Take the color of ones skin out of the equation and please explain to me who in their right mind does something like this:

A black man from Mississippi has been arrested and accused of sending racist death threats over the Internet to three black students at Louisiana’s Nicholls State University.

The FBI in New Orleans said Dyron Hart, 19, was arrested Wednesday. He is accused of sending the messages by way of the students’ Facebook accounts. The messages contained racial epithets and death threats and were sent to two black women and a black man at Nicholls State in Thibodaux, La.

The author of those messages cast himself as a white man who intended to kill blacks because Barack Obama was elected president.

Hart told an FBI agent that he sent the messages to “get a reaction,” according to the agent’s sworn statement.

The criminal complaint was filed in U.S. District Court in New Orleans. U.S. Attorney Jim Letten’s office said Hart made his initial court appearance in Biloxi. It was unclear when he would be brought to New Orleans.

Although the case sprang from a probe into messages sent to the three Nicholls State students, the FBI agent’s statement said Hart also admitted sending the message to students at other institutions, including LSU, the University of Mississippi and the University of Alabama.

Is it hatred, stupidity, seeking 15 minutes of fame or is a person like this simply unstable? Whatever the answer, Mr. Hart has now received a “reaction” on which he no doubt did not plan.

HT:Sweetness and Light

This article by Clarence Page from Real Clear Politics delves in to Hate Crimes but from the perspective of those which in the end turn out to be a hoax.

A student at George Washington University recently complained that swastikas were scrawled on her dormitory door. Thanks to cameras hidden by university police, they have a suspect: The student who filed the complaint.

I was shocked but not surprised, just as I am shocked but not surprised when, with thousands of cars on the road, some get into accidents. Similarly with the recent upsurge in national attention to swastikas, nooses and other racial vandalism in public places, I am shocked but not surprised that at least one case of racial-ethnic vandalism turns out to be phony.

The young woman’s sad case might have passed without much off-campus notice if these were not times in which any knucklehead with a rope or a felt-tipped pen can make national news by hanging a noose or scrawling racist graffiti in a conspicuous location.

Whether a hoax or the “real thing”, any hate crime is despicable. At least for the most part, the incidents Mr. Page discusses we know the targets were the perpetrators themselves..I suppose for attention.

Did you know that Christianity is under attack? Did you know that any day now that malicious Congress will pass legislation that will humiliate, silence, fine, or even jail pastors, and maybe even all Christians? Did you know that this is happening already in those secular foreign places like Canada and Sweden?

I sure didn’t. But thanks to Coral Ridge Ministries, I do now, and if I send the good Dr. D. James Kennedy a “generous” gift, if I “give today while we still have time,” then I can help stop this evil.

But this is all malarky. The melodramatic voiceover begins by saying that there’s not just one Hate Crimes bill before Congress, but three! Why is that scarier? Evidently, Coral Ridge Ministries assumes its audience is stupid enough to believe that three bills makes it three times as likely something will pass.

Actually, I count five bills, though two are really the same one traveling through both chambers (at the bottom you’ll find them summarized, with links to the texts). HR 1164 would make the Attorney General include crimes based on gender in hate crimes statistics. HR 2217 would add the homeless to hate crimes categories. HR 254 and HR 1592, which passed the House last May and is now in the Senate as S 1105, add gender and sexual preference to the list of hate crimes, and amend sentencing guidelines.

The Coral Ridge Ministries ad doesn’t state it, but what’s got them up in arms is that this proposed legislation adds gender and sexual orientation to the hate crimes categories. This ad presents the matter as if Christians who are hostile to homosexuality will be punished for their beliefs and words. This is deceitful representation. The proposed legislation is about identifying and punishing perpetrators of violent crime linked to prejudice.

Dr. Dobson and Focus on the Family opposes this hate crimes legislation on similar grounds. Neither Coral Ridge or Focus on the Family give their audience any text from the legislation. They can’t, for that would expose their mendacity.

It’s one thing to debate the merits of Hate Crimes legislation. It’s another to use the issue as a fear mongering tactic to demonize political enemies (they are out to get you), and lure money from the audience.

To paraphrase Senator Goldwater, I think every good Christian ought to kick Coral Ridge Ministries in the butt.

HR 254: David’s Law
Title: To enhance Federal enforcement of hate crimes, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Rep Jackson-Lee, Sheila [TX-18] (introduced 1/5/2007) Cosponsors (3)
Latest Major Action: 1/5/2007 Referred to House committee. Status: Referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary.

HR 1164: Hate Crime Statistics Improvement Act of 2007
Title: To amend the Hate Crime Statistics Act to require the Attorney General to acquire data about crimes that manifest evidence of prejudice based on gender.
Sponsor: Rep Maloney, Carolyn B. [NY-14] (introduced 2/16/2007) Cosponsors (6)
Latest Major Action: 3/19/2007 Referred to House subcommittee. Status: Referred to the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security.

HR 1592: Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2007
Title: To provide Federal assistance to States, local jurisdictions, and Indian tribes to prosecute hate crimes, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Rep Conyers, John, Jr. [MI-14] (introduced 3/20/2007) Cosponsors (171)
Related Bills: H.RES 364, S.1105
Latest Major Action: 5/7/2007 Referred to Senate committee. Status: Received in the Senate and Read twice and referred to the Committee on the Judiciary.
House Reports: 110-113

HR 2217: Hate Crimes Against the Homeless Enforcement Act
Title: To amend the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 to include homeless status in the definition of “hate crime” for the purposes of Federal sentencing provisions.
Sponsor: Rep Johnson, Eddie Bernice [TX-30] (introduced 5/8/2007) Cosponsors (9)
Committees: House Judiciary
Latest Major Action: 6/25/2007 Referred to House subcommittee. Status: Referred to the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security.

S 1105: Matthew Shepard Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2007
Title: A bill to provide Federal assistance to States, local jurisdictions, and Indian tribes to prosecute hate crimes, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Sen Kennedy, Edward M. [MA] (introduced 4/12/2007) Cosponsors (43)
Related Bills: HR 1592
Latest Major Action: 4/12/2007 Referred to Senate committee. Status: Read twice and referred to the Committee on the Judiciary.