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Call it the political revenge of the nerds. For nearly eight years, many mainstream scientists have been frustrated with the Bush administration. They’ve claimed that science has been censored, ignored and politicized on issues from global warming to stem cells to evolution. Even the presidential science adviser was booted from the White House, forced to set up office down the street.

Both presidential candidates — Sen. John McCain and Sen. Barack Obama — offer policies farther from the president than they are from each other. They advocate mandatory caps on the main global warming gas and favor federal funding for embryonic stem cell research — positions opposite the Bush Administration.

Obama and McCain promise to seek, not censor, government science advice and to restore the White House science adviser’s office.

The differences between them are more notable in the nuances of policy than in the broad brush of campaigns. Both have promised more money for scientific research, though the ongoing financial crisis may make that tough.

One science spending difference managed to creep into the second presidential debate, however. McCain ridiculed an unsuccessful Obama earmark attempt to get “$3 million for an overhead projector at a planetarium in Chicago, Ill. My friends, do we need to spend that kind of money?” McCain asked.

It turns out that wasn’t just an old-fashioned overhead slide viewer, but a replacement for the 38-year-old star-and-planet projector in the Sky Theater at the Adler Planetarium, the first planetarium in the Western Hemisphere and located in Obama’s home state.

For his part, Obama put spending for energy research ahead of health care and entitlement reform when asked in the debate to set priorities. He’s called for an investment of $15 billion a year over 10 years.

“While on the surface it may look like they say the same thing … when it comes to energy issues, you do get a little difference,” said Syracuse University science and public policy professor Henry Lambright.

The candidates touch on the same alternatives to foreign oil, but McCain pushes heavily on domestic oil drilling and nuclear power; Obama emphasizes renewable energy such as wind and solar.

Both men propose a dramatic reduction in emissions of carbon dioxide — the chief man-made greenhouse gas — but their long-term goals are slightly different. Obama wants an 80 percent reduction by 2050. McCain, who wants a 60 percent cap, was an early leader in proposing mandatory emissions caps, bucking his party and his president.

Both candidates favor President Bush’s plan to send astronauts back to the moon. But both disagree with the plan to retire the space shuttle in 2010, relying on the Russians for five years to send Americans into orbit. After once advocating diverting NASA money for education, Obama has been as vocal for space spending as McCain. Space is a big industry in Florida, a key battleground state.

Science policy experts like Granger Morgan at Carnegie Mellon University says, “Far more critical is to understand how the two candidates use science and technology advice.”

And he and others say either man would be an improvement over Bush.

“They both appear to have areas where they’ve had terrific track records, and we think that many of the issues will be handled in a way that tracks more closely to the science,” said Alan Leshner, chief executive of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

In past presidential campaigns, science advocates generally have been the wallflowers of political debate. This year, they have tried to get on the dance floor. More than 175 science organizations and universities called for a debate on science issues and got a 14-question survey answered by both candidates.

A number of prominent scientists have flocked toward Obama. In September, his campaign touted the support of 61 winners of Nobel science or medicine prizes, held a media conference call on science policy, and sent a speaker to one of the nation’s biggest science conferences in February. The McCain campaign did not do those things nor has it promoted Nobel-winning supporters.

McCain has, in a few cases, taken positions that are at odds with mainstream scientists. In a February town hall meeting in Texas, he declared “there’s strong evidence” that a mercury-based preservative in vaccines is linked to the increase in U.S. autism cases, according to ABC News.

The Food and Drug Administration, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and medical organizations say there is no such evidence. Since 2002, the preservative has been removed from shots recommended for young children, except for some flu shots. Fielding a similar question in April, Obama said: “The science right now is inconclusive, but we have to research it.”

McCain in 2005 also told a Tucson newspaper that he favors teaching the concept of intelligent design alongside evolution in schools. Intelligent design is the view that life is too complex to have developed through evolution alone, implying that a higher power must have had a hand in creation. In later interviews, McCain has sometimes distanced himself from that comment; last July he told the New York Times these issues are up to local school boards. While evangelical conservatives and President Bush laud the teaching of intelligent design, scientists, such as Leshner, say it would “undermine science education.”

The McCain campaign did not respond to several requests by The Associated Press for comment on science issues. The campaign also did not respond to 10 specific questions, including those about intelligent design and childhood vaccines and autism.

Obama’s science advisers, such as former National Institutes of Health director Harold Varmus, mostly paint differences between their candidate and President Bush, not McCain. Varmus criticized what he called “the Bush administration’s overall war on science.”

Jack Marburger, Bush’s science adviser says the campaigns have not been fair about the president’s leadership on climate change. As for the debate over embryonic stem cells, he called it “an ethical issue, not a science policy.”

“We’ve got a lot of money on the table (for science spending). The question is how to spend it,” Marburger said. “That is going to be the question for the next administration. That is going to be tough.”

Leading Republicans on Sunday faulted both presidential campaigns for the increasingly negative tone of their advertising, suggesting the bitter attacks undermine John McCain and Barack Obama’s credibility with voters and could backfire.

“Both campaigns are making a mistake, and that is they are taking whatever their attacks are and going one step too far,” said former White House political adviser Karl Rove. “They don’t need to attack each other in this way.”

“There ought to be an adult who says, ‘Do we really need to go that far in this ad? Don’t we make our point and won’t we get broader acceptance and deny the opposition an opportunity to attack us if we don’t include that one little last tweak in the ad?’”

In the last week, the McCain campaign has put out an Internet ad accusing Obama of calling Republican vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin a pig when he used the phrase putting “lipstick on a pig” to criticize the GOP ticket as trying to make a bad situation look better. McCain supporters said Obama was slyly alluding to Palin’s description of herself as a pit bull in lipstick, but there was nothing in his remarks to support the claim.

The McCain campaign also produced an ad saying Obama favored “comprehensive sex education” for kindergartners; as an Illinois state senator, Obama voted for legislation that would teach age-appropriate sex education to kindergartners, including information on rejecting advances by sexual predators.

In turn, a recent Obama TV ad makes a none-too-subtle dig at McCain’s age in saying McCain hasn’t changed in the last 26 years. It shows McCain at a hearing in the early 1980s, wearing giant glasses and an out-of-style suit. “He admits he still doesn’t know how to use a computer, can’t send an e-mail, still doesn’t understand the economy, and favors $200 billion in new tax cuts for corporations, but almost nothing for the middle class,” the commercial says.

Former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, who unsuccessfully sought the GOP presidential nomination, said McCain and Obama need to engage more openly in town hall meetings rather than back-and-forth negative advertising.

“I agree that the campaign has gotten too negative on both sides,” Giuliani said. “If the two of them are out there answering questions, a lot of these ads are going to get done that way, they’re going to be able to confront each other with these things. Senator Obama can explain his views on sex education and just what he was doing with that. Senator McCain can either back off it or agree with it.”

Rove said he believed that Obama’s “lipstick on a pig” comment was a “deliberate slap at Governor Palin,” saying it came too soon after the Alaska governor’s pitbull comment not to be. Rove also said while it might be fair to criticize McCain for being a longtime Washington insider, faulting McCain for not using a computer when he can’t type due to war injuries is not.

“McCain has gone in some of his ads — similarly gone one step too far, and sort of attributing to Obama things that are, you know, beyond the 100-percent-truth test,” Rove said, without elaborating.

In a statement, the Obama campaign said it partly agreed with Rove.

“In case anyone was still wondering whether John McCain is running the sleaziest, most dishonest campaign in history, today Karl Rove — the man who held the previous record — said McCain’s ads have gone too far,” said Obama campaign spokesman Tommy Vietor.

Rove spoke on “Fox News Sunday,” while Giuliani appeared on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

Sordid bribery allegations and jokes about “cold cash” hidden in Rep. William Jefferson’s freezer apparently did not matter much to voters two years ago when the New Orleans Democrat won a runoff election for his long-held congressional seat with a surprising 57 percent.

Hurricane Katrina was a fresh memory throughout much of the city. Jefferson lost his seat on the House Ways and Means Committee amid the burgeoning scandal, yet could argue that his seniority and clout in Congress were vital to the region.

Now that two more years have passed, Jefferson’s political future has become more precarious. He is awaiting trial in Virginia on federal bribery charges; his brother and two sisters are ensnared in a separate federal criminal case in New Orleans.

Donations to his re-election have slowed and there is a reported campaign debt of $250,000. Still, few count Jefferson completely out as he faces six challengers in Saturday’s primary.

“He’s still influential in Congress. He still has supporters in Congress, and in the district,” pollster and political analyst Silas Lee said.

Political scientist Ed Chervenak of the University of New Orleans said he detects a sense among some people in the 2nd Congressional District that Jefferson is being persecuted, but he questions whether that will be enough to save the nine-term incumbent.

“It’s really the great unknown in terms of whether people will rally around Jefferson or whether they just say, `We’ve had enough,’” Chervenak said.

Hurricane Gustav, which was due to hit the Gulf Coast on Monday, could delay the decision on Jefferson’s fate. Jacques Berry, a spokesman for the Louisiana Secretary of State, told The Washington Post on Sunday that his office was planning for the possibility that the primary may have to be rescheduled.

“We will not make a decision until after the storm comes through,” Berry told the Post. “We’re prepared for it, though.”

While campaigning for a new term, Jefferson also is preparing for a December federal trial in Virginia on allegations that he took bribes, laundered money and misused his congressional office for business dealings in Africa. He is accused of taking about $500,000 in bribes and travel expenses and about 34 million shares of corporate stock.

In what became fodder for late-night talk show monologues well before he was indicted, Jefferson is famously alleged to have hidden in his freezer some $90,000 received from an FBI informant. Jefferson, who did not grant an interview for this story, has maintained his innocence.

Meanwhile, his brother Mose and sister Betty, a New Orleans tax assessor, have been indicted on federal fraud charges in New Orleans. Both are accused of using family owned companies to funnel federal and state grant money to themselves for personal use.

A second sister, Brenda Jefferson, pleaded guilty in June to helping conceal the alleged scheme.

Attacks on Jefferson in television and online ads by his opponents have been unmistakable if oblique, not mentioning him by name.

Former television reporter Helena Moreno sits in a house still in ruins three years after Katrina, bemoans the lack of progress and promises to “restore honesty and integrity” to the office. State Rep. Cedric Richmond of New Orleans says the people of the district “need and deserve real leadership right now.”

While the recovery from Katrina is the biggest issue, the race also boils down to geography, demographics, turnout and political alliances.

Most of the district’s 369,000 registered voters are in New Orleans. But almost one-third are in neighboring Jefferson Parish, where popular Sheriff Newell Normand has endorsed parish councilman Byron Lee. Most of the voters are black; almost one-third are white.

If voting patterns break along racial lines, that would aid Moreno, the only white candidate in the primary, in earning a spot in an expected Oct. 4 runoff.

Turnout is expected to be low and the vote will be divided among several well-known candidates.

In addition to Moreno, Lee and Richmond, City Council member James Carter, former council member Troy Carter (no relation to James) and Kenya Smith, a lawyer and former aide to New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin, are running.

“Jefferson’s got a core constituency in both parishes,” said demographer Gregory Rigamer. “They’re going to split this vote up really fine.”

The Democratic nominee will face three little-known challengers — one each from the Green, Libertarian and Republican parties.

A congressional committee on Thursday asked for an investigation into a counterterrorism database software upgrade that it says is months behind schedule, millions over budget and would actually be less capable than the U.S. government terrorist tracking system it is meant to replace.

At issue is Railhead, a software upgrade to the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment, which is a vast database of names that feeds the nation’s terrorist watch list. It is meant to help analysts “connect the dots” between known or suspected terrorists and their contacts, potential targets and safe houses. As of January, the database contained 500,000 names. The upgrade was supposed to be completed by the end of this year.

But the House Science and Technology investigations and oversight subcommittee said Thursday that the program “has been imploding for more than one year,” citing internal program documents and e-mails obtained by the committee.

“The program appears to be on the brink of collapse after an estimated half-billion dollars in taxpayer funding has been spent on it,” said subcommittee chairman Rep. Brad Miller, D-N.C., in a statement issued Thursday.

Miller said the “majority” of more than 800 private contractors from dozens of companies working on Railhead have been laid off, and the National Counterterrorism Center “drastically curtailed” the program last week and may shut it down completely.

Spokesman Carl Kropf of the counterterrorism center declined immediate comment.

Miller sent a letter to the national intelligence director’s inspector general requesting an investigation.

The committee also says “Railhead insiders” allege the government paid the Boeing Co. $200 million to retrofit the company’s Herndon, Va., office with security upgrades so top secret software work could be performed there and then leased the office space from Boeing. A Boeing spokesman could not be immediately reached for comment.

The committee investigation also found problems with the existing terrorist database. It says 40 percent of suspect names and addresses contained in CIA cables that should be entered into the database are never entered.

Speculation hit a fever pitch on the U.S. vice presidential sweepstakes on Tuesday, with Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain nearing their choices of a No. 2 amid a flurry of sly hints and outright guesses.Time is running out for the announcement from Obama, whose running mate will be formally nominated at the party’s convention in Denver next Wednesday. His choice is expected by the weekend.

McCain has an extra week to make his pick, and the Arizona senator scheduled a big rally for the crucial battleground state of Ohio on Friday, August 29 — the day after Obama accepts his party’s presidential nomination.

Aides to the Republican candidate declined comment but did not dispute a report he would unveil his choice on that day, which would immediately shift the political focus from Obama’s coronation to McCain’s.

With the selections drawing near, intense speculation about the candidates filled Web sites and cable news talk shows — to the delight of both campaign staffs.

“The candidates want to stoke the speculation with nods, hints and winks to get as much visibility as they can for the ultimate announcement,” said Doug Schoen, a Democratic consultant and former pollster for President Bill Clinton.

Obama announced he would kick off his trip to the Denver convention on Saturday at the Old State Capitol in Springfield, Illinois, the spot where he formally announced his presidential bid in February 2007 — an indication he will unveil his pick before then so they can make the tour to Denver together.

After weeks of discretion in their search for a running mate, both campaigns have floated trial balloons recently to help them gauge reaction as the public lists narrowed.

Speculation about Obama’s choice has centered on three prime contenders — Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine, Indiana Sen. Evan Bayh and Delaware Sen. Joseph Biden.

Obama, an Illinois senator, has met or spoken recently to each of the three. He will campaign in Virginia on Wednesday, and he dropped a plug for Biden’s proposal for reconstruction assistance to Georgia into his speech on Tuesday to the Veterans of Foreign Wars.

Biden, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, returned on Monday from a weekend trip to Georgia.

“I’m proud to join my friend, Senator Joe Biden, in calling for an additional $1 billion in reconstruction assistance for the people of Georgia,” Obama said.

McCain’s short list includes Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, former budget director Rob Portman and former Homeland Security Secretary and former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge.

RIDGE NOT RULED OUT

McCain, an opponent of abortion rights, sparked criticism from conservatives last week when he said Ridge, a supporter of abortion rights, could not be ruled out as a possible vice presidential choice.

History has shown the choice of a running mate is unlikely to have a major impact on the November 4 presidential election between Obama and McCain, but it could offer hints of the candidates’ priorities.

The last two vice presidents — Democrat Al Gore and Republican Dick Cheney — played influential roles in the administration and redefined the office. Obama and McCain must gauge whether they want to pick someone who can help them get elected or someone who could help them govern or take over as president if needed.

Obama, 47, could reinforce his message of change with a new face like Kaine, a close political ally from a key battleground state, or add foreign policy experience with someone like Biden.

McCain, who turns 72 on August 29, the day he might unveil his choice, is well-known for his foreign and military policy experience. But he could also turn to former venture capitalist Romney or Portman, who also served as trade representative, to shore up his economic credentials.

Pawlenty could help in his home state of Minnesota and Ridge could help in Pennsylvania, both swing states. But there are no guarantees — Democrat John Kerry got little help from his running mate John Edwards in 2004, who could not put the ticket over the top in his home state of North Carolina.

“It’s highly unlikely any of those choices are going to decisively impact the election,” Schoen said of the potential running mates. “It could make a difference at the margins, but the choice is much more about governing.”

Republican candidate John McCain on Wednesday called on Congress to return from its summer recess to address immediately the U.S. energy crisis, though he missed numerous energy-related votes in the Senate last year.

McCain, campaigning on energy and economic issues in southern Ohio, said that as president he would tell members of Congress “not to leave town, not to take their vacation or pay raise” until they passed legislation to ease the burden of high energy prices on consumers.

The idea of forcing Congress to deal with energy issues could open the Arizona senator to charges of hypocrisy. The liberal-leaning League of Conservation Voters gave McCain a “zero” rating for 2007, saying he had missed all 11 votes related to such critical energy topics as automobile fuel economy, offshore Virginia drilling, refinery construction, renewable electricity mandates, energy efficiency, liquefied coal, support for biofuels.

Last weekend, the House and the Senate adjourned amid calls from House Republicans for a vote on an energy bill that would expand more domestic oil drilling. In the Senate, a debate was pending on a proposal by a bipartisan group of 10 to boost taxes on oil companies while allowing an expansion of offshore oil drilling.

Both McCain and Democratic rival Barack Obama have signaled an openness to such a compromise, but they have said they need to review details of the proposal.

Touring Merillat Industries, a cabinet manufacturer known in the industry for its efforts to improve energy efficiency, McCain repeated his support for more offshore drilling and criticized Obama for not fully embracing nuclear power as part of a comprehensive energy plan.

“He’s out of touch,” McCain said.

Obama has never ruled out the use of nuclear energy but has cautioned against expanding it until concerns about proliferation and the storage of nuclear waste can be addressed.

McCain also called for a crackdown on the credit market in light of the housing crisis. The Merillat company, which employs about 5,100 people in eight plants in the U.S., has been hit hard by the slowing housing market.

“Companies like Merillat and families across Ohio face challenges in business and across the kitchen table,” he said.

McCain released a new TV ad questioning Obama’s readiness to help American families. The ad played off a theme the Arizona senator has been pushing since Obama’s tour of Europe: Obama is a worldwide celebrity but not a leader ready to be president.

In the ad, an announcer poses the question, “Is the biggest celebrity in the world ready to help your family?” The ad goes on to criticize Obama as promoting higher taxes and more government spending, both leading to fewer jobs.

The ad touts McCain on energy, jobs and the economy as a whole.

McCain released an ad on Tuesday that seeks to distance him from unpopular President Bush.

The widow of a tabloid photo editor who died in the 2001 anthrax attacks insisted in a $50 million federal lawsuit filed years ago that the U.S. government was ultimately responsible for his death.

Now that the FBI is pinning the blame on government scientist Bruce Ivins, the lawsuit brought by Maureen Stevens looks positively clairvoyant. And results of the FBI investigation could have a major effect on the outcome of her case.

“We were right all along,” Patrick Hogan, the son-in-law of Maureen and the late Robert Stevens, said in a telephone interview Tuesday. “It seems to me it’s pretty much a slam dunk.”

Stevens was a photo editor at American Media Inc., the publisher of the National Enquirer, Sun and Globe gossip tabloids, when he was exposed to anthrax that was mailed to AMI offices in Boca Raton. Stevens died Oct. 5, 2001, the first of five people to be killed and 17 others to be sickened in the anthrax attacks.

Two years later, Maureen Stevens filed her lawsuit. In it, she claims the U.S. government was negligent because it failed to safeguard strains of the deadly anthrax bacteria at the U.S. Army disease research center at Fort Detrick, Md.

The government, her lawsuit says, “owed a duty of care, the highest degree of care” in handling of anthrax and supervising employees who had access to it. Although she didn’t know it when the lawsuit was filed, Ivins was one of those employees, a microbiologist who was working on an anthrax antidote. Ivins committed suicide last week as he was being investigated.

“One of the real areas of satisfaction, if you can call it that, is that we’ve maintained all along this was an inside job,” said Richard Schuler, Maureen Stevens’ attorney.

The case is unique among the legal actions brought after the anthrax attacks, according to the lawyers involved. Employees of a postal facility in Washington, D.C., where two workers died, sued the Postal Service for allegedly failing to protect them, but a federal judge in 2004 ruled the service is immune.

If the federal government ultimately names Ivins as the anthrax attack perpetrator, Schuler said the government’s lawyers should drop their long battle and settle the lawsuit. He noted that another scientist wrongly implicated by the FBI in the plot, Steven Hatfill, recently was paid $5.8 million to settle his lawsuit against the Justice Department.

“It’s been a long road for this family,” Schuler said. “I hope somebody who has some authority will call us and make it right with this family.”

Maureen Stevens declined an interview request, deferring to her attorney. The lawsuit, also filed on behalf of the couple’s three grown children, seeks a maximum of $50 million in compensatory damages for the government’s alleged negligence in Stevens’ death. Schuler said that figure represents the upper reaches of a possible damage award or settlement.

Two of the Stevens children did not return phone messages or e-mails seeking comment Tuesday. Hogan, husband of daughter Heidi, said he’s hopeful that the FBI has its man in Ivins.

“It seems to me they botched this thing from the beginning. It was one of their own people,” Hogan said. “I’m just very happy that they actually found somebody.”

A U.S. Justice Department spokesman declined comment Tuesday on the lawsuit. But in court, federal attorneys have fought hard to get the Stevens claim dismissed and currently are appealing a federal judge’s refusal to do so. The case is on hold pending the outcome of that.

One court document contends that even if a U.S. employee is found responsible for the anthrax attacks, those acts are “beyond the scope of employment” and the government isn’t liable. In the alternative, the federal lawyers say such actions were controlled by someone else and not the government, so it shouldn’t have to pay the Stevens family.

“The United States denies as a matter of law and fact that the plaintiff is entitled to the relief sought,” the government lawyers said in court papers.

The next development in the lawsuit will be a ruling later this year from the Florida Supreme Court on whether the U.S. government and a private laboratory named as a possible second source of the anthrax have a duty under Florida law to protect the public from such lethal materials.

The state court was asked to resolve that legal question by the U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta, which is considering the government’s appeal of the ruling by U.S. District Judge Daniel T.K. Hurley refusing the dismiss the case.

1. Absolutely!!

2. No. The President needs to be intelligent and powerful enough not to be a puppet.

3. Nope.

4. Oh my god no. She is the freakiest person I ever heard of. She makes absolutely no sense when she talks. She speaks in that government speak and does not make any sense. Have I mentioned she makes no sense?

5. Possibly, a black woman being president would be GREAT, but I don’t think there’s a chance she would ever run. She does seem to agree with EVERYTHING Bush does, other than that I think she could handle the job.

6. From what I have seen of her, I would seriously consider her as a viable candidate.

7. I would sooner vote for Condie than for Hillary

8. Helllllllllllllllllllllll Nooooooooooooooooooo!

9. It depends on who she ran against but she is definitely very highly regarded by me.

10. nope…no way …not a frig’n shot, she’s as bad as bush and darth cheney

11. Possibly, yes. IMHO, she’s the most qualified woman in America. However, she has never held an elected position in government. I say that she’d be a good VP running mate for the republican party … that would get Hillary’s and the democrat party’s panties in a bunch!

12. I would vote for her before I would Hillary Clinton. And with the way she handling foreign relations and the mid-eastern peace talks I think she would make a good president.

13. Maybe, depend on the other choice

14. She was so weak as the national security adviser and the Secretary of state that Donald Rumsfeld and the defense department bullied their way in to dictating what state department policy should be.

She would be a weak president.

15. depends on her stances and ideals, but i wouldn’t out right rule it out.

16. You bet. It’s nice to have a leader with class. And she’s tough and is a good speaker.

Joey, what a great idea!

17. No, since I never voted for her in anything in the first place. I want to know who the People get to nominate? All we get is a premade selection of choices that I would never make in the first place.

Attorneys choose jurors by using a system known as voir dire. This is where each side of a case has the opportunity to ask questions of the jurors to determine who would not be suited to serve on this case due to underlying biases. This is where the differences between federal and state court arise. In federal court, the judge is the one who generally conducts voir dire. the attorneys submit questions to the judge who will ask the questions to the jurors. In state court, generally each attorney is permitted to ask questions to the jurors in an alloted time period. At the end of voir dire, the attorneys are permitted to use for cause challenges to get rid of the jurors from the jury pool who would be tainted from delivering a verdict. This means for example if it is a murder case, juror fourteen’s sister was murdered. This juror would be struck for cause because it would be hard for this juror to think about this murder case differently than they would think about their own sister’s murder case. Then each side has an opportunity to exercise their preemptory challenges to get rid of a juror. This is where Batson challenges can arise. It is pretty complicated going into the ins and outs of jury selection but this is a bare bones summary.