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- Manlobbi
Halls of Shrewd'm / US Policy❤
No. of Recommendations: 16
From 2019, but truer now than ever.
Trump is poison for American society and culture.
President George W. Bush's chief speechwriter, Michael Gerson, has a message for people who are excusing President Trump's racism:
"I had fully intended to ignore President Trump’s latest round of racially charged taunts against an African American elected official, and an African American activist, and an African American journalist and a whole city with a lot of African Americans in it. I had every intention of walking past Trump’s latest outrages and writing about the self-destructive squabbling of the Democratic presidential field, which has chosen to shame former vice president Joe Biden for the sin of being an electable, moderate liberal.
But I made the mistake of pulling James Cone’s 'The Cross and the Lynching Tree' off my shelf — a book designed to shatter convenient complacency. Cone recounts the case of a white mob in Valdosta, Ga., in 1918 that lynched an innocent man named Haynes Turner. Turner’s enraged wife, Mary, promised justice for the killers. The sheriff responded by arresting her and then turning her over to the mob, which included women and children. According to one source, Mary was 'stripped, hung upside down by the ankles, soaked with gasoline, and roasted to death. In the midst of this torment, a white man opened her swollen belly with a hunting knife and her infant fell to the ground and was stomped to death.'
God help us. It is hard to write the words. This evil — the evil of white supremacy, resulting in dehumanization, inhumanity and murder — is the worst stain, the greatest crime, of U.S. history. It is the thing that nearly broke the nation. It is the thing that proved generations of Christians to be vicious hypocrites. It is the thing that turned normal people into moral monsters, capable of burning a grieving widow to death and killing her child.
When the president of the United States plays with that fire or takes that beast out for a walk, it is not just another political event, not just a normal day in campaign 2020. It is a cause for shame. It is the violation of martyrs’ graves. It is obscene graffiti on the Lincoln Memorial. It is, in the eyes of history, the betrayal — the re-betrayal — of Haynes and Mary Turner and their child. And all of this is being done by an ignorant and arrogant narcissist reviving racist tropes for political gain, indifferent to the wreckage he is leaving, the wounds he is ripping open.
Like, I suspect, many others, I am finding it hard to look at resurgent racism as just one in a series of presidential offenses or another in a series of Republican errors. Racism is not just another wrong. The Antietam battlefield is not just another plot of ground. The Edmund Pettus Bridge is not just another bridge. The balcony outside Room 306 at the Lorraine Motel is not just another balcony. As U.S. history hallows some causes, it magnifies some crimes.
What does all this mean politically? It means that Trump’s divisiveness is getting worse, not better. He makes racist comments, appeals to racist sentiments and inflames racist passions. The rationalization that he is not, deep down in his heart, really a racist is meaningless. Trump’s continued offenses mean that a large portion of his political base is energized by racist tropes and the language of white grievance. And it means — whatever their intent — that those who play down, or excuse, or try to walk past these offenses are enablers.
Some political choices are not just stupid or crude. They represent the return of our country’s cruelest, most dangerous passion. Such racism indicts Trump. Treating racism as a typical or minor matter indicts us."
— Michael Gerson
No. of Recommendations: 3
When the president of the United States plays with that fire or takes that beast out for a walk, it is not just another political event, not just a normal day in campaign 2020. It is a cause for shame. It is the violation of martyrs’ graves. It is obscene graffiti on the Lincoln Memorial. It is, in the eyes of history, the betrayal — the re-betrayal — of Haynes and Mary Turner and their child. And all of this is being done by an ignorant and arrogant narcissist reviving racist tropes for political gain, indifferent to the wreckage he is leaving, the wounds he is ripping open.
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The suggestion that the horrendous incident from 1918 is going to be repeated under Trump is just plain nuts. Since calling someone a racist has lost its panache, you think digging up 100 year old horrors will help your case is delusional. It won't.
No. of Recommendations: 13
The suggestion that the horrendous incident from 1918 is going to be repeated under Trump is just plain nuts. Since calling someone a racist has lost its panache, you think digging up 100 year old horrors will help your case is delusional. It won't.
Michael Gerson was a neoconservative and chief speechwriter for George W. Bush. He was raised in an Evangelical Christian family.
Calling a racist a racist has not lost its panache. If you do not think Trump is a racist, please search “Trump racist behavior” and pick from a very long list of articles from across the political spectrum.
Trump’s behavior didn’t just start when he ran for president. And it’s not just one or two instances. It’s a life long behavior and not much of a secret.
I believe that you would not ignore the life-long racism of any other politician or person. So why do you ignore Trump’s racism?
No. of Recommendations: 3
I believe that you would not ignore the life-long racism of any other politician or person. So why do you ignore Trump’s racism? - AW
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Because he isn't. No more than he is a Nazi or a Putin puppet.. And I do believe that there are racists in every population including those suffering from white guilt looking for acceptance and redemption
Labeling someone a racist lost its meaning when everything became racist. It is called identity politics and it was invented by liberals. It worked for them for a long time until it didn't. Some still need to think it wins arguments but all it does is out the accuser as not having anything important to say. You want to see real racism, see the antisemitism sweeping our country.
No. of Recommendations: 5
The suggestion that the horrendous incident from 1918 is going to be repeated under Trump is just plain nuts. Since calling someone a racist has lost its panache, you think digging up 100 year old horrors will help your case is delusional. It won't.
You must know full well that Gerson was not saying that that kind of horrific incident will be repeated now. He's making the point about the deep seated racism and hatred that has existed in this country for a long time and that is still with us.
And Trump feeds the racism and hatred. Not even with dog whistles; he says it right out loud.
No. of Recommendations: 16
Labeling someone a racist lost its meaning when everything became racist.
Everything is NOT racist, but Trump and a few of his friends like Laura Loomer clearly are. I can't find a single racist statement ever uttered by Republican senators like Mitt Romney or Lisa Murkowski.
Just a few racist things that Trump has said:
1. The lie that Haitian immigrants were eating their pets
2. The lie that President Obama was not born in the US
3. Calling for the death penalty for the innocent Central Park 5 (all African American men), never apologizing to them after they were all exonerated, and defaming them by lying that they had originally pleaded guilty (they had all pleaded not guilty).
4. Called Mexicans rapists.
5. Told 3 Congressional women of color, all American-born US citizens, to "go back and fix the broken and crime-infested places from which they came". That's like telling an American-born senator who's never been to Italy, but whose grandparents came from Rome, to go back to Sicily and fix the Mafia problem.
6. Called Senator Elizabeth Warren "Pocahantas".
7. Wanted more people to immigrate here from Norway rather than from "sh*thole countries".
Trump and his father Fred were also sued for housing discrimination against black people by the Dept of Justice. Black renters were told that there were no units available, while white renters were offered apartments in the same buildings. This was a violation of the Fair Housing Act.
It is called identity politics and it was invented by liberals.
No, identity politics is the opposite of racism. Identity politics tries to fix the marginalization of communities of color because of decades of discrimination against them. Just like what Trump and his father did denying housing to black people.
No. of Recommendations: 2
You must know full well that Gerson was not saying that that kind of horrific incident will be repeated now. - ges
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That is clever. Trump is not a racist, he is just "reviving racist tropes for political gain".
Either way, playing the race card, even in a novel construction, has worn out its effectiveness, keep it up.
