lot less sympathy for the plight of Native Americans after hearing stories like these.