In the land of the blind, the one-armed man is king. In an
Administration filled with corruption and terrible ideas, it's not difficult to
be the individual with the most sense. And Peter Navarro, critic of past trade
deals made by the federal government, may be the best member of the Trump
Administration. Asked on Trump TV last weekend about the coronavirus, the White House Trade Advisor maintained "And, what we have to do is unite around this central
fact: China lied; people died. The CCP lied; Americans died."
He did not admit "Trump denied, and people died."
Still, his statement was accurate, as was his observation "If China wants
to regain the trust of Hong Kongers and the international community, it should
honor the promises it made to the Hong Kong people and to the United Kingdom in
the U.N.-registered 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration."
However, Navarro here is bonkers (very unlikely),
self-delusional (plausible), or simply dishonest (likely).
You almost can't believe this guy would get on national TV and say this shit. https://t.co/R5WGabQMZ9
— Rachel "The Doc" Bitecofer 📈🔭🍌 (@RachelBitecofer) July 7, 2020
But you can believe it. Navarro was not the first to pretend not to see what is obvious and unavoidable. Asked in 2019 about an April, 2018
incident involving a black (non-) patron at Starbucks in Philadelphia, former Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz stated "As somebody who grew up in a
very diverse background, as a young boy in the projects, I didn’t see color as
a young boy and I honestly don’t see color now."
This "I don't see color thing" was supposed to be
a joke:
Navarro will at least recognize reality in the matter of
mainland China. On race, he will not. Regrettably, that is a pervasive
affliction among the Trump gangsters and, ironically, not absent elsewhere.
That is a terrible message, although not for July 4. July 4 comes every
year and always between July 3 and July 5. July 4 is a day for barbecues;
Independence Day is an occasion to celebrate the unity of Americans, all
Americans, as we proceed, by fits and spurts, with this American experiment.
With his tweet, Minority Leader McCarthy wrote one group out of this great experiment, an impulse becoming more popular as
Starting with the nationally televised regular-season opener
between the Houston Texans and Kansas City Chiefs on Sept. 10, “Lift Every
Voice and Sing,” also known as the Black national anthem, will be performed
before every Week 1 kickoff, before "The Star-Spangled Banner,"
according to a person familiar with ongoing discussions. The person spoke to
USA TODAY Sports on condition of anonymity because plans have not yet been
finalized and announced by NFL officials.
History should not be erased, and so it bears noting that
"Lift Every Voice and Sing" never has been the "Black National
Anthem." . Written as a poem by
James Weldon Johnson in 1900, the song was proclaimed sometime before 1921 by
the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (now,
"NAACP") as the "Negro National Anthem." The experience of blacks whose descendants were slaves, chronicled by "Lift Every Voice and Sing," may differ dramatically from those who have recently emigrated from Africa, Jamaica, Haiti, or elsewhere.
That was when de facto and de jure segregation was the the lay
of the land, a time of brazen discrimination and violence against "colored people," as they were then known (now, "people of color"). Though from 1960 through 1968, there were only
three reported lynchings of blacks, in the nine-year period ending in 1920, 495 were reported lynched.
Times were different, and it's understandable that in or about
1920 a civil rights organization would believe that blacks had no choice but to resist identification with the United States of America.
Nonetheless, while cultural anthropologists may argue
whether "black" is a race, ethnic group, and/or color,
"black" never has been a nation- the root of "national."
Therefore, there can be no black or Negro (as it was called since the NAACP got
its hands on it) national anthem, though there could be a black or
African-American anthem.
Though those may seem mere "details," therein God
lies (as in "lays," not as in veracity). When a song or poem is
identified as a "national anthem," the meaning is clear- it is a
rallying point for, or intended to lift the spirits of, individuals of that
nation. When that song appears immediately before (or after) the National
Anthem, it clearly is being presented as an anthem for people of that
country. It is why, for instance that
the Canadian national anthem is played back-to- back with the Star- Spangled
Banner at many athletic events featuring a team from Canada and one from the
USA.
An African-American conservative blogger argues Martin
Luther "King always appealed to the American dream for all. He was a
patriot and he never wanted blacks to deny or separate themselves from being
American. I think claiming an anthem for ourselves as black people is doing
just that."
If he isn't sufficiently credible, consider the opinion of
an assistant professor of English at historically black Clark Atlanta
University. Timothy Askew, who says he
loves the song and has studied it for over 20 years, maintains "To sing
the 'black national anthem' suggests that black people are separatist and want
to have their own nation. This means that everything Martin Luther King Jr.
believed about being one nation gets thrown out the window."
Admittedly, it's possible to make too much of this move by
the NFL. As noted by USA Today, its source indicates "after brainstorming
with numerous players and the NFL Players Association, NFL officials also plan
to honor victims of police brutality through elements such as helmet decals or
jerseys." Thus, it may be simply a way for the NFL to sell merchandise,
which raises the profile of its players and further enriches its owners, who
employ Commissioner Roger Goodell and determine his professional fate.
African-Americans do not constitute another nation. As
Askew appreciates, this is one nation and blacks are a part of this country. They are a part as much as
are immigrants, whom Kevin McCarthy wants to read out of this nation. Blacks also are a part of the fabric of this country and are so no matter how hard the
National Football League, its players association, or David Duke portrays otherwise.
The Twitter handle ("twitter handle"? so 2017) of
Republican senator Joni Ernst of Iowa reads "mother, soldier,
leader." She's a mother and former soldier- but she's no leader.
CNN's Dana Bash: You said in 2014 that Obama showed "failed leadership" with Ebola, when only 2 Americans died. Would you say Trump's showed failed leadership with coronavirus as 130,000 Americans have died?
As the video indicates, Bash asked the freshman senator
You criticized President Obama in 2014 for his handling of
the Ebola outbreak, saying he exhibited "failed leadership." Only two
people in the US died from Ebola. Right now there are almost 130,000 Americans
dead from the coronavirus. So if President Obama showed failed leadership, then
do you think President Trump is showing failed leadership now?
For a leader even of the Republican variety, there are only two possible answers: a) yes, him too; or b) no, and neither did
President Obama. Ernst gave neither, and when her response was a string of
words signifying only avoidance and timidity, Bash followed up with a question
ending in "is the President exhibiting failed leadership?"
Unsurprisingly, Ernst employed the GOP's go-to response, defending President Trump by attacking the Democratic Party. She replied in
part
.... of course, the pushback we got from the Democrats after
the President did shut down travel from some of those hotspots, it was an
extremely difficult environment to operate and we know different today than we
did at the start spread of the virus and we should continually learn from those
efforts and make sure we are doing the right thing.
Hours before the President announced major restrictions (except for American citizens, holder of green cards, and a few others) to
travel from China, three major USA-based airlines announced on their own that
they would suspend flights between this country and the world's largest
totalitarian regime. The American government did not end passenger flights
particularly late nor particularly early compared to other governments.
And that pushback from "the Democrats?" There was a grand total of two, both US
Representatives (neither a presidential candidate) who criticized Trump's action.
Moreover, as The Intercept reported on April 20, the first indexed case of Covid-19 in at least 13
states and territories has been traced to Italy. Further
In the six weeks prior to the European travel bans, the U.S.
was exposed to a massive amount of travelers from a highly infected region.
During that time, there were almost no checks in international airports for
passengers coming from Europe, as American authorities focused their screening
efforts on China travelers. The China travel restrictions were mostly cosmetic
anyway — the Chinese government banned flights from the Hubei region on January
23 and was sharply reducing its cases through harsh lockdowns and quarantines.
The Trump administration appears to have considered — and
rejected — an early European travel ban in January. The Washington Post
reported that Matthew Pottinger, the deputy national security adviser, had
proposed a travel ban on affected European countries in late January, which was
supported by health officials but was rebuffed by Trump and Treasury Secretary
Steven Mnuchin. As Trump faces increased criticism for a period of calamitous
early inaction, he has sought to focus the blame on China, and on Saturday he
published a tweet trying to discredit a New York Times story on the role of
European travel in New York’s epidemic.
(Note: This does not exonerate Beijing, the regime most
responsible for SARS-CoV-2.)
As cases of Covid-19 surged in Tulsa, this is how President
Trump continually learned and made sure he was doing the right thing fewer than
three weeks ago:
Covid-19 has become a growth industry in Oklahoma. Cases had not been rising in South Dakota, a (lack of) trend the President's visit- with few masks donned and little social distancing, as in Tulsa-F on July 4 to Mount Rushmore aimed to reverse. This is the only sense in which there is any validity to Joni Ernst's remarks. Donald Trump is in fact "stepping forward," striving to send the numbers of those infected to dizzying new heights.
A happy thought about Independence Day from one guy on
Twitter:
Today is a beautiful day to honor the ideals that our country was founded on as well as the free speech that allows us to look at our history with clear eyes and see both our flaws and triumphs.
This nation was not founded on "free speech" and
does not practice it. It was founded, among other things, on the First Amendment's guarantee "Congress shall make no law.... abridging the
freedom of speech."
That prevents government from infringing upon free speech
but private actors can do otherwise. We're reminded often by some on the race (formerly, "race and gender") left- of the Cooper vs.
Cooper showdown in Central Park, NY. There, as the New York Times summarizes
Mr. Cooper, who is black, asked a white woman to put her dog
on a leash. When she did not, he began filming. In response, the woman said she
would tell the police that “an African-American man is threatening my life”
before dialing 911.
The video went viral- or rather, half the video
went viral- the portion Mr. Cooper decided to release minus the portion in which
he threatened- uh, er offered- to feed a stranger's dog.
(True, relevant, story: after a
public meeting attended by many people including a K-9 police officer, I asked
the officer if I could give a little of the food I had to the dog. She said
"no" and only later, never having owned a pet, did I learn that
chocolate is poisonous to a dog.)
Mr. Cooper dared her to call the police, as she did, identifying Mr. Cooper as African-American rather than simply "some guy." Mr. Cooper left, the
police determined that the incident was minor, and that was it.
Unfortunately, that was not it as she faced a torrent of bigoted
and sexist abuse on social media, a majority of which was prompted by her identification of Mr. Cooper as "African-American, apparently now a toxic charge. She was fired from her
"high-level finance job," pleasing individuals cheered that a worker can be fired without due process. The dismissal was not constitutionally
prohibited because it had nothing to do with government, and her employer
evidently was less concerned with job performance than the popularity of the speech she expressed on her free time.
It was a reminder of the limits of the "free
speech" many people naively believe is guaranteed to us by the US Constitution.
So, too, is naive the notion that we "look at our history with clear eyes
and see both our flaws and triumphs."
In the video below, you will see presidential adviser Larry
Kudlow contending that the USA is not guilty of systemic racism because "You
have as evidence of that view, our first black president, just a few years
back, won two terms, and I regarded that with pride as an American."
He said that; he really did. He said that we couldn't
possibly be racist given that a black person had been elected President. Of
course, that was a binary choice, one made in part because the presidential
(and the very unpopular vice-presidential) candidate he was opposing had to defend
an eight-year presidency soundly rejected by the American people.
Larry Kudlow's remark would have almost made a little sense had he himself voted for Barack Obama and thereby helped demonstrate that America had wiped out its original sin. However, the chance of that having
occurred is slim to none, and slim is on its way out of town.
The theory that election of a black demonstrates that there
is no systemic racism is absurd. And it is absurd not only insofar as the
presidential terms of Barack Obama were followed by the election of an openly
and brazenly bigoted candidate who first caught the attention of the Republican
electorate by steadfastly maintaining that the black President was born in Africa.
It is similarly absurd when asserted by other individuals,
most notably by Fox News host Tucker Carlson, whom I recently saw and heard
state that America clearly is not racist because a black was elected President.
It is a belief expressed by many conservatives, most of whom probably voted
against Obama, though some no doubt did vote for him as a sort of expiation.
Trying to convince oneself or others that the USA is not
racist because of the election of an African-American is a way for
conservatives/Republicans to avoid looking "at our history with clear eyes
(to) see both our flaws and triumphs." But it's not only the right and/or
Republicans who need self-assurance. A
senior editor at The Atlantic actually tweeted
You can pick the anti-racism of Hamilton or you can pick the anti-racism of White Fragility.
Seemingly unaware that when one finds herself in a hole, she should
stop digging, some clarification:
Is Hamilton an effective program to overcome racial injustice in this country? Of course not. It's a musical.
But it does encapsulate the spirit we need to build a just society much better than diAngelo: a recognition of our flaws alongside a commitment to our founding values.
No, Refusing to face our history honestly does not
encapsulate a spirit to do anything better. We should not choose to be deaf, dumb, and blind. A historian and journalist (of the left, actually) has the courage to explain:
There's nothing to debate. It's a thoroughgoing fantasy. The real Hamilton was a literal plutocrat, who wanted to turn debtors into veritable vassals of a strong state, not some admirable multiculti hero. https://t.co/f3OKmst4Rl
Historian Annette Gordon-Reed, who enjoyed the musical,
nevertheless found
The show portrays Hamilton as a “young, scrappy, and hungry”
immigrant (he was born on the Caribbean Island of Nevis, but qualified as a
U.S. citizen when the Constitution was adopted), an egalitarian, and a
passionate abolitionist. All of this is wrong, Gordon-Reed said.
“In the sense of the Ellis Island immigrant narrative, he
was not an immigrant,” she said. “He was not pro-immigrant, either.
“He was not an abolitionist,” she added. “He bought and sold
slaves for his in-laws, and opposing slavery was never at the forefront of his
agenda.
“He was not a champion of the little guy, like the show
portrays,” she said. “He was elitist. He was in favor of having a president for
life.”
The musical simplifies and sanitizes history, said
Gordon-Reed. “The Hamilton on the stage is more palatable and attractive to
modern audiences,” she said.
Set amid the Revolution, the play fails to depict the
central role played by slavery at that moment in history, and also neglects to
mention that most of the Founding Fathers were slave owners.
Hamilton was not a bad guy for his time and no statue of his should
be removed. However, Abraham Lincoln
fought a war to end slavery and Hans Christian Heg was an abolitionist, and
their statues have seen better days.The celebration of "Hamilton" and
of the man himself reflect our preference to see things as we wish they were
rather than as they are.
Alexander Hamilton is not accurately portrayed on stage.
Election of Barack Obama neither ended racism nor proved that racism does not
exist. And Americans are not guaranteed freedom of speech. It would be
comforting to believe that we "look at our history with clear eyes and see
both our flaws and triumphs." But reality is often discomfiting and its
admission, it appears, is prohibitively uncomfortable.
The Washington Redskins of the National Football League will
be changing its name now that, as reported by The Washington Post
After years of resistance, the team said it was launching a
thorough review of the name. It did not share any details of the process, but
two people familiar with discussions between Snyder, NFL Commissioner Roger
Goodell and league officials that led to Friday’s announcement said the review
is expected to result in a new team nickname and mascot.
“You know where this leads,” one of the people said,
speaking on condition of anonymity. “They’re working on that process [of
changing the name]. It will end with a new name. Dan has been listening to
different people over the last number of weeks.”
The different people he has been listening to are not the
multitudes of protesters of racial bias, native tribal members, nor the
activists who for decades have been promoting a name change. Instead, on
July 2
FedEx, a longtime sponsor and naming-rights holder of the
team’s home stadium, issued a one sentence statement calling for a change. Fred
Smith, the FedEx chief executive, is a minority owner of the Redskins.
That would be the same FedEx which is non-union and in which
workers who charge that their benefits are less than at
rival UPS said the company has bombarded them with anti-union messages and
forced them to attend anti-union meetings.
The Guardian obtained recordings of meetings that were
mandatory and required workers to sign in, according to a FedEx employee, held
at FedEx facilities in 2015 and 2016, where managers and union avoidance
consultants lectured workers on unions as the Teamsters was attempting to
organize FedEx drivers at several locations around the United States.
“It’s time to campaign. If you don’t want this third party
coming in putting a wall between us, it’s time. Because when you campaign and
tell them you don’t want them here, eventually it becomes loud and clear to
them. You can do that,” said a FedEx human resources manager in a July 2016
captive audience meeting.
There is pressure coming from other socially conscious companies. And so
Larry Di Rita, Bank of America’s president for the
Washington market, said: “As a partner and sponsor, we have encouraged the team
to change the name and we welcome this announcement.”
Nonetheless, one owner of a small software company has explained that Bank of
America
is now being sued by small businesses for shutting my and
other small enterprises out of the Payroll Protection Program (PPP) loan. The
allegation is that BofA served large businesses first, on whom they could earn
the most in fees per transaction.
After joining with others to bring the world economy nearly
to a standstill earlier this century, Bank of America received a $45 billion
bailout from the federal government and still
brought tens of thousands of Americans to foreclosure court
using bogus, “robo-signed” evidence – a type of mass perjury that it helped
pioneer. It hawked worthless mortgages to dozens of unions and state pension
funds, draining them of hundreds of millions in value. And when it wasn’t
ripping off workers and pensioners, it was helping to push insurance giants
like AMBAC into bankruptcy by fraudulently inducing them to spend hundreds of millions
insuring those same worthless mortgages.
The Post adds
As major corporate backers of the team, FedEx and PepsiCo
tied their brands to that of the Redskins for years. In their respective
statements acknowledging that they support a name-change, neither company used
the word “Redskins."
How sensitive; or progressive; or "woke" the two
of them are. PepsiCo, as we know, is a major player in the soft drink market,
in which the easily absorbable sugar which is intrinsic to its product is
arguably the most important contributor in the universe to heart disease,
cancer, diabetes, and liver disease, let alone obesity.
At the time the WaPo article was written, Nike had not yet
issued a statement but had removed the Washington Redskins merchandise from its
website. In recent years, Nike has moved
some of its production from mainland
China to other nations, especially Vietnam. However, it still owns facilities
in China, whose dictatorial, murderous regime has been propped up by Nike and
other American corporations which, when pressed, will demonstrate their sensitivity and compassion by demanding that ethnically insensitive nicknames change.
Meanwhile, the exploitation of Chinese workers by a
government engaged in destroying the culture of Uighurs, and with the most extensive
deployment of internment camps since the Holocaust, will remain. The death of
Americans still will be an integral part of the PepsiCo business model. BOA will
continue to lead the way in cheating customers and small businesses. FedEx will
continue to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on union avoidance
consultants because the working conditions and benefits of its employees pale in importance to opportunistic public relations.
And why not? It's 2020 and workers, consumers, small business, health care, and genocide cannot compare to being on the right side in the identity wars.
Alas, no. According to the White House transcript of
"Remarks by President Trump on the Jobs Numbers Report," President
Trump stated (beginning at 6:40 of the video below) maintained
.... We followed them, with this terrible China virus, and
we are likewise getting under control.
Some areas that were very hard-hit are now doing very
well. Some were doing very well, and we
thought they may be gone and they flare up, and we’re putting out the
fires. But other places were long before
us, and they’re now — it’s like life; it’s got a life. And we’re putting out that life, because
that’s a bad life that we’re talking about.
But all of this suggests that workers are confident about
fighting a new job....
I've added the first and last sentences only as context.
Thus, speaking of SARS-CoV-2, the President stated
some (areas) were doing very well, and we thought they may
be gone and they flare up, and we're putting out the fires. But other places
were long before us, and they’re now — it’s like life; it’s got a life. And we’re putting out that life, because
that’s a bad life that we’re talking about.
It's a weird way of speaking but it's Trump's way of talking. Moreover, if anyone had said this, it would be a reference to the
coronavirus having a life. No one else would have said this, but still.
Of course, Trump has demonstrated by word and deed that he
believes American lives don't matter. (At least Black Lives Matter believes black
lives matter, which is at least some people). However, the President's words
today give little additional support to the recognition that, in pursuit of
what he believes would be a superior gene pool, Donald Trump wants people to
die. Stay tuned.
In a development as startling as "Donald Trump's claim does not meet the standards of objective truth"
The National Basketball Association and National Basketball Players Association are
planning to paint "Black Lives Matter" on the court inside both
sidelines in all three arenas the league will use at the Walt Disney World
Resort when it resumes the 2019-20 season late next month in Orlando, Florida,
league sources told ESPN....
On a conference call with reporters Friday, leaders of both
the NBA and the NBPA said the league and union were discussing several ways to
use the NBA's platform in Orlando to call attention to racial equality, social
justice and police brutality. Over the weekend, Chris Paul, president of the
players' union, told ESPN that the league and union were collaborating to allow
players to wear uniforms with personalized messages linked to social justice on
the backs of their jerseys in place of players' last names.
The NBA's concern for human rights stops right at the bank. China has Uyghur concentration camps and is preparing to crush Hong Kong and he talks of "mutual respect"? What a joke. https://t.co/KuC3WYMlg7
The Black Lives Matter movement may be in the process of
morphing into a more generalized one for social justice. But the number one
agenda item of BLM is "defund the police. It is at its core an anti-police movement.
If messages of social justice, including opposition to
police brutality, are permitted on the jerseys of NBA players, it will be
fascinating to see whether messages less compatible with the league's profit
motive are permitted. Kasparov might
suggest "Religious Freedom for Uyghurs" or "Free HongKong." For those individuals preferring the cryptic (and if the NBA
permits any names on jerseys), there could be "Where are Fang Bin and Chen Quishi?" or "In Memoriam, Li Wenliag." Disturbingly, the possibilities are nearly endless.
Otherwise, the NBA might prohibit anything critical of
mainland China, in which case the league will have decided that Xi Jinping's
totalitarian regime is more worthy of respect than, say, big-city police departments in the USA. If so, we would find out that the "mutual
respect" Commissioner Adam Silver talks about is the league's interest in financial gain, human rights be damned.
