Trump's Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

Aug. 13, 2019

12:57 p.m.

Official White House Photo by Andrea Hanks

First Lady Melania Trump holds the two-month-old son of Jordan and Andre Anchondo, as she and President Donald J. Trump pose for photos and meet members of the Anchondo family Wednesday, Aug. 7, 2019, at the University Medical Center of El Paso in El Paso, Texas. Jordan and Andre Anchondo were among the 22 people killed in a mass shooting Saturday at a Walmart in El Paso.

Nothing spoils a president’s day like showing up to pose for smiling, thumbs-up photo shoots at the two latest American cities emotionally grieving over weekend mass murders to find most of the people are in such a bad mood they don’t even want you in their town. Nobody had to tell Donald Trump twice. He got the hell out of those ungrateful cities of Dayton, Ohio, and El Paso, Texas, on his terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day, spewing insulting tweets behind him at local Democratic officials. So many community leaders made it clear Trump wasn’t welcome no public events were scheduled to avoid any embarrassing incidents either by protesters or by Trump.

The White House denied access for media coverage of Trump’s interactions at hospitals in Dayton or El Paso for fear of similar humiliations. It later released its own photographs and a video focusing on Trump smiling and shaking hands to a triumphant orchestral soundtrack. Included was a disturbing photograph of the smiling first lady holding a baby like a prize at the fair with Trump beaming and giving a thumbs-up. The life of the orphaned two-month-old was saved by his Latino parents who were killed shielding his tiny body from the El Paso shooter. Think of it as extreme family separation.

Objections to Trump’s visit were particularly raw in the bicultural border town of El Paso, where other survivors of the worst mass shooting of Latinos in U.S. history refused to meet with him. The Walmart mass shooter had posted an online manifesto declaring his intention to kill Mexicans to stop what both he and Trump call a Mexican “invasion” of the U.S. Trump also describes Latino immigrants as an “infestation.” Infestations require exterminators.

Trump’s Hate Rallies

At his hate rally in Panama City Beach, Fla., in May, Trump referred to Latino immigrants, asking, “How do you stop these people?” When thousands cheered a supporter who shouted in response, “Shoot them!” Trump chuckled and said, “Only in the Panhandle can you get away with that statement.” And only at a Trump rally. Trump is increasing his openly racist rhetoric to gin up Republican support among white supremacists for 2020. He tells people of color—including U.S.-born congressional representatives—to go back where they came from and declares African Americans living in city neighborhoods aren’t even human beings.

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Those who’ve warned about Trump inflaming dangerous racial divisions in America he couldn’t control now have fresh evidence how deadly that can be in the only country where military-style weapons designed to kill human beings in large numbers are sold legally. The El Paso mass murder killing 22 people and wounding 26 others was followed within hours by the Dayton mass murder killing 9 and injuring 27.

The most consistent features of Trump’s presidency have been his virulent racism and a constant stream of public lies. The Washington Post’s running tally of Trump’s falsehoods just passed 12,000. His biggest whopper yet: Trump denies his racist rhetoric is dividing America. “My rhetoric... brings people together.” Well, it does bring racists together.

More False Promises

The subcategory of false promises following mass shootings should include Trump’s recent claims about Republicans supporting “very meaningful background checks.” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who has refused to allow a Senate vote on House legislation closing background check loopholes, is “totally on board,” Trump said. “I think Republicans are going to be great and lead the charge.” No surprise, but none of those statements are true. McConnell, up for re-election in 2020 in Kentucky where his approval ratings are underwater, quickly rushed out a public statement that he hasn’t endorsed any legislation on background checks. Nasty rightwing Republicans, including Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson, oppose background checks. By the time the Senate’s summer vacation ends in September, Republicans think the heat will be off, so they can do what they’ve always done to reduce mass shootings in America: nothing.

By then, Trump will forget the thought ever crossed his squirming, chaotic mind. It happened after Parkland. Trump held a televised meeting with Parkland students and parents bragging he had the courage to cross the NRA and recommend a variety of gun safety measures. But after meeting with the NRA, the only proposal Trump could remember was arming teachers, which not even Republicans were crazy enough to pass. Besides, with mass shootings increasing, the bare minimum of universal background checks should be just the beginning. After the two most recent mass shootings, 70% of Americans—including 55% of Republicans and 85% of Democrats—support banning military-style assault weapons, according to a Politico/Morning Consult poll.

Clearly, the only way to slow our country’s frightening descent into racial division and deadly violence is to defeat both Trump and the Senate’s Republican majority in November 2020. Otherwise, decent Americans desiring peaceful lives and safe communities will be the ones experiencing terrible, horrible, no good, very bad days.

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Comments (3)

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Shootings... background checks...

What is it that a Trump supporter really wants?

Judging by what my 85 year old father once tried a few years back, I can say that what they want is the right to shoot a non-white (black or brown) in self-defense, simply the infraction of "walking down the sidewalk across my property" is enough. Their presence in his neighborhood was a threat to his personal security, an act he wants to defend with lethal force.

It was the gun store owner that straightened him out "your idea of self-defense is not what the courts allow as self-defense", and with many complicating examples of what has failed to stand up in court.

This is the classic "Stand your Ground" thinking that Trump's people really support. And the NRA will be right there lobbying for it if the political will eventually swings that way.

Political will... limited by who is allowed to even vote for the politicians who are tasked with setting the law of the land. The more people who can be prevented from voting, the more likely that the minority who still CAN vote will get their way.

It is not "tyranny of the majority" when only a minority is allowed to vote.
It then becomes "tyranny of the ruling class", and history tells us how that works out.

Remember that when our founding fathers set up this nation,
- women (wives, adult daughters, house-maids) could not vote.
- slaves and servants (occupants allowed on the owner's land) could not vote.
- tenants (adult sons, hired hands) could not vote either.
Yet, all these people were counted in the US Census (even slaves at 3/5 of a person).

I do not have access to the statistics, but I would guesstimate that only about 5% of the adult population were actually allowed to vote back when this country was founded. Yes, those who were "King of their Castle" or "Lord of their Domain."

Those who think they are at the top would like nothing other than to take the right to vote away from all of those who are "below" themselves, or at least "different" in ideology or culture.

But, cannot knock ALL of them off the voter lists all at once, they will use "divide and conquer" to take out one small group at a time, whoever is most unpopular in the news at that moment.

Trump's background checks are to name "mental illness", the person who pulls the trigger.
How about voting Democrat as a mental illness?
How about promoting "tax-welfare redistribution" as a mental illness?
How about promoting "socialism" as a mental illness?
How about listing "equal regardless of color" as a mental illness?

It is all being done in the political arena today... hidden as "survival."
To make this plan work, they need a long-lasting depression to convince the voter.
A harsh economic life is a strong tool for change.

And the ones putting up the money to support this are the very ones who need the white working class to eventually be purged from the voter lists. Russia, North Korea, Iran... and Big Business most of all wants this end to "one person one vote" democracy.

SE Wisc. Citizen more than 4 years ago

Related to the ICE raids... and failure to prosecute the big companies who hired them

Scenario 1 - Employer knows the immigrant is illegal, but they are just gambling on not being caught. No taxes collected from the immigrant's pay-stub, no money sent to the IRS or Social Security. The company who does not get caught wins, the IRS and Americans lose. Government has no evidence to catch this, only a raid can catch it.

Scenario 2 - Immigrant shows a fake id matching a real name on a stolen social security number. Company's HR can legitimately claim "due diligence" and avoid prosecution. This can go 2 ways.

Sub-part A - Company knows the employee is illegal but carries on the charade. HR falsely lists
taxes paid on the worker's paystub, IRS and Social Security receive nothing, the Immigrant thinks they got away with it... company wins on their bottom line, IRS and Americans lose. Government has no evidence to catch this, only a raid can catch it.

Sub-part B - Company thinks the worker is legal, and they do pay the taxes to the IRS and Social Security. IRS sees all the money coming in for that SS#, but still keep the taxes separate, saving the true owner of the SS# from a serious identity theft audit. -- Who is at fault here? The IRS. They look the other way, won't turn down tax revenue, does not matter if it is legal or not.

Sub-part C - The true owner of the SS# sees the extra income on their Social Security status report, complains to the IRS. Or the true holder of the SS# gets audited by the IRS for not listing all income. IRS can seek out the other income reported, or they can just correct the tax return of the honest citizen, looking the other way about that other income (Why should they turn down free tax revenue?) - Business just thinks they are honest, IRS still gets all the money, true owner of the SS# ends up paying the proper amount of taxes (no problem.)

So big business does not get prosecuted, and
a corrupt IRS just keeps the illegal's excess tax money,
and IRS leaves the legitimate taxpayer unchanged.

SE Wisc. Citizen more than 4 years ago

I read this somewhere, a "wishful" plan

Note: this is NOT a real plan, but it is in the backs of the minds of MANY of Trump's supporters.

Step 1: Like for the Japanese in a WWII internment camp, round up every last brown-skinned LEGAL CITIZEN, removing them from the "white" economy. (With the Japanese-Americans, the fear was real enough for our Nation to actually take this kind of action.)

Step 2: Any brown-skin person who turns up outside the camp is obviously a non-citizen who is not playing by legal rules.

The strategy is to remove the legal ones from public sight so that the illegal ones are easy to spot, standing out like a sore thumb if seen outside an internment camp.

How many would also like to do this with blacks, those of African ancestry? We had this even on Wisconsin with our "sundown laws", where an all-white town posted signs that required everyone of color to be out of town by sun-down (gone at the end of the work-day.) This included Wisconsin and other northern states, even as late as the 1960s.

But I am sure that those who voted for Trump sincerely hope he can pull this off with Mexicans (and those who LOOK like Mexicans), the non-citizen aspect being the angle that will get political support. These people think it will bring back not only whiteness to their public lives, but automatically force the white-hiring jobs to go back to paying $20-30/hour for whites educated to the "lowest common denominator" instead of paying $11 to them or cash-only less than minimum wage to an illegal.

If this can be pulled off with brown-skin, then it is a short stretch to cover those black-skin "illegitimate citizens" made by the 13th amendment, the freed southern slaves.

But here's the truth... if we can have the political will to designate a "nationality" or "culture" of people who are legally barred from invitation into the American Dream, then it will be only a small twist to expand that to the white working poor.

My proof... the recent proposed changes to immigration law and the placard at the Statue of Liberty at Ellis Island. These changes bar citizen green cards from being granted to those who had to use "welfare" or public assistance. It means no one is welcome unless they can stand on their own 2 feet. Who else would that knock out? White people in "the bottom 47% who don't pay taxes", therefore they are getting refundable tax credits that wipe out 100% of their tax burden or even pay a little extra refund beyond the taxes shown on their pay stubs.

I say this to be true because US Census statistics estimate that only 73% of Americans are white, so that means only (100% - 73% =) 27% are non-white... so if you "assume" every non-white is not paying taxes, how do you get "47%" who do not pay taxes unless at least 20% of Americans happen to be white and in that non-taxpaying group? That is almost 2 out of every 5 "poor" also are white.

SE Wisc. Citizen more than 4 years ago