May 29, 2020: Rioting Shakes Minneapolis

 

5/29/20: Thursday night into Friday morning, protesters and rioters mixed and looting and burning scarred downtown Minneapolis.  

Friday afternoon, Macho Don assured the nation that he talked to the family of George Floyd and understood their pain. 

The he dropped the idea that all the protesters were “THUGS,” as he had previously tweeted. “We have peaceful protesters and support the rights for peaceful protesters,” he admitted, adding, we “can’t allow a situation like happened in Minneapolis to descend further into lawlessness, anarchy and chaos.”

Burning down stores is almost always counter-productive.

 

Trump also said he understood the hurt of many of the protesters, who have “been through a lot.” 

“The family of George is entitled to justice and the people of Minnesota are entitled to live in safety,” he continued. “Law and order will prevail.” 

Trump’s first instinct, to start shooting, is off the table. 

For now. (See: 5/30/20.)

June 9, 2020: Trump Talks about Another Hoax - And Wants to Fire Mark Esper

 

6/9/20: Yesterday, the president floated another nutty theory. If you don’t have the stomach to check, trust me. The man’s Twitter feed, now approaching 50,000 tweets and retweets since taking office, is a cornucopia of madness and folly. 

Look, being a cop – a good one – must be hard. We saw what happened to George Floyd, however. That was an outrage.

 

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Trump says protester faked skull-fracturing fall.

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You don’t have to be a liberal or a conservative to figure out most of these cases of police brutality. In a similar, but less fatal way, when Charlie Chase, an 82-year-old Trump supporter from Fall River, Massachusetts, was attacked by a 27-year-old man, you can’t justify that. Donald Trump Jr., himself, heard about the attack, called the victim, and then tweeted righteous indignation. 

For once, the smarmy scion of the president got it right.

 

With a nation convulsed by protests over what millions see as a police murder, and with Mr. Chase nursing his bruises, the president continued to shrivel as a leader and as a human being. Yesterday, Trump binged on too much right-wing news. Then he floated a bizarre conspiracy theory. If you missed the tape of another egregious incident in Buffalo, New York, two police officers were seen knocking Martin Gugino, a 75-year-old protester, over backwards. 

I’m a rational kind of person. I doubt their intent was to injure. Still, Gugino stumbled badly, tripped on his own feet, and toppled like a Jefferson Davis statue knocked from its pedestal. His head hit the sidewalk and rebounded slightly. He lay there, blood pooling on the sidewalk. He twitched a little. His phone, which he may have been using to film officers, slid from his hand. 

The President of the United States watched the tape. He tuned in to listen to the explanation offered by the nuttiest of nutty right-wing news outlets, and decided it was all a “hoax.” If a stupid idea formed in his head, you knew Trump was going to let it come spilling out on Twitter. “Buffalo protester shoved by Police could be an ANTIFA provocateur,” he theorized. “75 year old Martin Gugino was pushed away after appearing to scan police communications in order to black out the equipment. @OANN I watched, he fell harder than was pushed. Was aiming scanner. Could be a set up?” 

Yes! A “set up!” Gugino ended up in intensive care. As of yesterday, he remained hospitalized. 

That faker.

 

* 

“A matter of last resort.” 

IN OTHER NEWS, even the Trump-friendly New York Post is reporting that the president wanted to fire Secretary of Defense Mark Esper last week. 

This came after a hot-headed Trump threatened to send U.S. troops into the nation’s cities and quell protests. 

Esper provoked the president’s wrath when he made it clear he did not believe it would be wise. “The option to use active duty forces in a law enforcement role should only be used as a matter of last resort,” he explained to reporters, “and only in the most urgent and dire of situations. We are not in one of those situations now.” 

Aides had to talk Trump out of firing yet another cabinet member. 

Esper began writing a resignation letter, himself, before his own aides told him he should not resign.

Special Post: Last Words of Rep. John Lewis

 

Rep. John Lewis, who spent his life fighting for justice, passed away on July 17. He had been beaten badly, more than once, for standing up for human dignity. He had seen the worst of Jim Crow justice and helped destroy it at the foundation. He had been elected to high office, after growing up in an era when most African Americans in the Deep South were denied the right to vote. In the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement, he penned the following tribute to those millions who had stood up to protest.  

Lewis was beaten and arrested repeatedly

in the fight against Jim Crow injustice.

It was released on the morning of July 30, a few hours before his funeral service began: 

While my time here has now come to an end, I want you to know that in the last days and hours of my life you inspired me. You filled me with hope about the next chapter of the great American story when you used your power to make a difference in our society. Millions of people motivated simply by human compassion laid down the burdens of division. Around the country and the world you set aside race, class, age, language and nationality to demand respect for human dignity.

 

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“Good trouble, necessary trouble.”

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While my time here has now come to an end, I want you to know that in the last days and hours of my life you inspired me. You filled me with hope about the next chapter of the great American story when you used your power to make a difference in our society. Millions of people motivated simply by human compassion laid down the burdens of division. Around the country and the world you set aside race, class, age, language and nationality to demand respect for human dignity.

 

That is why I had to visit Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, though I was admitted to the hospital the following day. I just had to see and feel it for myself that, after many years of silent witness, the truth is still marching on.

 

Emmett Till was my George Floyd. He was my Rayshard Brooks, Sandra Bland and Breonna Taylor. He was 14 when he was killed, and I was only 15 years old at the time. I will never ever forget the moment when it became so clear that he could easily have been me. In those days, fear constrained us like an imaginary prison [emphasis added], and troubling thoughts of potential brutality committed for no understandable reason were the bars.

 

Though I was surrounded by two loving parents, plenty of brothers, sisters and cousins, their love could not protect me from the unholy oppression waiting just outside that family circle. Unchecked, unrestrained violence and government-sanctioned terror had the power to turn a simple stroll to the store for some Skittles or an innocent morning jog down a lonesome country road into a nightmare. If we are to survive as one unified nation, we must discover what so readily takes root in our hearts that could rob Mother Emanuel Church in South Carolina of her brightest and best, shoot unwitting concertgoers in Las Vegas and choke to death the hopes and dreams of a gifted violinist like Elijah McClain.

 

Like so many young people today, I was searching for a way out, or some might say a way in, and then I heard the voice of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on an old radio. He was talking about the philosophy and discipline of nonviolence. He said we are all complicit when we tolerate injustice. He said it is not enough to say it will get better by and by. He said each of us has a moral obligation to stand up, speak up and speak out. When you see something that is not right, you must say something. You must do something. Democracy is not a state. It is an act, and each generation must do its part to help build what we called the Beloved Community, a nation and world society at peace with itself.

 

Ordinary people with extraordinary vision can redeem the soul of America by getting in what I call good trouble, necessary trouble. Voting and participating in the democratic process are key. The vote is the most powerful nonviolent change agent you have in a democratic society. You must use it because it is not guaranteed. You can lose it.

 

You must also study and learn the lessons of history because humanity has been involved in this soul-wrenching, existential struggle for a very long time. People on every continent have stood in your shoes, though decades and centuries before you. The truth does not change, and that is why the answers worked out long ago can help you find solutions to the challenges of our time. Continue to build union between movements stretching across the globe because we must put away our willingness to profit from the exploitation of others.

 

Though I may not be here with you, I urge you to answer the highest calling of your heart and stand up for what you truly believe. In my life I have done all I can to demonstrate that the way of peace, the way of love and nonviolence is the more excellent way. Now it is your turn to let freedom ring.

 

When historians pick up their pens to write the story of the 21st century, let them say that it was your generation who laid down the heavy burdens of hate at last and that peace finally triumphed over violence, aggression and war. So I say to you, walk with the wind, brothers and sisters, and let the spirit of peace and the power of everlasting love be your guide.

September 15, 2020: Trump Blows the Town Hall Meeting

 

9/15/20: President Trump shows up for a town hall meeting in Pennsylvania, where the audience will be composed of undecided voters. It’s hosted by ABC News and moderated by George Stephanopoulos.

 

You can tell it didn’t go well, because as soon as it ends, apologists claim the Big Orange Buffoon was “ambushed.” That is: Unlike the creampuff questions he gets when he shows up on Fox News, he was forced to try thinking.

 

Even easy questions gave the Buffoon fits. For example, Stephanopoulos wondered if the president thought he could have done anything better in battling the spread of the coronavirus.

 

“I don’t think so,” he replied.

 

Strike one.

 

Was it true, he was asked, that he had down-played the threat of COVID-19? You know, like saying it was no more dangerous than ordinary flu – and maybe powdered flower petals would protect us from the virus?

 

No, he actually “up-played it,” Trump insisted.

 

Strike two.

 

What about his repeated claims that the disease would just go away, like some miracle?

 

Trump claimed he was right all along. “Sure, over a period of time,” he said. “Sure with time it goes away.”

 

Apparently, the Big Orange Buffoon is thinking in terms of eons.

 

Strike three.

 

Carl Day, an African American pastor in Philadelphia, and one of the undecided voters in attendance, had a question about making America great again. “When,” he wondered, “has America been great for African Americans in the ghetto of America? Are you aware of how tone deaf, that comes off to [the] African American community?”

 

The tone deaf president responded with a tone deaf flourish.

 

“Well, I can say this: We have tremendous African American support,” he replied. Black people were killing it before the pandemic hit, he claimed. He insisted that the pre-coronavirus period “was the best single moment in the history of the African American people in this country.”

 

Asked by another questioner if he felt there was racial injustice in America, Trump did admit that the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and Jacob Blake were “tragic events.” Then he said the real problem was that citizens didn’t show police respect. “I will say this: If you’re going to stop crime, we have to give ... the respect back to the police that they deserve. We have to give them their mojo. We have to let them protect us.”

 

So! More mojo!

 

If cops had more mojo, they wouldn’t have to kneel on George Floyd’s neck, or break into Breonna Taylor’s apartment and shoot her dead by mistake. If they had their mojo, maybe they would have shot Blake less times in the back.

 

Seven. That’s a lot.

 

Even this liberal blogger would admit the job of law enforcement must, inherently, be hard. Trump only cares because he wants the police unions to support his campaign. So, he slathers it on thick. “Police are so afraid today that they do something slightly wrong, slightly wrong and their pension’s gone, their job’s gone, who knows what happens. Their life is ruined, their wife or their husband will leave, the whole thing, it’s a very scary thing,” Trump told the audience.

 

Then again, Floyd and Taylor are dead; and Blake may be permanently paralyzed from the waist down.

 

Trump blamed nearly every problem facing the nation on Democrats. He couldn’t get a second stimulus package passed because House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was mean, and his party only controlled the Senate, and he was only the president, and he didn’t feel like compromising.

 

(Later, Trump called on Republicans in the Senate to increase the stimulus bailout by roughly three-quarters of a trillion dollars, something similar to what Democrats have been demanding all along.)

 

Crime in the cities? Trump used to blame President Obama for crime in the cities – because Obama was president!

 

He should do something!

 

Now, Trump said the problem was “Democratic mayors.” Trump said he had kept his 2016 campaign promise to “restore law and order.” Except for those pesky cities.

 

This blogger has mentioned this before: but eight of the top ten states for most violent crimes per person are … Republican-controlled states.

 

One audience member asked Trump why he didn’t wear a mask more often and why he didn’t order a national mask mandate.

 

Nu  uh, Trump objected. He did, too, wear a mask. Like at hospitals and stuff. Maybe even on Halloween. Besides, it was the Democrats! “They said at the Democrat Convention … they’re going to do a national mandate. They never did it,” Trump said. “Because they’re checked out, they never did it.”

 

Probably because no one in the Democratic Party, including Joe Biden, has power to issue a national mandate, not even magic powers, such as invisibility and being able to levitate by chanting, “Shazam.”

 

If anything, Trump’s performance got worse. He claimed, “A lot of people think the masks are not good.” 

Stephanopoulos interjected, “Who are those people?” 

“Waiters,” the Buffoon said. 

 

Trump was asked a series of questions related to healthcare. If you were keeping track, he’d be striking out for about the ninth time in a row. It would be like he was facing Tom Seaver over and over.  

 

I’ll just cheat here and let ABC News describe what happened when one questioner offered a tough one:

 

In a powerful and passionate exchange about her lifelong health struggles, Ellesia Blaque, an assistant professor from Philadelphia, politely yet bluntly, asked the president to “please stop” interrupting her.

 

“Let me finish my question, sir,” Blaque said, as she described a life of overcoming the odds, battling an inflammatory disease called sarcoidosis that deemed her “uninsurable” from the day she was born, but still going on to get a bachelor’s degree, master’s degree and a PhD.

 

Blaque vouched for the importance of Obamacare, which allowed for people with preexisting conditions to qualify for health care at the same rate as everyone else.

“Within a 36 to 72 hour period, without my medication, I will be dead. And I want to know what it is that you’re going to do to assure that people like me, who work hard, we do everything we’re supposed to do, can stay insured? It’s not my fault that I was born with this disease,” Blaque said.

 

Trump missed the pitch so badly, that if this were real baseball, you would have felt sorry for the bum, because you’d know he’d be getting demoted to the lowest levels of the minor leagues the next day.

 

“It’s a total disaster,” Trump said, referring to Obamacare. And then he said he’d have a much better plan ready soon.

 

Kind of the healthcare equivalent of: “Mexico will pay for the wall.” On Day #1,334 of his presidency, Trump had still not revealed his great new healthcare plan. Still, he wanted Basque to know that “repeal and replace” would be so easy. Maybe in his second term.

 

Maybe in his third.

 

*

 

YOU KNEW, if you failed to watch the debacle, that Trump’ performance was terrible. On Fox News, Laura Ingraham, was furious. True. She’s always furious. But now she was furious about how the Big Orange Buffoon had been mistreated at the town hall meeting. The Democratic National Committee “may have put the whole thing on” she alibied for the president. The moderator was a “Clintonite.” How dared he ask Trump follow up questions! “The president loves mixing it up with everybody,” Ingraham fumed. “He did the interview with Jonathan Swan, the 18 tapes of Bob Woodward – now he did this. But this is an ambush.” 

Allow me to interject. If you’ve never seen Trump’s interview with Jonathan Swan, it was even more of a fiasco than his town hall failure.

During the Swan interview, the president used graphs

that looked like a third-grader made them.

As for those Woodward tapes, you know Trump wishes he could have destroyed them before they played. And don’t forget. He agreed to speak to the journalist. He even called him late at night, just to chat.

 

John McLaughlin, Trump’s favorite pollster (because he always says Trump is going to win), was a guest on Ms. Ingraham’s show. He claimed the president “was very sensitive and demonstrated empathy” during the town hall session. He mentioned the moving story of the woman who told of having just lost her mother. McLaughlin, astute observers noted, did not mention that the woman’s mother died from cancer.

 

Whereas the president repeatedly referred to the woman’s mother dying of “COVID” in response to her question.

 

 

POSTSCRIPT: Trump also had a busy day tweeting. At one point, with Iran threatening revenge for the killing of Gen. Qasem Soleimani, Trump tried to channel his inner Clint Eastwood.

 

“Any attack by Iran, in any form, against the United States will be met with an attack on Iran that will be 1,000 times greater in magnitude!" he said.

 

Have we mentioned? The President of the United States really likes making simplistic statements on Twitter.