Here is a quote from a speech that a Unitarian minister delivered in 1858 at an anti-slavery conference, a speech which inspired Martin Luther King in the 1960s, which can gives us consolation today, in difficult times: “I do not pretend to understand the moral universe; the arc is a long one, my eye reaches but little ways; I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by the experience of sight, I can divine it by conscience. And from what I see I am sure it bends towards justice.”
11
As voters were giving Roy Moore what he deserved, his wife told him a Facebook friend had copied her a “copy of an Associated Press story” claiming victorious opponent Doug Jones had just been arrested, caught smoking dope with, and preparing to sodomize a 17-year-old male in an Alabama hotel
The LIE was that specific. I quickly checked every legit, and even some Klan/Nazi news sites, and asked her why none of them, including AP’s own carried the tale. The largest threat I see to our electoral system is the destruction of the Internet by things it was never meant to be.
The net was NOT meant to be a source of news outside of scientific papers, a replacement fir the retail store, a system that has destroyed everybody’s privacy, making the most intimate details of our lives available to anyone with cash or a codebreaker. ...
And, worst of all, a system where anyone can lie - developing a Nazi or Klan professionally designed and quite subversive site, advertised well, all for less than $10,000, actors included, the destroyer of our last shreds of your privacy, and supplier of malicious gossip, magnifying lies through “ Social Network”.
Here was “fake news” prepared for release in Alabama on aElection Day, reverberating ‘friend’ to ‘friend’ and heading to NY from Ontario before the polls had closed.
And all those apparently-Trump campaign-linked-Russian Facebook accounts had no effect on the Presidential vote.
6
Most unauthorized immigrants are Latino, but this doesn’t make those who oppose illegal immigration racist. According to the Canton High School principle, a group of seven students chanted “Trump” during Canton’s game with Hartford’s Classical Magnet School, but the author is wrong to categorize the chant as a racial taunt. It was political speech, not a racial taunt. Prior to the game, Harford Public Schools issued a public statement titled “Protecting Immigrant Families, Educating All Children.” The statement was an obvious response to President Trump’s crack down on illegal immigration. The lengthy statement began, “At Hartford Public Schools we support the preservation of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA). Since its establishment by President Barack Obama in 2012, DACA has represented a promise of hope and fairness for many of our students.” It also quoted Hartford Mayor Luke Ronin, who said, “We won’t be bullied into playing the role of an immigration enforcement agency actively targeting families who call Hartford home.” The Canton students chanted “Trump” to show their support for President Trump’s stance on illegal immigration.
https://www.hartfordschools.org/our-district-protecting-immigrant-famili...
4
No surprises here.The nation decided that the White People were oppressed enough and for too long and this was the Whitelash.
What do you expect when you embolden hate,bigotry and xenophobia?
12
Kusserow-Smidt doesn’t sound like a particularly American name. Maybe your family should go back where it came from, Holly Jane!
5
What are you supposed to say when somebody says Trump, Trump, Trump to you or someone at an event you're attending?
Look at them an say, "Oink, Oink, Oink."
That probably won't solve anything, but it might feel good.
19
This is disgusting, infuriating, and unsurprising. Donald Trump based his campaign on racism. It was literally the opening statement of his campaign. In every day since, he has either openly and brazenly shouted white supremacist phrases and opinions, dog whistled racism, or stood utterly silent when more extremist elements both spoke and acted out.
More to the point, it has been shown that the primary motivation for Trump voters was racial resentment. Trump voters mainly voted for him out of anger over their waning white supremacy and the increasing power and visibility of ethnic minorities, LGBT Americans, and women. Both The Atlantic and Vox recently had in-depth articles about this. "Economic anxiety" or any other canard was just a thin fig leaf for racism.
As Mr. Muhammad said, never has the name of a sitting President been used as a racist rallying cry. That is a disgrace and a stain upon our nation and the highest office in the land. I wonder how long it will be until we can wash it away. I hope that we still can.
18
During the period of the Revolution, one of the Founding Fathers said:
"Never was a Just People governed unjustly - for long,
Nor was an Unjust People ever governed Justly - for long."
A bit more of a riff on "The People get the Government that they DESERVE."
5
Ms. Kusserow-Smith and Mr. Harris say their comments did not reflect who they truly are. Right! And I'm the Queen of Sheba.
9
As a reformed liberal, I am constantly astonished at the hatred that liberals now purport as "intelligent discourse." This article is a good example of this lightweight, reverse racism hatred.
4
Just the word "Trump" is disturbing got me to hear.
1
Eventually the name will be synonymous with some sort of shame, like "Benedict Arnold."
16
Quisling?
8
I actually typed that first, then decided the more familiar, American name might make the point more strongly
4
So Mr. Harris and Ms. Kusserow-Smidt say their comments do not reflect who they truly are. Well for them may I quote Maya Angelou who said “When someone shows you who they are believe them; the first time.”
26
You reap what you sow. No surprise that a campaign of bigotry led by our hater-in-chief brought us to this point. This man has plain and simple given license to hate and prejudice. i hope our nation can get through four years of this but whether we do or not, we've learned a lot about the character of so many in this so called 'Christian nation'.
19
"The two have expressed deep regret for their comments, which they said did not reflect who they truly were."
They said it, and so that is who they are!
Pretty much like Trump who claims he didn't say what he actually said.
It is appalling how quickly civility can break down and hatred can come to be considered "acceptable." That is what my father-in-law said about Germany as Hitler came to power and championed mass racism as Germany's foremost political leader. My father-in-law left Germany right before World War II to come to the United States.
After the War started and the US was involved, he was maligned and slandered for being German here in this country, and my husband's sister was beaten up when she was a child by a couple of bully boys because she had a German last name.
Wrong is wrong, no matter who is doing it.
A true leader is supposed to be someone who brings out the best in people. Trump is probably the worst president this country has ever had--and hopefully ever will have. Trump actively models despicable behavior and strives to bring out the worst in people. The GOP condones it.
As a matter of principle, don't vote for Trump and any GOP politician supporting Trump's reprehensible behavior.
17
No doubt the worst, yet from reading popular Internet blogs such as Yahoo and Google, I observe there are droves of posters who claim he is the best - ever. Hitler's principle supporters were the petite bourgeoisie and so also are Trump's. I wonder though if they are intelligent enough to discern that this crypto-fascist demagogue could lead them to catastrophe. I think not.
12
It took twelve years and a bloody global war to move Germans from shouting "Heil Hitler!" to shame and denial that they'd ever said it. Our country needs a clear electoral message in 2018 to speed the move back from "Trump, Trump, Trump!" to "We hold these truths to be self evident... ."
Germany lost a generation. Most of today's Germans had a hard time understanding how their great-grandparents let that happen, until they saw Americans doing it.
18
How could anyone really believe Trump would be a "model" of integrity, honesty, loyalty to basic American values and moreover a patriot. It seems Trump is more interested in his "loyalty" to Russian interests and in particular, Mr. Putin.
Ask yourself why!
Flynn took the chance and failed when lying to the FBI..Why!
Why to did the "Greek guy" lie to the FBI...
All these things lead to the logical conclusion Trump has orchestrated a "tune" in favor of Russia..and in doing so...the issue of Trump's financial ties to Russia become paramount (in re banking with Deutsche Bank); the dossier alleging Trump's truly perverted ways..and the investments in Trump properties from Russian ties to Russian government, crime or money laundering.
Those who blindly support Trump will be "tagged" and demeaned as the indictments become reality.
Trump is very bad for America..
12
Inconvenient truths for Trumpers....show me your friends and I will tell you what you are....throwing mud means dirty hands.
10
An unconstitutional law I would support is that to utter or write the word Trump will be punishable by jail and a fine.
7
With a tip of the hat to Joseph Heller, I knew that the president exploits violence, bigotry and hate in all its forms when I read a White House email saying..."The President condemns violence,, bigotry and hatred in all its forms."
16
"Many, many sides to this." I mean, sure, once side said the other should "go back where they came from" because of their race. But the other side had the audacity to be something other than white in America. Many, many sides.
5
History often repeats itself because people are historically simple creatures. My guess is that homo-sapiens are constantly struggling to cleave off into other lineages, obviously this is not a pretty thing to be part of.
Please don't misunderstand me. I am not claiming any special honors in moving this species forward - in fact I've long been left behind.
2
So much for the evolution of the human race. All of this is so very petty, so very unnecessary, so lame, so ridiculous, so stupid. It's all about attitude winning over aptitude.
Like it our not, we live in a world of diversity. Like it or not diversity is exactly what we, the species we call Humans need to survive, and yes thrive.
The few who we label as a bigot will one day become such a small population of the many. they will be but a memory our future generations will shake their heads and grin at the ridiculousness of it all
7
Trump has made tolerance a bad word among his supporters, money of whom are Evangelical Christians. This too shall pass, and when it does the name Trump, the Republican party and the Evangelical Christian cult will be tossed onto the ash pile of history. We are better than this.
13
They may eventually be tossed into the trash bin of history, but while they are her they will do great damage, most of which will be with us for decades to come.
8
50 years ago The Republican Party created the Southern Strategy, the conscious effort to appeal to the segregationist Strom Thurmond and George Wallace Democratic voters.
In the 1980’s the Republican Party gave us the culture wars and Reagan and the dog whistle politics of welfare queens and States Rights and created the Reagan Democrats.
In the 1990’s we got the Newt Gingrich House of Representatives take no prisoners confrontation, the Clinton impeachment, Whitewater, and Vince Foster murder conspiracy.
With Obama, they created the Tea Party and gave us the birthers, death panels, and support of the Confederate flag.
They co-opted Christians with abortion instead working to get women birth control.
They have been listening to talk radio and Fox all these years.
And all these years, the Republican politicians have been using the Reaganomics talking points of small government and tax cuts for the job creators coming from the right-wing think tanks.
For thirty five years, the rising tide of Trickle Down Economics has mostly helped the wealthy at the expense of the rest.
Like a magician, Republicans distract their voters with their right hand of the culture wars and 'us versus them' dog whistles while they pick the pockets of those voters (and the rest of us, too) with trickle down Reaganomics and tax cuts for the rich.
20
All of this was obvious since the day he announced his candidacy. We are stuck with him and the unleashed ids of millions of people who want to damage women and minorities. We will live with this damage for decades. Thanks, Trump.
10
Apparently, Mr. Harris and Ms. Kusserow-Smidt have forgotten their US History. Otherwise, surely they would know there were Spanish settlers with names like Padilla in what is now the USA years before there were settlers with names like Harris, Kusserow, or Smidt.
Maybe its Mr. Harris and Ms. Kusserow-Smidt who need to go back where they came from.
16
Republicans have been using the culture wars since they invented them around the time of Reagan.
Their lexicon includes:
Founding fathers
Patriots
Flag
The Constitution
Strong leader
Strong military
The Bible
The nanny state
Welfare queens
Entitlements
Protect the life of the unborn fetus
The sin of same sex marriage
For 35 years, they have been getting votes based on these “values” and the then cutting taxes for the wealthy.
If they can, they will cut health care for so many of their West Virginia voters that Obama-care gave them just to give the billionaire class some more tax cuts.
But there are those death panels.
13
Too many great comments in this section. All true. Trump is the primordial embodiment of the bully. So to other bullies he represents a powerful symbol of social acceptance, and to everyone else he is simply disgusting.
19
Trump is an obscenity. It's only fitting that his name would be, too.
24
Although it was a searing and shameful moment for us in Connecticut, am so grateful the brilliant Dan Barry, Audra Burch, and John Eligon included Canton.
4
History will not be kind to Mr. Trump, and his relatives.........but no doubt about it, in less than one year this man has reduced America’s image in the world.
14
The problem is rooted in the difficulty of defining what it means to be an American. Until the cultural revolution of the 1960s, immigrants to the United States were concerned with learning about American culture and striving to become “American”. Back then, immigrants were interested in assimilating and the focus was on becoming American. Then sometime in the late 60s the idea of hyphenating our national identity became the fashion. No other country appears to do this. But here we are now Irish-American, African American, Italian-American, Hispanic-American etc. No one is interested in a national identity anymore and liberals have succeeded in bringing shame upon anyone who seeks to learn about what it means to be American.
Racism cuts both ways and crosses party and political lines. Those who identify as being anything other than fully American deserve to be called out. Bigotry is being practiced by all races in this country and the media is complicit in muddying the waters with its emphasis on multi-culturalism. We should be one country and no matter where our ancestors or newly arrived immigrants come from, one people. But this emphasis on race and national origin has divided and weakened the United States. Racism is intolerable but it is a natural consequence of competing interests which have become even more acute in the past 20 years or so. Left wingers and Right. They are all Trumps now.
5
Your observations are interesting, however, they run counter to my experience as a young black man coming of age in the 60's. I'm not sure to what degree a "cultural revolution" altered the "striving to become American" for myself and my peers. I do know that our parents' kinky hair and dark skin had been ridiculed. Rather than "process" our hair, we grew it out into Afros; rather than bleach our skin, we listened to James Brown sing "I'm Black and I'm Proud". This revolution didn't disrupt American identity but it offered America a broader interpretation of what it means to be Amercian.
For children of immigrants, the question of how much to assimilate into American culture continues to be a crucial one. It has very real social, political and economic consequences. How much do you embrace your "otherness"?
For people of color and children of immigrants, the question was often resolved for us in very clever ways: housing discrimination, voter suppression, and a very robust Jim Crow handbook. I would contend that the "multi-culturalism" out of necessity; it was a reaction to marginalized people being considered less than American.
The hyphen added to the label "American" shouldn't be interpreted as a minus sign. Being identified as African-American, Italian-American, Polish-American, Hispanic-American, and so on, has been a plus; adding richness to America's identity.
14
What a despicable legacy. His predecessor gave us Hope. This Fake President is an infectious delivery agent of Hate. This lump of vicious, angry cells is simply sub-human: no heart, no mind, no feeling, no vision. MAGA!
18
Trump's appeals to bigotry fall on deaf ears if the hearers have been taught the evil of such divisiveness by their parents, grandparents, churches or schools. Divisiveness based on race, religion, gender and ethnicity is the greatest threat to this country because this weaken the bonds that that enable the People from stopping decision-making by or for a selfish, economic elite.
7
Trump is also an uneducated, simple minded oaf. I think that an intelligent, discerning, educated (in the humanities and social sciences) and world-experienced individual does not easily fall for his and his supporters' bigoted opinions and behavior. To be educated is to liberated, but as H.G. Wells said, "Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe." Has America gone too far down the path of catastrophe, not simply because this oaf is President but because he duped millions upon millions who voted for him.
5
Trump means hate, intolerance, untruthfulness, bigotry, self centeredness, narcissistic, and on and on.
He has trumped most of the good in this country and in so many of us.
6
The racist-in-chief is a horrible role model. These episodes are chilling and
heart breaking. Read Explaining the Holocaust, by Peter Hayes and see
if Nazi Germany reminds you of what we in the USA are experiencing now.
14
I have been against calling people names, but I have to admit that when I run across someone that makes a racist or sexist comment, I want to call them a Trump.
12
Foreign names like "Castro"? In 1848, 48% of Mexican California was owned by someone named Castro. I had a student last year with the surname Ortega, and asked him if he knew about the Ortega history in and around Gilroy CA. He did know--that his family had been here for over 200 years. "Foreigners"? Not even remotely.
16
A perfect example of left-wing unself-awareness.
If Trumps' name is used as a racial slur (which is reprehensible) its because the Dems were linking his name with racism during the election and after, based on no facts. Either they smear outright - "he's a racist because he is!" - or the deliberately quote out of contexts - 'he said all Mexicans were rapists" when what he said was Mexico was sending illegal immigrants which included, "their rapists" .
When Trump started to run he was treated as a joke, a buffoon--eg John Oliver's "Haha I dare you!" run for office. One does not say this to a racist. He'd been in the public eye for decades and the most one could say about him was that--he was an egoist, bombastic, ridiculous. No one said he was "racist." That only happned as a deliberate strategy once clinton saw she was running against him. For Dems - particularly those with weak platforms - anyone who runs against them are ipso facto racists. The hysteria was upped to his supporters being "racists."
Is it any wonder then that some scummy actual racists embrace the namecalling? This doesn't mean he is an actual racist. If racists used Obama's name as an insult, that doesn't mean Obama is to blame.
5
@d the name trump has always been associated with racism since the time donny's immigrant grandfather took the name Trump to hide from being German. in his 20s donny and his father Fred were charged with racism and defrauding the veteran's administration and pleaded no contest (guilty).
12
Actually, what we're going off is little things like his getting nabbed for blatant housing discrimination as early as 1972, the fact that he did not say "which included their rapists," his pointing to a guy in a rally as, "my black man," the lying about Muslims, the travel ban on muzzlims, his claiming not to know who David Duke is, the "there are good people on both sides," when talking about literal Nazis, stuff like that.
And of course, pushing his birther fantasy at President Obama. Oh, and dis I mention the rollbacks on civil rights regs?
You sound like that charming GOP official who, back in 2009, sent out Christmas cards showing the White House lawn covered with watermelons.
When called on this, he tried to claim that the red and green colors were a festive celebration of the holidays.
13
Woody Guthrie, long dead, wrote a song about Trump's very racist father, who would not rent apartments to black tenants. The name Trump has been associated with vile, racist behavior for a long time.
3
The worst and most common examples of sexual harassment have come from those who would call themselves "progressives". I suspect the same would be true of worse and most common cases of real racism.
We have a saying around here - "perception is reality". What the NYT attempts to do with "news" like this is to create perceptions which have little to nothing to do with reality. The goal is twofold to create the perception that Trump and his voters are all racists, driving minorities away, and to drive minorities to voting booths. The attempt to create false perceptions is irresponsible, and downright evil ultimately leading to more hate and violence. See the "hands up don't shoot" narrative and the violence that false narrative ultimately generated.
4
Interesting; hadn't known that O'Reilley, Ailes and Trump were progressives. Let alone Brent Farenthold.
I trust you're thinking of ol' Harvey the Abominable? Wellp, yew have got us thur, pardner, yew shorely have. Of course this clown needs to go to jail. Odd, that right-wingers never seem to think that about their own clowns.
By the way, the article's about the rise of racist violence, not sexual harassment. Given that your boy Trump's on tape abetting one and bragging about the other, I myself would avoid drawing the close link between the two to anybody's attention.
11
Skillfully worded. However, by your reasoning, Trump-supporting websites (and his very vocal supporters) should all be paragons of peace and goodwill to every fellow man and woman. But clearly, in objective, measurable, genuine reality, the opposite is true. Those most supportive of Trump are corporate scofflaws, white supremacists, neo-nazis, skinheads, neo-Confederates, etc. It is a veritable tsunami of hate, designed to intimidate, threaten by implication, and to communicate the message that certain people are disposable to this administration. And that is thoroughly, distinctly anti-American.
What most thinking Americans are experiencing right now—rage, confusion, worry, foggy-headedness— is not normal or average behavior found in a representative democracy. It is, however, standard operating procedure as found in oligarchies (yes, Russia), dictatorships, theocracies, and banana republics.
8
Never mind his name, our President is associated with so many things that are horrible, but the overall effect for too many of our citizens in even thinking about him is that it is associated with fear; fear that he condone the behavior of racist xenophobes, fear that he is working too hard to make it harder to get health insurance, fear that this scam of a tax reform benefits him more than anyone else. In this way, he is the terrorist we need to worry about the most.
12
The ugliness that is Donald Trump is as old as the human animal and as voluminous as blades of grass. We have spent generations trying to civilize this ugliness but even though we suppress it, it is still a raging river in the hearts and minds of many. The filth that is Trump, Bannon, McConnell, Ryan, etc occasionally rise to the top and exert themselves on mankind
It is time for a thorough cleaning in 2018 before it is too late.
Vote.
14
Trump's reality is not truth based nor is it about people. The same white folks who think he is making America great will soon find out they got stiffed on their taxes and will also lose the services that others stand to when the deficit looms and all of those tax breaks to the rich have to be covered. Trump will say anything to win. or gain the advantage. He doesn't care and we need to get it. He doesn't have to. Nothing about him is going to change for him to function as President of the US. He likes the distinction and the power it seemingly provides to him, but he is as white nationalist as those who have voted for him are. He is bringing the country down as a result and he just doesn't care!
7
That anyone would model themselves after Trump is difficult to understand, especially after the near disaster of this presidency. Of course if you equate destruction with success I guess you could say Trump has succeeded.
Sadly he has also succeeded in bringing forth the worst inclinations instead of the best.
Evangelicals have lost their minds. The low information voter has lost their mind and we now have a president who is not a role model for children.
Will we have a generation of grifters, liars and hypocrites who feel free to express their hatred and fears openly?
The only cure I see is teaching the Trump actually is a bad word: trumpism, tell a trump, hating like trump, lying like trump.
On and on it goes.
There used to be some sort of pride we all felt in our country. Now the anxiety levels equal the hatred spewed by the kool-aid drinkers.
It's come to this in just a year.
Many adults have apparently regressed to their lowest common denominator. I wish I could feel sorry for them but out of ignorance nothing positive grows for you.
5
Forest City and Eagle Grove, Iowa. Two megolopolises. NY City has city blocks with more inhabitants than either of those two hick towns crawling with bigots.
Some of us wonder how long before both of those two bergs blow away in the breeze. It cannot happen soon enough. Sad little nowhere’s populated with know-nothings.
6
"Ms. Kusserow-Smidt, 63, was fired as a board operator for the radio station; she has since resigned from the Forest City School District. Mr. Harris, 76, who had been with the station for more than 40 years, was also fired. The two have expressed deep regret for their comments, which they said did not reflect who they truly were." My question is, who were they truly? We saw EXACTLY who they are! Racists who voted for Trump.
14
If the President of the United States can bully anybody that speaks out against him, can down grade our greatest institutions cause they may not agree on the work they are supposed to do, and can defend criminals accused of crimes that he himself is guilty of, then he deserves whatever backlash he gets. You cannot respect people that do not respect others, and if you are a leader you can expect others to follow suit, it is human nature. Sad, it is not just him, but the Presidency he is in the process of degrading.
6
There is only one entity I hold in lower esteem than Mr. Trump. . . who should eventually resign or be impeached for his deeds rather than from slanted coverage. . .That lower entity is the mainstream media who have been shamefully lacking in journalistic integrity.
The New York Times has moved so far to the left and is so intent on destroying the Trump presidency that it has abandoned labeling articles like this one "Analysis," which is what it used to do during the campaign and Trump's first few weeks.
A high school journalism teacher (who these days would have to fear for his/her job for doing something so politically incorrect) would fail these two "reporters" for so blatantly injecting their own bias into what is supposed to be a "news article."
How sad that a once great newspaper has to stoop to such tactics. . . but unfortunately you're consistent. Whatever became of just reporting the facts and getting comments from both sides of an issue?
Consider just the substance of the article for a moment. There are hate groups on the left as well as the right but the NYT only publishes "articles" with a left-leaning gotcha mentality.
By the way. . .the only supposedly right wing columnist I read in your paper is David Brooks. I say "supposedly" because he's really in the middle and leaning more left all the time.
It would be too much to ask for balance in your opinion section but can you at least add one well regarded columnist from the other side?
6
Courtesy of the worse president in history, I guess those who lost their shirts by enrolling in the Trump U. scam can revise their "college" cheer, from Trump U.! to Trump You!
DD
Manhattan
5
I was going to prepare a real comment, but realized that I am so completely disgusted by the ignorance, bigotry and poor taste of those engaged in this behavior than there are no words strong enough to reflect my feelings. Let it rest at that.
13
This is a sad time. the United States becoming a terrorist theocracy, and a failed state!
13
Not only that, but as we relinquish our involvement in solving problems that made us a world leader, our rivals, the Chinese and Russian, are running over each other to take our place. Four years will be enough to lose the lead on just about everything that made us great. And, the Tax Bill will assure that we won't catch up after Trump is driven out of office. Hail Trump! MAGA (NOT).
6
If the President of the United States can bully anybody that speaks out against him, can down grade our greatest institutions cause they may not agree on the work they are supposed to do, and can defend criminal accused of crimes that he himself is guilty of, then he gets what he deserves. You cannot respect anybody is does not respect others, and if you are a leader you can expect others to follow suit, it is human nature.
5
“The president condemns violence, bigotry and hatred in all its forms, and finds anyone who might invoke his or any other political figure’s name for such aims to be contemptible,” Raj Shah, a White House spokesman, said.
Raj Shah needs to watch Trump's campaign rallies where be was videoed inciting violence against protesters.
Raj Shah may actually be more contemptible that Trump.
14
Perhaps the solution is to reframe the name by regularly using it as a negative: "excuse me while I take a trump," "I'm in deep trump," "his scores were the lowest ever; he's the trumpest student I've ever seen;" "I don't believe it; it sounds pretty trumpy to me;" "He regularly throws his associates under the bus; it's very trumpian of him," and so on.
17
I think those who support little hands in the white house might get an idea as to how we feel with their indignation and nastiness toward President Obama who was actually intelligent, a gentleman, and presidential. I doubt they can see the connection.
8
The longer this President stays in office, the tougher it will be to bring back the America we grew up respecting. After four years of Trumpism, I fear it will be too late. The damage he will have caused will be irreversible.
8
For some of us, it Is more like a curse than a jeer.
5
My ancestors came over on the Mayflower. Everyone arrived since should go back where they came from. (Oh ;)
2
Donald Trump exploited the very worst aspects of American society for political gain. I have long wondered how a cultured, civilized country like Germany could have been seduced by the forces of hatred and evil. Now I know because it is happening here.
28
I'm so glad I’m not in the classroom these days (30 years in rural Idaho) attempting to counterbalance this hatred with classroom discussions and lessons of tolerance, justice, the rule of law, decency, kindness, community, brotherhood, acceptance, etc. when the red state populace is so unwilling to hear any of these messages. My Holocaust and Civil Rights Movement units would certainly be met with many disbelievers these days. I’m guessing 25% would view them as fake news, never happened. How many young, 30 year old SS/History teachers are out there who will quit in June cause they just can’t put up with this toxic environment (their classrooms, their schools) anymore? Frightening.
12
On the flip side, I know I, and several others in the left use Trump's name to deride his supporters as being the worst ignoramuses: "you're clearly just a Trump-supporter!" It works both ways, you know.
6
I like to call his supporters 'trumpanzees'.
5
Only if you consider it insulting to be called a "Trump supporter."
Do you?
7
There's literally nothing worse to be called nowadays.
6
Racism, bigotry, hatred..that is the Trump drawing card despite all of the pretenses about creating jobs (what a con artist). Racism is not a dog whistle for Trump, it is a bullhorn. in fact it will always be Trump's primary legacy. In the meantime the so-called Republican leadership chooses to look the other way while they give trillion dollar handouts to the super-rich owners of the GOP.
15
Living in Canada, this has a bit of a surreal feel. It should have occurred to me that kids might be using his name as a racial, xenophobic taunt in the US, reflecting the attitudes of the adults within their orbits. Here in our small town on the US border, it has also become a schoolyard taunt: kids who do something particularly mean-spirited or despicable get called a "Trump' by the other kids. The playgrounds are acting as microcosmic examples of two countries' very fraught relationships with one toxic president.
7
“When I despair, I remember that all through history, the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they seem invincible. But in the end, they always fall. Always.”
— Mahatma Gandhi
18
Interesting article but I couldn't finish it - had to go to the bathroom and take a Trump.
12
I have been calling supporters of trump Trumpholes we get since the election. It's time this went mainstream.
9
If you are a citizen of the nation or have a Green Card or a valid work permit the federal law does not include your ancestry, sex, religion or none, sexual orientation, marital status, race in its assessment OF YOUR RIGHT TO LIE HERE! End of conversation!
1
Excellent post lost for lack of a single “V” — its a long way between “lie” and “live.”
1
Interesting to note that both Trump and his father Fred lied about and concealed their German ancestry - attempting to pass themselves off as Swedes. Maybe his base should take a closer look der Trump's genealogy.
10
Interesting point. But upon reflection this approach is right out of Trump's toolbox. Find another way.
1
President Trump expresses himself in ways that are often boorish, insensitive and highly offensive. He brings mountains of criticisms on himself, justifiably so.
However, I I fault the presidents opponents, the media, and most particularly those who would use anything for their own political advantage as much as I do the president for stoking fear and racial tension. There seems to be a microscopic search for anything and everything which may be , even in a twisted interpretation, called "racist". Again, I think the president has said many things which are downright insensitive or foolish, but I don't think that they are said with the racial animus many are so eager to find.
In particular just because the person he criticizes happens to be a member of a minority does not automatically mean he is being racist. For example, he probably would have been highly critical of anyone who knelt during the national anthem. He would be counterattack anyone who attacks him, no matter what race, color or ethnicity.
His words find equal opportunity targets. His targets particularly are very often establishment political figures, and not members of a minority. In the context of his constant personal invectives, some targets will be blacks, Hispanics, female or others who are targeted not because of their racial or ethnic identity, but because he doesn't tolerate criticism.
Deliberating stoking racial fears for political reasons is just as irresponsible as are the president's words.
4
Like most readers, I drifted away from such a long comment. But I'm sure you had something relevant to say. Could you summarize?
3
The President's words, actions, and programs are, very often, explicitly racist.
9
Trump has, in fact, earned his stripes as a full-fledged racist and xenophobe. No amount of finessing can polish it away.
-The Justice Department sued his company at least twice for not renting to African Americans
-Repeatedly questioned whether President Obama was born in the United States
-Refused to condemn white supremacists who campaigned for him and continue to support him
-Encouraged mob justice that resulted in the wrongful imprisonment of the Central Park Five
-Attacked Muslim Gold Star parents
-Condoned the beating of a Black Lives Matter protester; refused to condemn neo-fascists at Charlottesville, where one person was killed and 19 others were injured when a car deliberately sped into a group of counter-protesters.
-Characterized his supporters who beat up a homeless Latino man as “passionate”
-Claimed a judge was biased because “he’s a Mexican” (The judge is from Indiana.)
-Has stereotyped Jews: “I’m a negotiator, like you folks. Is there anyone who doesn’t renegotiate deals in this room?” Trump said. “You’re not going to support me, because I don’t want your money, You want to control your own politician.”
-Treats racial groups like a generic monolith; whenever he mentions a group, he uses the definite article, “the”: "I have a great relationship with the blacks, I've always had a great relationship with the blacks”
5
Consider the dominant construction firm in Dutchess County, NY: Completed contracts with all colleges, hospitals, significant libraries, major publicly-funded infrastructure; the FDR home and museum. When that firm's partners funded their own publicly-approved multiple-hundred-unit condominium complex, not one construction worker of perhaps 40 encountered in multiple visits came CLOSE to speaking English. Not close. Not the supervisor. These were well-disciplined, earnest, hard-working people. With a consistent urgency to avoid any chance of raising complaint.
All across this country, certainly felt in Iowa, the American worker no longer stands on his own land.
This past week in Washington, pay-to-play fundraisers were jammed as the owners and their lobbyists bought protection for their profits.
The first effect of a lie separates the teller from belonging. We are led by a serial liar whose most vehement defense is that all he is, and owns, is not dross.
This greed, separation, and fear is one orbit surrounding the vacancy at our heart. Leader and follower mount fervor to hide the hole.
Jimmy Carter's malaise called the turn for me: now we are flying apart. The way we need, the whole world needs. It still comes from us. Only trust builds the way. As soldiers do, we must each, in our field, proceed with courage, make a mark. We will be seen, and joined. This is our time.
2
That last paragraph was especially eloquent.
I wish I knew what it was driving at.
2
In the late 1940s I attended high school in Forest City and cheered wildly for the Indians. In those days student expressions of racism were usually reserved for black people in Chicago who lived in ghettos but drove big cars. But more to the point was my great-grandfather, a Norwegian immigrant who, in the late 1800s, struck a blow for diversity by breaking into the English political-financial establishment, getting himself elected to a county office and appointed as an officer in a local bank. His strategy included leaving the Lutheran Church and joining the Congregationalists. Fortunately my family soon moved west, winding up in Berkeley where my life was reshaped. Unfortunately,, we left before Winnebago was founded, making many of our friends millionaires.
2
The name Trump resonates. It's easy to say and to repeat over and over again. I believe a lot of the public display of loyalty to Trump is an emotional outlet after eight years of PC controlled thought under Obama. It is also a reaction to the unfair treatment he has received in the media. The article implies a very dark picture of Trump, but Obama did not really live up to his promise of hope and change. I could never even figure out what he meant by that. Although Trump is criticized for everything he does, he does seem to want to keep his promises. He's always having rallies long after the campaign as if he is thanking those who supported him. Most politicians disappear into the rabbit hole once they are elected. Not Trump. I thought life would be dull after the election, but he keeps us all entertained and interested. He has been great for the TV and cable ratings and a mainstay for every political blog like this one. So whether we bash him or praise him, it's always "Trump! Trump! Trump!"
2
Please tell me how Obama controlled out thoughts for 8 years?
If you are looking for hope and change, look within yourself, that was Obama's takeaway.
Like Gandhi said, be the change you want to see in the world.
In my words, stop whining, and do something significant.
6
Gee, I didn't realize it was so easy. I guess we don't need big government after all.
1
Kudos to Damon Winter for the spectacular images. Powerful and aesthetically rigorous.
4
As my conservative friends who voted for Trump have become disillusioned with his constant lying, embarrassed by his shameful behavior and frustrated with his lack of success, many still refuse to see that his election was built on the fear, hatred and xenophobia that many believed was not possible in this country.
Those angry, white racists who let their kids fall into the trap of blaming minorities for their ills will, I believe, eventually be drowned out by the patriots in this country who realize that we all came from immigrants who sought a better life.
This is because a majority of our country consists of good people who believe that men and women should be judged by their acts, and not the color of their skin, their religious beliefs or their country of origin.
13
maybe I am wrong but trump made me more proud to be Canadian.i am guessing many people in other countries have similar feelings.the American president is supposed to be the best America has to offer.
9
I see that the lawyers of Our Fake So Called President are trying to get some evidence in the form of emails suppressed. Of course there is no reason for them to do that unless the contents is incriminating. Sad.
8
So what did democrats cheering some version of lily-white, from the South, thinks half of Americans are despicable Hillary's name mean? That 150 million Americans ought to be marched off to Gulags and starved to death like so millions of Russian were in order to achieve a perfect equality Utopia? The democrats, the mainstream globalization obsessed media and the neo Marxist academic Left have for decades been branding everyone who disagreed with them on an ever increasing number of issues as racists, xenophobes, bigots, Anti Semitic, intolerant, insensitive, disturbing, guilty of micro aggressions, misogamists, guilty of making others "uncomfortable", being an inherently evil, white privileged imperialistic race that must forever pay reparations by being shoved into poverty (well except for white neo Marxists and the PC millionaires that live in NY City, LA ...)! "Trump" "Trump" now branded as a racial slur is just the latest divide and conquer, attempt to start a race war propaganda dreamed up by all the lies that money can buy democrats, their neo Marxist allies, and the neo liberal Robber Barons who think that the 90% in the US and Europe have no right to better lives than, and so should be forced to "compete" with the no rights slaves that live in, or mass immigrate here from the other 80% of the world that's oppressed by authoritarian One Party dictatorships.
5
Only 30 million votes for trump.
Wow! This comment pretty much encapsulates the intellectual rigor of Trumpism.
16
Sadly USA electing a man like Donald Trump as US president diminished their image and power. Of course intelligent and decent people all over the world jeer at this name Trump. We've always known some Americans citizens were bigot especially when these ignorant bigoted American citizens were or are traveling to Europe, South or Central America, Mexico and Canada - we all had to experience first hand their narrow-minds and lack of culture, education, politics and arts on anything coming from our countries except their pop culture. Certainly Donald Trump is representative of racism and bigotry and most of his supporters found a mirror in Trump. It has been a mistake and the mistake ought to be corrected.
But we're now sick and tired of this constant representation and sordid model for the new generations and it's time for serious and responsible American people to end that ridiculous joke and remove this impostor. He has to go very soon before he unravels the best of USA. Erratum. Corrigendum.
25
Donald Trump is not a president in the American tradition. He is a race baiting ("Obama was not born in the U.S., he faked his birth certificate!"), hate-spouting ("Mexicans are criminals and rapists!"), made for Reality-TV producer of spectacle for a particular resentful audience. This is why his strengths and practiced skills - lying, bullying, threatening, abusing, insulting - go over well with his core base, and his chosen channels (rallies, Twitter) are ideal for emotion at the cost of reason and understanding. This is also why Trump does not need to understand any policy area or speak to reality for this audience. After all his appeals to negative emotions he is now the image of these emotions. Trump would not be president but for: (1) The ready-made captive target group of Fox News primed by hatred of the previous progressive black president; (2) Twitter; (3) Russian interference in the election through cyber-hacking and bots on social media with targeted broadcast messages which Trump amplified.
19
And don't forget our undemocratic Electoral College.
3
Chanting is about willing reason to the dustbin and that’s what these “Trump, Trump, Trump!” screamers need to do. It’s literally mindless and connected to denial, their refusal to take responsibility for hard knocks in life. Sometimes it seems the emotion and ignorance of these people is in fact what America is really all about, that 8 years of a black president was but an anomaly, that democratic, secular, scientific and humanist values like those Democrats defend are destined to be ever minority views and an uphill battle to win. That’s pessimistic and I hope unrealistic. Regardless, it doesn’t mean those values aren’t worth the fight.
13
Shakespeare himself would have introduced the word "Trump" to describe swaggering bigotry.
11
Racism and pedophilia are moral equivalents, and the GOP have embraced them both with open arms. Even more disgusting is that the vast minority of voters are right there with them.
What's next? A convicted rapist for the House of Representatives? A cross burning KKK Grand Master for the Supreme Court? A mass murderer for the Senate?
For the current GOP, as long as you're for smaller government and lower taxes for the rich nothing else matters. And I mean nothing. And that political reality is as breathtaking as it is obscene.
Perhaps one day the will of the majority will return to this "democracy" of ours. After all, Trump lost the vote. It was our system of election that prevented the better judgment of the majority from prevailing.
As a nation, our number one priority should be to get rid of the electoral college and make this a "one person, one vote, majority wins" country. After all, isn't that what a "democracy" is supposed to be in the first place? This alone would have spared us from both the George W. Bush and Trump Administrations. Arguably the two worst Administrations in American history.
Like Bush, the damage Trump is doing is almost incalculable. We're talking decades and decades of fallout. I just hope Muller nails him before he starts WWIII. Unfortunately for all of us, the latter, at this point, is a very, very real possibility because with Trump in the White House the once inconceivable is now, not only conceivable, but common place.
13
In the May edition of The Atlantic, there is a picture of deliriously happy Trump supporters. One of them is holding a sign saying, "Thank you Lord Jesus for President Trump".
Looks as if this NYT article is focusing on the wrong person.
4
"Ms. Kusserow-Smidt, 63, was fired as a board operator for the radio station; she has since resigned from the Forest City School District. Mr. Harris, 76, who had been with the station for more than 40 years, was also fired. The two have expressed deep regret for their comments, which they said did not reflect who they truly were."
Yes. Yes, it DOES reflect who you truly are. You only apologized because you were called out on it and fired (rightfully so).
21
I use Trump's name in a highly derogatory sense as in, "You sound like Donald Trump." In the usual spousal disagreements married couples will sometimes have, when my wife tells me I'm sounding like Trump, my reaction is one of abject sorrow or over the top anger. In my circles, the mention of Trump's name invokes images of extreme unfairness or outrageously flawed thinking.
I sorrow that we have such a troubled mind leading our nation. We can do much better.
So I pray God with all my Heart for a rapid coming to our senses, for a speedy recovery, and for an ability to forgive ALL injured parties when this shared national sickness\disorder known as Trumpism has run its inevitable course.
5
"Many people are saying"...Trump is who and what be said he would be and he's doing what he said he would do if elected. Hard to imagine at the time that anybody seeking the presidency could be that far off plumb, but we were warned. As it turns out, he is all he promised and, unfortunately, much more. He is neither a one off nor an aberration. He is the end product of many years of Republican political inbreeding. Very, in the end, like the same cousin marrying cousin situation in old Europe. A watering down of the first class gene pool with all the chaos and destruction that insane leadership provides. European citizen/victims of inept monarchy were pretty much stuck. Fortunately, we aren't!
4
Trump no doubt considers the use of his name in this regard a badge of honor.
2
When it is soon proven that Trump is as guilty of fomenting an attack on this country as was Benedict Arnold, and guilty for much more besides, the name "Trump" as an epithet will reverse its polarity
4
President Trump is doing a good job trying to control our borders and keeping us safe. Trump also wants people to come to this country legally. For some reason the press paints this as racist. Sorry in my opinion it makes sense in today world and yesterdays world to be careful who is entering your country god knows we did with the Germans Irish and Italians. Democrats lost the election because they just don't get it, we want to control our borders and stop people from entering our country illegally. Its not racist to support this position.
8
Our "progressives" have diluted the term "racist" to the point it is all but meaningless. It is used to describe all that don't subscribe to "progressive" dogma. It soon will become a badge of honor to be called racist by "progressives" .
4
I gave up playing bridge so I wouldn’t have to hear or say his name.
7
Except I would have enjoyed saying,"NO TRUMP".
3
MASADA - Make America Sane and Decent Again.
12
I'm not sure that your choice of acronyms - the site of one of the last battles of the Judeo-Roman war in 74 CE - is very calming or comforting.
1
It's always a welcome surprise to me when I open the NYT to see the latest smack they're peddling about the President. I can't believe that this is the best that supposedly "intelligent left" have. The Democrats have got to ask themselves are these the stratagems in political opposition that they really want to leave to the next generation? Instead of putting forth a thoughtful critique of the oppositions policies or politics you go straight for the subjective. It doesn't take intellect to go there. Resisting, name calling and looking for skeletons in closets are not strategies. Education, formulating meaningful platforms and developing candidates that see beyond the next election are what win elections. The Democrats are wasting their time, talent and resources trying to do battle with the President. He is what the majority wanted. The left, if they're up to is, is to figure out what the people want and how they're going to deliver it. Hint: not by acting like a bunch of unhinged losers.
9
He is not what the majority wanted. He lost the popular vote by 3 million votes and is less popular now. And the name calling is largely a phenomenon of pro-Trump people. So thanks for the advice. We plan to resist your President's evil brand until the day when he thankfully rides off into the sunset in midtown manhattan or Long Island.
11
Given the vote count he in no way was what the majority voted to elect.
6
Hint for Kurt P: the 'right' should try not acting like a bunch of unhinged 'winners'...
4
Here in Brooklyn, the deadly “T” word has a completely different connotation. For example, during the campaign, I taught my border collie to growl and show her teeth when I ask her about Donald. Generally, humans around here have a very similar response. For over a year, people have been asking me to show the “trick”to their friends, who usually video it and post it on Facebook or YouTube. I live high up in a multi-story building. That has become a favorite elevator trick. Only once in all this time has anyone objected, asking if I could teach her to do that for Hillary. I explain that we watch tv together and discuss the issues. She has a lot of fans.
19
... try disliking only people you know. if you don't know somebody, you've got no reason to dislike them. you can't generalize.
4
It is so very sad that so very many are unable to recognize propaganda when they see it. See the majority of comments here as an example.
6
Jaco, it's the truth. I would love to take a video of what happens in class, but that would be illegal. It is not propaganda. It is not stretching the truth. I have seen some very real examples of 8th graders (who definitely are involved in things more than the other sex), use issues discussed in this recent election to express some very scary and VERY REAL racist remarks.
3
Every day Trump remains in office is a day that social justice, equality, fairness and morality suffer.
He is truly an awful President and an even worse human being.
Why, America?
31
In reply to Andrew Australia
You ask "Why, America?"
It is because of the ultra liberal leftist policies of the Obama era: The advancement of sexual deviancy as an acceptable life style. The toleration of a privileged class* of illegal immigrants within our midst. The introduction of homosexuals and transgenders into the US military and the legalization of homosexual marriage by five unelected justices.
*Illegal immigrants are privileged because they don't have to pay taxes.
2
President Trump is doing a good job trying to control our borders and keeping us safe. Trump also wants people to come to this country legally. For some reason the press paints this as racist. Sorry in my opinion it makes sense in today world and yesterdays world to be careful who is entering your country god knows we did with the Germans Irish and Italians. Democrats lost the election because they just don't get it, we want to control our borders and stop people from entering our country illegally. Its not racist to support this position.
2
Only in America could someone refer with a straight face to "the ultra liberal leftist policies of the Obama era". You do realise that in almost any other country the Democrats would be regarded as a center-right party?
Your other comments don't warrant a response.
4
It is necessary to recognize the phenomenon that brought Trump to the white house is similar to what brought Hitler to power. This phenomenon is extremely dangerous and completely un-American. Dressing legitimate concerns in the clothing of extremism only serves to delegitimize those concerns. It also is good to remember that we are all immigrants.
22
The scariest part of the article is that Holly Jane Kusserow-Smid who took part in the race baiting comments is a third grade teacher in Iowa. So the future generations are at risk if this is what some teachers are teaching them. It would be very useful to find out what exactly the people making such comments are afraid of and to see if the causes can be identified, discussed and addressed. It would not be surprising to find out that the Jewish people, Irish, Italians, people of Slavic origin were subjected to similar behavior. So this is nothing new but there should be no place in American society for this and especially not a president who slyly winks and promotes it.
24
When I saw the title of this piece, I mistakenly thought it was going to be about everyone’s use of the name as a metaphor for filth, and racial animosity. As a descriptive word for sexual predator , and misogyny. I was horribly mistaken
18
People have always had thier bias, and racial views of people. In the past, people knew it was wrong and kept in the shadows. Since the Election of Mr. Trump People are proud to wear their bias on their sleeve. They feel enpowered to shout it out. Yeah Make America Great again..... Dah!
11
As a proud son of John Brown, I am ashamed of my birth state.
5
The Mid west? Salt Lake City? god knows where else ....finally showing their true colors.....and not red, white and blue......
Is this what America has always been?
My heart is breaking.
10
Male privilege, white privilege, liberal guilt... I feel nothing of those things, but rather a deep shame at being American. The whole world is watching, and they are disgusted with us.
Not only should we blame the president and some of his supporters, but the parents of these high school and college kids who say these things. Racism is passed down from parents and community as culture. And now it is resident in the executive branch of the US govt. God help us.
17
People using "Trump!" to mean "We hate you because you're different!" are just making the implicit explicit. At a local university, during the 2016 campaign, some young men put up a gigantic TRUMP poster in their dorm window. Next to it was hanging a skeleton wearing a dashiki. The message was all too clear. Trump has emboldened racists, and they can now invoke his name to communicate that they have friends in powerful places.
16
I also use the President's name as a jeer, but against his racist and/or moronic followers. My favorite term is "Trumpanzee" as it's pretty self-explanatory.
9
Older immigrants hate newer immigrants. That simple. Not unique to America either.
1
The clearest analogy here is that the U.S. presidency is suffering from cancer, a disgrace previously beyond imagination. Yet there is a constituency of 30+% that supports & encourages it. Sad that such a large portion of our population is pure rot.
7
President Trump empowered racists to come out from under their rocks. When you start to blame other races for your problems despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary (e.g., immigrants are a net win for the country economically and illegal immigrants are about 3% of the U.S. population), the problem is staring you back in the mirror.
10
Reading this article made me feel physically ill. Oh how I long for the days when racists had enough shame to be racists behind closed doors.
11
Trump is a humiliation to this country, a stain on humanity, and a disgrace to our founding fathers and our Constitution.
13
It's more than racism, homophobia, xenophobia. It means I believe I can do whatever I want and no one is going to stop me.
Just look at the tax bill. It has more than enough enablers...no one is stopping him.
Our democracy is being dismantled and we need to stop the destruction. Getting out the vote for 2018 is essential. And the building momentum is encouraging. But protection for voting rights can't be taken for granted. Attention to access and the security of the vote is critical to the stability of our country.
25
Taking back our country must start in the 2018 midterm election and be completed by the general election of 2020; this objective overrides our pocketbooks. To win, we must show trumpism and his 44 million followers that we are in fact the majority in this country.
17
This most despised in our land was....
Appointed to the oval office by the republicans in the electoral college.
"We The People" did not elect this obscenity.
And THAT needs to be corrected, so it can never happen again.
12
The two sentences in the article - “It’s authoritarian, the cult of personality,” Mr. Meacham said. “It’s saying that we’re American — and you’re not.” - are the most telling of all. It is becoming a cult and the true believers will believe anything that the leader says. No matter how outrageous it is.
12
Trump represents the same ideology as symbolized by the Confederate flag and swastikas, white supremacy and nationalism. It's what he believes and champions, as do most of his supporters. There's nothing veiled or hidden, all you have to do is listen.
As for the broadcasters, spare us. Those words and musings represent exactly who you are now, who you have always been and what you believe. They're sorry they got caught and fired, that's all. But at least they did get fired. Trump wouldn't have fired them.
14
The Center for the Study of Hate & Extremism was correct in projecting the FBI's 2016 Hate Crime Report would show an increase over 2015, a nonelection year, The FBI’s 2016 Hate Crime Report, released in November, reported 6,121 hate crime incidents in 2016 compared to 5,850 incidents in 2015. However, the 6,121 hate crime incidents reported in 2016 was lower than the 6,628 in 2010, the second year of the Obama presidency.
The uptick in 2016 over 2015 appears have been caused by a increased in the number of swastikas and white nationalist symbols scrawled on walls, but arrests have proven many of these were fake hate crimes. Racial slurs scrawled on walls should not count as hate crimes until perpetrators are arrested and motives are established.
1
Nice cherry-pick and downplay, as the FBI actually listed an additional 7000+ "related offenses," and carefully separates out the different types of open hate crimes.
3
Proof that Trump's supporters heard those racist dog whistles loud and clear. There's no backing away from the responsibility. Who says identity politics don't pay? Maybe the next presidential candidates should consider we are all Americans, and making things better for all of us is the goal.
8
All this, notwithstanding the 'We even have a Jew lawyer' pearl of wisdom from the wife of Roy Moore could not be any clearer an indicator that Trump and his supporters do not need to 'code' their racist beliefs. They espouse it in the clear. So, why are they tolerated? Does it mean that the majority of America is racist too, and is relieved that someone is willing to express the beliefs they have been afraid to express themselves? I pray that is not the case.
11
What is really astonishing is that so much latent racism exists in this seemingly tolerant country and a great deal of lip service was paid to the 'melting pot' culture.
I am originally from India and came to this wonderful country in 1984 as a graduate student and stayed on after completing my education. In the 80s it was not all that unusual to be subjected to overt or not so overt racial discrimination (including at least one professor). On the positive side, I got to enjoy flying in the 80s and 90s with (sometimes) the only empty seat in the plane next to me
However it is also obvious to me that things did get a lot better overtime despite the odd incident ( typically in the Southern states).
It has taken a monster like Trump to draw out the worst in white America. My guess is that it is mostly people who are not particularly happy with their current personal and professional state of affairs and thus are badly in need of an outlet to vent their frustrations.
Who better to pick on than the people who do not look like them.......
However, I am optimistic about the future and I know that all this will eventually go away. I teach the younger generation now and I have great faith in these college kids. They may not be color blind but they certainly appreciate the fact that they are richer for an academic experience with a lot of students who look different and speak with a foreign accent.
11
Trump makes it easier to use his name as a slogan by constantly referring to himself in the third person, as if something bigger (and outside) himself is signified by the name Trump. A more thoughtful person would be troubled by the meaning his supporters ascribe to that single syllable.
6
Disturbing indeed. We don't have to look for someone saying "Heil HItler" any longer. Now we get to hear them saying Trump instead. It seems that since Trump was elected things have snowballed to the point where he's a beacon for the Alt-Right. As someone who is Jewish and a lesbian I find this newer intolerance frightening because of the fanatical element it has. This is same sort of fanaticism Hitler's followers exhibited and Mao's and Stalin's. I hope that the GOP is happy with what it's purchased for itself by supporting Trump and accepting support from rich sponsors who do prefer to eliminate diversity in all its forms from America. Why? Because at some point these same sponsors will turn on them as not being sufficiently white and Christian and pure.
10
Trump is on the wrong side of history. If his supporters don't realise it, please help them God.
As divisive as Trump is, his views are highly toxic. But one day people will spit on his image and his name will be pronounced with a tone of contempt. But he doesn't care about how he will be seen in history. He just enjoys himself and basks in glory for the brief moment he is in office. And most of all he seeks to secure his personal gains as much as he can.
10
Those presidents mentioned were not vicious white supremists. They showed more decorum in their racism. That decorum is what really bothered people who voted for Trump. They want to shout and be in peoples faces.
7
The Trump supporters who Use his name as an expression of hate towards Americans who are not white has been part and parcel of the the built up hate of having a black man as president and allowing non whites to share in the American dream .
The GOP has used race and religion to divide Americans for far too long and it is a stain on all Americans that we have allowed the GOP to continue to get away with using these tactics... It is long past time that we call them out and shame the racist into retreating back into the dark corners of which they came..
29
There once was a popular song "I Weep For You, Argentina".
I weep for you. America. I am proud to have been born in the City of Brotherly Love, Philadelphia. But I am glad to be in Canada, where "Trump" is not racist cheer or jeer but cause for puzzlement and a sympathetic shake of the head: "How did you Americans let this happen? And how can you get rid of Trump?"
Trump, Trump, Trump?
It breaks my heart, your hearts, our hearts. Time is fleeting, find a way soon.
28
Yes, this happened at a school in New Orleans where I taught. To my shock and surprise, the administration did nothing. Vulnerable students continued (and continue) to be harassed. For a teacher - this is heartbreaking...not being able to protect your students.
21
I recall reading in the Times comments that the Republican Party will be tarnished by the name of Trump well before he won the general election. Throw Roy Moore into the mix and this is very likely the flavor of the GOP for a generation. Race-baiting and fear-mongering campaigns for decades -- added to voter suppression and gerrymandering -- taught Donald all he needed to know about Republicans. He play their game and he won.
Trump disgraces his office and our country every day. It will be a long while before we regain our international leadership standing.
22
Excellent articles. Congratulations Gentlemen.
11
Both announcers were fired. This isn’t tolerated in the US. This story is more racist then what happened in little farm country Iowa. This story starts by giving instructions for a race related newsletter. The data for the 26 percent increase wasn’t data by the police it was data vetted by the Center for Hate and Extremism California State. In other ward they decided if it was a hate crime. Perhaps they are biased?
4
So briefly put, it's racist to document or to report or to analyze racism.
Okay, sure.
7
As a white, 58 y.o. woman, I would like all of our citizens who are not white to know that there are many of us out here in America-land who despise this so-called president and everything associated with him, including all the race-baiting words he uses. We are all immigrants unless you are a Native American. But ignorance is the train that delivers what the republican party is pushing, and sadly, there are way too many white Americans who are buying all they have to sell.
28
What are people with racist, xenophobic views like that doing on the air in the first place?
Let us not forget, they are stigmatizing children -- yes, children -- with their careless, hateful rhetoric.
There was a time in this country of ours, when people like that would be dismissed faster than you could blink.
And rightly so.
This country is a mix of peoples, faith, and nationalities. When we turn on each other, what will be left? It reminds me of the story from the 20's, set in Brooklyn, when to get the grocery store, to get some milk for his mother, the teen narrator has to run the gauntlet of the Irish, Italian, and Scandinavian neighborhoods, all with youth gangs waiting to pounce and beat the daylights out of him. Is this really the world we want for ourselves and our kids?
7
They're on the air without benefit of opposition, because ClearChannel effectively removed almost all alternative voices from radio.
"Much of that changed with an act of Congress. The passage of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 swept aside many of the old ownership limits and ignited the business like a firecracker. Small owners started selling, and larger companies began feverishly merging. Six years later, radio is a big business, with publicly traded companies now dominating ownership of the nation's 11,400 commercial stations."-- Old Post Gazette, 2002
6
Appalling. The teacher in question should find a new profession. She is not an educated person. All Iowans should be ashamed.
13
People in countries around the world are shaking their heads at the guttering of the US. Germans would recognize the echoes of Hitler worship. The only thing that will slow this onslaught is a change in Congress but it's a very long time from here to next November, and the Fascist roll will continue unabated until then.
16
Evil takes over when good people do nothing.
Trump and his ilk have made racists of all ages more proud and more loud, and they are morally bankrupt in our country (and now with Trump's tax law they are financially bankrupting our country.)
Who are the good people who do nothing about rising neo-nazi behavior? Everyone who sits in those gymnasiums, classrooms and moms coffees and listens to racist jeers and banter, and doesn't shut it down. But the worst case of doing nothing came from people who believe they are good decent people, but refused to vote or voted Green in 2016.
Racist, bankrupt thieves of decency can run for office any time - it's up to people of decency and humanity to vote to keep them out of office!
21
Awwww, poor little thin-skinned, fragile ego Trump, he can dish it out but the poor chump can’t take it. How did this dumpster fire get elected?
10
HRC was correct. Trump and his followers are despicable.
22
If he continues drinking all the diet soda and eating all the fast food meals, our president will implode/explode before long.
5
I find it similar to how many times extremely homophobic individuals are actually gay but so far in the closet they will never get out. They lash out in anger, jealousy and fear.
I think that the people who spew this anger and hate--chanting Trump or MAGA-are just simply afraid that they are the real losers, the inferior ones, the ones who do not have the work ethic or drive to prosper in today's economy. They want to have the riches, the "stuff", without the hard work (or daddy's money) that gets them there. It is disgusting that in this age this nonsense still goes one and that the targets of these pathetic losers now have a President egging them on. This, too, will pass (God willing).
5
Racism, sexism, and hostility toward the "other" is always based on fear.
5
Trump, the immoral, the racist, the sexual predator, the psychopathic narcissist, the swindler, the liar, opened a box with the words United States on it. Out of the box came a cloud of immorality, racism, sexual depredation, narcissism, dishonesty, and lies. Trump opened the box and bared the soul of America, and half of the American People don`t like what they see. The mirror, it seems, is too truthful for comfort.
8
What is Trump's problem with this? Trump actively sought out hateful, ignorant people and coerced them to vote for him under the misguided perception that Trump the charlatan was actually on their side and would help them out of their miserable lot in life.
Why is Trump now denying that he is one of these hateful, ignorant people?
Huh, Trump??? Why do you deny that you are the leader of these blokes???
7
"Trump" is a jeer in my household - it can mean "idiot", "fool", any number of obscene words... in fact, my dogs bark now when they hear it.
17
It's clear that White people are the problem. Until whites are reprimanded for their bad behavior with severe consequences, these instances will continue. Enough is enough.
4
When I hear anybody chanting Trump, Trump, Trump, I answer with Chump, Chump, Chump! And If I can fit it in between the Trumps it sounds even better, TrumpChump, TrumpChump, TrumpChump. Trump stands for everything that’s wrong with America, he doesn’t have a single redeeming quality, he is a national shame and scandal.
Just sayin’......
19
'Trump' a racial jeer? What else did you expect, if the Donald flaunts his degenerate ethnic discriminatory stance with such a flair, shamelessness and pride? Donald Trump is the ultimate "ugly American" (arrogant, ignorant and stupid). And yet, Trump was elevated to a stolen presidency by complicit folks ripe to accept his demagoguery and graft. So, there is blame to go around, though no one is expected to admit guilt, given that scapegoats abound.
5
Race relation have never delivered weeklybebetter in this country. That scares the left. Racial divisions keeps their base intact. This article starts out by saying you can have a race related news letter delivered weekly. Something to remind you that whites are still racist no matter how nice they may treat you. We also have the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California cited in the story. What would one expect that center to say but whites are racists. What is more racist? This story or the old radio announcer in farm country Iowa saying something stupid. The announcer was fired by white people you know. Why isn’t that part of the story? “ White people fire a white guy for racist comments” could have been the headline for this story.
5
At my house, trump is not a racial slur. It's a bathroom fixture. Here, we "flush the trump".
13
The President says lots of things. He does many other deeds in contravention of his words.
Trump = {hate, ignorance, fear, lying, disrespect, loathing, greed, insecurity, authoritarianism, bullying, racism, gluttony, sexism, ...}
He is the antithesis of Christ’s teaching.
Of course “Trump” has become a slur.
8
Sorry to say it out loud but Trump's supporters are largely the dregs of American society, in my opinion. Racist, sexist, bigoted, ignorant know-nothing's with a penchant for disruption in the service of extreme right-wing flame throwing are not the models for tomorrow's generation of Americans.
They should be relegated to the dustbin of history, but, let's just vote them back into 5e nation's nutty closet by electing rational, mentally stable politicians.
5
The validation of the Peter principle. Trumps rhetoric combined with his incompetence allows the repukes to nominate and confirm any judge they choose. Trumps campaign issues on about taxes, Social Security and Medicare will not be fulfilled. The deconstruction of the federal governments role in American socoety has begun. The civil war between the States has never ended. The anti north faction by all accounts has succeeded,the which is evident in the tax legislation. Next SS and Medicare will be chopped which will adversely affect Trump base.
4
The word `Trump' is nothing more than verbal spit.
6
Trump! An epithet signifying the cruelty of human spiritual immaturity.
6
It is quite telling, although not the least bit surprising, that the New York Times does not have nearly the same level of concern about the rise in anti-semitism (often of the crudest variety) on many of our college campuses or the anti-semitism of the Black Lives Matter movement.
4
Sad times.
3
Who wants to be American anymore.
#calexit
8
Anybody who supports Trump at this point, is a racist and supports the Alt-Right or they are in complete denial of how horrible he is.
4
We are slipping towards fascism and the Republican controlled Congress is nor stopping this. Trump just banned seven words that the CDC can't use. Banning words. The RNC backed a pedophile. Everyday I think the bar can't get lower and than it does. Worse than Trump and his followers of hate are the Congresspeople and Senators not impeaching this fool on the "hill".
6
I have one.
trump [truhmp]
verb
1. behaving dishonest, incurious, and/or otherwise lazy in social and mental efforts.
"You drunk dialed your best friend's girlfriend and then lied about who was calling when he picked up the phone. You didn't even block your caller ID. You totally trumped that one."
4
This what White Nationalists do. They incite animosity between the races so they can exploit them for their own political objectives. Don't fall for it.
6
I wonder why was Kusserow-Smidt allowed to resign from the school district where she taught? After making comments like those she should have been fired.
5
Terribly sad to see young minds being poisoned by racism and xenophobia. However, let's not forget that most Americans do not support these idiots. There are incidents against migrants in Europe too. Has anyone read stories about people putting their very lives on the line to defend the victims? As for the Americans who did just that in Oregon and Kansas - two of them were killed and two others badly hurt - were they Democrats or Republicans, does anyone know or care? These are only a few good men, do I hear? Well, what about the thousands who besieged the airports in support of the hapless immigrants stranded by that senseless order on immigration? As someone commented, there were probably more people in the rest room queues at the women's march than the nutjobs who turned up to spread hate in Charlottesville.
Things are worrying in your country but the apocalypse is nowhere near. I always get a good laugh out of comments likening President Trump to Hitler and Mussolini. The German dictator, for all his faults, fought well in the First World and I doubt Il Duce ever dodged the draft.
3
At some point, the white christians who support trump and have the beliefs that led them to support trump need to reflect on whether their xenophobic hate filled political beliefs are really going to do them any good. Keep in mind, nazi germany didn't exactly undergo a economic resurgence when hitler took power. I do not recall reading any historical accounts of how germans became exceptionally wealthy during the nazi takeover..except when they stole from the Jews. The mass deportation of ethnic minorities from this country by many white christians seems to me an ill conceived idea since not only is such a proposition morally reprehensible but also terrible for the economy.
The blame truly lies in our horrendous education system, which is a feudal system at best, run by members of school boards who are often the same xenophobic white christians who have political aspirations for something more rather than the comprehensive education of the children in their district. For decades, generations of white christian youth have received zero knowledge of other cultures in this world, and when they do, it is often laced with racist beliefs about other part of the world.
3
When will the Race/Related team awaken to the genomic case for seeing human-difference in a framework of "only one genomic race the human", infinitely varied in multidimensional space.
Take Aryan white race away from Donald Trump, American Neo-Nazis, and NMR (Nordisk motstånds rörelse)
Only-NeverInSweden.blogspot.com
Dual citizen US SE
1
A year later, I still cannot believe that my country has embraced this foul King of the Pigs. Clinton called the Trump cult the "deplorables" and they rightly took possession of the term, because they are, almost without exception, deplorable human beings. Welcome to the New Dark Ages, brought by the billionaire savior of the dimwitted class.
9
There certainly are historical precedents - last one was a short Austrian who wanted to Make Deutschland Great Again.
The real shocker is all this began because of whipped up bigotry when our last great president was first on the campaign trail but nobody dared say anything - at least in any but the racist media.
- I remember an acquaintance I never had reason to believe was as un-American as Trump casually saying to me in ‘08, “ I just don’t know, a black man in a White House, no good”.
Why? I asked, she shook her head as if I had something wrong with me for not seeing “the obvious problem”.
I stopped just short of vomiting.
3
Now there is the opposite happening also. My neighbors who voted for Trump, now use the term to connote stupidity as in: "I pulled a real Trump yesterday."
3
Kusserow-Smidt and Harris' racist remarks accurately reflect who they are and what they believe as is their right. But they should at least own their remarks. Don't do the weeny, 'that's not the real me' excuse simply because their ugly side was publicly exposed. Racism AND cowardice. Real heartland values. Pathetic.
5
“The president condemns violence, bigotry and hatred in all its forms, and finds anyone who might invoke his or any other political figure’s name for such aims to be contemptible,” Raj Shah, a White House spokesman, said.
Dear Raj Shah:
I'll give you the benefit of doubt; perhaps you haven't paid attention to your boss's pre- and post-11/8/16 rallies, off-script comments and interviews! Unfortunately for me, I have paid attention to his nasty utterances.
All you need to do to make your comment truthful is to substitute "promotes" for the word "condemns." Easily done, and then you can sleep with a clear conscience.
3
We finally let a complete idiot run our country. But this one is filled with hate, anger and divisiveness. We have no protections at the presidential level against such an event, especially when our Congress supports his behavior. Good luck getting out of this one. The hate continues and it spreads to other countries.
3
The white man came to the New World with sabers and swords and gunpowder and now that they are here they turn those weapons upon each other while the overlords mind a state within a state.
Build a wall? For those overlords.
Take back America? They take it from you.
Trump, a name synonyms with gambling and gaming meaning override. Overriding the citizenry. The irony is so thick, if it was fiction, it would be considered so cliche a good editor would remove it.
2
It is hard to believe that adult announcers would call out high school basketball players by name to shame them because of their names. This is such outrageous behavior I can scarcely believe that it happened.
These men should be ashamed of themselves.
4
And while we sit here denouncing the president of the United States, elected by democratic processes in the world's oldest democracy, but as élsewhere reported in this paper, fawns over the Saudi Arabian prince, neither democratically elected, a monarch in fact, buys a $300 million mansion in France, along with a $500 million dollar yaght, and is admired, again in this very paper, as a "young" and "progressive" prince. You guys are sick!
3
Trump's election is a case study in a broken electoral system: voter suppression, Russian influence, a rubber-stamp electoral college who acted against the wishes of the majority.
Saudi Arabia is not the United States. The Saudi prince may in fact turn out to be much better for ordinary Saudis than his predecessor. The same cannot be said of Donald Trump. Even if he had won the election fairly.
3
After reading about the incidents in this article and others cited in the comments, it is particularly disheartening to read about black students taunting Hispanic ones. You would think they would have some sympathy, just as you would think that white women would also not join in, considering how badly the petty jerk in the Oval Office and his party of billionaires treat women in general.
I suppose some think it is easier to join the mob, but remember that many non-practicing Jews whose families had been in Germany for centuries initially thought that Hitler wouldn't harm them, because they thought of themselves as German first. They were soon disabused of that notion very rudely.
That is how fascism works, though: you don't get to choose whether you will be a victim or not. You are judged by the way that the mob judges you, and if you are a woman or a member of any minority, you are on the hit list.
So we either hang together, or we'll all hang separately, to borrow a famous freedom fighter's phrase.
5
“Trump! Trump! Trump!”
I first heard that chant by the crowd waiting to pass through metal detectors to gain passage to the Mall on Inauguration Day; as we protested opposite, it would start, grow into a medium roar, then peter away, like a failed “wave” at a stadium.
The chant is their defiant response to the facts looking them in the face: He is a racist, a fascist, a howling, orange vulgarian, and you voted for him. He is the worst of all of you, a truly bad person, and you’re OK with that.
That’s what has permanently divided me from some close friends and family: this painful gulf I cannot reach across, this assertion of white nationalism and hate. All I see is that crowd, gleeful and defiant, chanting “Trump! Trump! Trump!” In my face.
6
trump is the product of the republican Nixon southern strategy that is white supremacy. The target of this strategy can be placed on a continuum that ranges from those that do not usually speak of it, but vote for it, to the neo-nazis.
trump himself is on this continuum, however, he is more interested in money and self gratification, than suppression of the other. He has sold out the U.S. for Russian money, money being the reason he lives.
The fools that shout "trump" have been duped by him.
4
Sarah Huckabee, Paul Ryan, General Kelly, the list goes on. There are racist, hateful people helping a man spread violence and distrust in this country and around the world. I have wondered how these people sleep at night.
7
It's beginning to look like nothing will be named after this creature once he is driven from office by the Truth or falls over dead from hatefulness. No saintly Reagan mantel for this creep although Reagan was a lie. Probably his name will be spat out for generations to come and then as the attempts to redeem Nixon failed so will the ones for the Crazy Man.
4
The entire northwestern quarter of Iowa, which includes these communities, is represented in Congress by Steve King, a Trumpista who makes Roy Moore look like a flaming leftie. King has incited his constituent base to fear and hate any who are not blue-eyed and European surnamed. People in King’s district are growing up to be pustules on the acned face of bigotry.
5
Many Americans have never had the conversation about race. They didn’t have to. Now they are too stuck in their archaic thinking and influencing the next generation. Like a dumb herd being led.
I am convinced, though, that a change is in the future, where those racists will crawl back under the rocks they came from, Fox News will lose its momentum, and the rational humans will prevail. Inshallah.
1
I know that there are so many Americans who disdain what are said over the members of the "foreign" basketball team. This group of respectable people are outweighed by Mr. T and his supporters.
Trumpism Tranptism ....... Good luck
1
Trump.
A five letter word that became a four letter word.
4
A mark of true wisdom is to learn from the disasters of the present to improve yourself. In the case of Trump we have to realize the frustration of voters who did not want to put Hillary (and Bill) back in the White House.
It was the Clinton team that made a mockery of all our values. Bill's main talent was to get away with anything and everything. The list goes from rape to impeachment to lying to expanding our prison system to redefining the word "is" etc. Hillary's use of the word "deplorables" was the last nail in her coffin.
The Clintons were simply too repulsive to many thousands of people. The Democratic Party and the NY Times and we should have seen this.
1
Trump not only created the atmosphere for this horrific behavior, he exacerbated it by refusing to denounce vile attacks on racial, sexual and ethnic minorities. Indeed, he encouraged these attacks in his rallies, and continues to do so.
Trump's message: It is open season on anyone who is not white and Protestant Christian.
Invoking Trump to justify hate and discrimination started during the Presidential campaign. It is no accident. Trump himself ginned up his base with racist, homophobic, xenophobic and misogynist rah-rah remarks. He got the crowds going with attacks on any group that was "other." Although it is vulgar to compare anything to the Nazis, this is about as close as we have gotten to that terrible time in Germany in the 1930s. The parallels continue as, just like in the "Final Solution" the woes of the Trumpian base are blamed on those "others," who need to be eradicated.
This is a frightening time in the United States. I am convinced that "Trump" will become a permanent epithet in the United States along the lines of "McCarthyism." We will be deeply ashamed of this sordid episode in our history and look back on it with loathing
If we survive!
5
I guess you missed the story of how the DNC hired operatives to create havoc and violence at Trump rallies?
1
That's true. They all rode unicorns and hurt a lot of people with their light sabers. I saw it on Fox, which is so not a propaganda machine!
4
This should be no surprise. After all, even though he lost the popular vote, there were plenty of people who voted for a known racist, xenophobic, misogynist, who also happens to be mentally ill. If those things truly bothered them they would have withheld their vote.
3
The New York has moved so far to the left and is so intent on destroying the Trump presidency that it has abandoned labeling articles like this "Analysis" (let alone editorial) which is what it used to do during the campaign and Trump's first few weeks.
A high school journalism teacher (who (these days) didn't fear for his or her job for saying something so politically incorrect) would fail these two "reporters" for so blatantly injecting their own bias into what is supposed to be a news article (unless labeled something else).
How sad that a once great newspaper has to stoop to such tactics. . .but at least you're consistent. Whatever became of just reporting facts and getting comments from both sides of an issue?
Consider just the substance of the article for a moment. There are hate groups on the left as well as the right but the NYT only publishes "articles" with a left-leaning gotcha mentality.
There is only one entity I hold in lower esteem than Mr. Trump. . . who should eventually resign or be impeached for his deeds rather than slanted coverage. . .It's the mainstream media who have been shamefully lacking in journalistic integrity.
3
If POTUS could read this, he'd be so proud.
2
This piece has all the hallmarks of fake news. The term "mega rallies" referring to unknown rallies of a few white nationalists for example. Other so called racist incidents reported here are either unverifiable, or very open to interpretation. Pure unadulterated propaganda.
1
My great-grandparents were immigrants. At what point do people decide immigrants are bad? Once they are safely "in the house" and are able to shut the door to keep out others?
3
"I'm sorry for my remarks, they really don't reflect who I truly am."
You have to love these weaselly apologies. No, they reflect exactly who you are or you wouldn't even think of making them.
4
Like it or not, this taunting DT's name is part of who we are and we better examine it and make a change. Yes, we're not going to change the minds of neo-nazis, bigots, racisits, etc. But we saw change recently in Alabama, when the usually silent said "no." And part of the blame of DT lies at the feet of the Democratic party,that still sits in smug silence, debating Bernie vs HRC. If the Democratic party and supporters want more of this vicious Congress and lunatic in the WH, and even accelerated attacks on fellow citizens, then keep fighting over nonsense. The Democratic party better unify, communicate with people about issues they need to care about, not esoteric philosophical liberal debates, and start fighting the GOP/Fox news lies and propaganda and right now. 2018 isn't that far off.
4
Please don't be naive or fooled, last year's presidential election didn't give oxygen to hate. It simply doused more gasoline into the fire.
3
There have always been bad people, and surely there have been dark and shameful periods in American history. It is really unnerving to be living through a dark period with no idea how and when it will end. That bad people are so embolden is also not without precedent, but it is hard to merely laugh at their stupidity.
4
Our son and family live in Switzerland with our only 2 grandchildren. We are heartbroken they are so far away but there are many pluses. They walk to school, ride their bikes to friend's homes, take the train into the city to shop or go to the movies. It's a very safe country with a low crime rate and a genuine love and respect for children The public education is excellent and they are fluent in German, Russian and English and on their way to being fluent in French. Their air is clean, their food chemical-free, their meat and dairy products without hormones. But the biggest advantage? They are not living under a Trump regime. A man who is a role model for haters, extremists, bigots and women sexual molesters. Since this election, I have gone from wishing them back in the US to being thankful they are not.How sad is that?
13
Name one policy that Trump has pushed which is all his and bigoted. You can't. The wall? Hillary and Bill pushed for a " physical barrier". The travel ban? It was a list of countries devised by Obama and others, which Trump didn't select. and Trump has promulgated no policy to hurt women or blacks or anyone as an identity group. All you have is hype and hyperbole.
1
The earth is also flat Gormley. Just in case you wanted another "fact". No need for any thanks.
5
I turn 60 in February. I hope I don't live out my remaining years having to listen to this racist/sexist/inhumane/misogynistic rhetoric. America was about innovation. Let's get back to innovating. It is better for the country and the world.
7
Trump's family is littered with immigrants. His German-born grandfather, the alleged brothel and saloon operator (while in Canada) who made his cash and settled down in the NYC area. (Canada apologizes for the error of allowing Herr Drumpf in.) His mother is Scottish. Two of his wives are Slavic beauty queens. But that's okay. They are still all white. But I'm sure there are fine people on all sides. On all sides. It would be better we were able to rescind Trump citizenship retroactively to Grossvater.
3
"According to several scholars of American history, the invocation of a president’s name as a jaw-jutting declaration of exclusion, rather than inclusion, appears to be unprecedented."
Uh, Obama? Did you not hear every rap song in 2009? Have you learned anything from last year's election?
Umm... no clue what this anti-white, Obama-themed rap music was. I’m going to go out on a limb and suggest you got this either from Brietbart or a Facebook meme? Because I’m just not buying you as a fan of hip hop.
The current political mess we face today is the direct result of a rigged DNC, Wasserman Schultz, Hillary Clinton and the MSM. Democrat or Republican, it doesn't matter. The citizens and this country are pawns (cannon fodder is more apt) in a game of power, money and control.
Shock and awe is the new mantra: people are in shock and awe the country has sunk to this level of greed, party before people, and disregard for its citizens. We've become numb to the ridiculousness of our government and erosion of our rights.
I don't have a problem with government, it's politics that's killing our country.
1
The Trump white House has released guidelines on the appropriate use of Trump's name - as if they can restrain the Free Speech Rights of others. Mostly, they seek to have the name of Trump not be used in any way they deem derogatory, especially by those on the Left.
Ironically, it is Trump, and his supporters that first steered the Name "Trump" towards that of a rallying cry for his White Nationalist leaning followers - as a banner, as a cry of defiance, as a hammer against Clinton, and even other GOTP Presidential Candidates. It became part of that same family of declarations as "Lock Her Up!" Trump himself has sought to have his name glorified as being synonymous with the Presidency, with Patriotism, and with his own private means of making profit - by branding the "Make America Great Again" slogan as a Trump family money maker. In this, he has been largely successful.
All autocrats have followed this route. Hitler became more important as a name of German Patriotism, an ongoing development of a Cult Of Personality. Trump is only doing what so many before him have done. Is it any wonder that the name "Trump" is also a rallying cry of Racist Hatred? I fear these are early days yet. Far worse may be in our future, unless we find a way to bring back Civility, Restraint, and Dignity.
4
As an epithet, "Trump" cuts both ways. Yes, for some, Trump's name is used as an aggressive racial, misogynistic, or homophobic club. For others, though, it's just an epithet or a euphemism for denouncing racist, misogynistic, and homophobic attitudes, as in "You're nothing but a Trump!" Actually, when I first saw the Home Page headline, "How a President’s Name Became a Racial Jeer", I was not at all sure which usage it referenced.
In any case, think of politics and life as a game of bridge.
Diamonds beat Clubs.
Hearts beat Diamonds.
Spades beat Hearts.
But one thing beats them all: No Trump.
3
I have always considered my Iowa 'roots' to be an asset but no longer. I am ashamed. People keep saying that this unleashed racism is a "backlash for eight years of Obama." I say "No." I think that the growing monopoly of Sinclair and the disinformation campaign of Sinclair and Fox is a far more sinister and obvious reason for my home state becoming a welcome place for racism and incivility and for sending embarrassing representatives to Washington. (https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/12/business/media/sinclair-broadcast-kom...
2
Great insight and reporting by the NY Times, as always.
Excellent piece yesterday in the Daily Beast about the Jones win in Alabama, by David Litt, titled - "How Doug Jones Destroyed Roy Moore’s Whole Shtick with One Well-Chosen Verb". Very insightful and it reminded me of a post mortem comment I read just after Trump was elected. Some big name pundit or campaign strategist mentioned how he had strongly urged the Clinton campaign to attack the vain driven Trump with ridicule. They ignored the advice - they knew better.
Jones in Alabama, came out with a great statement about Moore, that Moore had been “Prancing around on a stage in cowboy suit.”, instantly turning a macho move by Moore into
the obvious farce it in fact was.
Vain drunk Trump deserves the same treatment and pundits must must work overtime to craft direct hits. This tactic was recently used very successfully against white nationalists and neo nazis at their rallies, causing them to quickly fold away like wimps.
4
So much long-distilling, deep-seated hatred magically sprung free by history's second-best charlatan
2
Because the times downplays the realism of Scalise, King, Brownback, Cruz, Trump and the rest.
In a nation armed to the teeth with millions of guns owned by we don't really know how many anti-Trumpists, anti-Nazis, and other anti-bigoted people, along with a national military leadership that has clearly indicated that it would defy any Trump order to launch nuclear weapons as insane and illegal, far-right-wing conservatives, the national Republican leadership, and their cowardly shadow supporters had better be watching their backs. In the 1930s, when the German-American Bund, the first national Nazi-sympathizing organization, began amassing members and holding rallies, American Jews ranging from columnist Walter Winchell to prominent Rabbi Stephen S. Wise to Meyer Lansky--and thousands of other, lesser-known Jews--banded together to attack Bundists not only with fierce, courageous rhetoric but with ruthless violence, both at their rallies and meetings and outside in the streets, with fists, kicks, bats, and lead pipes. When the Bundists held their largest rally at an earlier version of Madison Square Garden in February 1939, it took 17,000 NYPD officers to (barely) hold back an estimated 100,000 enraged anti-Nazi demonstrators surrounding the arena and trying to force their way in to bash the Nazis. Trumpists should be met with the same self-defense methods Jews used against Nazis nearly 80 years ago.
1
We had the same incident take place in my hometown Hoboken, NJ. A local business owner berated pedestrians with an anti-immigrant slur and “Trump!” Sick.
https://patch.com/new-jersey/hoboken/hoboken-vape-van-rant-immigration-t...
2
Sub title off the piece starts off by characterizing statements as "braying assertions".
I'd like to pose a question to the authors.....regarding claims by BLM of systematic police killings of blacks (which by the way are complete rubish when analyzed side by side against demographic crime data). Would you or any other writers at this paper ever deem such claims as "braying assertions".
The media just keeps on offering a steady diet of slanted "news" that is blatantly constructed to fit certain Narratives, and can't understand backlash it gets. No small wonder this paper and other outlets were completely wrong vis a vis 2016 elections. Just living in make believe land.
2
The epithet's success lies in its monosyllabicity; big words confuse his supporters.
4
Sixty-three MILLION Americans voted for Trump. What do you expect?
With a bit of luck, "Trump" will end up an obscene sexual verb that replaces the old, Anglo-Saxon 4-letter one. America, you've been trumped!
2
To all the little people out there who believe in the self-absorbed man with the little mindset: history will come with a judgement, and I am certain you will not like it. Your grandchildren will be ashamed of the ignorance and racism of your thoughts and actions. Generations will wonder how so many people gave so much shelter to such a dark and backward movement.
2
How sad that the USA has gone through race issues for so long and things had improved to some degree although there is always room for more improvement .. but then this Bigot comes along and makes a mess of things in record time.
And sadly this is only the beginning .. and then it will take years again for things to improve .. erase the ugly stench of Bigotry .. which lingers around trump.
2
Cowards! How dare adults taunt
children by calling them “foreigners”
and telling them to “go back where
they came from”. Sickening.
I hope they see themselves in this
article and are ashamed.
I can barely stand to read articles like this.
I don’t go to see my relatives in
northwest Indiana because this is
how they live. And they shoot
automatic weapons day and night
because they’re wealthy and powerful, nobody can stop them.
The awful irony is that their town is
dying from “whiteness”.
Some surrounding towns are healthier and more vibrant. Why?
Frankly I think it’s the far more
welcoming attitudes toward immigrants, refugees, people of
color, and LGBT folks.
4
Trump initially wanted "Trump" to stand for the highest in luxury.
Then he went all Hilteresque to win a campaign and the suckers he whipped up turned "Trump" to an umbrella term for bullying and white Nationalism.
But in the end, after everyone finally figures out the Trumperor is wearing no clothes, I expect his name to be more like a cross between that of Mudd, the doctor who helped John Wilkes Booth, and Santorum, an epithet that was Savaged due to Rick Santorum's zero tolerance attacks on homosexuality and same-sex marriage.
"Trump" will always be a stand-in for fraud and corruption. But it has to also be something worse, because he certainly deserves it.
5
Ninety percent of media coverage of Trump has been negative, during his run for the nomination through today. Is there really a question why the false reporting regarding Trump that he is a misogynist, racist, Islamaphobe, etc. has been adopted by extremists as true? White supremacists have become convinced by the NYT that Trump considers them core supporters. when they make hateful statements, the media then attributes their comments as if they are being made by Trump.
Leftists, meanwhile, attribute evil intentions to anyone who disagrees with their policy recommendations. Lacking logical arguments for their policy, they resort to the "other side has evil intentions" narrative.''
It is a media reinforcement of Hillary's lie that anyone not voting for her is deplorable that is empowering the extremists on both sides. But that's what sells newspapers and TV ad time.
2
The non president, whom we didn't vote for, has proven to be the obscene stinker in chief, presiding over his howlers.
That's why the country voted for Mrs. Clinton,
by 3,000,000 more ballots.
6
Tell me this isn’t the oddest phenomenon, trump has the backing of both fascism and communism. And both on the world stage. Anything to disrupt democracy.
Is a civil war in the offing? A world war? A nuclear war?
Eventually, something’s gotta give.
I’m hoping that once people feel the sting of their own stupidity, we’ll peacefully have a new president as the result of a peaceful election. ( relatively speaking)
1
Trump is currently married to an immigrant who barely speaks discernable English. All but one of his children are first generation Americans. Where does Trump get off encouraging violence and hatred toward immigrants and their children?
5
These few ignorant people have nothing to do with Trump I did vote for Hilary but the last year of media (CNN which should be news not editorial with 6 heads on screen wasting time on Russia, etc) has been ridiculous I dont expect fox or msnbc to be impartial and dont watch either. This is just a scurrilous screed allowing trump haters to comment endlessly, grist for the mill. I hope it does not make me vote for trump in 3 years although I doubt he will run.
1
My daughter is Asian, so this is personal for us.
My fervent hope is that these are the death throes of a flailing worldview, agitated and desperate because they know they've lost.
And I hope that all the Republicans that have aided and abetted it, or even simply tolerated it, go down with it. For inflicting Trump and all he stands for on our country, let them go out in shame.
And they are trying to undermine an investigation of hostile Russian interference in our election to preserve this ignoramus, cheat, and racist. They have lost all honor or decency and should never be allowed to forget their complicity.
7
As as for the incident in canton ct,research shows Democrats outnumber Republicans in that town,so are we to believe that it is absolutely about race,not politics? (canton is 97% white)
1
I hope that someday I can just look on these times as a bad dream. For me, I simply cannot understand how it is that the values I was taught as a kid, and the values I tried to instill in my own children, have been simply smothered in greed, hatred and intolerance, both of which have always been latent in the American character but kept in check by our leaders, writers, artists, teachers, and the very Constitution of the United States.
Trump has unleashed the worst in us. He is by far and without question the worst chief executive in our 241 year history. I have not and will not speak or write Trump's name with the appellation of "President" in front of it. Neither my heart nor my mind will permit it.
I am waiting for the emergence of a presidential candidate who will remind us of who we really are: generous to those without, tolerant of those who are different, considerate of the land on which we depend for life, creative in expanding our horizons, industrious in our work, and honest in all things.
I wait.
8
Trump's public conduct was atrocious throughout the election. His victory rewards an open display of contempt for everyone on one excuse or another.
4
In how many countries would you now find a majority of support for America?
Israel? Russia?
That's two and that something all voters in America should be aware of and should continue to contemplate,,
Britain has been a faithful and vigilant ally for at least a century but I can assure all readers that the current Preisdent of the United States of America is both despised and loathed by the majority in this country.
Furthermore, he's not welcome here - but you are.
Thought you should know that.
7
There is absolutely no point trying to reconcile with these puerile Luddites. They do not possess the basic intelligence, moral fortitude and spiritual courage required for introspection and change. We need to divide the china and get this divorce over with. Let the Red States start their own country where they can gleefully devolve into the segregated, deregulated third-world paradise so desired... and let the rest of us (the 70%) get on with our lives.
8
Amen.
One of the ongoing problems with the mismanagement at the White House is the game show host has no clue how to hire people. A great example of this is Dan Scavino his former golf caddie who has no prior experience in media, journalism or anything else. Scavino daily gets paid with our tax dollars to pontificate lies via twiter because nobody in this administration can speak or write above 120 characters.
6
My dad and his father came here legally in the 50's. My dad got beat up and called names. He and all his friends who were immigrants all carried some form of weapon in their cars. Americans beat up immigrants.
So forward to 50+ years. America ain't great. Not even close. It is good to exploit for fortune, but little else. It careens to and fro because the people are so mindless they still think rich people care about them - so they vote Republican. White American women are the most responsible. They vote for Republicans.
5
A hiss and a byword.
Let' not fool ourselves: Trump's white nationalism is not limited to the rubes and the two Senator Red States that are little more than dirt and cows. There's plenty in Blue State suburbs. If young people at basketball games can shamelessly voice their racism, what do they hear at home? What sort of America will we have not just in four years but in the next generation? America's original sin has found its champion in Trump whose name simply identifies the supporter as a racist. Dogs don't need a whistle to hear this. And we think we're in trouble now? What's coming will be worse, even in Connecticut's suburbs.
4
One of my students said: "If you're white, you're for Trump." I work hard every day to battle racism and then racism gets a free pass from the president of the US. But, what is perhaps worse, racism gets a free pass from some parents in my community.
4
The most sickening thing in the article was the commentators, Kusserow-Smidt and Harris, claiming that their comments didn't "reflect who they truly were" after being fired for their words. So a 63 year old woman and a 76 year old man had a double racial epiphany on the spot. One must wonder if they had not been fired would the epiphany have taken place at all? One also wonders what they talk about in private now that they've lost their jobs.
5
And he just loves it, too.
1
Not the central point of the story, but an 'Hispanic' and a 'Muslim'? When did these become parallel categories? 'Muslim' is a religious identification. 'Hispanic,' a cultural one. One can be a Muslim and identify with countless other cultures - including Hispanic. And, one can be Latino and follow any number of faiths, including Islam.
2
Hispanic and Latino are not interchangeable terms. The former refers to language, the latter to a geographical origin. For instance, a Spanish National is Hispanic, however they are not Latino, whereas a Colombian National is both.
I am terrified not by ignorant bigots but by the silence of God fearing people who know better. Where is your faith? Is it confined to houses of worship? Is the God of love who created us all pleased to see His creation trampled upon because they are deemed to be “the other”?
Here’s a thought what if people of faith stood up to the bullies in their schools work places neighborhoods and families. The only hope we have to drive back the growing tidal wave of hate is to become representatives of the love we want to see in the world.
3
I consider Trump supporters my enemy. And I will treat them as such.
7
Face it: our president and those who think like he does are turning the Statue of Liberty around!
3
Interesting. I would have thought Trump's name would be used the opposite way. For example, a debate team or chess team chanting "Trump, Trump, Trump" to signal the other team's ignorance, lack of preparation, and utter intellectual incompetence.
6
I agree,I've been uttering "Trump" under my breath when confronted with unexplainable stupidity since last January.
2
Fascinating how some people self-identify. When I hear the word "Trump," all I think about is ignorance, bigotry, provincialism, and dishonesty.
6
When I first read the headline, I thought the racial jeer was directed towards Trump supporters, not originating from them. You might call someone a "Trumper" in the same way you might call someone a racist or a bigot. As in: "Wow man, you're a Trumper? That's messed up." I'm a little disappointed to learn the opposite is true. I was hoping for a positive story.
I still think we should turn this idea on its head though. Rather than using Trump's name to ridicule minorities, the word "Trump" should be a source of shame and humiliation for the individual. We can still redefine "Trump" in the vernacular. First person that comes up with a definition that goes viral wins a cookie. Who knows? Maybe we can even get the definition published in oxford next year.
3
Those who are compulsively rude, vindictive, and vulgar see Trump as their champion not only because he behaves in that sort of juvenile manner, but he gives their ugly behavior a benediction of approval direct from the White House.
They reject cultural diversity - which is the reality of America and the world at large - simply because they are without social skills and scarcely know how to fake good manners. The idea of personal growth and education are beyond their imagination.
But these retrograde anti-democrats happen to live in the most powerful country in the history of the world and they voted a huckster into the office who is itching for nuclear war when not trying to tear up the Constitution. In other words, they are trying to drag the world down to their level, and they are winning.
8
Trump - will become the name of a period in history, where small minds, prejudiced minds, hateful minds, ruled our nation - and good people everywhere were paralyzed and incapable of doing anything to stop it. See now how Trump and his ilk continue to ruin our nation - our world - and nothing, nobody, stops the onslaught against us. We have allowed ourselves to walk into the oven and shut the doors behind ourselves with free will. Our children will learn to hate us and the future will condemn us - if there is a future.
4
Racism is the glue that binds Trump to his white base. They hear his message loud and clear, because the same thoughts live in their hearts. He also pretended he would give them economic benefits but instead his tax plan is a gift to his wealthy friends and Republican donors. They probably don't even mind that he lies to them all the time, because his obvious antipathy to non-whites boosts these little guys into feeling like big men who own the place. The place being America.
7
Interesting, because last year, before the election, I heard students teasing each other on the playground, saying, "You're voting for Trump!" (in a sing-song way) as an insult. In a school with very few white children.
3
Where I live people refuse to mention the name of that man who now lives in the White House. And the worst slur one could hurl at somebody would consist of calling him or her an adherent. But we don't like to hurl slurs around here, and nobody would characterize their worst enemy as just like him whose name we shall not utter.
3
Fascism is thriving in America. This is the brutal truth.
There are many ways to deny or part-deny it. But it's time to be honest, now:
Fascism is alive and well in America.
6
"Trump" is code for lies, deceit, phony, bigotry and corruption.
Trump's life has always advanced hatred, indecency, deceit.
From first announcing his candidacy at trump tower, surrounded by
EXTRAS, term for shills, paid to hold trump signs and chant trump's name.
Similar to the "unAmerican" and overwhelmingly white gangs of deplorables who denounce democracy only to spew their hatred, ignorance, regressive and repulsive slogans.
"Trump" breeds bigotry, breeds deceit, breeds dissolution of equality and American democratic institutions, and deterioration of democratic laws.
Trump erodes decency and humanity.
3
The Republican Party will forever be branded as the racist party in my mind because its leaders and members refuse to call out the president on his comments that undergird racist, nationalist, and misogynist sentiments and behaviors. Silence in the face of injustice is acquiescence, if not outright agreement.
2
It seems we are sleep walking our way to fascism. All the elements have been placed in the landscape, awaiting a final blast. Our democracy is not designed to stop this internal attack. We wrap a notion of daily normalcy around us, hoping this will end in 2018.
3
It's bad enough that Ms. Kusserow-Smidt should "feel like that, too," but when a 3rd grade teacher doesn't know how to reflect on her own feelings and think if they reflect kindness, then the human race is truly in trouble.
4
I don’t know who I despise more, Trump or the people who voted for him and unleashed this abomination on our once proud and beautiful country. What they have done, and are doing, to it is beyond the pale. It is somehow fitting that this crude, vulgar, obscene and profane thing has himself become a profanity, a racial epithet that, when rolled around the tongues of the deplorables, is the equivalent of the worst curses ever uttered by mankind. While I do not, nor ever would, condone the invectives spewed by the lowlifes portrayed in this article, there is a kind of poetic justice in the current “president” having been reduced to a swear word.
5
How deserved! How apropos!
If only Trump or Congress cares.
America loses.
2
Similarly to those who voted for Brexit, these sorry Americans are spoiling the country for all. They can't see down the road far enough to see that people worldwide will shun America for decades to come, in particular the flyover states with their small town bigoted thinking. American children and grandchildren everywhere in America will pay for their behavior, but they won't be here to see it. Good riddance to these bad people.
5
It pains me to no end to see anyone with an Irish surname tell anyone else to "go back where they came from." During the Famine, there was a great effort made in America by anti-immigration activists to send the Irish back to Ireland, where people were dying from eating grass because there was a famine in progress.
The party that took charge of the anti-Irish campaign rightly called itself the Know Nothing party. If Trump had been alive back then, he would have been trying to throw all the Ryans, Conways, Flynns, O'Reillys and Bannons out of the country for not being real Americans. Plus for being Catholic, which was the "foreign" religion most Americans feared before they learned to fear Islam.
It's a shame that so many Americans seem to know so little about the harassment their own families faced from xenophobes when they first arrived on these shores.
289
"At every crossroads on the path that leads to the future, tradition has placed 10,000 men to guard the past."
Maurice Maeterlinck
1
In the March/April 2004 issue of Foreign Policy magazine, Samuel P. Huntington brilliantly predicted this 12 years ago ("The Hispanic Challenge" and "The Threat of White Nativism"): "A plausible reaction to the demographic changes underway in the United States could be the rise of an anti-Hispanic, anti-black, and anti-immigrant movement composed largely of white, working- and middle class males..." Now you got it. It'll be interesting to watch what happens next
2
American racism wasn’t invented by Trump, he tapped into the darkest side of Americans. Growing up in Minneapolis, the onetime center of anti-semitism, I have always felt I was an outsider, the target of slurs, jokes and outright hatred. As a nation we have never been willing to face our flaws, more concerned with polishing the notion that America is filled with exceptional people. Trump took the easy road to power by telling the threatened WASP “true Americans” that the Others needed finally be dealt with. Complaining about Trump let’s us off the hook; if this wasn’t a nation with its share of racists, he would never have become its racist cheerleader.
3
Shortly after Trump was imposed on us, an AirBnB homeowner in Big Bear, California, cancelled a young law student's reservation and left her stranded in a blizzard on account of her being asian. She said, "This is why we have Trump." AirBnB proprioter became regretful after being fined $5,000.
3
These are the grandchildren of people who supported George Wallace’s stand in the schoolhouse door, who were Dixiecrats in the South and Copperheads in the North.
3
Loud ugly zealotry and hatred is a poison in any community. That said, teens and young adults can easily get caught up in the excitement of the moment and a need to be accepted by peers. How many of my generation of the 60’s lament our
loud contempt for the drafted and often poor soldiers of the Vietnam war? I for one feel shame for that while still proud of my resistance to that useless conflict. Sadly the parents and community leaders of many “Trump Trump Trump” chanters and even the president himself are feeding this ugliness to a new generation who are at vulnerable time in their lives. We desperately need calm wise leaders at every level and have dangerous buffoons instead.
2
The Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism analysis was completed before the FBI released its 2016 Hate Crime Report. The center projected that “Any increase nationally for 2016, would mark the first time since 2004 that the nation has experienced consecutive annual increases in hate crime reported to the FBI, but expected totals are still materially below that of any year in the previous decade of 2000-2010.” The center’s projection turned out to accurate. The FBI’s 2016 Hate Crime Report, released in November, reported 6,121 hate crime incidents in 2016 compared to 6,628 in 2010. Fewer hate crimes were committed in 2016 than during the first years of the Obama presidency.
https://csbs.csusb.edu/faq/5851
Can you really fire someone who is 76? I mean, when you're that old I don't think you are doing the job because you can't make ends meet.
Best way to return fire? As things get worse tell the president's supporters not that they've been fooled or duped, but that they've been, well, what else? "trumped."
2
Well, what can one expect from the feeble-minded individuals who voted for Trump or supported him in the first place? He was quite open and declaratory about his racist, bigoted, xenophobic, and discriminatory perspectives from the start. His use of hate slogans at his rallies served to embolden his followers and give the credence they otherwise would not possess or gain other than among other like minded individuals. The use of his name in racial jeering is an understandable next phase of this truly ugly aspect of reactionary politics in America that appears to have found a safe harbor in the Republican Party.
2
I have struggled with the Trump victory for over a year. The comments the right made about President and Mrs. Obama always upset me. I thought they were awesome and had more class in their little fingers than most people have in their entire bodies. I was alway proud of the way they handled hateful situations with grace and dignity. That being said, what dismays me today are all the unkind racists comments about white people, older white veterans, and white men. I think those types of attitude and comments are what gave us Trump. If we really want to progress as a society we need to work to be inclusive of everyone including old white men. There isn't one race, one religion, one ethic background or one sexual preference that is responsible for where we are today. In my opinion, we are all responsible for making the world a better place. I still have faith we can get there. United we stand, divided we fall.
3
The arc of the Trump brand will be complete when it has the same connotation as Madoff.
2
This article fails to mention how Democrats and the media (including The NY Times) play a role in perpetuating these ideas.
Now, after Alabama the Democrats are convinced that the politics of race is a winning strategy.
As a black women, I must say that I am sick of being used this way.
3
I am Indian-American (born in NYC, raised in Rochester, NY). I believe that the apologies of Ms. Kusserow-Smidt and Mr
The first time I heart Trump! used as an intimidating epithet occurred during a peaceful rally in my small hometown. The rally was in response to Charlottesville. Two men walked by shouting, “Trump!” again and again. The woman speaking at the time broke down and several of us men moved to the periphery to afford some protection to the group.
The use of this president’s name was all the more chilling because, no matter what the White House emails claim, as an epithet promising us retaliatory harm, it was absolutely perfect.
1
Let Iowa work their own farms. Let Iowa pack their own meat. Iowa is a state that routinely elects Steve King. It's a state that elected Donald Trump. The Mexican-Americans, and the immigrants who live there, should find a welcoming Blue state to move to. We are not all like the Trump states.
2
This President, his enabling supporters and today's GOP, make me feel ashamed of my country for the first time. We've lost our way. The heart and soul have been ripped out along with respect for our guiding principles - the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. The empire is burning as those complicit in this play the fiddle.
3
Enough Enough Enough!
I can't take it anymore.
2
“As Trump would say, go back where they came from,”
One wonders how many native peoples, all over the world, thought the same thing soon after Europeans began arriving on their shores.
Trump did not create these bigots, he allowed them to show their faces. He did the rest of us a favor by reminding many of us that a part of America we thought we had left behind is still with us.
As my senator Chris Murphy said to his stunned staff the morning after the 2016 election,"We live in the same country today as we did yesterday; we just know it better now."
The ascent of Trump should stir many of out a creeping complacency.
Stay woke!
4
Well traveled friends droped by this afternoon commenting “We don’t go there anymore” and the three things combined that made them give up on the USA: The “welcome” from Customs going in, the TSA going out...and Trump. I hope the GOP allowed for the fall in revenue from inbound travel when they hashed out their Doner Tax grab.
3
No surprise here. It was right in front of us throughout the election. He is not the president of all Americans. He is the president of hatred. His name is and always be synonymous with hatred. Racism in particular but also xenophobia and sexism. The studies all tell us the same thing. His supporters all know this by now. No more excuses. Now is the time for them to show us who they are. Either they are good people who have made a terrible mistake, or they aren't. Either they are or they aren't. Deplorable.
5
Those who are bitter, critical and ferociously hostile towards anyone who points out Trump's follies, serial lies, falsehoods and lack of managerial skills tend to overlook the most basic facts. Those who expose Trump are, simply, repeating his words and his actions and mannerisms do the rest. Hatred, dismantling of America's system of governance and a sociopolitical chasm will be his key legacies. Don't blame his critics. Trump has shown the entire world what most who follow the business news have known about him for more than 35 yrs.
2
Perhaps a return to traditional values ( those old, soggy, stuffy , unhip , backward ones ) would prevent a need for all of the hate / revenge based ' MeToo activism' so fashionable today. Yes, perhaps a move ' backward ' is the real solution needed to improve and impel our culture ' forward.'
1
Hate, as it turns out, is easy because it doesn't require any thought. Trumpism, as it turns out, because it doesn't require any thought.
2
As a teacher in the Lehigh Valley area of Pennsylvania, I have seen and heard of incidents like this in the school I teach and others surrounding me.
During the election, I heard a group of white students chanting, "Build the Wall!!!" after coming out of lunch. It had the look and the feel of a mob.
Within the classroom and in the hallway, I have heard white students taunt minority students with "TRUMP". Most of the time, the students do not say anything back, however, there are been multiple incidents of arguments started with this altercation. I have never seen violence as a result, but the threat of violence being started by this is very real.
Recently, I had a student make a comment about Trump in a presentation, which resulted in another student calling him "gay" and talking throughout the rest of the presentation about his 'un-americanism'. An argument ensued that I had to squash.
I'm worried that this will continue. What will it inspire? How will these 8th graders that I teach be influenced by people around them feeling justified in making racist, bigoted remarks because they want America to be 'white' again?
121
I don't believe you, your examples just sound to contrived. Frankly adolescents are more interested in the opposite sex than politics.
Erik, I grew up there. I remember full and well an ongoing neo-Nazi campaign that presented itself in the form of violent activities, e.g., The Freeman Brothers: "Re-sentencing on hold for teen Neo Nazi killer." - The Morning Call
So sad to hear it still exists.
5
jaco, young people often mimic whatever they hear at home and the Lehigh Valley is well noted for ongoing racial tensions, even home to several white supremacist camps. Also, bullying behavior co-exists with whatever else is occupying teens these days.
10
It's unfortunate that Donald Trump's name is not something longer and less convenient to blurt out.
I'm perfectly serious. The pernicious effect of his election on American society would still be there, but it could not so easily feed on itself or produce such a web of connections between haters and thoughtless children.
The name "Trump", which I have no wish to denigrate as a name (though it was apparently made up some generations ago as a substitute for Drumpf), has the sound of a blunt instrument delivering a crushing below. It also suggests "trample" and "tramp" as in "Tramp, tramp, tramp go the goose-steppers" -- or, for that matter, "trump" as in "My interests trump yours, so there."
A longer, more complicated name would at least spare us the threefold repetition. Or it would cause bullies to collapse from shortness of breath after shouting, say, "Schickelgruber, Schickelgruber, Schickelgruber!"
I apologize. I can't say I'm perfectly serious anymore.
2
It's hardly surprising that (not my) president's name has become synonymous with hate, racism, misogyny and bigotry. Isn't that what he's been cultivating for the last two years? Isn't that what his brand has been promoting? We all knew there was a percentage of the country inclined toward the kind of vile behavior this article describes. All it needed was charlatan with enough star power to tell them it was okay. Perhaps the only surprising thing was how large that population really is, and how many Senators and Congressman are willing to abide by it for their own cynical ends.
3
In my lifetime I have lived through many administrations. I watched the demonstrations against Johnson and the Vietnam war, Nixon and his dirty tricks and the domonstrations against him, the anti and pro segregation demonstrations and riots.
I have listened and read comments decrying “political correctness” and watched and listened to those on a few media outlets, with their less than factual comments stoke the fires of hate against those whose are different color, different religion or do not speak English. I watched a campaign by an individual, whose past history against non-whites is disturbing. He became President.
The country survived the turmoil of anti war demonstrations, desegregation, Nixon, and G.W. Bush’s dubious claims concerning Iraq.
The big question is, will our country survive Trump and his toxicity, racism, bullying and failure to unite a politicall and now a racially divided country. Perhaps the country will survive. However, putting the divisiveness he created back in the bottle will take many years.
3
I notice the phrase, "did not reflect who they truly were," is currently in vogue. It sounds nice, but it is usually false. Those epithets truly represent the people saying them, they just don't like what their expressing those ideas say about them.
Those two old racists in Forest City have harbored animus against the "other" for decades. I expect there are several "others' for these two people. They just don't like the fact their animus made it to the public discourse.
When these two people were young and forming their world view racism was rampant, even encoded into the Jim Crow laws. They may have seen "Colored Entrance" signs as I did.
Some of us got over it. Many are still in thrall to the fear of the "other."
1
Oh come on: Trump as a brand has been synonymous with low quality and over priced since it’s inception. It has been an aspirational brand for people with little sense and no taste, and it has never been anything else at all. That it adds racism, sexism, violence, social regression, and division can hardly be a surprise...except maybe to those who thought something labelled Trump was actually desirable.
3
Think of politics and life as a game of bridge.
Diamonds beat Clubs.
Hearts beat Diamonds.
Spades beat Hearts.
But one thing beats them all: No Trump.
3
It is no real excuse that Trump may not intend such insults, as Trump's supporters are allowed to get away with this kind of behavior without reproach from Trump. Trump needs to respond correctively, and he knows how to do so using Twitter. It wouldn't be too hard for Trump to marginalize this kind of speech, because it invokes Trump's own name and "brand." The onus is on Trump to distinguish border security from xeonphobia and white supremacy.
2
'Officials at Salem State University in Massachusetts discovered hateful graffiti spray-painted on benches and a fence surrounding the baseball field, including “Trump #1 Whites Only USA.” An undocumented immigrant in Michigan reported to the police that two assailants had stapled a note bearing a slur to his stomach after telling him, “Trump doesn’t like you.” '
I believe the verifiable cases such as the IA incident, but there is so much hoax racism reported, I have my doubts about the above MA and MI cases.
https://www.commentarymagazine.com/american-society/racial-hoaxes-colleg...
http://www.breitbart.com/milo/2016/05/02/hate-crime-hoaxes-growing-epide...
The MSM does a great job in reporting about the allegations of racism, some but certainly not all are verifiable. And the conservative media does a great job reported those allegations that later proved to be hoaxes. Some cases remain indecisive, and cannot be verifiable one way or the other. Some commentators even assert that hoax racism is more prevalent than real racist attacks - it is a well known strategy that some identity groups report incidents that later are debunked as hoaxes in order to garner sympathy for their cause - this is unfortunate because it muddies the waters, and also because there are verifiable cases out there.
I wish that the MSM would only report on these verifiable cases, and then the conservative media would not need to report on the hoaxes.
1
By his words and actions Trump has in effect, asked for this. One wish, however subliminal, granted. Sad.
1
This may be a situation where the Trump supporters and their love of the Second Amendment may backfire on them. The more easily guns can be obtained the easier it will be for people to defend themselves against these bigots and Trump supporters. It might have been an entirely different outcome for the biker who confronted the college students and they had been armed.
Not a particular good thing to desire buy then it has become a "Trump, Trump, Trump" world.
1
Although Hillary misstated when she called Trump supporters "a basket of deplorables" (most of them are average Americans, with flaws and virtues), she was on to something. Trump fans deplorable instincts that usually are suppressed or willed away. He's the exact opposite of Lincoln, who fostered "the better angels of our nature."
2
since the majority of Americans did not vote for Trump, I am assuming that the majority of us are absolutely disgusted with the damage trump has done to our country. Every single day the damage gets worse. It will take years to overcome the damage from his presidency. It will take longer to overcome the embarrassment Trump has brought to the United States
3
No doubt Trump is flattered by the attention.
What could be worse?
Let’s stop focusing on Trump and let’s focus on making sure we treat each other with respect and kindness. Trump is such a con man with many donors standing behind him happy to sow hate and divide everyone. When they divide us they win. Let’s all hope for a return to working for the common good in America in 2018.
1
While reading the whole article, I kept wondering if the two Iowa "announcers" were going to receive their comeuppance. Glad to see both were canned for their despicable comments about the kids! Such behavior by a third-grade teacher is particularly worrisome, given how she could be warping the minds of 8 or 9 year-olds!
Every day presents more and more evidence of the negative impacts produced by the criminal in the Oval Office. Glad to see, though, outstanding presidential authors such as Jon Meacham and Michael Beschloss pointing out how outrageous the behavior of many of the supporters of Trump has become. Fighting back against nativism and racism is essential!
The investigations proceed...the evidence mounts...Impeach him now!
1
Jessica Ohio
Trump's narcissism fuels the racial and ethnic fires that have existed since European explorers took over the land we now call the United States. It started with the Native American Indians who were known to 'drink firewater'. Everyone of us who is NOT a native American has ancestors from other lands which makes us related to the immigrants who came to our land to live, prosper or just to be in a different place. As for the announcers who said these insensitive remarks, I certainly hope they were making fun of Trump and not the actual people.
My mother, who is 84 and lived through the original, saw the newsreels, told me that Trump's rallies reminded her of the 30s; she saw Trump as someone giving permission to hate, to scapegoat, to condone violence. She saw the same crazed intensity in Trump's crowds.
She told me that the march with torches through Charlottesville reminded her of the 30s and frankly terrified her.
Trump specifically sought out groups that are threatened by immigrants, people who feel that minorities have taken their jobs, their place in society, and he fed the beast. He gave bigots permission, and bigotry a platform. He did it for free publicity and for a faithful base.
Many people who voted for Trump, or still support him, give excuses, and rightfully claim that they are not bigots, that is not why they voted as they did. They are right - they voted for a Justice, for curbs on abortion, to protect guns, for cuts in taxes - all the normal issues. But they ALSO voted for bigotry. They just chose not to focus on that.
Trump fed the beast, and it is thriving. God help us.
3
Most unauthorized immigrants are Latino, but this doesn’t make those who oppose illegal immigration racist. According to the Canton High School principle, a group of seven Canton students chanted “Trump” during Canton’s game with Hartford’s Classical Magnet School, but the author is wrong to categorize the chant as a racial taunt. It was political speech, not a racial taunt. Prior to the game, Harford Public Schools issued a public statement titled “Protecting Immigrant Families, Educating All Children.” The statement was an obvious response to President Trump’s crack down on illegal immigration. The lengthy statement began, “At Hartford Public Schools we support the preservation of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA). Since its establishment by President Barack Obama in 2012, DACA has represented a promise of hope and fairness for many of our students.” It also quoted Hartford Mayor Luke Ronin, who said, “We won’t be bullied into playing the role of an immigration enforcement agency actively targeting families who call Hartford home.” The Canton students chanted “Trump” to show their support for President Trump’s stance on illegal immigration.
https://www.hartfordschools.org/our-district-protecting-immigrant-famili...
2
They like code words. Trump has been added to the list of code words.
2
I'm so glad not to live in the Iowa 4th District, now Steve King's district, any more. That's where the mentioned Iowa towns are. It makes me sick. Please consider joining me in donating to whoever becomes his Democratic opponent.
3
We have not seen such hatred towards a president, maybe since Lincoln. Of course, he has brought a lot of it on himself with his campaigning and intentionally inflammatory statements. Even some supporters consider him terribly flawed. Of course, the Ds and his other adversaries have an option in 2020. They could run a relative moderate against him and people will flock to him or her. I doubt it very much because the Ds, who ran HC, are as much the problem and partly, along with the media, responsible for Trump. I dislike the radical left's "resistance" more. As much as I dislike his presidency, those who believe him to be some kind of Hitlerian figure or a throwback to Jim Crow seem delusional to me. And I do not want to go back to the Obama policies either. For many, Trump was a reaction to Obama (as Obama was to Bush) and I would hate to see the reaction to Trump be Sanders or Warren or others of their type. I expect it will be though. Obama and Kerry before him were both from the far left of the party. Now that the machinations of the Clintons with the DNC have been exposed, I don't think the more orthodox among them will be able to withstand the radicals of the party again.
1
I'm glad to see the Times consult historians for their perspective on this. I would like to see more of that on TV as well.
2
One telling moment of TV coverage on that ill fated election night stays with me. A reporter was talking to ecstatic trump revelers at an election night event, asking a young, white woman from somewhere in the midwest what her feelings were. She bubbled over in tears of joy, "We have our country back!" I would have asked her who are "we" and what exactly did you lose? So it's "we," "them," "those people." etc now. When I was a child in the 70s, my family used to nervously laugh at the antics of a fictional Archie Bunker, knowing that his viewpoint was unacceptable, but in a comical way, the real views of a small sector of a fading generation. Now those views are validated and not so funny anymore when turned into national policy.
2
As a Jewish woman, I know a thing or two about hatred based on religion or race. I would hope by this time in our evolution, we would have risen above the need to find scapegoats for anything. However, I see my worst fears are confirmed by the meteoric rise of extreme divisiveness and the spread of evil beyond all reason.
As a society, we judge ourselves by our weakest inhabitants: how well we take care of our elderly, needy, children, infirm and those different from ourselves. Not only are we failing spectacularly in this endeavor, we are allowing hate to overtake our country, and with eyes wide open, we watch as a criminally-inclined, mentally unbalanced man rapidly dismantles our democracy, and thumbs his nose at our precious Constitution.
What we do next has immense consequence and will determine both the course of our country and the esteem in which we hold ourselves. Let truth reign supreme.
134
To say nothing of a Congress that has no interest in America, our diverse backgrounds, our poverty, our educational system that keeps our least advantaged out of the marketplace, and our productivity, down; that forces our industry out of the country because we don't have prepared workers, that has forgotten that their families were immigrants just a few generations ago. Now that our failures are public, will America have the resiliency to re-group and move forward? Or will we, like the fires and storms that are consuming our country, continue until we are ashes?
2
As a white woman raised in the Southern USA married to a Jewish man from NY .. I sometimes don't know where to look first , when it comes to bigotry.
And God bless him, my husband with a glorious background of people who survived untold horrors, who managed to make it to NY and not only survive but raise smart children with open minds tells me .. ignore them, pity them, they are ignorant .. they will not grow, they will not prosper, they will wallow in their ignorance .. And so I try .. because if he and those in his family could do it, so can I.
2
I accept the apologies of Ms. Kusserow-Smidt and Mr. Harris. I believe their remorse to be heartfelt. I’m sorry that they lost their jobs after many years of dedicated service.
There is an unfortunate mob mentality trait in human beings, which when left unchecked can lead to dire consequences (lynch mobs, scapegoating of minorities). A civilized society attempts to keep such passions under control.
I am an Indian-American doctor (born in NYC, raised in Rochester, NY) who treats people from literally all over the country and the world. It is my experience that people of various religious and political leanings have shared values of compassion and empathy.
The “Trump, Trump, Trump” chanters have momentarily embraced a mob mentality. While I would be cautious around them, I am willing to forgive them (they are my patients, after all). Like so many others, I am looking forward to when we can all move on from this unfortunate period in our country’s history.
1
Forgiveness doesn't not preclude consequences for bad behavior, in this case behavior by adults directed at adolescents which could have resulted in violence. The termination of employment is no less than what the two announcers should have expected. To let this pass is to minimize the impact their choices had on the players, their families, and the community.
4
Trump is the ultimate result, thus far, of the effects of political climate change. And he will deny that too. The political storms will be stronger and more frequent. Legislative droughts will last longer and both will cause economic and social chaos. Elements in the community that favor this chaos are emboldened and will be more active than they have been in generations. And there will be little shelter from the evil spawned in his name.
4
"The two have expressed deep regret for their comments, which they said did not reflect who they truly were."
No, actually it does.
7
They come from Steve King's Congressional District, where voters keep electing one of the most bigoted and bat-craziest members of Congress, who gives a black eye to the entire state. Not hard to guess who they voted for in the last election, when he got 61% of the vote.
So embarrassing for a formerly proud native Iowan.
3
Many, many comments on this piece strongly suggest that those who rightly find Trump abhorrent have taken on the very same negative and divisive mentality and demeanor that DJT has so perniciously and brazenly propagated.
Three more years of Trump in the Oval Office and American will be even more viciously divided.
The Trump phenomena far transcends our usual political Circus Maximus.
The 2018 mid-term elections need to be a resounding repudiation of both Trump and the GOP Congress that has so willfully enabled and supported him.
3
Rarely have I ever felt such hatred as I do for Trump. In the 58 years I know my wife, I never heard her use profanity, until Trump.
Americans need to rise up and march on Washington. We need to demand an end to this disaster just like we demanded an end to the VietNam war and demanded the Equal Rights Amendment. It is apparent that our representative system has failed and it's time for change but that change will never occur until we demand it.
If an old man like me has the energy for one more march on Washington, so should you.
8
It cuts both ways. For some, Trump's name is used as an aggressive racial, misogynistic, or homophobic epithet. For others, it's just an epithet or a euphemism for denouncing racist, misogynistic, and homophobic attitudes.
Interestingly, when I first saw the Home Page headline, "How a President’s Name Became a Racial Jeer", I was not at all sure which connotation it referenced.
2
Visiting family in nyc for Thanksgiving we got into a parking space altercation with a gentleman on a Vespa. In the course of his profanity-laced diatribe he noticed our North Carolina tags and started screaming that we were selfish Trump supporters etc etc. Of the entire incident I think the most insulting part was being called a Trump supporter. Invoking the president’s name in a parking spot confrontation was kind of funny but it also speaks to the negative emotions— both among his supporters and detractors— this vile man brings to the surface.
2
The Id is a terrible thing. I would highly recommend our society work very hard to establishing some sense of proper order, or as the Id calls it, "political correctness."
1
"Um, I came from Mason City, Iowa." Such a great line. You can almost hear the Midwestern defiance in his voice.
America's demons thrive in political climates like the one we are currently experiencing. Fear and willful ignorance give rise to hatred and, as is our sad custom, violence.
If there is a silver-lining, it may be that being faced with stark evidence of just how bad it can get will be a jolt to younger and minority citizens. Hopefully it will lead a renewed appreciation of the strength of their numbers, their voices, and their votes.
4
After the election, the Republicans of my acquaintance were offended and shocked that anyone could possibly consider them racist for supporting Trump--they proclaimed loudly and to anyone who'd listen that their vote was all about the economy or "values". Thanks to this article, we now know without a doubt what those values are.
3
No question, we have crossed a line with Trumpism and where it will end is unknown, but likely not well!
2
Yes, the magic number three. I noticed it too and thought of Beetlejuice...
1
The view that Trump is "not my president" is no longer really a statement of political opposition to Trump. It simply states a fact: Trump is only the president for a minority of Americans. He has made this so, as have his supporters. They'll come to regret it. The GOP is desperately swimming against an ceaseless demographic tide.
6
The sad truth is, the problem here is not Trump, it is us. Trump brings out the worst in people, no doubt about it, but that worst has long existed in America, although apparently suppressed. And judging by what is happening in Europe, I would say the problem of suppressed racism and bigotry is not even unique to America; it seems to be pretty widespread, in humanity. So while I would prefer we had a rational, compassionate, intelligent and visionary president, I am not sure we can blame Trump for something that already existed.
There are intractable persistent problems which will rarely be resolved. "Why" is a question left to the psychologists.
My guess is that we need scapegoats as an excuse to avoid responsibility for our choices.
The best we can hope for is not to elect officials who pledge to worsen and exploit the situation.
2
I was born and raised through the age of 11 in New York City, my father emigrated from France, hence my given name of Jean Pierre, after respectively my father and grandfather. The name would become my daily nightmare as I would trudge over the PS69 for another day of bullying, verbal and sometimes physical agression. I would plead with my father to change my name to John, all the more considering I did not speak a word of French.
In 1960 I was shipped off to the "old country", France, to live with my birth mother, in Saint Tropez no less. In those days hardly anybody spoke English and in the usual French way those that might would shy away from admitting their deficiency - my isolation was near total but not uncomfortable, the French were kind and tolerant, soon i was known in this village as 'le petit amerloo des..."
Still I would seek out people who spoke my native tongue, Saint Tropez was already an upscale tourist attraction and we were and remain a loud crowd easy to pick out. All the louder as the anglo-sphere, still full of post-war hubris, would bellow their impressions in the belief none would understand. Too often what they could not understand or appreciate was denigrated with language I was ashamed to hear.
I learned French very quickly returning home some years later proud of my bi-linguistic ability. I moved to France in the mid 90's, a proud expat able to assume my culture as well as my host country's. Today I feel more refugee than expat.
5
When America was first formed, it was hoped the then five Canadian colonies to their north would join the new union. The Articles of Confederation in fact invited them to join. Imagine for a moment if they had joined. What would America have looked like? Would the Civil War have even happened? Would we have a Trump today? All speculative of course, but think now what America would look like, and what the world could look like if Canada and the US joined as one country, as perhaps they were always meant to be. While we have enjoyed having a peaceful, friendly neighbour to the north, their absence from our political body politik is beginning to have real and dangerous consequences for us and for the world. Maybe it's time for a more perfect union.
I'm in my mid-50s. Like many children I would pore over an atlas. I was enthralled by place names like Sioux Falls and Walnut Creek and hoped to visit them one day. My early interest in the USA, fuelled by that atlas and TV programmes, developed into an admiration, respect and yes, love, as I learned more about this fascinating country over the years.
I've visited the East Coast several times and the Midwest. I had planned that my future trips would be more adventurous and maybe I would stop off at Sioux Falls for a few days!
Now, I can't even think about visiting the US. I have a Muslim name (I don't practise my parents' religion), and now that the hate is out in the open I am worried that the mere sight of my name of a passenger manifest or hotel guest list will be enough to trigger the kind of abuse I have been reading about since Trump began his run for office. UK citizens should be able to travel to the US as before but I have read stories of Muslim UK travellers stopped from entering the country for no apparent reason, presumably on the whim of a newly emboldened airport official. "Yes we can" has a whole other meaning these days.
3
The article indicates it will tell us “how” this happened, then blames the election. How it happened is much more complicated.
It was decades of unfettered immigration that led to 11 million undocumented people in the US. It was decades of allowing NAFTA to destroy our manufacturing base, and thus our middle class. It was the emergence of identity politics that marginalized the needs and aspirations of other large blocs of voters.
It is much more complicated than two elderly broadcasters denigrating young Hispanics and then profusely apologizing. To treat the illness, we must first recognize the true cause.
3
What we are seeing is an additional agglomeration of meaning to an already specifically meaningful brand. The president spent decades associating his last name with high-visibility construction projects and casinos, lifestyle products like vodka and steak, and even a TV character who was supposedly real. Trump's name already stood for a lot before he ever got into politics. Now it stands for racism, too.
"Thank you, Mrs. Hoover."
That phase, among my parents' Depression-era peers, was a common retort when served a paltry amount of food.
Hooverville, etc etc.
1
Given how the current President's name functions as a call to racism, and given that there are many ways to refer to him, we should treat his name as a dirty word, one not to be said out loud or printed in respectable newspapers. It is equally easy to say or write,"The President," or, in the right circumstance, "The POTUS." Some of us, looking to a better future, might prefer, "The future ex-President," but that is matter of individual choice. The use of the name should be no more acceptable than other racial or religious epithets.
Ms. Kusserow-Smidt, 63, was fired as a board operator for the radio station; she has since resigned from the Forest City School District. Mr. Harris, 76, who had been with the station for more than 40 years, was also fired. The two have expressed deep regret for their comments, which they said did not reflect who they truly were.
It reflects exactly who you are.
3
The anti-christ Con Don and his Robber Baron brethren have taken over OUR government with hate-anger-fear-Lies-Lies-Lies and they want WW3.
Merry anti-christ-mas Everyone.
30
At least it is a banner Christmas for gun sales.
According to _Revelations_ the Anti-Christ is a crowned king. Mr. Trump is merely President, so he does not qualify.
I can't bear to say or write the "man's" name. I even hate reading about bridge games now.
I refer to the creature either as DT or 45.
78
Agree, except I've found a new joy in bidding "no trump."
2
Yeah.... Trump opened the American Pandora's Box with his violent rhetoric and hate filled campaign. His attacks on minorities and the foreign born, his attacks on the disabled.. courting the most regressive right wind American Evangelical-Taliban. His tax plan will indeed "suffer the little children".
I don't know Jesus, but from from what I hear, he would weep.
They cry "Jesus"; they worship Trump.
They say we are being unfair to Trump. That there is bias against Trump. ha! Why might that be? Maybe because we the voters did not elect him - the electoral college undid the will of the American People, for the 2nd time since 2000. Trump lost the vote by 3 million, yet rules by fiat. GWB, started wars that no-one thus far had been able to bring to a close, but he did not unleash the violent hatred we have seen from the con artist reality host from Manhattan.
And so, this is an existential fight.
Our nation cannot survive this Presidency if it continues much longer.
We have a cult of personality in place of a political leader. That personality is unhinged and swings wildly between positions and tactics and when all else fails, he obfuscates and petulantly casts aspersions on - it doesn't even matter - changes all the time.
And here were are." Trump, Trump, Trump" used as a cudgel by bigots.
Who claim to be American.
We are all being battered.
If Mueller goes - take to the streets.
Stay there until "Trump, Trump, Trump" is gone, gone, gone.
190
Please don't say this much-hated man is "from Manhattan".
Yes, he shoved his way in to build a much-hated eyesore building in the middle of Manhattan, but we want nothing to do with him here. More than the rest of American voters, Manhattan overwhelmingly rejected him. Even the Queens neighborhood where he is from, Jamaica Estates, voted decisively to keep him out of the White House.
https://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/numbers/clinton-trump-president-vice-pr...
He even lost the vote in Bedminster, where his NJ golf course is
https://patch.com/new-jersey/bernardsville-bedminster/election-results-w...
He did win a narrow strip of wealthy voters around Mar-a-Lago
http://apps.mypalmbeachpost.com/interactives/201612-elexmap.html
Most Americans clearly rejected this insult to our democracy, but tragically, he has been propped up by Republican, from the Electors who installed him defying our choice, to the Republicans in Congress, who are willing to badly damage and tear apart America jus so they can give a tax cut to their donors.
31
Trump has made it clear exactly who he represents, and whose interests he will protect. And it’s not *all* of us. Why wouldn’t we complain?
2
Thank you for your excellent post.
As I told a colleague at work, the day after the election, I felt the same way watching the towers fall on 9/11. I was watching something uniquely American die right before my eyes. Its heartbreaking what is happening to our democracy and I hope Mr. Mueller can save it.
6
These anecdotes are disturbing. Vladimir Putin must be the only one smiling, confident he’s helped increase racial and ethnic divisions in this country.
Donald Trump likely doesn’t care because he loves stirring the pot of controversy.
But there’s a big difference between knocking the PC standards of your opponents/ establishment and deliberately saying divisive things that can be easily picked up by kids or even basketball announcers.
Donald Trump is responsible for the growing nastiness in this country whether he likes it or not.
He’s made it clear from the get-go where his priorities lie, and they’re not in favor of anything that benefits people who aren’t lily white.
124
and very rich.
In fact, rich would trump race, gender, religion, nationality, etc.
2
Nobody else seems to have picked up on this, but to me one of the worst things about this report was that one of the offenders was an educator. I know that families hand down prejudice to the next generation, but it's very disheartening that it's reinforced at school. When people say, however apologetically, that it doesn't reflect who they truly are, it's a good bet that it is indeed who they truly are.
537
As a former educator I can say I have been the 'fly on the wall' in faculty rooms and witnessed the ugly, bigoted remarks of some of my white colleagues. "Oh Gwen, I'm sorry, I didn't realize...." I retired early taking a reduced pension - I often excuse that with - 'the reduced pension is still more than the cost of being bailed out jail for being one more angry black woman."
3
Yes she should be fired. A teacher of 3rd graders should not be espousing racist views. How can she teach a minority child?
3
I do not believe in being politically correct as I believe it to be a form of enabling a community not to self evaluate ( i:e - black on black crime, hijab on muslim women as a form of resistance...AIDS and promiscuity in the gay community, etc,..) In my opinion, the announcers were remarking the obvious ; an over representation of hispanic names on american teams. There is nothing wrong with that. The fact that they back tracked on their observations and comments is what is truly disapointing. That's cowardice.
Really, a 76-year-old man doesn't know better? Too many men in this country seem to be stuck in adolescence.
269
Apparently neither did a 63 year old woman. What's your point?
2
He has spent 7 decades in the turmoil of WWII, the cold war, the civil rights movement and its violent suppression, Vietnam and the shams exposed thereby, outreach for equality by women, gays, transgenders, immigrants, "disabled" people,
. . . and learned _nothing_!
Not exactly the sharpest knife in the sack of rocks.
Tell me again why he's a commentator with a brief for educating the general public, instead of cuspidor supervisor?
1
I am at a loss for words that adequately describe my loathing for trump. He is fueling and encouraging the ugliest aspects of our society - people and ideas that have long lurked in the darkest of shadows, which thanks to him, have been emboldened to step forward and bark their loudest.
577
At least we now know who they are. It is our responsibility to mitigate their influence in all aspects of society, from governance at all levels to authority in business to responsibility in community.
2
Did you go out to vote against him, against his Republican enablers? If not, don't complain please....
1
I guess what you don't understand is that you cannot get rid of what you call "the ugliest aspects of our society." It's the opposites of a thing that are always present, and projected. It's a balancing act of acceptance and kindness. You are not better than them.
"How a President’s Name Became a Racial Jeer"?
And also an obscenity to many, many people, not just in the USA but throughout the world.
370
Yes, it’s very unfortunate to have to apologize, when traveling overseas, for a president for whom I did not vote and and who does not represent anything I stand for.
1
The evil of Trumpism has been unleashed, abetted by the GOP panderers. And for what? For votes to keep the oligarchs and kleptocrats fed.
320
To expand Eddie Lew's comment.
The "GOP panderers" utilize their sTrumpet as the go-between to reach an ignorant electorate, as well as the many needy single issue voters.
Lock him up!!
3
The GOP plunderers too!
1
Why am I not surprised that, as expected, a vast majority of white Americans would blame 'fake media news' for their own racist attitudes? Fake news reports made you racist? Non-white people being constantly broadcast on TV doing 'crime' made you racist? Seeing too many non-white skinned people around you made you racist?
Trump made white people who ALREADY had a racist disposition COMFORTABLE enough to shamelessly express their racism. It never went away under Obama, but it is OVERTLY exhibited now under Trump.
And the irony of all of this is that Trump used white racism to help the very people whom he can relate most to: the EXTREMELY WEALTHY. He used the fears and bigotry of the white middle class to enrich and empower the super upper-class, and the white middle class does not even see this....But they will feel it in 2018 and beyond. This tax bill is just the beginning of their pain.
257
I have an idea. Lets stop giving to charities, especially those that aid working class and poor families in the South.
22
To MoneyRules: If you stop giving to charities that "aid working class and poor families in the south," you will harm the black and Hispanic families who are among Trump's victims even more than you harm the whites who voted for him.
9
In case you didn't notice, Iowa, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Kansas, Colorado, and New York are not in the South. The only southern location mentioned in the article is a reference to Trumps response to the events in Charlottesville, Virginia. And by the way, Trump is from New York.
2
My understanding is they are against "free stuff."
1
We are kissing the edges of fascism and authoritarianism in this country and Fox News is fueling the flames.. I've never seen them stoop this low- especially with their attacks against Mueller. We have a cadre of GOP lawmakers at the ready to discredit the investigation. Trump is a pariah not a president. Just last night Laura Ingram [barf] had Huckabee Sanders on her show and they were doing the proverbial "liberal media bashing" of White House reporters and Huckabee made an off the cuff remark, "until we can replace them.." I can't believe that comment hasn't gained any traction in today's news.. ????
If the DNC doesn't replicate Virginia and Alabama in every state in the upcoming election cycles we are doomed .. I mean we are finished!
267
Well said, and by "finished," I think you mean "trumped."
I agree. Every single day you see our democracy becoming a dictatorship, with Faux news cheering it on
3
What is worst of all is on one level, if he can even grasp this, he is proud of it.
68
He is ignorant, and loves the "uneducated". Remember this when you see what they are doing with tuition loans, and the entire Dept. of Education. Keep them uneducated, and then feed them Hannity, and lies.
3
Hey, ever took a trip to Breitbart? Read the comments? Trump supporters absolutely hate blacks, hispanics, Jews, Muslims, and anything else they don't understand. The more Trump spews, the more he stokes their fires, and the more they love him like a savior.
While claiming to be "Christian" and to love the Constitution, they would gladly approve of laws banning blacks and hispanics from voting altogether.
This is what Trump has unleashed, and what today's Republican party abides for the sake of their donors.
341
Jules, I don't think Trump supporters hate minorities in general per se. I think a majority of white americans simply feel like their needs have been ignored by the establishment and are complaining about it in a very outspoken way. The fact that minorities seem to push legislation or ideas that seem to benefit only them and not americans in general does not help..
Yep, and remember who let Bannon, ex-editor for Breitbart, into our White House? Trump himself. Speaks volumes
2
Their needs have been ignored Johny, in contrast to who? What needs to you refer to? If good jobs leave the country for China, does that not affect everyone, whatever their color? Please explain why white americans have a particularly harder situation than anyone else.
4
How about more stories like this and the survival techniques of Trump's victims? I am tired of the stories trying to paint nice pictures of the economically aggrieved and racist White Trump supporters!
124
Those of us who can afford it are moving our Y memberships to places that teach hardcore self-defense.
The economic hardship of most of his supporters is highly exaggerated.
1
So happy that the announcers were fired. Hopefully that was publicized to such extent that the audience listening to them with agreement and pleasure will think twice before airing such hate openly to others. How in the world can those people fail to see the humanity in others?
100
Remember, I always the state that elected the openly racist US Representative Steve King. Racism is alive and well in rural Iowa where there aren't as many minorities as there are in the urban areas. Non-white or non-Christian Iowans are the evil scary minority in the rural areas.
3
Statement of apology from the stations. I went to High School there and am so ashamed:
https://kiow.com/2017/12/04/kiow-statement-in-regards-to-video-feed-inci...
America has become so politicised that the name of a politician is being chanted at a sporting match as if it’s a team facing the other one. This is actually a sign of creeping totalitarianism- when politics take the place of other activities, games, and elements of society completely divorced from them. It is important to deal with the issues of the time- corporate greed, climate change, and inequality among the main problems with modern society- but they shouldn’t be inserted into sports matches. Sad!
86
I agree. STOP kneeling for the national anthem and inserting politics in games. OFF SUBJECT!
Why not?
Do economic injustice, racism, etc. end at the door of the local billionaire owned sports facility?
Wake up. History shows that sporting events including the killing of any perceived enemy of the ruling class goes back to Roman times. It is called diversion. Put the masses into uncomfortable places in society and give them Bread and Circus. That is our collective history. Now the question is: can we move past that history and make all people equal in law, jobs, housing, education, opportunity?
Or do we wait for the one percent to toss a bone to the masses to watch them fight each other to get a morsel? Or we can watch a sports event and make believe it is not cold outside filled with hunger and no or little hope.
Excuse me. I have to turn the channel to watch some real men fighting over a football. Ah, that is much better. Or is it?
2
They're "entertainers" too. I believe the ghost of one of our great American songwriters now lives in Paris. He's taking scalps.
Fixin To Die Rag
I appreciate the focus on younger individuals perpetuation of this racism. I think sometimes my generation, myself included, views racism as a Boomer problem and that we’re better than they are. That’s clearly not the case.
63
My parents were from the Silent Generation. As far as I’m concerned, that generation wrote the book on prejudice, bigotry, racism, religious hypocrisy, white nationalist paranoia, and idolatrous worship of the wealthy and powerful. My parents raged and hated how their chosen home of Miami, Florida, went from being a white supremacist paradise where the local sheriff routinely set dogs on blacks to a multi-cultural city where Spanish was the second-most spoken language.
I rejected my parents’ conservative ideology and became a liberal cosmopolitan with a lifelong love of learning. Tambien, apprendí como hablar un poquito de Español. (Having learned a little Spanish, I also have an enduring fascination with languages!) Unfortunately, for every person like me there are hundreds of others, perhaps thousands, who choose to march in lockstep with the ideology in which they were raised rather than think for themselves. To them, the survival of their tribe trumps (pun intended) the survival of our species as a whole.
In their ignorance, Trumpist Conservatives believe their white skin and their worship of the 1% will protect them from the social and environmental reckonings to come.
They could not be more wrong.
2
I grew up not far from Forest City and Eagle Grove, in Waterloo, IA. On Friday and Saturday nights, in the muggy heat of summer and crystalline cold of winter, my neighborhood buddies and I cruised "The Strip," 4th Street. The Cedar River, a dangerous, fast-moving brown torrent, splits the town, flowing beneath the 4th St. bridge. The East side of town was home to nearly every black family in the city. We were from the West side.
More than once, on seeing a group of black teenagers on the sidewalks or in their cars on the east side of the bridge, we yelled out the windows to chant, "Two, four, six, eight, we don't wanna integrate!" The schools on our side of the river were lily white. We had no black acquaintances, let alone friends. Today, I am ashamed I did that. But it does those kids I screamed at no good now. I can only hope, if they even registered what my friends and I yelled, they went on to live honest and honorable lives, and made a mockery of me and mine.
The intervening years and decades...the Army, basic training, Vietnam, working as a nurse in the ER of a Texas town with a black community of significant size, with black co-workers and, yes, black friends, gave me a truer perspective of those I once mocked.
To know that northeastern Iowa is little changed from those days in the mid-60s is beyond disheartening. But then, Michelle Bachmann, a generation behind me, hails from Waterloo. I can't say, with any sincerity or honesty, that I'm surprised.
845
"To know that northeastern Iowa is little changed from those days in the mid-60s is beyond disheartening."
Why "disheartening?" Don't all those decent white folks from northern Iowa, past and present, consider themselves to be good, pious Christians? Haven't they all been Saved while still holding on to their hard-hearted racism? Why, I believe they view Ms. Bachmann as an exemplar of Iowa's Evangelical community; perhaps as you describe, they all should be.
3
My father moved to the US from India 50 years ago. As I was growing up, I realized that I would never be accepted as American and would always be considered Indian because I am brown. I remember thinking this consciously when I was 10 years old, feeling saddened and realizing that there was nothing I could do about it. Years later, I was sitting in an Electrical Engineering lounge of the State University that I was attending when I heard a discussion by my white peers talking about Blacks being subhuman. I looked up and around and realized there were no black students there. I'm darker than many blacks. I was wondering why they could speak about it so openly. I was a little shocked ... yes, just a little. It was the age of Jimmy the Greek speaking about how Blacks were bred to be superior athletes and announcers would speculate about how Warren Moon didn't answer whether Blacks could play the role of QB on Nationwide TV broadcasts. Racism exists. White folks don't notice it especially the subtler variants. It was my white neighbors worried about a subway station being opened within walking distance of our homes and how this would allow inner city kids to come rob us. I was worried enough that I asked my father as our neighbors were both PhDs and were, of course, intelligent so they must be right. My father laughed it off. I thought exposure to different people would end racism. Blacks have been here since the beginning. Integration didn't help. Trumpism was always with us.
10
Although I trust that you are honest with your apology, I don't think you understand.... Yet. This feeling that the'others' would have led honest lives to prove something is itself reflective of the superiority you are feeling. Their lives are their own. You feel ashamed for your actions, regardless of the quality of lives of the person you affected.
12
I remember this movie. It was called "Beetlejuice." If you say his name three times, he appears and wreaks havoc.
52
Well, in all fairness, I use Trump's name as an epithet all the time, as in, "Don't be such a trump", or, " How trump of you", or, "When do they pick up the trump in this neighborhood?"
114
"In all fairness" many of us make private jokes, among friends, at the expense of disliked public figures. If doing so with a microphone or on the air is OK, then soon we'll have shouting matches IN the air and in airports or wherever people of differing views gather in public. Who wants their flight to get interrupted because a couple of insensitive boors don't know when to keep their mouths shut?
14
I always feel better after a good trump.
1
`How a President’s Name Became a Racial Jeer`
In my opinions, it took a lot of fake news and innuendo. In other words, some parts of the media worked hard to make this happen. As to their motive, we can only assume it`s the usual political wish to divide-and-conquer the country.
35
I assume you mean Fox News, helped by trump's own words and tweets?
57
Read the other comments and you will see it is not just the media. And why would the media be against him? The media love controversy, which he has provided in abundance -- they should love him.
13
I think Mr Trump himself wants this. His underlings encouraged this sort of chanting at this rallies and he gloated. No parts of the media had to work hard to make this happen. He wants the people of his Great America (= United States only) to hate each other -- divide and conquer.
1
There is away to rid ourselves of racist republicans like Trump. We should demand that our moderate republican representatives in congress switch parties or become independents. I live in a district that always elects republicans. I never vote republican and I have wasted my vote since 1991. My daughters graduation ceremony was tainted by a state senator who fosters voter suppression. How rude is that in Minnesota.
69
There are no "moderate Republican representatives."
Without apparent exception, all GOP reps and senators are some combination of venal, bigoted, evangelical (the very definition of bigoted hypocrisy), and/or downright crooked. None appear to have the slightest shred of ethics, morals, or compassion.
4
Breaks my heart to see what is happening in the U.S. and terrifying to see politicians here in Canada - specifically Jason Kenney of Alberta's United Conservative Party - adopting the same tactics that vaulted Trump into the White House. How did this kind of venomous behaviour become normal...become acceptable? Why are we allowing it to continue? When I look at Trump, I am amazed at just how much he looks and acts like Mussolini...that same arrogance...that same galling swagger. How the people of Italy bought into that arrogance...and how they were brought down by it. The Italians...the Germans...for decades they fought to rid themselves of the shame brought down on them by their slavish devotion to demagogues. Sad that America must now live with that same shame.
766
NOW is the time to stop it in Canada, Barb, before it can gain more traction. The International Mafia top 1% Global Financial Elite Robber Baron/Radical religion Good Old Boys' Cabal is trying to take over the world. They have already tried to take over Vancouver's housing market, which is the first step in civil disruption. The global economic system is next if WE THE PEOPLE of the world do not stop them. They want WW3 to cause chaos so they can take over while we are busy dying - and killing- for them.
4
What I feel we didn't catch and nip in the bud quickly enough was the right wing false news. I should have been calling my facebook friends out much sooner. I only have one facebook friend from Canada but she has bought into the right-wing propaganda hook line and sinker. Hopefully, Canadians will do a better job of stop it then we did. Forwarned is forearmed.
6
Please know that this venomous behavior has not become normal...and has not become acceptable. Yes it may seem that way presently due to the coverage but, I truly believe that for every one spewing hatred, there are at least twice as many to counter them. We have not forgotten the past, and will not be doomed by repeating it.
4
There is an interesting alternate use of the word Trump that I encounter occasionally: “You are so trumped, trump you, don’t trump with me.” This seems to be an attemp by those opposing the racist policies of the President to take control of the name away from the racists. Have others encountered this too?
20
The president’s name has been used as a racial taunt for well over a year. Black shoppers and workers in supermarkets and restaurants have been confronted by angry whites bragging about the president and how they voted for him, an in-your-face put-down that’s just as mean and nasty and the “n” word. The taunt has the demeaning and effect of a racial slur that is now in the verbal arsenal of racists.
Racial name baiting is nothing new in America but this president has become rightly synonymous with bigotry and intolerance. Sadly, mocking American citizens of color by this president is a pattern of behavior that he has made acceptable and to which the country has become accustomed.
81
'Sock him on the nose. Carry him out on a stretcher. If I was down there, I'd do it myself.' Remember when Trump made these proclamations are his rallies? Then he met Putin, face to face and did not have the guts to sock him on the nose for hacking our election. Perhaps this will be the new definition of "trump".
64
So chilling to listen to the commentary of the game. Instead of looking at the players as just young people on a team...instead of welcoming these kids as part of a visiting school, they are singled out. Sickening!
92
You live in a very diverse county in California. Many rural counties in Iowa are almost 100% white and Christian. Even the urban areas in Iowa are overwhelmingly white. To white people in Iowa, Hispanics, Asians, Muslims, and African-Americans can be truly "the Other".
I grew up in a small bro town in Iowa with no non-white residents. It wasn't until I moved to an urban area, that I had regular interaction with non-whites or with Hispanics.
4
Has there been any investigation into the antecedents of trump - was drumpf Nazi sympathiser? It would explain, but not excuse, a lot.
This article scares me - a lot.
41
Trump's father, Fred, was a member of the Klu Klux Klan. He was arrested in New York City as part of mass arrests at a Klan rally. Presumably, the NYT could provide the details.
3
Order the book Donald Trump in 100 Facts, which will be released 1.15.18 by Amberley Books. It discusses this and 99 other facts. Will also be on Amazon in April.
Typical Iowa, the epicenter of whiteness and void of diversity. I'm waiting for Trump to take away the farm subsidies, he has nothing in common with the the local towns, a grain elevator, ham and egger and an implement dealer. Whiteness makes them feel like they are somehow Trump's equal, foolish and naive.
77
Barkster...where does your hate come from? leave the white overworked and OVERlooked farmers out of this. Diversity is not a silver bullet... jobs, security and better education is what america needs. When did it become so important to be diverse? ever hear of the tower of Babel?? that's how a lot of people feel... please respect that.
1
You are mistaken about Iowa's diversity. Storm Lake, Iowa's public schools are more than 80 percent non-white, with 18 languages spoken. Iowa Central Community College helps residents who speak as many as 35 different native languages.
1
Trump and his father were sued by the Federal government twice in the 70's for refusing to rent to blacks.
Trump demandef death for the Central Park five, who were found to be innocent.
Birther Trump lied about the citizenship of Obama.
Trump is a racist through and through; an exemplar for other racist/haters.
155
Daddy Trump was also arrested at a Klan rally. Anybody think he was there mixing it up in opposition to the KKK?
56
Also Daddy Trump did not fight during WWII. How did he avoid the draft? He certainly wasn't doing war work. Five generations and not a single soldier for the US in any one of them. Grandpa wasn't even allowed to return to Germany in the early part of the 20th century. They knew trash when they saw it. In the boomer generation I grew up in, every single dad I knew fought in WWII. Cowardice and racism are the real Trump family heritage.
4
Not only that, the police report from that say states all arrested were in Klan costumes. #TrumpFacts
4
"Kusserow-Smidt" is not a "foreign" name ??
You have to wonder about this lady teaching anything to third graders.
79
Not anymore! She was fired....as an announcer, as a teacher!
1
A White House spokesperson: “The president condemns violence, bigotry and hatred in all its forms." No he does not, Mr. Shah. The president does no such thing. He berates entirely nationalities, taunts individual people with belittling names, and has been extremely reluctant to speak out against violence bigotry and hatred. When there is violence from the right, Trump is famous for equivocating about "good people" on "many sides", not for clearly denouncing the side of hatred. When there is violence from immigrants, Trump attacks all immigrants with the same religion or nationality. The fact that a presidential spokesperson claims that Trump does something is not evidence that he actually does that.
637
For the current White House, I don't even think their message is "truth is optional." I have yet to hear a single truth come out of anyone's mouth there. A true, honest truthful statement.
4
Actually, if a spokesperson for this president says that this president does something, it's pretty sure evidence that he does the opposite.
5
Maybe this is part of a blowback for having an African American president for 8 years? And the success of Trump might also indicate many are not ready for a woman president either. Is American society moving backwards relative to the rest of the world? I hope there will be a course correction after Trump finishes his terms.
40
Trump is not a "success"; he has not passed any legislation. He has been stopped by the Courts in his Muslim ban. His tax records will surface; then you will see the 250M loans from Russian oligarchs - laundered through the Bank of Cyprus and Deutsche Bank. He has recently been bailed out again in Florida - failed real estate ventures, suddenly purchased for the inflated price of 95M, cash flown in on a private jet. He is so in debt to Russian money; so unqualified to lead the United States as CIC, a draft dodger with fake bone spurs. He has old NYC connections to the Mob. His current state of Early Onset Dementia is no excuse; it just allows him to spew nonsense openly. And, those unemployed factory workers in the Heartland will remain unemployed, because Carrier moved its jobs to Mexico. The current Congress wants to cut unemployment benefits, in addition to not extending them. They will have to finance their own moves to where jobs are; they will have to finance their own re-training for good jobs. Clinton offered them benefits, travel expenses, and education benefits for their kids. Trump gas lighted them and they fell for it. They voted for Congress men and women who will cheat them and their children of any financial security. Then they will look to the Federal government to bail them out with taxes paid by the Coastal "elites".
3
On this flip side I remember my sister in middle school facing some backlash (she was white and the majority of students at her school were not) during the election in a similar context. Telling her she must be like him or have the same views, Trump was her daddy, and all that.
It's fascinating and disturbing that simply his name is used as a way to divide people. And please don't take this to mean that I find her isolated experience on the same level as what minorities with much to lose and much less representation face. I understand that on a macro level, her facing such ugliness is much less common than the daily discrimination faced by others who do not walk around in white skin. I just find the whole situation disheartening.
125
Trump is a weak, small man who empowers other weak, small people to follow in his footsteps.
The saddest thing for me, is that this increase in racism exposes a deeper problem in America.
We have a long road ahead.
145
Glad to hear the two announcers espousing Trump epithets were un-Trumped themselves!
Trump and his words will go down in history as a bigot.
Don't forget the following, which was reported in NYT: Trump's father came to the US from Germany. And changed their name from Drumpf, to Trump. And it was further reported that they told others they were Swedish, and not German, when they came to the US.
So, The Donald himself, at best, is merely first generation here. Further, there are aristocratic Mexican families here from the 1700s, who were in the areas of our country which became the US, which is BD&T (Before Drumpf and Trump ever came here).
Using Trump's "fake" theories, those Mexican families pre-date Trump, and have more right to be here than him! How about that!
54
Not only that - I've read that the average African American has longer roots in the US than the average white American.
32
Donald Trump's father was born in the US, his grandfather emigrated from Germany. Their name was changed to Trump in the 17th century while still in Germany. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Trump
8
Forget his father, what about his mother? She was a Scottish immigrant. I'd call him a first generation Scotsman, but that'd be unkind to the Scots, especially since he seems to think their country is one big golf course.
2
You ain’t seen nothing yet. When republicans start losing because of the increase of blacks voting, maybe Trump but definitely his supporters will say, are we going to let blacks vote us out. I personally, am not sticking around for that.
8
The only things more despicable than Trump himself are those who support and/or enable Trump.
116
Took you a long time to write this story. This was a reality here in California the morning after the Nov’16 elections.
55
And for months before the election in western PA...
The day after Charlottesville it was now obvious. Obvious to anyone in America without white skin that they are on their own. They knew for certain after Trump’s remarks that President of the United States does not have their backs protected.
And for neo-nazis, white supremacist hate groups, and the KKK it was a huge moment, watching Trump speak about Charlottesville. They were ecstatic, emboldened and found comfort and safety in Trump’s remarks.
78
Allow me to amend that. It was obvious to anyone, right from the start of his campaign, regardless of skin color or affiliation.
2
Mr. Trump came to poison the American psyche, and the Republicans rejected 17 alternatives to select him. Now that poison has spilled everywhere, and like India ink, it is impossible to wash out.
I know of two uses of the name "Trump", one is the one described in this article; the other is used as a pejorative against a thin-skinned, childish, idiotic person, who just is incapable of taking advice. The usual usage in that manner is as a dismissive "Okay, Mr. Trump," uttered to the person fitting the description. Either way, Mr. Trump is unique among American presidents, or perhaps that should be American "presidents".
23
When one is racist, everything associated with him become racially sensitive.
His tweets certifies them
20
It would be great if white nationalists decided to secede from our country and form their own country. The nationalists are a disgrace to our great DIVERSE country.
33
The Hispanic youth club met in my classroom the day after the election. One of my students wandered the hallways before class started chanting Trumps name like his team won a football game. They had to walk past this kid (by thid time silenced, but the words had been said) who honestly had no concept of the fear they felt as they entered my room. They sat in silence for a while and then a kid asked where another student was, and another kid piped up to say that they had stayed home out of fear. A kid half-jokingly said that he didn't know what would happen since his parents weren't from America. A normally boisterous and lively group made shellshocked and numb. I don't talk politics with students, it's out of line in my opinion, but I felt my eyes start to sting as they talked about it. I told them that not everybody agrees with what happened, and that you have to remember that someone else win the popular vote, that means the majority didn't agree. I heard many adults say how happy they were that he won that day, and I wished so badly they could see the fear and despair those teens felt. Whether you wanted to or not you sent out a strong message that these human beings are not wanted.
I have on multiple occasions heard Trump's name used as a racial slur. It's clear by the context of the conversation, but we live in a world where the highest office of our country is operated by a known bigot, and how do you tell a kid not to say the president's name?
576
Trump is President. He is a bigot. He announced his bigotry openly on the day he declared. He was voted in by the Electoral college. Even if he lost the popular vote, over 60 million voted for him. I still don't understand why. I've boycotted Facebook because I am friends with folks who voted for Trump. I asked why and they said Hillary was unacceptable but I don't see how Trump could be viewed as a better choice.
6
The name Trump is an ethical, moral slur.
8
I'm afraid K, that those adults happy with Trump's election that you mention would most likely gloat in satisfaction and approval on seeing "the fear and despair those teens felt."
5
I just do not know how we are going to put this back into the bottle. I just don't know if we can.
89
The problem has always been that a great many people either didn't know "the problem" existed or thought it was was bottled-up. It existed and it came out often. There's never been a bottle for many of us.
In 1950, I was a Spanish- and English-speaking white-looking kid in 1st grade in a California school. The principal told my mother I'd either have to "forget" Spanish or "go back where I came from" -- I was born in a clinic that was 2 blocks from that very school. (And I never forgot Spanish OR English.)
1
You can't, with a Republican majority in both houses, but the way forward is clear and it's up to you and your fellow citizens to save your country in 2018 and 2020.
2
There is a fog of hate that has descended on our country. Its grip is tight and it is terrifying and depressing and it chokes all hope. We have found that our democratic institutions are fragile and have been bent to the breaking point; our values and commitments to what is right, just and honorable are shallow. And we are passing all of this on to our youth -- teaching them that this is America. How did we get here and how ever will we recover?
58
And in bridge, these days, the most popular bid is "no trump".
14
There's an endemic cruelty and divisiveness among 14-year-old boys that many grow out of as they mature emotionally. Those that remain developmentally stuck in this adolescent snarl well into adulthood (and in the case of our groper in chief, even to age 71) find a community of kindred spirits within today's Republican Party. See also: Bannon, Stephen K.
Trump is the living embodiment of every American bad habit. Racism, misogyny, narcissism, anti-intellectualism, greed; it's all there. No wonder the dark corners of our society where these bad habits are nurtured were so thrilled with his election. The nastiest ids are convinced that conditions are ripe to come out into the sunlight. Know them when you see them, and know they will soon be soundly defeated by the rest of us who chose to grow up.
79
"You never let a serious crisis go to waste. And what I mean by that it's an opportunity to do things you think you could not do before." Rahm Emanuel
A primary mode of Arsonist-in-Chief Trump is to set fires and stand back to see what happens: sabotaging the Paris Climate Accords, NAFTA, Iran Nuclear Treaty, TPP, NATO, Jerusalem, North Korea, EPA, Obamacare, the Federal budget, social programs, the Internet, key Senate races and more. He has no end game in mind, just breaking things to see what happens.
His White Nationalist agenda is no different. He has no end game in mind other than fomenting anger and chaos to fuel adoration of him.
But if Rahm is right, well then, opportunities abound. When issues smolder unspoken just beneath the surface, it is hard to mobilize resistance. But when a provocateur like Trump blows these issues blow up, they are much harder to ignore. The popular term "share of mind" perhaps applies here.
And when someone like Trump takes on so many areas of common and community interest at once, the resistance effect is amplified.
Who knows, maybe resistance and leadership from black women, who often have the highest voter turnout, will inspire others to vote. If that would happen, the stranglehold the GOP has over too much of America can be broken in places like Texas, Arizona, Florida and Wisconsin.
This is the worst nightmare of the GOP. Any wonder there are so many "retirements"?
45
I'm not quite sure using a quote from Rahm Emanuel is the best way to begin. Here's a man, that as mayor of Chicago, did his utmost to keep under wraps the blatant murder of Laquan McDonald, shot 16 times by Chicago police officer Jason Van Dyke, until after his bid for re-election was over. As one who believes in democratic principles, I sometimes find those chosen to represent us and the ideals, are not worthy of that distinction. For me, Emanuel certainly falls into that category.
10
But still, the quote is a good one.
2
The new America, where any boy or girl if they study hard at school, apply themselves at work and live a good and wholesome life, may one day grow up to be a racial slur. God bless us everyone.
29
Nailed it.
10
During the campaign, almost every Trump utterance was a lie (and that has of course continued into his so-called presidency) and almost every statement Hillary made was the truth. The fact that the electoral college winning minority of voters preferred the liar to the truth teller is a deeply disturbing fact that we as a country will have to come to grips with. The hallmarks of the campaign however were the one truth told by Trump and a half truth told by Hillary:
Trump:"I Could Stand In the Middle Of Fifth Avenue And Shoot Somebody And I Wouldn't Lose Any Voters"
Hillary:"You know, to just be grossly generalistic, you could put half of Trump's supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. Right? The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic -- you name it. And unfortunately there are people like that. And he has lifted them up. He has given voice to their websites ... He tweets and retweets their offensive hateful mean-spirited rhetoric. Now, some of those folks -- they are irredeemable, but thankfully they are not America."
HIllary's mistake was that the number of deplorables among Trump voters was way more than half.
Thankfully, Hillary's words that "they are not America" is absolutely true. Too much of America sat back and was content, or believed there was no difference between the parties, and didn't vote. But Trump voters are not America, and as we are seeing we are content no longer. The tide is turning. Even in Alabama. Enough is enough.
122
Hillary's mistake was she openly told the truth about the deplorables.
43
On the contrary, Trump supporters make up about one-half of America and that is what makes him, his supporters, and a despicable Republican congress so dangerous and scary. That group now controls the nation and if they are able to solidify their control the other half of America is in for a vicious reckoning.
2
The bit after the oft-quoted section of Clinton's words:
"But the other basket -- and I know this because I see friends from all over America here -- I see friends from Florida and Georgia and South Carolina and Texas -- as well as, you know, New York and California -- but that other basket of people are people who feel that the government has let them down, the economy has let them down, nobody cares about them, nobody worries about what happens to their lives and their futures, and they're just desperate for change. It doesn't really even matter where it comes from. They don't buy everything he says, but he seems to hold out some hope that their lives will be different. They won't wake up and see their jobs disappear, lose a kid to heroin, feel like they're in a dead-end. Those are people we have to understand and empathize with as well."
The bull text of her comments:
http://beta.latimes.com/nation/politics/trailguide/la-na-trailguide-upda...
In the speech, Clinton outlined what her administration would do to protect the LGBT community from discrimination and violence. It's a beautiful speech: wise, compassionate, inclusive. Presidential. Re-reading it reinforces my pride in Hillary Clinton and her supporters, but at the same time, it makes me sick. Because what we have now is so much less.
3
When Trump announced his candidacy it was hard to take it seriously. When he lashed out at Mexicans and Muslims it was hard to believe he would go far. When he insulted John McCain and a disabled journalist it seemed absurd that America would vote for him. When he incited violence at his rallies it was proof he was dangerous and couldn't get elected. And when he boasted of sexually assaulting women it seemed inconceivable he could win.
His victory was shocking, but as President he's been even worse than we imagined. His presidency has revealed the ugly side of America, which he continues to milk for all it's worth.
One day Trump will no longer be president, and the nation can begin to heal. That is, if we still have a nation.
103
Trump himself does nothing to fight against racism. No surprise there. But it disturbs me that no one -- no one -- in the Republican Party does, either. The entire party is content to ride along with the racist tide. As long as they get to cut their taxes, Trumpism is OK by them. After Trump is gone, some Republicans will say they never REALLY supported him -- but that will be a lie. Right now, Trumpism = GOP ---- GOP = Trumpism. Shame on them.
82
It's a whole lot worse than shame. It's a tragedy bigger than 9/11.
3
There is another insidious, perhaps more important, issue here: taunts like these serve to constantly undermine minorities, immigrants, and those who are non-white that they are not considered a part of their own country. They are second class and how dare they think about competing with the white folks. This is a psychological abuse on these populations.
Imagine if this is in liberal, progressive, New England state of Connecticut; to what degree is this done in other parts of the country? And to what extent does it serve to deter minorities and immigrants who otherwise are qualified, but cannot overcome the emotional barrier put up by a society?
Finally, one can logically deduce that this visceral reaction displayed in games, is possibly also exercised in reality under layers when considering career promotions by those in power; making the barrier of entry artificially higher for minorities & immigrants.
Corporations are just opening their eyes towards abuse to women. This was not a surprise and everyone knew the hypocrisy that women faced; yet it takes until 2017 to faithfully back words with actions to start.
So when will my fellow citizens realize the barrage of insensitivity and abuse that minorities, immigrants, & even those who just look different face?
Look at me - I am every bit as American as you. My dreams, aspirations, aims, and even frustrations are the same as you. All I want are the same chances and considerations as you. Why does that anger you?
39
It doesn't. But if you were here without the courtesy of going through the proper procedures, I might not feel the same way. Come and be known, just like me; be my friend and kind neighbor, and I welcome you. Come and isolate yourself in communities composed of persons of your former country and culture, with "no-drive" zones, and I might not feel as welcoming. I think the wrong message gets out from media, that dark skinned immigrants are some kind of problem. That is not what I see or feel. The "immigration problem," in my mind, comes from people being here illegally and under the radar (with all the attendant exploitation and crime), from moving language and culture intact from where one came and then insisting everyone move over for it, and essentially creating foreign zones within the US. At least when I search myself, that is what I find. These seem to be more cultural conflicts than racial ones. We are all human beings but we don't all act alike. It is just human for "difference" to produce some level of fear and anxiety, even as it stimulates growth, complexity and beauty. I think we will all be OK in the long run.
I am 67 and a continuing student of the second world war.
And, until recently, I would ask myself -- how could the Germans let Nazism happen to their country? How could they allow the violence and hatred that sprang up in their nation to drive the deaths of millions and millions of 'others.'
I don't scratch my head over that time any more. I'm seeing it first-hand in my
own country.
But it's hard to take in nonetheless.
My parents -- a father who stormed Omaha on D-Day+1 and my mother who grew up in the cotton fields of rural Texas during the Great Depression -- would literally roll over in their graves.
110
I don't scratch my head or question Germans any more after I have seen what is happening in Turkey under AKP.Civility, respect for law, for difference of opinion, way of life, religion all gone.When the leader of the country starts to insult, to use 'strong' language and to incite an 'us and them' attitude, it starts to reflect on others.At best, they decide to shed civility, even as a veneer.
4
No one should be surprised. This justification of bigotry started the moment he descended down that escalator. And it only got worse with his every utterance and bigoted gesture. Some ignorant bigoted citizens always existed in our society, but they were reluctant to express themselves so vocally. That's all changed with this President.
298
If you remember what happened with the Central Park jogger and what Trump said in the ads he took out it's definitely not a surprise. It is disappointing however that a country composed largely of immigrants and their descendants (a good number of whom came here for a better life) buy into his statements about immigrants and making America Great Again. Then again, ignorance is capable of fomenting many kinds of tragedies.
4
What was pretty surprising is the number. How many of your fellow citizens? More than 50 million I think voted for him. Not unique to the US though. I feel ashamed that 17 million of my fellow citizens in the UK voted to tear up 40 years of European Citizen membership, with much of the same bigotry and animosity towards our EU friends. Hate is now legitimised in the US and the UK. Both countries have gone backwards and have lost their moral leadership. It's very sad.
4
"The two have expressed deep regret for their comments, which they said did not reflect who they truly were."
I would guess that what they say in the privacy of their homes is much, much worse. If it walks like a racist and quacks like a racist, it's almost assuredly a racist.
62
He never should have been elected in the first place. This "thing" that the name "Trump" represents is a volatile reaction to Obama and his tenure as the first black president, and everything that represents. A more balanced, less bigoted, sexist and racist America. And the white supremest mindset is pushing back. My hope is that this hatred fizzles out and that the better part of human nature recaptures the mantle before it's too late.
25
Racial attitudes and bad behavior by those against the other are not unlike sexual behavior. Those who talk about the other are usually afraid to admit their own failings or prejudices. We are dealing with that from the top down in this country, and it is abhorrent!
15
The hate will be the only legacy left by the Grifter.
54
Its simple. At some point, Rush and Hanity convinced republican conservatives that the ultimate goal of a modern conservative is to make a liberal angry. They say the most morally outrageous things possible, and when a liberal's hair gets on fire, the republican leaning trolls proudly proclaim, "I did that".
Republicans are trolls. Trump is the ultimate troll. Barry Goldwater turned over in his grave. Reagan too.
31
The majority of American voters decisively rejected Trump. He is President only due to the Republican Party Electors, which is built upon Nixon's racist Southern Strategy and installed this uninformed hate-spewing race-baiter in the White House defying the clearly expressed will of the majority of voters.
to make clear to the young basketball player from Mason City and his family that of course we are glad they are part of America, may all Americans of good will rise up and vote the destructive Republican party out of office from the local to the national level in the next election and reclaim what actually is both good and great about America.
45
Perhaps it is time for the coach to remind his players of three great basketball players: Wilt Chamberlain, Michael Jordan and Charles Barkley.
2
Became a racial jeer? The first words out of Trump''s mouth were about imaginary "Mexican rapists."
Enough of these haters. They need to blame others for their failed lives, a very sad bunch.
38
I wonder Mr. Trump will retweet this article in his next tweet with his benighted comments.
3
This will all change once the Trump Presidency phenomenon has run its course. People will forget about it and do something else. Remember when George Bush Jr. got elected? We thought the sky would fall.
3
Didn't it?
9
Didn't it?
7
Racism is wrong. Period. This is not Henny Penny.
15
I teach social studies in an ethnically diverse metropolitan school district in the reddest of states, Oklahoma. I witnessed first hand the taunts made by students during the election. What really surprised me wasn't the taunts by white students such as,"Trump, Trump, Trump" or "build that wall" directed toward Hispanics but that the black students joined in on the taunting as well. I tried to connect as best as I could by telling them the stories of xenophobia my own ancestors suffered during World War I and II as German speaking Mennonite pacifists but I felt ill-equipped to deal with the level of vitriol I was seeing levelled by white and African-American students against Mexicans. They just could not see themselves in the "other". My heart was sick as I tried (and continue to try) to reassure my students as they express genuine fear in the age of Trump that not everyone is against them. A year later, the taunts are still heard and I do everything I can to address them, but I must admit I sometimes feel powerless against such a tide of hate.
316
Gary....hang in there.
I know it's not easy, but your good efforts must continue to reach even one reasonable mind that is open to your sense of reason and compassion....even in Oklahoma.
41
Keep fighting the good fight, Gary in Oklahoma. There are kids for whom you make all the difference. Every lifted voice lifts the discourse.
5
Short sightedness is typical of the fearful. Fear is the engine driving our tribalism. I am ashamed that my party is capitalizing on this worst instinct.
4
It's the call of a species dying of its own fear and insularity.
26
Trump is a magnet for fear in all it's manifestations and his pathology
thrives on that putrid magnetism.
My prayer is that we- the majority of people in this country- will continue to stay awake, use our votes, voices and resources to overcome this Trump/Republican blight.
In the meantime- let's be grateful for the work of Robert Mueller and his staff.
50
I pray for their safety and succes.
10
It is simple how these things happen, very ignorant and non thinking people do these sorts of things, on both sides.
9
Sorry to break it to you, but one side clearly has a monopoly on "ignorant and non thinking people," as evidenced by the election of our pathetic President.
2
This is Naziism, pure and simple. There’s only one way to combat it, and that’s to win elections—while there’s still time. The formula has been set in Alabama and Virginia. We must forgo this empty debate about people of color versus white moderates. BOTH were needed to win in Alabama and Virginia, and BOTH will be needed to win the House and Senate in 2018.
Jim Messina was Obama’s 2012 campaign manager. In a recent Politico piece, he argued that President Obama won twice by courting both. In part, here’s what he wrote:
"I want to reiterate that Democrats don’t need to adopt an either/or strategy, treating support from each group as though it’s mutually exclusive. Barack Obama won two presidential elections because he focused on both, and going forward, Democrats would be wise to remember the lesson of his example." http://tinyurl.com/y7hvo8fy
169
This is it folks; the battle to be won is at the ballot box.
Trump may be the underbelly of our country, but if we, who see things differently, don’t vote we have no one to blame but ourselves.
14
It's important to realize that Trump did not create hatred, racism and bigotry in America.. He enabled it and made it acceptable for the deplorable to crawl out from under their rocks. This is the new reality and they will not return.
140
Your first half is correct, the second is idiotic. Many Trump supporters totally are against these radicals.
8
And let's not forget that there has been some 50 years of racism against Caucasians. Legislated and enforced by the US Feds. Granted it's now where near as bad as what went on with other races it's been there. These bigots have been around forever and nothing will make them go away.
2
I did not say that all Trump supporters are racists, only that he enabled those who already harbor racism.
7
Will bridge and pinochle adherents need to change eon old trump designation in their card games to avoid cursing at the card table?
9
The antidote for this resurgence and vocalization of racial hatred is for all good men and women to register to vote and the vote in each an every election that comes up on the calendar from school budget, to town council, to congress and, of course, for President of the United States. But there is more, each of us should reach ot to friends and family across the nation and urge them to likewise register to vote and then vote. Let us not be distracted from our fundamental obligation to participate fully in our democratic electoral process. RAK
27
I agree. The road to change runs through ballot boxes at every level. In my own extended family there is strengthened commitment to vote in every election--local, state, national; and I suspect our family is not unique in the wake of what is happening both in and to our democracy. We are eager for the November 2018 mid-term election; and if my reading of our family is accurate, not a single vote will be cast for any Republican candidate.
15
The story says: “The president condemns violence, bigotry and hatred in all its forms, and finds anyone who might invoke his or any other political figure’s name for such aims to be contemptible,” Raj Shah, a White House spokesman, said." I would suggest more like a "promotion" than a "condemnation" on the Presidents' part.
16
Mr. Trump has managed to poison political discourse for an entire generation of Americans -- perhaps many generations. This will be his most lasting 'contribution' to the ongoing conversation that is America. It's a horrid legacy and a shameful one. And the Republican Party -- from top to bottom -- has been complicit in that poisoning. Shame on them. Vote them out.
465
Beautifully put.
4
There is opportunity in this country for anyone willing to strive for it. Anyone who feels that someone is taking away their opportunity is mistaken and is not striving for their own opportunity. Be accountable for your own success or failure; the latter is not because someone took the opportunity from you. Life is not a zero-sum game. Ignorance, especially in the form of racism and sexism, is a zero-sum game. Succeeding at someone's detriment is ignorant.
9
There is injustice. Trump is not the answer to it.
2
New Yorkers have seen this before. When Giuliani was mayor, police aggression and brutality towards blacks and Hispanics exploded, with some officers intimidating minorities by saying, "It's Giuliani time!" Now, with the Destroyer of American Ideals in the White House, it's become national. Trump absolutely supports bigotry in all its forms, and it's only right his name should become the rant of choice.
46
Economic downturns can lead to this kind of scapegoating. It needs to be stopped. If builders and developers are hiring cheap labor, the labor is not at fault; they are being exploited. If Big Ag is hiring cheap labor, the cheap labor is not at fault; they are being exploited. Trump and the current Congress will exploit all of us; they are an equal opportunity Mafia. Hitler promised full employment; he achieved it with a massive military build up. Trump cannot do this; he cannot support corporate government and put people to work at the same time. The current corporate donor owned Congress cannot run a consumer economy on widgets. Americans don't need more widgets; they need jobs paying a living wage with benefits.
2
In any measurable category of a sane, rational, civilized society, the Trump regime is setting us back years and doing major damage. Clean air? No thanks. Meritocracy? No thank you, we are kleptocratic. Women's rights? See "Access Hollywood". Children? No, forget the "Dreamers" AND funding public education AND the CHIP. Tolerance for other religions and ethnicities? No, because that requires keeping your brain turned on. The Constitution? Forget that, fake news!
As a white male in this country, I feel awful and embarrassed for the behavior and people that put this wannabe, orange tyrant in office and I feel awful that his name is now a rallying cry for racism. I'm sorry non-white, non-male America. Truly sorry.
97
I’m sorry for all of this. Remember that Trump has just uncorked the wine that has been fermenting since the Donor Class planted its vineyards with Reagan’s help.
2
Trump has made bullying not only OK but applaudable, a route to success.
This is just one way his disgraceful transgressing of civic norms is harming our society.
50
I really have to laugh that Ms. Kusserow-Smith and Mr. Harris say their comments did not reflect who they truly were. Who do they think they are fooling, at 63 and 76 years old respectively, it's exactly who they are, two old racists. They felt emboldened by a president that has made many racist comments. The only regret they really have, is that [he] didn't come to their rescue.
404
Agreed. It is always utterly baffling to me that people caught making bigoted statements can somehow try to claim that the comments don't reflect who they are. Yes, what people say is a a reflection of how they think and who they are. Kusserow-Smidt and Harris are racists, pure and simple.
30
"Who do they think they are fooling, at 63 and 76 years old respectively, it's exactly who they are, two old racists." --Michael Kelly of Kauai
Whether intended or not, this remark associates being old with being racist. So skip the "old," dagnabbit. They are just racists.
3
I have some advice for those subjected to this taunt: say it back and in their faces. Those who say it seriously are without redemption; it's fruitless to contort ourselves to give them credit for humanity that they just don't have. The taunt's sole intent is to antagonize. But what if it empowers you instead? The purpose of saying it back would not be to shut them up, not to grieve their hatred, ignorance, or stupidity. No, the purpose is to taunt them back. The word itself is meaningless and powerless, like saying Beetlejuice three times and expecting Michael Keaton to show up. Their intent is what matters, and YOUR intent is what matters. Saying it back, you rob it of its significance to them, and to you; you shine a light on its meaninglessness. And let's stop expecting them to be reasonable. These are shameless, hateful people, and neither will we bargain with our values.
36
In our family the name Trump has taken on an increasingly popular meaning. It's my son's job to clean up the dog Trump in the backyard. Last week when I came home from work my wife said "Take a shower. You smell like Trump!" And just this morning when I told my kids to hurry up my 6-year-old yelled "Dad, I gotta take a Trump first!" I guess that with all the Trump happening in the world today, and so much Trump coming from the White House, we should expect to be up to our noses in Trump.
188
Thanks much, Steve, for a few moments of out-loud smiles your little note has given me!
11
Thank you for that. Your family is very humorous and right on point!
11
Bless you. I will now adopt this term into our family.
11
Radio announcers saying hatefull, racist things about high school kids.
Classy.
41
"Trump" is a racist epithet. His bigotry has been used to encourage and inflame racism across the globe. He has set humanity back fifty years. I am profoundly ashamed of our country for electing him.
255
Only half of eligible voters voted and only 46% of those people elected him: about 57 million people. His approval rating is at 37%, where it's been around for months, so at least some of those people are showing buyers remorse.
The point is not that you shouldn't feel shame (I understand the feeling). The point is that you should at least feel some hope that he not popular among most people and probably never will be. Feel pride in your fellow Americans who resist him, and support them, and never ever tolerate fascist or racist apologetics, even if they come from the mouths of people you care about. Be strong.
11
The electoral college put him in office after disregarding the duty that the founding fathers had assigned them.
3 million more voters voted for Clinton.
Let us be more accurate that saying he was elected. He is president because of how the Constitution was written, but he was not elected. Clinton was.
4
"We" did not elect him; we voted for Clinton by a margin of 3M votes. The gerrymandered Electoral College from key States elected Trump. This needs to be addressed. We need a national popular vote for President, as they have in Europe. As a voter from a State of 33M population, I resent the corrupt Electoral College.
2
As a citizen of another country close by I find it difficult to believe such a person got to be Commander in Chief as president. He continues to say very negative things about a country that has the bombs and the way to deliver them. He bad mouth's people born in the US as dangerous. He is the danger. If he gets mad enough, to start a shooting war it will affect the rest of us as well. There must be some way tp dump him
25
You get your views from this newspaper that is why you are confused. The choice was Hillary, much worse.
5
I can't help but won
Death To America, Yankee Go Home. . . It’s not like it never happened before Trump came along.
7
That's a false equivalency. Rallies with those chants were in another country and directed toward the United States in a broad manner.
The Trump chants are used by Americans against fellow Americans.
37
Way to not get the point.
24
Adults, real adults, are supposed to model the behavior that kids will see as acceptable for the society. If our leaders engage in the most vitriolic, divisive speech, how can we expect children to behave decently? This is intolerable.
Parents and elders, consider what kind of people you want in your lives and draw the lines at what is or isn't acceptable.
To paraphrase a former First Lady, raise your kids to Just Say No to intolerance and petty cruelty.
217
Parents set the example and the boundaries, not some others. Not the president, not this news paper, parents.
5
You clearly don't have kids or understand what kids witness and understand.
18
I feel like my father when enough is enough. He would quote Popeye:
' That's all i can stands cause i can't stands no more'.....
2
Racism was what first gave Trump traction in the 2016 campaign, and he only encouraged it. He has a decades-long history of casual racism (in housing, in casinos). His support of birtherism was a cultivation of racism, he was quite happy with the anti-Semitic Hillary meme which went out in his name. He began his administration with religious bigotry -- the Muslim ban. There's no end to it.
A few words from "the White House" criticizing a few instances of Trump-affiliated hatred are not even on the right track -- they are just providing cover, and, frankly, journalists who just report those words without pressing Trump or his flacks further are not doing their job.
If Trump truly wants to clear his name: (a) he will show he understands what the issue is by apologizing specifically for the racism and bigotry he's encouraged; (b) he will be consistent in condemning it.
31
I have always found the chant of "U.S.A.!" to serve the same purpose.
37
Depends on the circumstance. It's not a strictly racial chant unless it is intended to be.
2
The people of a country are its true treasure, we need to value everyone and have the whole country sparkle their best.
8
Remember a few years ago when people were saying racism was over?
I am white, live in Texas, and know a lot of white people who just don't believe racism is a serious issue these days. It's total willful blindness.
Harboring and expressing hatred changes your psyche, your view of the world, and your behaviors, and limits the amount of friendly and loving relationships you might enjoy. Even lesser forms of bigotry, like seemingly benign, unquestioned biases, diminish life by concealing opportunities for friendship, romance, valuable business partners, etc.
91
It is relative. Nobody is being lynched, almost nobody is being denied employment, eating at a resturant, staying at a hotel, etc. So that racism is almost gone.
2
I call it a lynching when an unarmed black man with his hands in the air is shot by a cop.
5
Two days after the election, I was walking across the Cornell campus where I teach. I had been in the school paper the day before for having canceled classes and held discussions instead. A group of white male students, all seated in a circle outside Goldwyn Smith called, "Hey Professor Law!" When I turned around, they all started jeering, "TRUMP TRUMP TRUMP." It felt really horrible.
253
Well when you are arrogant and lose sometimes people respond inappropriately.
4
Some of your students claim you have a good sense of humor; not on this occasion.
And why cancel a lecture about Japan, because someone you dont like win an election, are you not paid to teach?
8
Jane Marie Law: those students were trained by their parents to behave so abominably. Good luck trying to turn around twenty years of that sort of indoctrination. I know - I’ve been teaching for forty years.
4
His real surname is 'Drumpf'. His grandfather changed it to 'Trump' so that it would look more American, but changing the name doesn't change the reality.
234
Thank you for that explanation. I had been told by several people that it had been Schicklgruber, but apparently that was just a rumor.
3
A few years ago I dated a man whose grandparents, of German origin, grew up in the Midwest. He told me how during and after WW1 and WW2, many German families changed their last names to avoid the stigma of being German, even if their families had immigrated generations ago. Some German-Americans then were beat up, placed in internment camps, denied jobs, shunned by their community, etc. although they were less identifiable overtly because they blended into white America. This was most evidence on the gravestones in cemetaries, where names changed in family plots during those years. I'm sure Trump's family changed their last names from Drumpf for the same reason yet DJT can't seem to get through his thick skull that what he is doing now is what his ancestors suffered from decades earlier.
5
"The two have expressed deep regret for their comments, which they said did not reflect who they truly were." Oh yes it did. Of course it did. Why do people think they can make flagrantly racist statements and then say "I'm not really racist, I don't really talk like that," right after doing exactly that? It's because they are convinced that they are good people, and that therefore they can't be racist, no matter how much they may sterotype and despise people of other groups.
617
...when somebody shows you who they really are, believe them the first time.
26
In the book "Strangers in Their Own Land," the author recounted how some Louisiana residents who were highly prejudiced did not think they were racist, because they did not use the N-word.
2
This story alone should be enough to get the man removed from the Presidency.
151
Sorry, but that's not how it works.
8
Trump does not behave as a legitimate president. He is primarily a sympathizer and champion of white nationalist causes, using the bully pulpit of the presidency to amplify his rallying calls and rationalizations. That is why there is no comparison between Trump and legitimate presidents. He is not trying to be one.
118
The Bully in the Pulpit.
A Cult of Sadism.
23
Frightening development...Along with false news/claims to counter opposing views, attacking people for being different than you is very disturbing. It runs counter to what America is about.
America is about the Norman Rockwell image/idea of tolerance, acceptance for all races, genders, religions and nationalities. That is what makes America great not divisive comments about denigrating the next guy because he looks different ....and you feel threatened because of your insecurity. We unfortunately have a government that is running amok encouraging destructive forces reminiscent of the Third Reich, appealing to the violence of a disenfranchised segment in our society. Let's make sure that our insecurities do not get the best of us.
A President leads by taking the high ground by instilling a positive life invigorating world view ...sorely lacking in our present administration.
For all his attempt to be loved by his country, Trump appeals to the worst in us.
We must make sure that each of us everyday appreciate and understand what truly makes us great... what Joseph Nye, at the Kennedy school of Government calls America's biggest asset, our Soft Power. That moral center of individual rights, the Rule of Law that everybody gets a fair chance at justice no matter what color, religion, gender or nationality.
Let's not go to the Dark side.
17
What I find astonishing about all this racism and xenophobia from Trump and his followers is that they are originating from the exclusionary rhetoric and bias of a man whose own mother was an immigrant and whose children have immigrant mothers. Trump, Don Jr, Ivanka, Barron are all first generation Americans. Who are they to tell anyone to go back where they came from? Some of the people who are targets of racist taunts have longer histories in this country than the ones taunting them. When will these racist, nationalist efforts to debase this country come to an end?
816
Not to mention his immigrant wife.
34
But they are not BROWN first generation.
26
It is not immigration itself that bothers Mr. Trump, it is the color and economic position of the immigrants that annoy him and scare his followers. If most immigration applicants were Swedish and middle class, Mr. Trump and friends would not have an issue.
33
This is a fantastically well-written article.
45
When saying the name of your highest elected official can be used as hate speech...
It is a metaphor for the vicious divisiveness of our political climate today. But POTUS invites the association of his name and incites the racial character of his supporters.
63
What's happened to "Iowa nice"? When Hillary Clinton referred to a "basket of deplorables" - she shouldn't have said it - but the the reality is that its more like a truckload than a basket. Even here in Iowa!
376
She said it. She meant it.
8
reply to Faroutlier2, Iowa City:
One of my first experiences with "Iowa nice" came by way of news in early 1989 about a murder of a tatooed biker in a small central Iowa town just after I'd moved to Omaha. The man had moved to Iowa about a year before, had some rag-taggle friends visiting now and then but no other contacts, kin. Locals' response to his murder (found dead in his house several days after death): "Well, he wasn't one of us." No nothing else, no other comments of interest, surprise, concern. Just, "Well, he wasn't one of us."
Made me wonder if I really wanted to live there (Omaha) after all, never mind good job, etc.
20
She was right.
15
When the White House is presenting guidelines for how to use the President's name, you know you are looking at Over-Control and Over-Reach!
13
"The President condemns violence,, bigotry and hatred in all its forms."
No he does not. He actually foments it in all its forms. His supporters who are responsible for these racial and ethnic attacks and harassment are not misunderstanding his messages and his cues. They are following them. The above statement from the White House is simply a lie, in keeping with the steady stream of them that emanates from the pathological liar that lives there.
764
The Orwellian presidency.
No wonder he excoriates the Free Press. Which gets in the way of his up is down spokespeople.
27
Yes, it's lie after lie after lie from President Duplicitous and Disingenuous, the biggest fraud and greatest gaslighter in the history of this country.
That he continues to command the support of even 32% in some polls is now beyond my comprehension. I know there are extreme levels of poverty and deprivation to be found in many (if not most) parts of the country by why have those who have been so deprived or for a variety of reasons have failed to succeed turned to a film-flam man; a huckster whom they must have realised was going to treat them as he has always treated his creditors, his staff, his contractors. He was always going to stiff them.
5
spokestrolls. not people.
4
Trump with the help of Bannon, the neo-Nazis and Fox "news" has become an eponym for divisive racial hatred and religious bigotry. Our problem is, he's the President and so he debases us all.
204
...and a national JOKE!!!
28
Think you mean inter-national.
13
I feel like this article could simply be three words: because he's racist.
58
See Germany, 1930s. Duh.
128
I followed the "riffing" link and was able to hear to full content. The apology they issued is not nearly enough, those two need to be fired. Anything less says it is tolerated.
26
They both were fired. I will avoid the link, don't need that stuff in my head.
11
All Americans except Native Americans are descended from immigrants or are immigrants.We should all remember this.
This rich melting pot of culture , skills and talent made America great and the way to make America better and greater is to build on and embrace this precious heritage and build on it.
As I write I am watching the " lost inaugural ball" for JFK and reflecting on the inspiration of JFK compared to the division of DJT.
My heart bleeds for this country
117
Outside of a portion of Africa, it seems that people everywhere are descended from immigrants. The generations who stay in an area a long time have the opportunity to create rich cultures that are attached to the land they inhabit. The modern Americans that dominate the way of life in the United States are descended from intruders who first appeared on the continent a relatively short time ago and never became one with the land. Every generation has struggled to define what it means to be an "American." Now, it seems, there being no deep and meaningful answer to the question, many have resorted to defining who is not their idea of a proper American and attacking those people for having their own answers.
16
The jeer is not racial alone
What about the nuclear zone,
Climate change denial
Tweets that are vile
In talking to Women, the tone.
The exaggeration and the lies
The words like "bigly" we despise,
The sheer racist hate
That does not abate
The locks that his hairdo comprise.
120
@Larry Eisenberg: Glad to hear from you....Great as usual!
27
Larry, one of your best.
2
As I reach my 60's I keep wondering when that day will come that our country truly gets past race as a form of social, economic, and educational exclusion. It is truly saddening how politicians like Trump are able to use such bias as wedge issues to invoke tribal allegiance and get more votes. When kids in High School can invoke a politician's name as a form of saying they are better than others, then you know we still have a long way to go. Its a reflection on parenting and our educational system in the United States that still remains as segregated as when Brown versus the Board of Education was decided by our Supreme Court in the 1950's. We really have a long way yet to go before the ugliness of racism is eliminated.
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Lord of the Flies is just beneath the surface in all of us. Good parenting is what civilizes us. Racists are not born that way. They are raised that way.
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