Donald Trump recently doubled down on his comments he made right after a group of Neo-Nazis marched in Charlottesville, VA with lighted tiki torches shouting, "Jews will not replace us," and "Blood and Soil." In front of a gaggle of reporters on the White House south lawn just prior to boarding Marine One the erstwhile Commander-in-Chief opined that he had described the marchers who in his re-telling were just "history lovers" that were upset at the attempted removal of the statue of beloved General Robert E. Lee.
In his words his saying that there were "very fine people on both sides" defined the situation "perfectly." He was after all a student of history.
Donald Trump is a white supremacist. Not of the ilk who were marching in Charlottesvile in 2017 where a counter protester Heather Heyer was killed, deliberately run into by a car plowing into the crowd. No Donald Trump isn't Bull Connor, or Edgar Ray Killen, Governor George Wallace, standing in the schoolhouse door at the University of Alabama (although he would stand astride the U.S. southern border blocking refugees fleeing persecution in Central America from seeking asylum). No he's more Woodrow Wilson who segregated federal workers by race and hosted a premiere of Birth of a Nation at the White House.
Donald Trump is just your average run-of-the-mill white supremacist. He's the white supremacist next door. He's the one who takes advantage of "redlining" to maintain segregated neighborhoods that result in segregated schools that foster a distorted worldview where "white is right" or as Jane Elliot observes, “...[I]f you graduated from high school and you aren’t a racist you weren’t listening, you should have gotten an F in social studies… we are conditioned to the myth of white superiority.”
Donald Trump is maybe the best thing that's happened to America. His election and the unwavering support by his Republican base and the sycophants in Congress explodes the myth of an America that is all that different fundamentally in 2019 than it was in 1969 or 1619 for that matter. For all of Obama's "hope 'n change" message that carried him to victory the backlash that has resulted blows the delusion of American progress toward a more inclusive society right out of the water.
White people, at least a significant portion of "white" folks are afraid of losing their privilege. Period. Full stop. Who can blame them really. They've been indoctrinated from cradle to grave in the myth of "white" manifest destiny. They must always remain at the top of the heap. But nothing lasts forever.
People get ready...
There's a train a-comin'...
Picking up passengers coast to coast...
You don't need no ticket...
You just get on board...
As I wrote on Twitter the other day "...Which DEM POTUS candidate is prepared to confront his [Trump's] white supremacy directly? And run on an anti-white supremacist platform?" Who will take up the mantle of Frederick Douglass and the abolitionists or Stokely Carmichael, or the Deacons for Defense? Who will confront not just the White Supremacist in the White House, but the White Supremacist next door?
In the end white supremacy is a persistent myth that must be destroyed if America is to survive and prosper post Trumpism.
Wake up everybody...
No more sleepin' in bed...
No more backward thinking...
Time for thinking ahead...
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