With that kind of a world view, how can he be Justice of "Peace"? he'll start a freaking racial riot.

Keith, I am sure you have a warm place in hell waiting on you.

I'd advise this couple to waste no more energy on this man, a relic of a hood-wearing past. There is another justice of the PEACE somewhere who will gladly do the honors. As for the official, he ought to be held against the power of US Law, which explicitly condones marriages between any American with another.

I'M SO SICK AND TIRED OG BLACK PEOPLE SAYING THAT ALL US WHITE PEOPLE ARE DISCRMIATING THEM.HEY GET A LIFE AND WORRY ABOUT THE MORE IMPORTANT THINGS IN LIFE LIKE THE WAT THATS GOING ON IN OUR COUNTRY.

Tangipahoa Parish has another claim to fame: It was the filming location for In the Heat of the Night, the TV show about race and the law.

See:

http://notionscapital.wordpress.com/2009/10/17/...

A Puertorican is a mix of black, hispaniard and Taino indian. You have one now in the supreme court so there goes your theory judge Dred.

The Justice is simply a rationalizing racist.

Wow! I thought we were passed this kind of stuffed but this country still has serious racial issues down South. We really shouldn't be describing ourselves as free and equal when we've got states that can't live up to that title. The state of Louisiana has put the entire country to shame!

rapid-rabid de-evolution is at hand. look at all the weirdos that have , until now, stayed anonymous under the previous administration. their work WAS being done for them, at times covertly, now, it seems to have halted, at least from the top. thus the outward show of TOTAL ant-social BACWARD behavior, at has ALWAYS been there, it just had to come out, in the aces that we are seeing. the true colors of the fringe of madness are being seen, and there are MORE of them than even the least cautious could have ever imagined. HOONTS!

I applaud this man for standing up for his beliefs. In this age when if anyone makes a stand against interracial marriage, or gay marriage, they are labelled a "Racist or Bigot".
It's about time somebody said "NO" to them. I also hope the U.S. Court system throws this one out if they file a discrimination lawsuit.

Hopefully you all find this utterly shocking. Now you know how all the loving same sex couples out there feel every time they are denied marriage licenses. My marriage was forcibly annulled when the Supreme Court of Oregon ruled that the city of Portland did not have the legal right to marry us. Welcome to our world.

I just wish this couple got help from the ACLU and they sued this bigoted judge and cost him his job as well as his license to practice law.

a) It's none of his business whether they have children or not.

b) They have full legal rights to marriage.

c) The judge is a prejudiced bigot who needs to learn a lesson about racial integration.

He's history of judgements is immediately suspect and should be reviewed. Has he given lighter sentences to white people versus black? I'd be willing to bet on it!

I, like all of the respondents here, am bothered by Bardwell's opinion on interracial marriage. That's exactly what it is, by the way, an opinion. He's entitled to his opinion, no matter how morally wrong the rest of us feel it is.

I also think that he shouldn't be forced to marry a couple if he feels uncomfortable in doing so. Because his thinking is so backward, though, I don't know that "justice of the peace" is an appropriate job for him.

Something is wrong when an appointed justice of the peace, someone who is supposed to uphold the law and ensure the freedom of the people of this country, is actually hindering freedom.

Perhaps it's time for Mr. Bardwell to retire.

Wow - How many ten of millions of people did not accept Barack Obama

tanj 17 hours ago
“99 percent of the time” an interracial couple will consist of a black man and white woman, and “I find that rather confusing.”
Proof that 45.6% of all statistics are made up on the spot.
Other things that confuse Mr. Bardwell include; Daylight savings time and the infield fly rule.
I see a resignation in your future.

"Proof that 45.6% of all statistics are made up on the spot"...Did YOU just now MAKE THAT UP, or just like all other stats, we're supposed to believe this just because it ends with a percentage symbol?

racism pure and simple. There's no guarantee that ANY marriage will be succesful and all this moron is going on is race

why stop there. Let's ban people from not hiring others based on JUST their education...after all, you are judging that person based on a personl aspect of their life.

lets ban them from hiring people who speak multiple languages first....after all, that is discriminating against me, and other swho only speak 1.

People have the right to judge others based on any factors they damn well please....that's life...get over it.

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judge, not act. I judge you to be a sub-human piece of shit not worthy of life. But I can't act on that. Not if I hope to live in a society without mass chaos and not if I want to preserve my rights.

You're really stretching on the whole "can't use education level as job qualification determination" angle. Though, Ron Paul would like to agree with you on that point, to a degree. Here's the problem. You don't chose to be born.. you don't chose to be born white, or black, or brown, or red or whatever. You CHOSE not to educate your self. What you're suggesting is that we should punish those that chose to advance because you chose to remain ignorant, and that's not fair.. And that premise is simply idiotic.. and you'd understand that if you had any education. Since you clearly don't, I can't start to explain it in any kind of terms you'd understand..

which is exactly why certain jobs require certain levels of education. You can't do the job if you don't have the education, and you're suggesting that a company pay people to sit around and NOT be able to do the job, just because the person applied for a job? WTF? but you're also against welfare, I'm guessing..

Do the world a favor.. shoot yourself in the head.

Sure, people have a right to make any judgments they please. I've judged this guy to be a backwards moron that shouldn't have a job. What this guy DOESN'T have the right to do is inflict his judgment on others, by denying them the right to marry. That's where he steps over the line. I don't give a damn what his personal beliefs are, they're irrelevant to the task at hand, which as a JP, he's signed on to do.

"neither black nor white society accepts the offspring of an interracial couple"

Nah. That's why Barack Obama had such a hard time getting elected!

"I’m not obligated to do that just because I’m a justice of the peace."

How's that working out for ya, Lester? I mean, Keith?

I love Louisiana, with it's colorful culture, and it's joie de vivre, but some of the people there are really soo 19th century. Such ignorants shouldn't hold public offices. Virez les culs - kick the bums out!

I go to Louisiana often, love it, know many people there and I agree, colorful culture love of life.
Most people are not like "Name" above or Mr. Bardwell. These two anomalous dinosaurs.

Let me ask all you liberal nuts something. Why do your beliefs have to trump his beliefs. In a truly free country, doesn't he have as much right to his belief as you do in yours.

1 other thing I always find funny....every time I read message boards with people complaining about tolerance, it's always northerners who ironically have a much lower black population. Come live in New Orleans for a couple months....I PROMISE you, your opinion will change. You talk about being educated, and doing the right thing....explain to me how I am not supposed to be racist after watching the events after katrina. I promise you that not a single white person was SHOOTING at safety crews, or forming gangs in the superdome SHELTER.

explain that...

oh...just take a look at the crime statistics. You wanna give me an answer on why african americans make up about 20 percent of the US population...but account for over 50 percent of violent crime? just answer the question.....

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Everyone has the right to their beliefs. But everyone also has the obligation to uphold the law. Your beliefs don't give you a pass on the law, period. If your beliefs trumped law, everyone would do anything they wanted and simply say they believe it's ok. Rape, murder, theft, abuse.. the list goes on.

And that you conflate poverty with ethnicity is another major failing in you. You talk about after Katrina, but you're also talking about a very impoverished location. Want to know why so many people of color live in the south? Many of them are in poverty and when you can't afford heat or a house that isn't drafty, you don't live where you can freeze to death, or where food must be stored for long periods of time because the growing season is so short.

Want an answer to your crime question? ...

www [dot] statehealthfacts [dot] org/comparebar.jsp?ind=14&cat=1

(sorry, you'll have to put the link together.. disqus likes to kill my posts if they have links..? )

POVERTY. When you have nothing, you have nothing to lose. The reason blacks make up most of the violent crimes is the same reason whites make up most of the financial crimes (like insider trading, embezzlement, etc etc).

What's really sad is that you have very flawed understandings of the world because you only have a tiny piece of the puzzle. The full picture is out there, and people that stand back and get a better view (read: knowledge, education, understanding, thinking, using reason and logic), they lose their bigotry. Your world view is based on what amounts to a huge lie of omission.. you'll forgive us that took the time to gather more information if we shake our head at you in disgust.

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Everyone has the right to their beliefs. But everyone also has the obligation to uphold the law. Your beliefs don't give you a pass on the law, period. If your beliefs trumped law, everyone would do anything they wanted and simply say they believe it's ok. Rape, murder, theft, abuse.. the list goes on.

And that you conflate poverty with ethnicity is another major failing in you. You talk about after Katrina, but you're also talking about a very impoverished location. Want to know why so many people of color live in the south? Many of them are in poverty and when you can't afford heat or a house that isn't drafty, you don't live where you can freeze to death, or where food must be stored for long periods of time because the growing season is so short.

Want an answer to your crime question? .. http://www.statehealthfacts.org/comparebar.jsp?... (might have to edit to get it to show)

POVERTY. When you have nothing, you have nothing to lose. The reason blacks make up most of the violent crimes is the same reason whites make up most of the financial crimes (like insider trading, embezzlement, etc etc).

What's really sad is that you have very flawed understandings of the world because you only have a tiny piece of the puzzle. The full picture is out there, and people that stand back and get a better view (read: knowledge, education, understanding, thinking, using reason and logic), they lose their bigotry. Your world view is based on what amounts to a huge lie of omission.. you'll forgive us that took the time to gather more information if we shake our head at you in disgust.

Ok you ignorant racist cracker, I will.

I live in Baltimore, which I guarantee you has a higher African-American proportion than your town. So living in NO for a while would change my views not one bit.

Yes, Keith IS entitled to his backward, knuckle-dragging beliefs. It is, indeed, still a free country. But he does not have the right to refuse to do his JOB because of them, any more than religious zealots have a right to refuse to sell condoms if they have a job at the Rite Aid. They are free to think it's sinful all the time they are ringing them up, because THEY do not have the right to impose THEIR beliefs on others, a concept you, to your credit, seem to understand.

If they refuse, they are (rightfully) fired for their ACTIONS, not their BELIEFS.

The law of the land makes discrimination illegal, and that's the way it should be. Discrimination in ACTION, that is, not in thought. He can think "the poor kids" all the while he is signing their marriage license.

That's the way it's done in the USA, and if you don't like it, go join the Taliban or something.

By the way... all that "shooting at rescue teams" and "forming gangs in the superdome" crap? Journalists who investigated afterward failed to find a single instance of that happening. It was just more racist BS cooked up at Fox News, probably at the behest of Karl "Goebbels" Rove or Darth Cheney.

Wanna know how a real liberal thinks? Listen up: Criminality proportions are a complex cultural issue that has to do with educational opportunities, family influences, etc. etc. If some blacks are criminals, what does that say about the rest of them? NOTHING. Nothing whatsoever.

That said, do we think the Law should go easier on black criminals? OF COURSE NOT. You'd like to think we are all minority-criminal and terrorist sympathizers, but that is just more Fox BS. None of us are. We say if you committed the crime, you get the punishment regardless of color. We say if you plot violence against Americans, death is too good for you. Surprise!

Equal treatment, get it? It's the American way. So quit yer bitchin' and get a life.

Personally, I can't wait for when so many of us have a racial background that is just too complicated to explain (like Tiger Woods) that people quit talking about it, and the whole nasty "white America/black America" thing is a-mouldrin' in its grave.

Don't tell me what stories were cooked up...I live here, I watched friends and family risk their lives in this hell hole.

You believe what you want from CNN, I watched it first hand. You think the superdome did that to itself?

I have family on the police-fire-and rescue teams in this area....and I promise you....it was a very consistent pattern to the looting, the shooting, and the damn mall didn't burn itself. They had one look at a situation with no authority....and they abused it.

did FEMA act perfectly....hell no....but at the end of the day I got my ass out, I didn't RELY on the government to tell me "oh shit...maybe you should move"

and don't give me the crap about "most didn't have the means"

they have a terms for that too that maybe YOU should look up.

1. population control 2. survival of the fittest

"it was a very consistent pattern to the looting, the shooting, and the damn mall didn't burn itself. They had one look at a situation with no authority....and they abused it."

And, naturally you surmise that it's poor judgment therefore warranting a savage label.

Have you given any thought to why people would be overcome by such a basic survival instinct so quickly? What had you done, yourself, prior to Katrina, to demonstrate that you would be there for your neighbors...ALL your neighbors.

I imagine everyone who was held back at the bridges at gunpoint figured "It's ok, relax, once those nice white folks in Slidell hear about this, they won't stand for it. They'll come for us for sure..."

I'd suggest plan ahead for your next "survival of the fittest" moment by figuring out how to reach out now and embrace camaraderie and compassion.

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1) Population control comes best with education.. the right-wing doesn't want to educate everyone... that's a huge topic in and of itself.

2) "fittest" is an abstract term often abused by idiots that don't understand all of the underlying concepts.. and, typically, they are religious morons who use the term when it's convenient for them and dismiss the entire topic when it becomes a contradiction to their other beliefs.

And, we don't live in the "natural world" where that principle applies. In an advanced society with technology that usurps "nature", that concept is nothing more than a crutch, a lie, to be used by those that would seek to be absolved of their abuses. In fact, if you're talking "fittest" as in "strongest and meanest and willing to kill for stuff", then what you _really_ mean is, you're scared that the more "fit, animalistic black men" would kill you and take all your stuff and you're too weak to do anything about it.

You really are too uneducated and simple to even waste time on with this. You're a bigot and have no desire or will to change that. That makes you a waste of time for both me and the species as a whole. The greater concept of "survival of the fittest" will prevail because eventually, unevolved dipshits like you won't be here any more.

I respectfully suggest you try looking up "disenfranchisement" , then ponder how several generations of it would affect a populations offspring. Have you ever been told you're 3/5 of a person?

By your own logic, look at the financial events of the last year, the government response to Katrina and how Mr Bardwell acted tell me how a black Katrina victim in NOLA should have relaxed and trusted anyone to help them out.

Take a look at "cycle of racism" too.
Here's the thing, we're all naturally a bit racist. It's the same instinct that keeps herds of animals together, we share it.
Do you see the human pack delineated by skin color(or creed or whatever) or can humans acknowledge the instinct and work toward equalization and respect, working to overcome barriers.
By the way, you forgot to mention the white people who stood at the borders of NOLA trying to make sure "those people" didn't escape into their towns. What was that about gangs?
A lot of your undesirables moved here to Austin, Texas and stayed, and we're a better city for it. Our food, music, and cultural offerings were enriched by NOLA's disaster.

I'm glad you think Austin is a better city....you can keep em.

Yeah, a lot of people turned them away from coming into their towns, including mine. Why..because they have created disaster wherever they go. I literally watched cars of them drive down the highway and throw their garbage out the windows. They built a FEMA trailer park in a certain area over here....couple years later and guess what. The land value in the area has dropped horribly, and crime is higher in this area than it has ever been on record. You can't change facts...and the facts point out that every time you try and reach out your hand....they bite it off...they always...ALWAYS do the wrong thing when given the benefit of the doubt.

Put a black man on the streets of new orleans at midnight with nothing but whites, and he is fine....do the same to a white person and see what happens. Something is wrong with that...that is a fact....all your "peace love and happiness" bullsh!t wouldn't do a dang thing to protect you.

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"I literally watched cars of them drive down the highway and throw their garbage out the windows. "

And you're a fucking moron if you think white people don't do it as well.

"Something is wrong with that...that is a fact...."
Your are absolutely correct. Something is wrong with that lack of respect. Hmm, where was that disrespectful behavior learned? Let's see...

The difference between you and I is you blame them, I blame you. In a small way, we're similar, laying blame and all.

Until you try to gain a better understanding of how the situation got where it is, nothing will change for you. Your life will be miserable.

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You used a word that doesn't come into play with bigots. Understanding. bigotry is the opposite of understanding, and understanding illuminates the factually absent opinions that form bigotry.

oh, he has every right to believe anything he wants, no matter how stupid, backwards and ill informed. What he doesn't have the right to do is inflict his nonsense on others, as in denying two people the right to get married.

If we insist that the government has the power to grant permission to marry, then we must concede that it has the power to deny it for any reason. To eliminate the power to deny, we must eliminate the power to grant. This couple had to pay $35 to exercise a natural right. Remember that the next time you breathe.

Excuse me, what year is this? That magistrate should be fired and fined big time.

I am totally disgusted by this and I am white.

Interesting, weren't children the reason gays & lesbians couldn't marry?

Nice to know the children of tomorrow are being considered. Their future is guaranteed.

;-)

Old Coyote Knose... there's nothing quite as cruel (or more vicious) than southern hospitality. And Keith Bardwell, the Justice of the Peace, sounds like a typical KKKristian $outherner

Truly, stunningly outrageous. And most of all, he sounds likes he's proud of it! Does he deny this for all "mixed" couples, or just black and white couples? What about black and Hispanic couples? Or even taking it to the extent of religion with Jews and Catholics?

The problem is this (man who is part of the justice system) is openly and willfully discriminating against citizens based on nothing more than their race. That is illegal. He should be immediately stripped of his authority (no, not allowed to resign but removed) and face some type of legal consequences for it.