"Black Panthers" Intimidate Voters in Philadelphia

Things got a little tense in Pennsylvania when two men dressed as Black Panthers stationed themselves outside a Philadelphia polling place. One of the so-called Black Panthers was brandishing a nightstick.

According to one bystander, a Republican poll observer, interviewed by Fox News, the "Black Panthers" made their intentions very clear:

"We got a phone call that there was intimidation going on. I walked up to the door, two gentlemen in Black Panther garb, one brandishing a nightstick, standing in front of the door. They closed ranks as I walked up. I am a veteran; that does not scare me. I went inside and found poll-watchers, they said they had been here for an hour - I went inside and found poll-watchers, they said that they had said not to let people outside because black people are going to win no matter what. At that point, I spoke to him, we would not get into a fistfight, I said, and I called the police."

The police arrived and escorted the "Black Panther" with the nightstick off the premises.

The Black Panthers, also known as the Black Panther Party, was a violent militant group that as active in the late 1960s and 1970s espoused a Marxist/Maoist philosophy as a means to further black liberation and black power. Their reputation for violence during that era was exceeded only by the Weather Underground. Author David Horowitz has claimed that the Black Panthers were responsible for over a dozen deaths and conducted illegal enterprises such as prostitution, extortion, and drug trafficking.

While there are some organizations calling themselves "Black Panthers," they have not achieved the sort of notoriety that original Black Panthers enjoyed. The original Black Panthers fell apart as an organization due to legal entanglements and internal disputes. One of the founders of the Black Panther Party, Huey Newton, himself was shot to death in the late 1980s.

It is unknown at this time if the two men with the nightstick outside the Philadelphia polling place, were actually Black Panthers of some sort or were just wearing the garb to be intimidating. Nor is it known on whose behalf, if anyone, they had stationed themselves outside the polling place.

This sort of voter intimidation demonstrates that, no matter what happens and whatever the polls say, Pennsylvania is more in play than the media suggests. Both John McCain and Barack Obama have visited Pennsylvania in the closing days of the Presidential campaign. A McCain win in Pennsylvania would complicate, if not outright short circuit, Barack Obama's quest for the Presidency.

Source: Video: Black Panther poll intimidation in Pennsylvania?, Ed Morrissey, Hotair.com, November 4th, 2008