posted May 14 @ 12:54 PM by Jason Kottke · gift link This is a smart piece about where we are in America right now, post-Citizen’s United, post-Voting Rights Amendment, post-Dobbs, mid-MAGA: The VRA Was the Nice Version ( archive ). First, let’s be honest about what the Voting Rights Act actually was, because everything here on out flows from it. It wasn’t a gift, not charity, and definitely not some magnanimous extension of democracy to people who’d been waiting their turn. It was architecture. Lyndon Johnson, who had few illusions about how power actually worked, understood something the current Court either doesn’t know or doesn’t care to. The bargain was simple: your participation produces results, so stay in the game. That deal wasn’t made for the benefit of Black Americans alone, though it was Black blood that paid for it.…