That this spills over into the realm of public policy is self-evident. Here's how we go about this, if I may:
President Trump, if you are not racist, then let's get off this absurd merry-go-round, and let’s deal. And let's do so in a good spirit and with a good intention at a level that matches your rhetoric about your own non-racism.
Anything short of this is a testament to a bad intention.
Friends, we need to avoid falling into this premeditated discourse that threatens to consume the whole. No. I say let’s enact a good intention in all of our ways of knowing and being if we are to effectively counter this spirit in our own lives and dealings.
Not succumbing to evil inheres within each and everyone of us, as well as calling out this bad spirit that seeks not to engage in constructive dialogue, but rather to dispirit and destroy.
And we of course know when we have a positive intention by the fruit that it bears.
We must continue to abide by the Golden rule and treat others as we ourselves want to be treated.
Or as the Mayan precept dictates, In Lak'Ech! You are my other me.
-Angela Valenzuela
George Conway: Trump is a racist president
by TeacherKen
·
That is the title of this Washington Post op-ed,
up now for tomorrow’s print edition.
Conway’s wife might now live in DC and work for the
occupant of the Oval, but he is listed as a New York Lawyer and has been
increasingly critical of the Donald, especially on Twitter, but increasingly in
other venues as well.
Conway begins with an incident that involved his mother
who had immigrated from the Philippines decades before the incident where, when
he was three, he heard his mother told to go back from where she had come.
He explores his own wrestling with both the issues that
those who had no connection with slavery having negative reactions to
some of the efforts to ameliorate the racism and discrimination that was a part
of our history, and of the increasing evidence of Trump’s expressions of
discrimination, xenophobia, and — yes — white supremacy and racism.
You really should read the entire piece.
The guts of this piece — and the gut punch it delivers —
is found in the final four paragraphs, the first of which is this:
No, I thought, President Trump was boorish, dim-witted,
inarticulate, incoherent, narcissistic and insensitive. He’s a pathetic bully
but an equal-opportunity bully — in his uniquely crass and crude manner, he’ll
attack anyone he thinks is critical of him. No matter how much I found him
ultimately unfit, I still gave him the benefit of the doubt about being a
racist. No matter how much I came to dislike him, I didn’t want to think that
the president of the United States is a racial bigot.
That’s just the set-up.
So without further comment, here is the next:
But Sunday left no doubt. Naivete, resentment and outright
racism, roiled in a toxic mix, have given us a racist president. Trump could
have used vile slurs, including the vilest of them all, and the intent and
effect would have been no less clear. Telling four non-white members of Congress —
American citizens all, three natural-born — to “go back” to the “countries”
they “originally came from”? That’s racist to the core. It doesn’t matter what
these representatives are for or against — and there’s plenty to criticize them
for — it’s beyond the bounds of human decency. For anyone, not least a
president.
it’s beyond the bounds of human decency
Yep. Absolutely.
In his penultimate paragraph, which I will not quote,
Conway takes the Republicans who have remained silent to task, making clear
that he views it as an act of cowardice.
But it is his final paragraph, with its clear dismissal of
ANY rationalization (judges, tax cuts, etc.) for supporting Trump, that
rings loud and clearly, and absolutely sounds the appropriate alarm:
But none of that is good enough. Trump is not some random,
embittered person in a parking lot — he’s the president of the United States. By
virtue of his office, he speaks for the country. What’s at stake now is more
important than judges or tax cuts or regulations or any policy issue of the
day. What’s at stake are the nation’s ideals, its very soul.l.
What’s at stake are the nation’s ideals, its very soul.
We, all of us, need to make this very clear.
What kind of nation, what kind of society, are we willing
to be?
What then does it require of us, ALL of us?
No comments:
Post a Comment