by Pa Rock
Resident Crank
Yesterday I received an official government document in the mail. It was the 2019 Census Test Questionnaire. I don't know if every American received one, or if I am part of some special select group whose answers will be extrapolated across all of America to demonstrate what the country looks like, population wise, a year ahead of the real, constitutionally-mandated national headcount.
There were a couple of things about this pre-census that caught my attention and seem worthy of a bit of crusty commentary. First of all, it arrived by mail, in paper form, at an undoubtedly significant cost to our government. The enclosed eight-page questionnaire is supposed to capture what the population looks like and where they are residing on July 1, 2019 - so I guess I will put it aside for a few weeks and hope that I can find it when July 1st rolls around.
(Last night there were two people and two dogs living in my house, but I literally don't have a clue who will be in residence here in three weeks.)
The practice census can be completed in two ways. Respondents can either fill in the paper version and then send it back in in the handy pre-postage-paid envelope, or they can go to a website and fill out an internet version and click a button. The letter that came with the practice census encourages people to use the internet method and save the government the expense of having to hire people to rip open the paper surveys and they physically tally the responses.
Use the internet - that's what our government wants - but I have some other thoughts on that matter. If our government can afford to send one thousand more troops to the Middle East as Trump wags the dog and tries to justify a war against Iran, then it can damn sure afford a few more bean-counters to work with the census. That's where I want my tax dollars to be spent - and not on some damned Trump vanity war!
There is also a stern warning that those who fail to send in the practice document will receive a visit from an official US census-taker. Oooh!
The questions on the survey are interesting as well as invasive. It has room for descriptions of ten individuals who are in residence on July 1st. Those with households of more than ten can probably expect an in-person visit to count heads. A lot of information is requested on the first six, including relationship status. The census folks want to know, for instance, if any listed spouses are opposite or same-sex, and are they official spouses or just "unmarried partners." All of that is a good thing, I suppose, and I am left to wonder if troglodytes like Franklin Graham realize that his government is counting married and unmarried gay couples as real human beings!
There are also the standard race questions, reminding us that skin color and physical features are still sadly relevant in the early years of the twenty-first century. There are all sorts of boxes which can be checked on the race questions, giving individuals a great deal of latitude in describing their biological and ethnic make-ups.
And then there is Question #8: Is this person a citizen of the United States? The big question, the one that is supposedly still working its way through the courts - but is included in the practice census nonetheless. Question #8 has five possible answers: 1.) Yes, born in the United States. 2. Yes, born in Puerto Rico, Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands, or Northern Marianas. 3.) Yes, born abroad of US citizen parent or parents. 4.) Yes, US citizen by naturalization (along with a space to print the year of naturalization). And, 5.) No, not a US citizen.
And by now most of America knows that Question #8 was was hatched by the racist Trump administration to scare non-US citizens away from participating in the census and skewering the final totals more in favor of predominately white areas - areas where Republicans can expect to do better at the polls. The final census numbers will chart out where those all-important 435 seats of the House of Representatives are ultimately assigned. Texas, you are about to get screwed. Arizona, you are about to get screwed. California, you are about to get screwed. And so are a lot of minimum-wage farm production states like Arkansas, Missouri, and most of the chicken-picking states of the Deep South.
The Supreme Court may ultimately bounce Question #8 because of its obvious racist intent, though that outcome is not by any means certain, but it has still made its way into the 2019 Census Test Questionnaire. The Constitution mandates that everyone residing in the United States be counted in a census conducted by our government every ten years. Question #8 is intended to send many people into hiding.
But Pa Rock isn't hiding. He's standing tall and telling the world just how pissed off he is by the Trump administration's racist attempt to keep people from responding to the census.
Everyone living in the United States should be counted in the census.
Why is it that with Trump everything has to be a scam?
Resident Crank
Yesterday I received an official government document in the mail. It was the 2019 Census Test Questionnaire. I don't know if every American received one, or if I am part of some special select group whose answers will be extrapolated across all of America to demonstrate what the country looks like, population wise, a year ahead of the real, constitutionally-mandated national headcount.
There were a couple of things about this pre-census that caught my attention and seem worthy of a bit of crusty commentary. First of all, it arrived by mail, in paper form, at an undoubtedly significant cost to our government. The enclosed eight-page questionnaire is supposed to capture what the population looks like and where they are residing on July 1, 2019 - so I guess I will put it aside for a few weeks and hope that I can find it when July 1st rolls around.
(Last night there were two people and two dogs living in my house, but I literally don't have a clue who will be in residence here in three weeks.)
The practice census can be completed in two ways. Respondents can either fill in the paper version and then send it back in in the handy pre-postage-paid envelope, or they can go to a website and fill out an internet version and click a button. The letter that came with the practice census encourages people to use the internet method and save the government the expense of having to hire people to rip open the paper surveys and they physically tally the responses.
Use the internet - that's what our government wants - but I have some other thoughts on that matter. If our government can afford to send one thousand more troops to the Middle East as Trump wags the dog and tries to justify a war against Iran, then it can damn sure afford a few more bean-counters to work with the census. That's where I want my tax dollars to be spent - and not on some damned Trump vanity war!
There is also a stern warning that those who fail to send in the practice document will receive a visit from an official US census-taker. Oooh!
The questions on the survey are interesting as well as invasive. It has room for descriptions of ten individuals who are in residence on July 1st. Those with households of more than ten can probably expect an in-person visit to count heads. A lot of information is requested on the first six, including relationship status. The census folks want to know, for instance, if any listed spouses are opposite or same-sex, and are they official spouses or just "unmarried partners." All of that is a good thing, I suppose, and I am left to wonder if troglodytes like Franklin Graham realize that his government is counting married and unmarried gay couples as real human beings!
There are also the standard race questions, reminding us that skin color and physical features are still sadly relevant in the early years of the twenty-first century. There are all sorts of boxes which can be checked on the race questions, giving individuals a great deal of latitude in describing their biological and ethnic make-ups.
And then there is Question #8: Is this person a citizen of the United States? The big question, the one that is supposedly still working its way through the courts - but is included in the practice census nonetheless. Question #8 has five possible answers: 1.) Yes, born in the United States. 2. Yes, born in Puerto Rico, Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands, or Northern Marianas. 3.) Yes, born abroad of US citizen parent or parents. 4.) Yes, US citizen by naturalization (along with a space to print the year of naturalization). And, 5.) No, not a US citizen.
And by now most of America knows that Question #8 was was hatched by the racist Trump administration to scare non-US citizens away from participating in the census and skewering the final totals more in favor of predominately white areas - areas where Republicans can expect to do better at the polls. The final census numbers will chart out where those all-important 435 seats of the House of Representatives are ultimately assigned. Texas, you are about to get screwed. Arizona, you are about to get screwed. California, you are about to get screwed. And so are a lot of minimum-wage farm production states like Arkansas, Missouri, and most of the chicken-picking states of the Deep South.
The Supreme Court may ultimately bounce Question #8 because of its obvious racist intent, though that outcome is not by any means certain, but it has still made its way into the 2019 Census Test Questionnaire. The Constitution mandates that everyone residing in the United States be counted in a census conducted by our government every ten years. Question #8 is intended to send many people into hiding.
But Pa Rock isn't hiding. He's standing tall and telling the world just how pissed off he is by the Trump administration's racist attempt to keep people from responding to the census.
Everyone living in the United States should be counted in the census.
Why is it that with Trump everything has to be a scam?
1 comment:
So, did you refuse to answer question #8?
Ideally the paper census questionnaire you received is being used for proper purposes to establish a benchmark, test the wording of questions, response bias, and nonresponse bias.
The citizenship question is before the Supreme Court, The questions in that case, Department of Commerce v. New York case number 18-966, are:
1. Whether the district court erred in enjoining the Secretary of Commerce from
reinstating a question about citizenship to the 2020 decennial census on the ground that
the Secretary's decision violated the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), 5 U.S.C. 701
et seq.
2. Whether, in an action seeking to set aside agency action under the APA, a
district court may order discovery outside the administrative record to probe the mental
processes of the agency decisionmaker-including by compelling the testimony of highranking Executive Branch officials-without a strong showing that the decisionmaker
disbelieved the objective reasons in the administrative record, irreversibly prejudged the
issue, or acted on a legally forbidden basis.
The case was argued on April 23rd. One of my favorite attorneys, Dale Ho, was one of the lawyers heard that day. He represents the ACLU and was there on behalf of Respondents New York Immigration Coalition.
The unofficial transcript can be read at: https://www.supremecourt.gov/oral_arguments/argument_transcripts/2018/18-966_5hek.pdf.
There is developing news to report on the case. Mr. Ho submitted a letter to the Clerk of the Supreme Court informing him of a motion filed based on new evidence in the case. That letter:
The Honorable Scott S. Harris
Clerk of the Court
Supreme Court of the United States
One First Street, N.E.
Washington, D.C. 20543
Re: Department of Commerce, et al. v. New York, et al., No. 18-966
Dear Mr. Harris:
The petition for a writ of certiorari before judgment in the above-captioned
case was granted on February 15, 2019, and the Court heard oral argument on
April 23, 2019.
Respondents New York Immigration Coalition, et al., respectfully inform the
Court that they filed today the attached motion in the district court for an order to
show cause whether sanctions or other appropriate relief are warranted in light of
new evidence contradicting the sworn testimony of Secretary Ross’s expert advisor
A. Mark Neuman and senior DOJ official John Gore, and representations by
Petitioners to the district court, in this case. Ex. 1, NYIC Pls.’ Letter Mot. for an
Order to Show Cause, State of New York v. U.S. Dep’t of Commerce, No. 18-CV-2921
(S.D.N.Y. May 30, 2019), ECF No. 587. A hearing on the matter has been scheduled
in the district court for Wednesday, June 5 at 3:00pm EST.
The new evidence reveals that Dr. Thomas Hofeller, a longtime redistricting
specialist, played a significant role in orchestrating the addition of the citizenship
question to the 2020 Decennial Census in order to create a structural electoral
advantage for, in his own words, “Republicans and Non-Hispanic Whites,” and that
Petitioners obscured his role through affirmative misrepresentations.
American Civil Liberties Foundation
Voting Rights Project
National Office
125 Broad Street, 18th Floor
New York, NY 10004-2400
(212) 549-2500
aclu.org
The attached copy of the letter motion, Ex. 1, which was filed publicly with
the district court today contains redactions to certain testimony of Mr. Neuman over
which Petitioners have asserted deliberative process privilege. An unredacted
version of the letter motion is on file with the district court.
Respectfully submitted,
The Repsondents submitted their own letter and a motion for limited remand.
case documents at https://www.supremecourt.gov/search.aspx?filename=/docket/docketfiles/html/public/18-966.html
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