A lonely president
Richard Fulton
You have to give it to President Trump; he has indeed seemed to unite the country. Unfortunately for him it was in the form of overwhelmingly negative responses to his moral equivalency response to the Charlottesville conflict last weekend.
His first response was a half-hearted statement condemning violence “on both sides”— pause from written statement to ad-lib— “on both sides.”
Then, nearly two days after an outcry of criticism over the moral equivalency of the statement the White House staff wrote a decent statement for him to half-heartedly read.
But he didn’t quite believe that statement so a day later he gave a rambling statement in front of his Trump Tower home doubling down on his initial view that there were good people and bad people on both sides. Moral equivalency on steroids.
The “Unite the Right” (understood by the participants to be “unite the white”) rally was made up, says President Trump, of very fine people, good people. And the “alt-left” was made up of the same but equally of not so good people. Equally!
The demonstrators were people holding Nazi flags, and confederate flags which they all knew as being a symbol of resistance to non-white Americans as it was when resurrected in the 1920s as a symbol of support for segregation.Note, no American flag to be seen.
They brandished automatic rifles, armored vests (expecting what?) and other weapons while marching with torches reminiscent of the Nazi rallies in Germany (look at the films of the time).
They shouted out slogans: “blood and soil”, a slogan of the Nazis in Germany; “you will not replace us” (clearly meaning minorities of color); and “Jews will not replace us.”
These are not “good people”, these are racists and bigots. And President Trump was legitimizing them and their views by making them equivalent to those who had the audacity to stand up to their evil in counter-demonstration.
The reaction to the president’s rambling justification of his views was swift and devastating. Nearly every segment of society checked in with blazing statements of antipathy towards bigotry and racism. Often naming the president’s shortfall. Their statements define the very foundation of the higher angels of the American dream.
From the very beginning America has struggled with the evil of slavery and continuing discrimination based upon difference of “the other.” The civil war was fought against the South that wanted to leave the union in order to sustain slavery. Civil rights movements both for African-Americans and women (note the overwhelming number of people in the “white” rally were men) flourished later.
Discrimination continues today, which is why it is vital to reaffirm a commitment to equality for all Americans by fighting back at bigots and racists.
The president has contributed to a kind of unity by bringing condemnations of his moral shortcomings from all parts of our society. Note that corporate America’s leadership has quit his advisory councils amidst elegant defenses of America’s values. He disbanded them to avoid continued embarrassment.
A highly unusual unity of public support for the value of equality came from the military’s Joint Chiefs of Staff. All of which gave eloquent statements of support for equality in American life. Religious communities have joined in the condemnations.
Key Democrats and Republicans (with so far a few noted exceptions) have criticized the president’s inability to focus on condemnation of neo-nazis, the KKK, and white supremacists. Mayors and governors included.
There is not unanimity, of course. David Duke and the KKK praised the president’s statements as support for their cause. As did white supremacists.
Oh, and the Missouri Republican Party, on its official site, also praised the president. They said he “takes on hypocrisy and intimidation of #fake news” (fake news? did they see the pictures?) and added “way to go.” No wonder the NAACP has warned about Missouri as a dangerous place for minorities.
Richard Fulton is an emeritus professor of political science.
