There were a lot of people trying to argue that Black voters had voted for Greene because he was Black, even though the vast majority of them had no way to know what People started arguing that Greene with an extra E was a "Black-coded spelling" and such
-
-
Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy
(Which is mostly pulled from thin air - I think someone crunched the numbers on the census and eventually concluded that, nationwide, Greenes are slightly more likely to be Black than Greens, but that's because Greene is a *Southern* spelling of the name)
1 reply 0 retweets 4 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy
Or, rather, that archaic English spellings of names are more common in the South I mean the most famous Greene (Graham Greene) is a white guy So, you know, inconclusive
1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy
The other famous Greenes that come to mind - Lorne Greene from Bonanza, Ashley Greene who played Alice Cullen in Twilight - are also quite white The most famous Black Green, Al Green, as you point out, *doesn't* have the E
1 reply 0 retweets 2 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy
Honestly the best explanation, barring fraud, is just the "normal name hypothesis" You get a lot of people who feel like voting on something despite their low level of knowledge or investment, they just vote for whoever has the most "normal" name
1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy
Or, you know, if people want to protest vote against someone they don't like, they're psychologically much more likely to do it if the unknown challenger has a "generic" name so they can imagine their protest vote is going to a "generic politician"
1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy
"Alvin Greene" isn't a MUCH more whitebread Anglo name than "Vic Rawl" but it still clearly wins the "more normal" contest
1 reply 0 retweets 2 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy
The most cynical deployment of this principle, of course, was the infamous "Bagel Lady Judge", where an LA Superior Court Judge with an impeccable record, Dzintra Janavs, was unseated by Lynn Olson, the proprietor of a coffee shop on the PCH known for excellent bagels
1 reply 1 retweet 4 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy
Lynn Olson did meet the minimum requirements for the bench, having a JD and having been admitted to the California state bar, but had, unfortunately, never actually practiced law, finding that the cafe was a more rewarding pursuit
1 reply 0 retweets 2 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy
It's not uncommon for people to find they wasted their time and money going to law school in this way It is uncommon for them to decide to make good on this investment years later by cynically gaming the system of judicial elections in the nastiest possible way
1 reply 0 retweets 5 likes
By finding a judge whose seat was up for election with no other challengers, who happened to have a difficult to spell Czech name, and then filing to run against her and spamming her district with flyers and lawn signs saying "VOTE LYNN OLSON"
-
-
Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy
Anyway she won by a landslide, the whole legal community was incensed, and it became a whole big news story in 2006 Gov. Schwarzenegger immediately appointed Janavs back onto the bench via the next open seat But, constitutionally, there was nothing they could do about Olson
1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes -
Replying to @arthur_affect @Nymphomachy
She remains an LA Superior Court Judge to this day, having narrowly won reelection in 2012 against a guy named "Doug Weitzman" (which is just a tiny bit too ethnic)
2 replies 0 retweets 2 likes - Show replies
New conversation -
Loading seems to be taking a while.
Twitter may be over capacity or experiencing a momentary hiccup. Try again or visit Twitter Status for more information.