It is a fantasy to assume that Trump and the conservatives and the Republicans can be convinced to shed their skin, and suddenly transform into admirers of MLK and what he stood for.
Forget trying to change the colors of a human-killing animal.
I do not agree with Trump, at all. However, there are dozens of rallies by various bigot organizations, all over the nation, 12 months a year. Evidently eruptions of violence involving factions opposed to their viewpoints and tactics are rare, as we are not inundated with weekly reports of events descending into the chaos seen in Charlottesville. Something bad happened there. Did it have to get out of control like it did? Iâm not a Jew, but were a group of people gathered yelling slurs about Jews I might decide my time was better spent going to have a cup of coffee on the other side of town. You know, as opposed to getting nose to nose with 10 guys holding fire sticks, ball bats and shields.
You hold out hope opposing a rational person(s) meaning you harm somehow might be productive and civil. You go to meet a Congressperson contemplating a bad bill. You protest at a city council meeting. A group of coworkers present a united front and have it out with the boss. But why the hell do you pick a fight with a bunch of wild-eyed, armed idiots so obviously in your face that are solely there with the purpose of instigating that very fight?
Because youâre pissed off? I am. I would be all the more so if they showed up in my town. Is it right? Maybe not, though if these types of things arenât opposed they often grow. But is it understandable? Yes, I think so. Definitely.
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TOTALLY surprised that scorpion stung me halfway across the river. Now weâll both drownâŚ
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No one holds too many damned rallies if the consistent reaction to their provocations is to totally ignore them. Does anyone ask a person for a date after the tenth âNO, never!â is their reply?
Meanwhile, 3M is also out of Trumpâs rah-rah MAGA whatever bullshit council.
Not a black guy, so I doubt weâll hear about it on Twitter.
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Read the true story of how Trump got that winery. Short version: Mafia tactics.
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I realize the joke is overly simplistic, but I felt it was a laugh that might do others some good as it did for me this morning. I agree with your broader point too.
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Ok, now surround yourself by a bunch of torch carrying Nazis shouting Nazi slogans. How easy do you think it is going to be to simply ignore them? You might be right that would work, I donât know. I canât off the top of my head recall that ever actually being the case, though. But we need to live in reality. People have emotions. It is very difficult to watch this stuff and not get angry, and want to react. And people are going to do that.
I loved the Colbert monologue! And in the context he was speaking in, the joke was perfect, on point, not simplistic at all.
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Maybe, just maybe, this whole thing is a bridge too far for more on the Right than they could have realized otherwise.
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I am so hoping you are right on that. Like x 1,000.
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Abby Huntsman - privileged, rich, pampered white girl graciously gives blacks âpermissionâ to be emotional - how sickening - then tries to revert back to the phony âstatueâ debate. A better example of the utter disgrace that FOX News is could not be found. The Republican Party owns this all - campaigning for decades with racial dog whistles, and NOW weâre supposed to believe they are appalled? Sorry, NO.
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[quote=âaustin_dave, post:5, topic:60722, full:trueâ]
I think the answer here is to repeal ACA and cut the taxes on the rich. Thatâs the way home.
[/quote]Itâs certainly the way for Republicans to come together as one - united in the effort to do whatâs good and right ⌠for the 1%.
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The unabashed, unapologetic (and public) revulsion of pundits is promising, very promising.
Trump is tearing the leaking scab off the festering wound of the Republican abstraction strategy as Lee Atwater laid it out in 1981 viz
âŚweâre doing away with the racial problem one way or the other. Do you follow me? Because obviously sitting around saying, âwe want to cut taxes, we want to cut this,â is much more abstract than even the bussing thing, and a hell of lot more abstract than, ân_gger, n_ggerââŚ
Contemporary Atwaters could add âvoter fraudâ, âwar memorialsâ and âfree speachâ to the âstates rightsâ and âtax/spending cutsâ (that harm minorities) bandaids but #45âs scratching at the wound while smearing it with his bucal/digital diarrhea is pretty much ruining the ploy.
The cynical abstraction game has been going on for too long and it has given too many revanchist policies the cover of darkness. It is good the filthy sore is exposed and a gag reflex is a healthy response; for starts, just for starts.
NB: Atwater was alluding to a 1964 Lyndon Johnson speech when discussing âoff the recordâ how Republicans would win the South; e.g., Lee Atwater, Lyndon Johnson, Sam Rayburn, and Joseph BaileyâŚ.
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No it isnât a bad idea to discuss their ownership of slaves. But still bringing that subject up now helps the right-wing confuse the issue, which of course is their aim. Erecting a statue to someone does not imply that the person is morally flawless or that we embrace everything he has done in his life. It is to commemorate some achievement. Washington and Jefferson are Founding Fathers; no one questions whether they are worthy of being celebrated. By contrast, Robert E Leeâs achievement was to fight for a treasonous movement whose aim was to preserve the practice of slavery. His own status as a slave-holder, or his feeling about the issue, is completely irrelevant.
(I realize you are not making the argument for a slippery slope from Lee to Washington. This is directed against those that are.)
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I wrote elsewhere this morning the sentiments I have seen from others:
Find me a statue of Hitler, Goebbels, or Himmler in Germany.
Find me a statue of Ceaucescu in Romania.
Find me a statue of marshal Tito in what remains of Yugoslavia.
They donât have them because they donât need to have a reminder of the darker periods of their history.
And for those who would remind,that 45 is our President and I should get over it, they are, many of them, the same ones that maintain âhell, no, we ainât fergettinâ about a war they lost 150 years ago.
Hypocrisy.
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People throughout history have suffered for their inability to decide how they choose the react to events. Reacting emotionally rather than rationally to things has ruined many lives. James Fields reacted emotionally rather than rationally in running down that young woman, and his life is over for all intents and purposes. Me, Iâd choose not to operate in the James Fields paradigm, it might similarly come to bad ends. I guess if others choose to fail to control their emotions thatâs their business. Just keep your whining about that busted nose and facial laceration to yourself afterwards. You made that choice. You could have had that cup of coffee on the other side of town instead.
âThis is personal.â
Indeed it is. So, I hope black people take that sentiment to the voting booth and vote. Black votes could have made the difference in many places in 2016 and that is why we have a President Trump. I remember President Obama practically begging black people to get out and vote and instead many stayed home. Not only do Black Lives Matter, but Black Votes Matter.
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Understood. And I know what you mean. When Iâm here at home, I feel free to criticize the US. When Iâm in other countries and everyone around the tableâs slicing up my country, I talk out of the other side of my mouth.
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