October 7, 2004 [home] [contact] [links] [disclaimer] [boycott list]
Minority Report: Florida Employing Psychics to Suspend Voting Rights of Future Black Criminals
In counties all over Florida, individuals with extrasensory perception are pouring over the names of black constituents, searching for extrasensory signals of future felonious wrongdoing.
The undertaking, dubbed "Project Whitewash", aims to eventually scrub the state's voter roles completely of all black people with future conviction records, but Governor Jeb Bush hopes to eliminate the names of 100,000 future bad guys in time for the upcoming Presidential Election.
"So far I’ve single-handedly scrubbed over one hundred black felons using my gift of telepathy," boasted Janusz Rajski, a psychic currently working for the Dade County Board of Elections, “For everything from bank fraud and drug dealing to battery of a theme park mascot while under the influence of PCP and shotgunning psychics in dark alleys. It’s appalling the things some people will do someday.”
One of those whose voting rights have been stripped by the new system is Rachel Elliot, 46, of Gainesville. Mrs. Elliot, who describes herself as a happily married nurse and mother of three, was astonished when she discovered that she would be ineligible to vote in the November elections on account of her future felony arrest record - which reflects convictions for armed robbery and manslaughter in connection with a daring 2006 heist of an armored bank truck.
"I couldn’t imagine in a million years the circumstances under which I’d rob a bank truck,” remarked Mrs. Elliot, “And it’s sort of strange, but the psychic’s whole story about how it all happens sounded a lot like that movie ‘Dead Presidents’.”
Project Whitewash has drawn sharp criticism from Democratic politicians and civil rights groups, who argue that the practice of selectively suspending the voting rights of a single race of people for crimes they have yet to commit by supposed psychics is a corrupt and racist policy designed to help the incumbent George W. Bush win the state's potentially pivotal electoral votes in November.
"What? That's ridiculous. What will they come up with next?" rebutted Florida Secretary of State Glenda Hood, "Our sole motivation is serving justice and maximizing the integrity of our state's electoral process. In 2000 this state suspended the rights of a lot of black people for crimes they hadn't committed yet and got a lot of flack for it, so that's why we brought in the psychics this time. So now what's the problem? I suppose we could've tried to prognosticate the future felony convictions of our state's inhabitants independent of racial characteristics, but we just didn't, and that's that. There's no wicked conspiracy behind it, and frankly, I think it's perfectly disgraceful that our Democratic colleagues are trying to make political hay from it all."