Donald Trump erased any doubt today about his soft spot for white supremacists. After staying mute most of the day following the Charlottesville rampage, Trump finally took to the podium to deliver a message dripping with hypocrisy including this line, “We condemn in the strongest possible terms this egregious display of hatred, bigotry, and violence on many sides. On many sides.”
Hatred, bigotry and violence on many sides. Right, Donald. Everyone's to blame and therefore no one.
That wasn't good enough for Trump's faithful supporter, former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke, who fired back: “I would recommend you take a good look in the mirror & remember it was White Americans who put you in the presidency, not radical leftists.”
The governor of Virginia, Terry McAuliffe didn't share Trump's convenient ambiguity. He told a news conference that he had a message for “all the white supremacists and the Nazis who came into Charlottesville today: Go home. You are not wanted in this great commonwealth.”
Trump's problem is that he courted the racist, white supremacist, white nationalist vote and it's an important segment of his dwindling base. That's why he has to pull his punches, hedge his words, blur his message. He's got them working in his own White House, a couple of them - Bannon and Miller - are close advisors. Then there's Gorka. If the racists abandon the already weakened Trump what support remains? David Duke is right. It was the white supremacist vote that put Trump in the presidency.
Trump sought out these bigots on his campaign to the White House. He preached the politics of division, suspicion and hate and reaped the rewards on January 20 when he was sworn into office. He can't distance himself from them now, they won't have it. He's attacked Muslims of all ethnicities. He's attacked Mexicans. He's attacked Asians. He's pushed a Sarah Palinesque notion of what constitutes a "real American." Trump energized the Alt.Right. He's their man, their president. They voted him into office. And standing before the microphones today he made it clear that's the way it is, that's the way it's going to stay.
And the normalization by the NYT and WaPo accelerates as the cowardice in the press corps deepens. CNN seems to be trying to come to terms with it, although weakly and without acknowledging their hand in the rise of Mr Ui.
ReplyDeleteCruz of course is calling on the Justice Department to investigate - which I'm sure Sessions will get right to.
Tearing itself apart for a failed casino owner. What an appendix for the US Constitution.
.. 'Unite the Right' ..
ReplyDeleteI am grateful to the nazi thugs.. for embracing the same term as Jason Kenney has been making political hay with.. I hope some of the stench wafts on up into 'Jason Kenney's Alberta' .. You know.. the Alberta he wants to get back or take back or reclaim via political manipulation.. kind of a Harper old snot reverse Morman marriage of convenience, just for the sake of 'power'
Bottom line though is we must thank President Clump.. after all.. its his presidency that's encouraging other pus sack scumbags like him to come storming out of their closets & mommy's basements, gather together for comfort & strength & spew invective at any likely target. Hey lets wave nazi flags & wear Sergeant Shultz style battle helmets ! Shout sieg heil !
Some of those hateful nazi wannabe's I saw in photos were in full battle gear. Almost impossible to differentiate from riot police or National Guard called up for riot duty. Realistically though, there is no real solution for what ails them. This is hardcore racist obsession and by now its totally hardwired in. Those folks aint redeemable. Its over.. they aint coming back to sanity.. or really to any aspect of being useful to or in society. They hide well, fake it well.. and they're toxic, radioactive.. poison. When they do appear in public, they need to be photographed and/or caught on video. They need to then be identified, plus where they work & live duly noted.
Just like our 'prouts' .. the so called 'proud boys' .. these are folks who really need to be dropped off on remote arctic islands to live with each other, chant, wave flags.. be tough guys up where the polar bears & arctic wolves can smell them. Seriously.. its really the only place I can think of where these truly dangerous cretins belong. I'm just a farm boy, somewhat growed up now n getting old.. and on any farm I've ever been on you don't let disease carrying rats flourish in the granary. No sir ..
Dana, what's the "Mr. Ui" reference?
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ReplyDeleteWe watched as hopes that Obama's election might trigger some racial ceasefire in the U.S. only to see the black man in the Oval Office treated as a desecration of "real America." That found expression in Obama the Muslim or Obama the Kenyan tropes and was the stock in trade of the Tea Party movement. Trump, taking a page out of Lee Atwater's book, harnessed the energy of that racist America and brought it in-house,straight into the White House. He made the racist vote his alone and it was enough to win him the Electoral College. That's America today.
The Resistable Rise of Arturo Ui is a play by Bertholt Brecht that satirizes the rise of totalitarians. Most recently given a prominent production in London this past spring but I'm sure being produced in numerous theatres around the world as well.
ReplyDeletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Resistible_Rise_of_Arturo_Ui
https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2017/may/07/the-resistible-rise-of-arturo-ui-donmar-lenny-henry-review