Who needs the drama surrounding Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor? North Carolina has its own racially tinged reality show in Raleigh.

In case you missed it, the House on Tuesday gave tentative approval to the “Racial Justice Act.” In short, the bill would allow death row inmates to escape execution if they can prove that race played a factor in their sentencing. If a judge agrees, they’d get life in prison with no parole.

Needless to say, the loonies are out in force.

Things grew heated Tuesday when Rep. Dale Folwell, R-Forsyth, referred to victims of the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland while arguing that N.C. murder victims were being ignored in legislative debate.

According to the Associated Press, Folwell held up a pair of shoes -- reminiscent of the shoes of the camp's victims that remain at the Auschwitz museum -- to remind lawmakers "of the people who wore them and the people whose promise was taken away from them by murderers and rapists in North Carolina."

Rep. Jennifer Weiss, D-Wake, said it was "vile" that Folwell would use a Holocaust reference to score political points. "Everyone in this body cares about victims," she said.

As it turns out, the shoes Folwell displayed actually belonged to his son, who died in 1999 when a motorist struck him as he was trying to get on a school bus.

Meanwhile, the Racial Justice Act gets a final House vote today then heads to the Senate, where it faces a tougher battle.