Last Tuesday I watched the greatest ever political-showman address the American nation – or more likely – his political base.
With black solemnity, President Trump tells the nation that he will stop the domestic acts of terror. He will do so with greater violence. He will dominate the streets.
Thomas Paine (1737-1809) is well remembered – among other things – for this famous comment:
“The duty of a true Patriot is to protect his country from its Government.”
Trump said that America was founded on the rule of law. The forefathers would be turning in their graves. America was founded on freedom!
The protests spread like a festering ulcer across the United States making a vain attempt at overcoming an unpretentious and legitimate frustration over decades-long failure to reform police practices and the broader criminal justice system in the USA.
Trump, in characteristic fashion, was condemning the violence he and his capitalistic ugliness were ultimately responsible for.
Condemning the violence of the protesters and promoting his.
Not once in his callous speech was there a hint that the protesters might have a point. That the knee had been bent over inequality and injustice for too long.
There is no offer of peace from the leader of a once great nation, no extending the hand of reconciliation, just showmanship.
There was none of the persuasiveness of Kennedy or Clinton or Obama. The showman ended it with a walk to a church outside The White House. A very special place, he said. The symbolism couldn’t be missed. God was on his side.
The only people he impressed were the racists themselves. God bless America.
“Those who threaten innocent life and property will be arrested, detained, and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” he said.
He didn’t include the police and military.
His empathises on the Second Amendment (right to form MILITIAS and BEAR ARMS) made the hairs on my arms stand on end. Was he seriously suggesting that militias were a possibly.
When a nation grows so powerful it tends to abuse its power, then slowly becomes authoritarian.
He talked about the protesters, rioters, and looters, for almost his entire speech. He spoke about George Floyd for 10 seconds.
As Trump claimed to be an “ally of all peaceful protesters,” federal police were violently clearing them out of the way with tear gas to ensure the president had a clear pathway to a church.
There with a Bible upside down, he posed. It was the showmanship of the dictator, with a dose of Hollywood.
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My thought for the day
When you push people beyond their capacity to understand their victimisation you can hardly expect them, during demonstrations, to behave rationally.
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