This 2018 piece by Charles M. Blow is an excellent complement to Umair
Haque's "The
Everyday Obscenity of American Collapse" article that I just
posted.
It has several zingers that are clearly directed at Christian fundamentalists that help explain Trump's unflagging popularity with them, including:
"Trumpism is a religion founded on patriarchy and white supremacy."
"That is because Trump is man-as-message, man-as-messiah. Trump support isn’t philosophical but theological."
Trump’s supporters are saying to us, screaming to us, that although he may be the “lowest white man,” he is still better than Barack Obama, the “best colored man.”
At the
heart of this is actually not Trump himself, but the Trumpism or white
supremacy that empowers him. Spot on, Charles Blow.
-Angela Valenzuela
 |
| Eric Thayer for The New York Times |
Jan. 11, 2018 | New York Times
‘The Lowest
White Man’
I guess Donald Trump
was eager to counter the impression in Michael Wolff's book that he is
irascible, mentally small and possibly insane. On Tuesday, he allowed a
bipartisan session the White House about immigration to be televised for nearly
an hour.
Surely, he thought
that he would be able to demonstrate to the world his lucidity and acumen, his
grasp of the issues and his relish for rapprochement with his political
adversaries.
But instead what came
through was the image of a man who had absolutely no idea what he was talking
about; a man who says things that are 180 degrees from the things he has said
before; a man who has no clear line of reasoning; a man who is clearly out of
his depth and willing to do and say anything to please the people in front of
him.
He demonstrated once again that he is a man without principle,
interested only in how good he can make himself look and how much money he can
make.
Yes, he has an intrinsic hostility to people who are not white,
particularly when they challenge him, but as a matter of policy, the whole idea
of building a wall for which Mexico would pay was just a cheap campaign stunt
to, once again, please the people in front of him.
Trump is not committed
to that wall on principle. He is committed only to looking good as a result of
whatever comes of it. Mexico is never going to
pay for it, and he knows it. He has always known it. That was just another lie.
Someone must have stuck the phrases “chain migration” and “diversity lottery”
into his brain — easy buzzwords, you see — and he can now rail against those
ideas for applause lines.
But he is completely malleable on actual immigration policy. He
doesn’t have the stamina for that much reading. Learning about immigration
would require reading more words than would fit on a television news chyron.
If Donald Trump follows through with what he said during that meeting, his base will once again be
betrayed. He will have proved once again that he was saying anything to keep
them angry, even telling lies. He will have demonstrated once again his
incompetence and unfitness.
And once again, they won’t care.
That is because Trump is man-as-message, man-as-messiah. Trump
support isn’t philosophical but theological.
Trumpism is a religion founded on patriarchy and white
supremacy.
It is the belief that even the least qualified man is a better
choice than the most qualified woman and a belief that the most vile,
anti-intellectual, scandal-plagued simpleton of a white man is sufficient to
follow in the presidential footsteps of the best educated, most eloquent, most
affable black man.
As President Lyndon B. Johnson said in
the 1960s to a young Bill Moyers:
“If you can convince the lowest white man he’s better than the best colored man, he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he’ll empty his pockets for you.”
Trump’s supporters are saying to us, screaming to us, that
although he may be the “lowest white man,” he is still better than Barack
Obama, the “best colored man.”
In a way, Donald Trump represents white people’s right to be
wrong and still be right. He is the embodiment of the unassailability of white
power and white privilege.
To abandon him is to give up on the pact that America has made
with its white citizens from the beginning: The government will help to
underwrite white safety and success, even at the expense of other people in
this country, whether they be Native Americans, African-Americans or new
immigrants.
But this idea of elevating the lowest white man over those more
qualified or deserving didn’t begin with Johnson’s articulation and won’t end
with Trump’s manifestation. This is woven into the fabric of the flag.
As I have written here before, when Alabama called a
constitutional convention in 1901, Emmet O’Neal, who later became governor,
argued that the state should “lay deep and strong and permanent in the
fundamental law of the state the foundation of white supremacy forever in
Alabama,” and as part of that strategy he argued:
“I don’t believe it is good policy to go up in the hills and tell them that Booker Washington or Councill or anybody else is allowed to vote because they are educated. The minute you do that every white man who is not educated is disfranchised on the same proposition.”
In his essay “Black Reconstruction in America, 1860-1880,” W.E.B. Du
Bois discussed why poor whites didn’t make common cause with poor blacks and
slaves but instead prized their roles as overseers and slave catchers, eagerly
joining the Klan. This fed the white man’s “vanity because it associated him
with the masters,” Du Bois wrote.
He continued:
“Slavery bred in the poor white a dislike of Negro toil of all sorts. He never regarded himself as a laborer, or as part of any labor movement. If he had any ambition at all it was to become a planter and to own ‘niggers.’ To these Negroes he transferred all the dislike and hatred which he had for the whole slave system. The result was that the system was held stable and intact by the poor white.”
For white supremacy to
be made perfect, the lowest white man must be exalted above those who are
black.
No
matter how much of an embarrassment and a failure Trump proves to be, his
exploits must be judged a success. He must be deemed a correction to Barack
Obama and a superior choice to Hillary Clinton. White supremacy demands it.
Patriarchy demands it. Trump’s supporters demand it.
I invite you to join me on Facebook and follow me on Twitter (@CharlesMBlow), or email me at chblow@nytimes.com.
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