Jatinder Sandhu - Democracy Now

Jatinder Sandhu

Soc 122

4-27-2014

Democracy now

http://www.democracynow.org/2014/4/23/resegregation_of_american_students_new_report

The US Supreme Court upheld a ban on affirmative action which desegregated schools. This article goes into depth of the impacts of affirmative action and the progress that has not been made to equalize school districts. The report concludes that segregation is different but still exists in today's schools. It targets almost exclusively poor black and latino students. In 2007 Chief Justice Roberts struck down a case which desegregated schools in Seattle and Louisville. These schools wanted to maintain integration and were basically forced not to. The case has been made that due to segregation minorities, black and brown students have an inferior education than their white student counterparts. This segregation is heavily imposed in the southern states. It's almost as if Brown v Board of Education never happened down there. It is not just segregation based off of color it is also segregation based off income. Schools with poor students are left disadvantaged from the lack of fund provided. This in turn gives students a far inferior education than they deserve. Some of these schools have a 99% black or brown attendance. This is not just a minority population of schools, it has become the majority and that is the real issue. The Supreme Court decision furthers this divide and makes all the progress made during the civil rights movement nothing.

 

http://www.democracynow.org/2014/4/24/muslim_americans_accuse_fbi_of_placing

A group of Muslims are suing the US government because they claim they were forced into becoming FBI informants. The government purposefully put them on no-fly lists so they would agree to become informants. The list of people on the no-fly lists tops over 700,000 as of now. The case of Naveed Shinwari is something repeated by many other Muslim Americans. Naveed Shinwari went on a religious trip over seas. When she attempted to return she was forcibly interrogated on her return trip by FBI agents. The agents demanded they tell her everything she had done in order to return to her home, in America. Naveed Shinwari suspects that this was illegal and is suing to have her name taken off the no-fly list. It is a question of if the no-fly list is even constitutional. Naveed Shinwari wasn't a person trying to come into America, she was a US citizen. The system is broken fundamentally, any agent can name any person and nominate that person to the No fly list. This allows for too much leeway and too much abuse of authority and power.

This question isn't just about being forcibly stopped. The issue at hand is being on a list at all. These people have not committed a crime, they have not done anything wrong. They are constantly being watched, constantly being harassed. It also puts these people in a bind. You cannot just say you are not a terrorist, you have to prove it. To this date there hasn't been one person allowed off the list. Once you're on it, you seem to be on it for life.