"Peter, I resent enormously you thinking that I and other Trump supporters are racist. There isn't a racist bone in my body."
Comment sent to me this week.
Donald Trump is an everyday, garden-variety bigot who doesn't mind offending people when he voices his prejudices.
It is what people liked about Archie Bunker, too.
Liberals never learned to love Archie Bunker. They thought they needed to fix him, shame him, out-live him, or out-vote him.
It is tempting for Democrats to overthink Trump's bigotry, or act like they found something hidden or obscure. Trump claimed Obama was born in Kenya, that Mexicans are criminals and rapists, and that Haitian immigrants eat cats. Big discovery: Trump is racist. Trump is a playboy tycoon who bragged about grabbing and assaulting women. Big discovery: Trump is a sexist misogynist.
Trump supporters resist admitting that Trump is a misogynistic racist. Trump is open about it. So was Archie Bunker.
Last Thursday I wrote about the lesson I learned from Mr. Conway, the Irish-American father of a girl I took out for a date in 1967. He told me that voters voted along ethnic group lines. It is still true. I would generalize that to saying that people vote along links of perceived affinity. People segment and associate with people they feel comfortable around. Liberals do it, too. There is a way of saying some of the things said by Trump and Archie Bunker that aren't mean spirited. Mr. Conway was proper and circumspect in his language. There was nothing wrong with Italians, Jews, and Blacks -- just that they were on different teams. Mr. Conway wasn't endorsing predatory misogyny. He feared it. He was protecting his daughter's honor and virtue.
I liked and respected Mr. Conway. Democrats would win more elections if they could get comfortable with people like him.
Erich Almasy did what Trump opponents sometimes do. They document Trump's racism and misogyny. Maybe sunlight will disinfect it. I share his comments below. These incidents are moral errors for Trump, but not political errors. They are qualifiers. Credentials. Trump, like Archie Bunker, is proud of who he is. When Trump displays his prejudices he gives permission to his tribe to do the same. They turn the attack onto woke liberals who look for and find prejudice.
Erich and his wife Cynthia Blanton, both college classmates, live in the Mexican city of San Miguel de Allende.
Guest Post by Erich Almasy
Racist and misogynist both.
If Trump is a racist, why are Black men voting for him? The simple answer is that misogyny (or patriarchy) “trumps” racism. Namely, some Black men cannot abide the idea of a woman (any woman) being President. The more complex answer is wrapped into what NYT columnist Charles Blow stated last week: the willingness of Black men to downplay racism as a political consideration (Opinion | When Patriarchy Trumps Race).
Does Trump fit the definition of a racist, “a person who is prejudiced against or antagonistic toward people based on their membership in a particular racial or ethnic group.” His racist history goes back to 1973, when the Department of Justice sued him and his father for denying Blacks access to their 10,000 apartments. More famously, he called for the execution of the "Central Park Five", four Blacks and a Latino who were convicted of a brutal rape through coerced confessions, despite DNA evidence that proved their innocence, Trump continues to claim their guilt.
He fired longtime adviser Omarosa Manigault Newman, the only Black in a senior advisor position in his administration. She recently came out for Harris and stated that “Trump losing to a woman of color would be devastating to his ego.” This may explain Trump’s recent extraordinary and demeaning comments about Harris, including his assertion to an audience of Black female journalists (and on Truth Social) that she “isn’t Black." He has a particular soft spot for Haitians, deriding Haiti as a “shithole” country and fantasizing about them eating cats and dogs in Ohio.
Isn’t he also a convicted misogynist, aka rapist? That is, “a person who hates, discriminates against, or is prejudiced against women or girls.” Since the 1970s, at least 26 women have publicly accused Trump of rape, kissing, and groping without consent; looking under women's skirts; and walking in on naked teenage pageant contestants. His 2016 taped admission on Access Hollywood should have been enough to disqualify him from the Presidency. But White males and antipathy toward Hillary Clinton saved him.
So, how should we categorize Mr. Trump? I lean toward a “bigot,” a person who is obstinately or unreasonably attached to a belief, opinion, or faction, especially one who is prejudiced against or antagonistic toward a person or people based on their membership of a particular group. This seems to cover Blacks and brown people, Latin and South Americans, Caribbean people, Muslims, Liberals, RINOs (Republicans in Name Only), and women. We have fewer than three weeks to add another group to his hate list.
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12 comments:
McDonald’s released a statement Sunday admitting it has no record of Kamala Harris ever working there, as she has repeatedly claimed.
The story of the boy who cried “Wolf” is relevant here.
Liberals have cried “racism” so often (and often with so little justification) that no one who is not a member of their tribe is listening anymore. (We have one of those crying boys right here in these blog comments.)
A famous sign from the old Tea Party used to say:
It doesn’t matter what this sign says,
you’ll call it racist anyway.
I'm not worried about his racist stuff. Everyone knows he's a racist and he's proud of it. He doubles down on it. In reality, it's no big deal. What is a big deal is his dealings with other countries. He alienates our friends, and gets cozy with our enemies. Why would a President do that? Just because they flatter him? Does Putin have something on him? Are he and Kim buddies? It makes no sense, but nothing about him makes sense. He's unpredictable and claims he uses his gut instincts. Even his closest allies find him perplexing. Imagine working for him and giving him advice. A waste of time.
If the Democrats had taken their time and put forth their best candidate, it was probably an easy win. However, they just rubber stamped Harris because she was convenient. There wasn't even a debate. Automatic. So, the Democratic Commitee will be the biggest loser if Trump wins. It's all on them. Like with Hillary.
I'd be surprised if Hunts still has records of me working there decades ago either. So what? And what does that have to do with Trump's misogyny and racism.
Peter C. has some good points, but I have to disagree with blaming the DNC for Trump’s election. It’s all on the people who vote for him. They do it, not in spite of his blatant racism, misogyny and criminality but because of it.
Of course, some people deny we have racism in the U.S. I suppose they’d consider the deadly march in Charlottesville was just a “day of love,” like Jan. 6.
My favorite Tea Party sign was “Get A BRAIN! MORANS”
https://mericamagazine.org/2015/09/27/get-a-brain-morans-the-meta-discourse-of-misspelled-tea-party-signs-arlynda-boyer/
McDonalds released a statement saying they do not have records dating back to the 1980's. This doesn't mean Kamala Harris didn't work there, it just means they don't have a record.
VP Harris is a wonderful candidate and will be a great POTUS.
If a person supports racists and racism, then they're a racist, too.
It's not hard to see the connection.
The notion of the banality of evil comes to mind. We wonder how 1930s Germany could elect a party dedicated to the destruction of Jewish ethnicity, the “others” of that time and place. There are certainly major chinks in the moral fabric of human beings, we seem to put assholes in charge from time to time. My sense is that these assholes never work out well in the long run. May we escape this one via democratic means in 2 weeks…
At a rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday, Trump described Harris as “a shit vice president,” to roars of approval from his supporters. Now that’s what I call presidential! Nothing racist or misogynistic about it, I’m sure. He’s just trying to make his little mushroom seem like a big swinging dick.
The D’s would never use a word like that; they just imply that Trump = Hitler. So refined…
Actually, it's Trump who implies that Trump = Hitler, with all his Nazi rhetoric.
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