Blog Credo

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.

H.L. Mencken

Sunday, November 11, 2018

Take A Knee

Donald Trump adroitly leveraged white Americans' outrage over Colin Kaepernick protesting the unnecessary deaths of African Americans by creating a sort of dime store patriotism: cheap, gaudy, loud and ultimately fragile. Trump's decision to skip a commemoration of the end of World War I because of the weather is just a huge glaring example of how fragile that "patriotism" is.  Soldiers exist as props for Trump (just ask the thousands of soldiers sent to the boarder as a political stunt). 

Clearly, too, Trump is a brittle narcissist.  Narcissists are created by psychic wounds that never heal.  Each new wound to the ego cuts deeper than the last.  Because he was wealthy and a celebrity, Trump has largely avoided consequences for his shitty behavior over the years.  It has to be sinking in to him that consequences are coming.  His public behavior since election day has been more erratic than usual.  Perhaps he just wanted to sulk in his hotel room like the petulant man-child that he is.

Either way, it was a disgraceful display.  Could you imagine if this had been Obama?

No comments: