All that, plus “cherish our history” is a nod to the strand of white supremacy that Spencer now leads, which posits that a so-called white race exists and that since men of that race founded the United States, white males in some general sense are the only legitimate inheritors of this heritage. Everyone else should have fewer rights, or no rights. All non-whites and all non-Christians literally cannot be truly American in Spencer’s way of thinking. “Cherishing our history” in that context is Trump giving his stamp of approval to Spencer.
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There is another element of the situation that argues against getting rid of Bannon any time soon. Recall that a central element of Trump’s “management” style is keeping those around him in chaos, at each other’s throats. That allows him to sit in the middle of mess and pull strings, playing offf one group against another to preven any from becoming powerful. In the mean time, the generals are probably trying to at least get their own houses in order. These guys typically don’t tolerate chaos in their own leadership systems – goes against both their formal training and their most basic instincts.
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That’s interesting because I just spent part of the week seeing and discussing CA missions with the grandkid who will start 4th grade this coming week. (CA fourth graders study CA history.) First there were the Native American peoples who happily hunted and gathered until Spanish troops claimed Alta California in 1769, building presidios (forts) here and there beginning in San Diego. The troops brought the Franciscans, who established 21 missions from San Diego to Sonoma over the next 54 years, to covert the natives and provide a workforce for the colonists. In 1821, Mexico became the official owner of CA. So CA spent 52 years as Spaniards and another 25 as Mexicans before it became attached to the U.S. CA is now pushing 167 years as a state, but those previous 77 years as Spanish and Mexican plus the native population has left us with a very brown heritage. Half the place names in this state are Spanish (Los Angeles, San Diego, La Jolla, San Francisco, Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, etc.). The origin of our “cherished heritage” is decidedly neither lily-white, nor English speaking.
Stephen Miller, who whispers alt-right propaganda in Trump’s ear, grew up in Santa Monica (yes, Spanish), yet felt the need to berate his bilingual classmates when they spoke Spanish. He strikes me as another low self-esteem jerk whose manhood doesn’t measure up. By “cherishing our heritage,” all these people mean is, “I feel like a tick on the butt of a buffalo, but I want you to know how important I am. I’m white. That makes me important in my own eyes.” Bullies.
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McMaster is supposed to be one of the adults in the White House. But he’s trying to keep his job.
You got it backward, H.R. You need to be organizing the ouster of the Nazi in the Oval Office. Let’s take our country back again.
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The origin of our “cherished heritage” is decidedly neither lily-white, nor English speaking.
This is also true for Texas, Florida, Louisiana, and New Mexico.
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I’ll go with McMaster covering his butt and not looking like he’s piling on.
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I certainly don’t have any special knowledge about the alt-right or the psychology of racism or any of that fun stuff. I do think a certain suspicion, at least, of outsiders as well as altruism toward one’s own group was adaptive in the Pleistocene and both qualities are now baked into our DNA. I also know we tend not to think of rabid racists as being especially well-balanced, open, or self-reliant. Pretty soon they all strike you as maladjusted. Maybe we shouldn’t say “alt-right,” which tends to dignify them—we maybe should call them “dateless wonders,” which is what they actually are.
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LA, though, also got a big dose of French. They’re white, but not English speaking. Actually, I’m not convinced Louisianans actually speak English now. 
“Any time that you commit an attack against people to incite fear, it is terrorism,”
That fits on a tweet, how come after 24 hours the President still hasn’t said that?
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Uh, oh. Who let McMaster out of his box? Mr. Bannon not gonna be happy.
Great post. Thanks for taking the time to put it together.
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Interesting tidbit in Anne Proulx’s historical novel “Accordion Crimes” in which she points out that the docks in New Orleans were so infested with Yellow Fever, typhoid and other tropical diseases that slave owners didn’t want to use their expensive humans ($600 for a strong young male) loading cotton and unloading cargo from Europe. So boatloads of desperate, starving Irish immigrants who had bought passage to Boston or NYC were detoured to La. to be used as indentured servants/slaves on the docks. Her theory is that a good percentage survived and that is how the Irish were able to take over the docks and unionize later in the 19th century. With their accordions of course.
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I’d say McMaster’s more of the measured institutionalist type, who’s not going to say something speculative that’ll be taken as official conclusion. It’s the same kind of caution that leads to smart lawyers calling the guy found with the smoking gun ‘the alleged murderer’.
Besides, this angle is actually a good one consider the congruence: McMaster has said (in his way) that this fits the definition of terrorism. He’s also called it a crime.
Terrorism seen as a criminal act, not an act of war, is the sane response that we want to encourage. When we apply that to radical groups around the world, it’s the smart way to approach it, deny the ‘clash of civilizations’ crap, and remind people ‘these are not noble martyrs of self-sacrifice, they’re just murderers who want you to be afraid’.
I’ll take measured restraint in a public statement over elevation of terrorist groups like AQ and the KKK to the level where their declarations of ‘holy war’ seem credible to some.
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Many folks in the South don’t speak English all that well - there are many dialects too, not just one “southern accent”. I heard a Cajun/zydeco band from Louisiana about a month ago at a blues festival and the leader (a senior citizen and “white”) made a point of talking about whose songs they were doing (some in French of course) and how they were from different races and how the Cajuns were part of the “Catholic world” and how important Mardi Gras was. He even said something like folks, we need diversity - our diversity makes us strong in Louisiana. I liked his music - loved his message.
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That said, Trump supports Bannon because he believes in white nationalism and Bannon has found a way to cast Trump as an historic figure and change agent within that movement.
Trump believes in nothing but himself. He’s playing the presidency as a reality show and the only skin in the game for him is his. I think Bannon knows there’s nowhere to go from here, but he’ll play it for as long as he can. The only mind in which he cares about casting Trump as an historic figure is Trump’s.
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Your first sentence says it all. The cretin has no beliefs, no convictions, no foundation of morals. He is a totally self absorbed narcissist devoid of all emotional attachment to anyone or anything other than his own well being and advancement. Dominance in business, human interaction and politics is the only tactic he knows and he ruthlessly employs it as a survival mechanism. I consider him to be subhuman in emotional development.
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Just watching McMaster on This Week…does he always chuckle at inappropriate times? almost a tic…a bit unnerving to a listener.
McMaster clearly daring Bannon to come at him
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Will the White House send any representative to the funeral of the Charlottesville victim? Whom?
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Thank you!
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