by Tom Kando
Our blog hasn’t been very active as of late. Some have blamed us for “disengaging” just as evil is getting worse. The reasons for writing less frequently over the past few months are private and irrelevant.
Nevertheless, our country sometimes reaches such a loathsome new low, such an abysmal nadir of immorality, that I feel compelled to take up the pen again, if for nothing else at least in order to re-iterate some of the verities which most people of good will already know:
The Trump-instigated , Republican-condoned and FOX News-encouraged policy of child torture at the Mexican border is an historical event whose gravity is comparable to our World War Two Japanese internment camps. The break-up of families which effectively makes orphans out of thousands of children is comparable to the break-up of black families during slavery. As my wife said, this policy is a crime against humanity and it deserves scrutiny by international courts in the tradition of the Nuremberg trials, or at least the International Court of Justice in The Hague.
Here are some salient, absurd or otherwise noteworthy points about this issue:
1. The Right’s immigration agenda is clearly and obviously motivated by one single overarching motive: To do everything in its power to maintain white supremacy. It is purely and exclusively a race war by non-military means. And to that end, the Right will stoop to ANY conceivable means. I have long believed that Trump’s instinctive sympathy for Russia has to do with the fact that Russia is the largest white country.
2. When attacked or criticized about ANYTHING, the Right (e.g. Fox News), relies on ONE strategy, to the near-total exclusion of everything else: CHANGE THE SUBJECT. Two examples:
Russiagate (the Mueller investigation): While Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity and the other folks at Fox do cover this to some extent, of course, (how could they not, what with Giuliani’s antics?), they prefer to talk about other things. I often channel surf and spend a few moments looking at Fox News (until it makes me too sick, after a few minutes), and I am struck by the fact that they are frequently NOT discussing the latest revelations about Trump malfeasance, be it Stormy Daniels, Michael Cohen, Paul Manafort, James Comey or any other aspect. Instead, they continue to dwell on Hillary Clinton’s e-mails, or they have some cooking show on.
The current child-separation crisis at the border: Accused of horrific cruelty, right-wing spokesmen’s response is something like this: “What about the homeless and downtrodden people in the slums of Detroit and Chicago? How come liberals and the New York Times don’t talk about that? How come liberals love foreigners more than they love Americans?
3. And then there are the desperate maneuvers: Kellyanne Conway’s and Attorney General Sessions’ biblical arguments, their appeal to Saint Paul’s Romans 13 to argue that one’s first duty is obedience to the law...
...or Ann Coulter calling the crying babies at the border CHILD ACTORS! Can you believe this?
The depth of depredation on the Right has become bottomless. There are probably still many millions who swallow such desperate and unbelievably idiotic arguments.
More likely, millions don’t care.
The effort to keep America white is beginning to make this country resemble Germany in the 1930s. I am very worried.
© Tom Kando 2018;All Rights Reserved
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28 comments:
DEAR TOM
THANK YOU
I TOTALLY AGREE
thanks
Thank you for speaking out. Arriving at the border seeking asylum is not entering illegally! Is the next step arming border patrol with machine guns to slaughter any non-US citizen who dares place a toe a mere inch over the border? Children included? This has to have been preplanned for a considerable amount of time. The Walmart store has been vacant for how long prior to this? And, conveniently, there were thousands of cots immediately available to fill the prison. It is a disgrace. How bad does it have to get before even diehard Trump supporters become sickened with the blatant transparent lies that deny that what is happening in plain sight is not happening? Child actors, indeed!
Tom,
I’ll keep this brief, because I’ve become too emotional about my country and it’s slide into Facism. Your last sentence really sums it up; we have become the “Good Germans”, appalled by the concentration camps, but what could we do??. As the “Good Germans” we do nothing, and the “nothing” is what is driving this country, like Germany, into an ever escalating decline. I really have little hope, at this point. I believe that we have become what we have always deplored.
By the way, I forgot to express my thanks to you, Tom. You continue to serve as an eloquent voice for reason and humanity. Please keep it up.
Cher Tom, merci pour ta lettre toujours pertinente.C'est vrai que, vu du Cambodge-où je retournerai dans un mois faire le survey des élections législatives à la tsar pute-yn-UN candidat, le dictateur HUN Sen en poste de chef de parti et du pays depuis 39 ans et 6 mois- et des pupets, l'opposition en prison ou réfugiée à l'étranger le clown Trump intéresse moins que l'empereur du Milieu à vie XYI et sa colonisation terminée en Asie du S.E. SAUF au Viêt-nam...sous parapluie US comme Philippines...La WW 3 débutant aux parfams paarfums sino-russes en Sibérie vide, que les Chinois veulent conquérir, en douce ou en force (l'EAU et Terres précieuses).D'ici nous sommes plutôt optimistes pour le moyen orient, Israël bénéficiant du schisme musulman, IRAN vs Arabie des Saouds.Pute-yn le syrien reste imprévisible, jusqu'où ira-t-il dans son post stalinisme ? Au Cambodge,Laos,Taï,Burma...,il a tout laissé aux chinois.L'Europe après la Crimée? aux suivants:Hongrie, voire Pologne etc?Charlie.
I thank Jennifer, Robert and Charlie for their comments.
Right. We are back to having internment camps - this time for babies, too.
This is the ugliest thing I have ever witnessed in this country since I arrived here nearly sixty years ago (I was a refugee myself).
Regarding Jennifer’s comments about the suspicious “anticipation” of this crisis by the authorities: I just read something which makes things even uglier, if that’s possible: There are (allegedly) millions being made already by contractors setting up these facilities.
which brings up a different but equally disgusting topic - the privatization of our prison system; prisons for profit; long favored by the “Trumpian” Right.
So Bob can add “capitalism” to the mix.
As to Charlie, his French commentary deals with issues in Asia and also Russian expansionism, which is tangentially related to this post.
But let me get back to Bob:
He brings up what happened in Germany - the “Wir haben es Nicht Gewust” excuse (We didn’t know), and the moral equivalence of complicity with saying and doing nothing. The famous poem attributed to Pastor Niemöller:
First they came for the Communists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
To which we can add George Santayana’s words: Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.
Things have taken a negative turn! Faith and hope and activism ....so that history will not repeat itself.
Gail
Thanks for clear-eyed, well thought out arguments. It is good to know others think and feel!
Goed gedaan, Tom
Thank you Tom! It’s scary!
Wow Tom! I’m impressed. You pointed out the atrocities last night - and today Trump changed his mind!!
Thanks for sharing!
I can understand why, for the sake of one's mental health, it is hard to keep commenting on the atrocities of the Trump administration.
Thanks for you word Tom. I am worried also. Resist the right
It’s gratifying to get so much reaction - not as an “ego” thing, but because it indicates that most of us are still sane, and have normal human feelings and values. Thank God!
To Nancy: Joking aside about getting credit, etc.: What matters, obviously, is that this revolting policy outraged a large enough majority of Americans so as to make a difference.
To Scott: Right. Battle fatigue sets in. Maybe if the situation improves after the Fall election, we will be re-energized and things will be less dire. However, counting on a magnificent “blue wave” would be as big a mistake as it was to count on Hillary’s victory.
Yes I agree that the family separations are terribly wrong, and that they are a stain on our national reputation. But your friend (or his wife) go too far in relating them to Nuremberg Trials. The latter were about systematic, industrial mass murder. Not everything bad, even very bad, is that bad.
Right.
There is always a question whether or not one speaks hyperbolically. That’s why I wrote “scrutiny” (a question mark) and I added “...at least the International Court of Justice...” (Which tries crimes against humanity that may be less severe than the Holocaust).
Of course evil, like everything else, comes in degrees. But I am apparently not alone in finding this particular case exceptionally heinous. The outcry has been pretty generalized.
I do not equate America with Nazi Germany. I write that we are beginning to resemble it. This is not Auschwitz (although it does resemble the Japanese internment camps).
What is worrisome is our country's current trajectory. There seems to be a hardening of positions on the right, a revival of racism. I hope that I am wrong.
And one more thing: America has always claimed moral leadership; “American exceptionalism,” etc. The combination of this claim with current practices appears to be particularly hypocritical. I hope (and still believe) that a majority of Americans are decent people. However, Trump and his large base are frightening. In Charlottesville, The President declared moral equivalence between left-wing protesters and neo-Nazis; police continue to kill several thousand people each year with impunity; football players who protest against this are blackballed by the NFL. So, whether or not invoking Nuremberg is hyperbolic, there does seem to be a spreading disease...
Tom,
Can you explain to me why minority men and especially minority women are “for” Trump. Educated female optometrists.
Thanks for your eloquent writing.
Hi Ann,
Right: “False consciousness” is the term Marx created, when he noted that it is often/sometimes the lower class that is the most conservative and supportive of the king, the wealthy elite, etc.
Same with the groups you mention. Americans have always had a much lower degree of class consciousness than others (Europeans, for instance), because of their belief in “the American Dream,” the Horatio Alger myth of pulling yourself up by your bootstraps, etc.
So, maybe an admirable attitude in some ways (if you just work and dedicate yourself, you’ll succeed), but also (often) a fairy tale.
To be sure, the percentage of Trump supporters is lower among the groups you mention, than it is among (older) white males, who are the most reactionary group, and for understandable reasons. THEY, at least, do understand their self-interest, unlike the many misguided people you mention…
Actually only 4% of black women voted for Trump as opposed to 52% of white women and 13% of black men as opposed to 62% of white men.
If by 'lower' class you mean white men and especially white women without a college degree, then I agree. But I believe it is the opposite of what Tom says regarding the American Dream. It is the minority groups (and immigrants) who still believe in the American Dream and hence vote more progressive. It is the 'forgotten' white 'lower' class that no longer believes in the level playing field and hence are looking for someone to offer them a way to get back what they lost, i.e. their white advantage.
They are certainly conscious of a class structure, but realize that they are now at the losing end and look at their political, cultural and economic situation as a zero sum game. Someone else gets more, so they get less.
To see the breakdown of Trump supporters by gender, race etc. see: https://www.cnn.com/election/2016/results/exit-polls/national/president
Madeleine makes very good points.
In my reply to Ann I, too, state that “the percentage of Trump supporters is lower among the groups Ann mentions, than it is among (older) white males.” I also agree that the explosion of white rage among the Trump base has a lot to do with white men losing their traditional advantage.
As to who subscribes more to the American Dream:
True, immigrants are the hardest working group, they come to the US as Emma Lazarus’ proverbial “huddled masses yearning to breathe free” and all that.
However, the cultural myth, ideology, or call it a “meme,” of self-reliance, hard work, no reliance on government handouts, etc. is at the core of the average “Joe’s” mentality.
He is the one who rags on the alleged lazy welfare chiselers, the welfare queens, the lazy and criminal immigrants who come here so they can be on the dole and be supported by the taxes paid by hardworking Americans. If you are unemployed or poor, it’s your own fault. These are all false beliefs of course, but beliefs nevertheless.
"Joe" is the one who hates the government (as well as unions). Remember the old Tea Party geezer carrying a picket sign saying “Government: Keep your hands off my Medicare!”
Of course, this is a terrible perversion of the spirit of self-reliance, but it is this perversion which helped elect Trump and Reagan, and which precludes America ever becoming a social democracy with a reasonable safety net for all.
That’s why I connect Americans’ lack of class consciousness and their inability to recognize their self-interest with their traditional belief in “self-reliance,” individualism and all that. That’s why the Trump base laps up Trump’s anti-government message. It’s also what the NRA is banking on: the cowboy mentality, guns and all. I am talking about ideology and a longstanding culture, not reality. I’m talking about the deep-rooted belief that relying on the government is un-American. The government is the problem, not the solution. And it’s the beneficiaries of “socialism” (Social Security, Medicare) who rant and rave the most about “socialism.”
Tom:
Yes, the points you make are all true: Americans are inherently more individualistic, suspicious of government and are not taught the concept of solidarity. But deep-down, the Trump base is motivated by a basic human instinct that we all share: tribalism. The 'we' versus 'them' mentality. This happens in other countries too, everywhere where populism and nationalism raise their ugly head. These movements are also fueled by the left's 'identity politics'. After all, that also reeks of tribalism.
Maybe Jonah Goldberg is right when he says that the West is committing suicide, by not defending and being grateful for what took so much effort to build: a liberal-democratic system that is trying to look beyond tribalism. He gives the analogy of the story of the goose that lays the golden egg: the farmer is not content with just one golden egg a day, he wants 2. When the goose says she cannot, he kills her.
In the end, maybe the Trump base is just more honest about admitting who we really are: tribal animals. It's like a virus that spreads easily. I myself suffer from tribalism by identifying with the 'anti-Trump' group, to the point of not being able to watch him speak!
I still believe in the strength of our institutions. I hope that this ever growing wave of tribalism will not destroy this precariously balanced system that we all should hold up together.
Sorry for the hyperbole. I got a little carried away.
Wow, you guys will be apoplectic when Trump is reelected in 2020 (and I will be laughing). Too bad you don’t care for citizens as much as you do illegal aliens. MAGA! Trump was right, we are going to get tired of winning! Obamacare (strangled), ISIS destroyed, Tax Cuts, Booming Economy, Low Unemployment, Regulations Reduced, Paris Global Warming Pact Withdrawn, Jerusalem Recognized and Embassy Moved, Iran Agreement Nixed, N. Korea Disarming, Right Wing Governments in Europe, Deportations Up, FBI Exposed as Colluding with Dems, Travel Ban Approved, Religious Freedom for Merchants, Media exposed as Fake News, Conservative Judge Appointments, Welfare Rolls Down, Defense Spending Up, Majority of Americans see Hilary as a pathetic LOSER, Bill as a Misogynist, Pelosi and Waters leading the Opposition (how pathetic is that), etc. Trump is the greatest president since Reagan!
This is a fairly comprehensive list. I, too, have been recognizing that the Trumpites are winning. For example, on June 26, the Trumpites scored THREE major judicial victories in one single day: The Supreme Court approved the Texas gerrymandered voting map, it ratified a California anti-abortion decision, and it upheld the President’s anti-Muslim travel ban. I’m afraid that this is just a taste of things to come, as Trump’s judicial appointments are only beginning to take effect.
In time, all this will come crashing down, as it did after the rise of the Right in the 1930s. No doubt there will be a lot of pain. Trump will be remembered as the most ignominious politician in our history, and the GOP will be remembered as a bad dream.
Exodus 6:6
"Therefore, say to the Israelites: 'I am the LORD, and I will bring you out from under the yoke of the "Democrats". I will free you from being slaves to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment." Trump is Moses!
Tom, it would appear that Milo Yiannopolous came out from under his rock to infect your Blog. Too frightened to reveal his true identity he is using “Anonymous”. So wise, as I have a couple of friends from Berkeley, Bruno and Frank, who would really like to talk to him.
Hi Bob,
You make good points. I always wonder whether or not to delete comments such as these last two anonymous ones. I decided not to delete these two.... Maybe partly because it pleases me whenever I see that I am not just preaching to the choir, also because such comments provide additional evidence of these people's imbecility...Tough call, though...
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