Tag Archives: KKK

national news

Did we elect a flaming racist?

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Follow me through this sequence for a brief moment.

* A riot breaks out in Charlottesville, Va., when counter protesters objected to white nationalists, neo-Nazis and Ku Klux Klansmen gathered to protest the removal of a Confederate statue. Three people died. The president of the United States, Donald Trump, issues a tepid statement that talks of “many sides” being guilty of inciting violence.

* Two days later, after getting pounded by, um, many sides, Trump finally issues a statement condemning by name the white racist groups associated with the riot.

* Today, Merck CEO Kenneth Frazier resigned from the President’s Manufacturing Council over the president’s failure to respond appropriately to the race-based riot in Virginia. It took Trump all of 54 minutes to fire off a snark-laden tweet that suggests Frazier could now spend more time to deal with “rip-off drug prices.”

* Later in the day, Under Armour CEO Kevin Plank quits the same council. Plank cited the same reasons as Frazier. Trump remained quiet via Twitter. No criticism of Plank. Nothin’.

This is important, too: Frazier is black; Plank is white.

I need some help on this one. Why do you suppose the president was so quick on the Twitter trigger finger regarding Frazier’s resignation, but has remained silent on Plank’s decision to quit? Is there a relationship between those responses and the president’s initial public reaction to the violence?

Is it a coincidence? Or are there some motives that need careful examination? I’m just askin’, man.

national news

Trump finally says what he should’ve said the first time

That wasn’t so painful, was it, Mr. President?

Donald J. Trump returned to the White House — aka “a real dump” — to sign an executive order and then deliver some remarks about the “criminals and thugs” who instigated the deadly race riot in Charlottesville, Va., over the weekend. He had been facing immense pressure from, um, “many sides” as a result of his initial response to the violence.

The president said what he needed to say at the outset. The Klan, neo-Nazis and assorted white supremacist groups provoked a riot while protesting the planned removal of a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee. It went bad bigly.

Trump has condemned racism and bigotry and called out the white supremacists and Nazis as “criminals and thugs.” He called them what they are. Trump said “racism is evil” and said hate groups such as neo-Nazis and white supremacists “are repugnant to everything we hold dear as Americans.”

How far will his remarks go in healing the damage that already has been done by his initial remarks in which he blamed “many sides” for the violence that erupted? Time will tell.

If he had asked for my opinion, I would have preferred that the president atone more directly for his error of omission. He should have acknowledged publicly in the White House that he erred in failing to respond appropriately.

Moreover, he could have said categorically that he does not welcome the overt political support of individuals such as one-time Ku Klux Klan grand dragon/lizard David Duke, who over the weekend invoked Trump’s name. Duke said he wants to “take our country back” and said “that’s why we voted for Donald Trump.”

He didn’t do those things. The president did say the right words — today! I still have to ask: Did they come from his heart, his soul?

Please demonstrate that they did, Mr. President.

local news, State news

There are Klan rallies, then we have what happened at UVa

I feel as though I’ve dodged a bullet or two, having watched the tragic events unfold in Charlottesville, Va.

Now for the explanation.

My former life as a full-time journalist enabled me to two attend two Ku Klux Klan rallies. The first one was in Orange, Texas, way down yonder on the Gulf Coast, just west of the Louisiana state line; the second was right here in Amarillo, Texas.

Why the feeling of relief? They both were peaceful. Unlike the pandemonium that erupted in Charlottesville, the rallies in Orange and Amarillo were tame — although one was far tamer than the other one.

The Orange rally occurred without incident of any kind. Some Klansmen showed up to protest the racial integration of a federal housing project in nearby Vidor, Texas, a community full of fine folks but also a town known to be a sort of KKK haven. There were no counter protests; just a lot of fiery and ignorant hate speech coming from the podium.

The Amarillo rally was a bit different. A Klan chapter sought permission to gather at City Hall; the city granted it. The head Klansman started to speak, only to be drowned out by a large procession of cymbal-bashing, drum-beating, horn-blaring and shouting counter protesters who marched onto the City Hall parking lot. They drowned out the KKK speakers.

There was no physical confrontation. There were no fights. No violence. Indeed, the Amarillo Police Department, the Potter County Sheriff’s Department and the Texas Department of Public Safety were out in force to ensure a peaceful outcome … although they couldn’t guarantee a quiet one.

I’ll stand by my previous posts in asserting that the “white nationalists” who gathered in Charlottesville were the provocateurs. They instigated the violence merely showing up. Then to have someone mow down counter protesters with his motor vehicle? I believe I would call that a terrorist act.

We well might have witnessed a horrifying symptom of a deteriorating national mood.

I never want to see anything like that again, let alone up close.

national news

Here is how to respond to violence

There’s been no shortage of outrage being expressed today over the violence that erupted in Charlottesville, Va.

It has come from across the partisan divide. Republicans and Democrats alike have spoken eloquently about their outrage at the violence perpetrated by the white supremacists who gathered there to make whatever statements they want to make. They have spoken as one.

I want to share a statement that came from U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, the Texas Republican who’s been a target of this blog on many occasions over the years. Today, though, I want to applaud Sen. Cruz for speaking eloquently and passionately about an incident that has consumed the nation.

It’s tragic and heartbreaking to see hatred and racism once again mar our great Nation with bloodshed. Heidi’s and my prayers are with the loved ones of those killed and injured in the ongoing violence in Charlottesville. The First Amendment protects the rights of all Americans to speak their minds peaceably, but violence, brutality, and murder have no place in a civilized society.

The Nazis, the KKK, and white supremacists are repulsive and evil, and all of us have a moral obligation to speak out against the lies, bigotry, anti-Semitism, and hatred that they propagate. Having watched the horrifying video of the car deliberately crashing into a crowd of protesters, I urge the Department of Justice to immediately investigate and prosecute this grotesque act of domestic terrorism.

These bigots want to tear our country apart, but they will fail. America is far better than this. Our Nation was built on fundamental truths, none more central than the proposition “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness”.

Well said, sir. Thank you.

national news

Trump fails leadership test with tepid response to violence

We hear it all … the … time.

Someone takes the heat for a political error or for acting badly and they seek to deflect the harsh negative light by saying, “Yes, but both sides are guilty of it, too.”

Both sides do it. All sides do it. Don’t blame me. Or the people on my side. Look at the other guys, too.

It’s a dodge. A ruse. A rhetorical escape hatch.

So it was just like that when the president of the United States spoke about the violence in Charlottesville, Va. Three people are known to have died in the violence. The president’s remarks came before the death toll had risen to that level.

But he did that equivocation thing. He condemned the violence that was provoked by the presence of white nationalists/supremacists in Charlottesville; they were there to protest the taking down of Confederate monuments. All hell broke loose.

Did the president condemn the hate mongers? Oh, not precisely. He watered it down by saying “many sides” are to be condemned.

Many sides? Are you bleeping kidding me?

Compare that with what Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe said. He told the white supremacists to “go home.” They have no place in Virginia. He belittled their claim to be “patriots,” saying they are “anything but” patriots.

An equally strong and unequivocal statement should have come also from Donald J. Trump. It didn’t. The president has failed yet another leadership test.

national news

POTUS becomes ‘equivocator in chief’

I was delighted to learn that the president of the United States would comment on the violence that erupted in Charlottesville, Va.

And for a moment, Donald Trump had me riveted to his statement. He talked about the need for us to unite as one nation, that “we’re all Americans.”

Then he went off the rails. Big surprise? Not really, I’ll concede.

The president talked vaguely about “all sides” being responsible for the violence. All sides? Let’s see: White nationalists, including some Ku Klux Klan members, started marching to protest the taking down of Confederate statues. You know what kind of response KKK members evoke, correct?

Then came the counter protesters who despise what the Klan stands for, not to mention the white nationalists who essentially stand for the same thing.

“All sides” are responsible? I’m still waiting for the president to issue a full-throated condemnation of the “alt right” movement and the white nationalists/supremacists whose presence at the rally provoked the response in the first place.

Then, during his remarks, he launched into another one of those nonsensical riffs about “record low” joblessness and how everything is going so darn well in the United States of America. The implication — to my ears — was that all this good news was the result of his becoming president.

Even some Republican lawmakers were critical of Trump’s response.

The president once again missed a tremendous opportunity to speak with passion and eloquence about a segment of our society that needs a serious presidential condemnation. His predecessors — all of them, regardless of party affiliation — have risen to the occasion when it has presented itself.

Not the guy who’s now sitting in The Big Chair.

If I could borrow a term we hear so often via Twitter from the president: sad.

national news

Let’s try again, Mr. President

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How about this: David Duke has given Donald Trump a chance to rectify a seriously fluffed response to something Duke said.

Duke is the former Ku Klux Klan grand dragon who’s been in Charlottesville, Va., to participate in a white nationalist protest against attempts to remove Confederate statues.

Duke called the protest in Charlottesville a sort of “victory,” saying that Trump’s election has given people such as the Klansman a voice in current policy discussions. “That’s why we voted for Donald Trump,” Duke said.

Let’s flash back for just a moment. Duke aligned himself during the 2016 presidential campaign with Donald Trump’s “law and order” rhetoric. The Republican candidate was asked to respond to comments from Duke. Trump said “I don’t know Duke” and said he didn’t even know anything about him, his history, let alone his affiliation with the KKK.

Astounding, yes? Sure it is.

Here’s chance for the president of the United States to offer a full-throated condemnation of all that this fire-breathing extremist stands for.

I just wonder, though, if the president has studied up on David Duke and knows any more about him now than what he said he knew during the campaign.

Or was he just lying?

national news

Violence erupts in a city known for knowledge

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe has declared a state of emergency in Charlottesville, home of the University of Virginia and a community associated with one of our greatest Americans, our nation’s third president, Thomas Jefferson.

Donald J. Trump has condemned the violence that has erupted there, as he should have done. “We ALL must be united & condemn all that hate stands for. There is no place for this kind of violence in America. Lets come together as one!” the president said via Twitter. Exactly, Mr. President.

White nationalists, some of them wearing Ku Klux Klan garb, are protesting the removal of a Confederate statue. Their presence has prompted counter protests; thus, the clash that is threatening to blow the community apart.

I keep noticing something about the white nationalists marching through Charlottesville. It’s the presence of the Stars and Bars, the flag generally associated with the Confederate States of America, which seceded from the Union in 1861 and commenced the Civil War.

We’ve been debating for the past 150 or so years about the reason for the Civil War. Was it about slavery? About race? Was it about states’ rights? Or southern “heritage”?

Defenders of the Confederacy keep suggesting the Civil War wasn’t about race, or about slavery. They point to the “heritage” issue as the linchpin issue, and that the states didn’t want the federal government dictating to them how to run their internal affairs.

OK. If that’s the case, why do these white nationalists keep marching under the Stars and Bars? What does the presence of the Confederate symbol mean in that context?

For that matter, I should note, too, that one sees that symbol displayed with great “pride” at KKK rallies. Someone will have to explain to me the juxtaposition of the Stars and Bars and the KKK/white nationalists.

I’m all ears. You may now have the floor.

national news, political news

Yes, Sen. Cruz, but the Democrats have evolved

Oh, how I hate it when someone I detest is correct … even if he doesn’t tell the whole story.

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas delivered a historical truth this week while talking to the Fox News Channel. The Republican said that the Democratic Party is the party of the Ku Klux Klan. He said Democrats — not Republicans — have a history of racism and scorn of minority Americans.

Sure, Ted. I get that. Southern Democrats resisted the enactment of the Civil Rights and Voting Rights acts of the 1960s; prior to that, some Democrats bolted their mainstream party to form something called the “Dixiecrat Party,” and then ran the late Sen. Strom Thurmond for president in 1948; Thurmond would later leave the Democratic Party to become a Republican. What’s more, Democratic history of racial intolerance goes many years before that.

Indeed, President Lyndon Johnson faced fierce opposition from within his Democratic Party to enact the civil rights legislation. He enlisted political help from his Senate Republican friends to push them through to his signature.

But times and policies can change. They did with the Democratic Party. Democrats “evolved” over time.

It’s one thing to talk about historical perspective. It’s quite another to relate politics and policy in real time.

Cruz’s comments came after Senate Republicans shut down a speech by Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, who was reading a letter by the late Coretta Scott King; Warren used the letter to state her opposition to Jeff Sessions becoming the next U.S. attorney general.

Sen. Cruz spoke correctly about Democrats’ sordid history. It’s understandable, too, that he would ignore how the Democratic Party has evolved into a more inclusive organization.

It’s also understandable that he would ignore how his own Grand Old Party has become, well, a bit less inclusive.

I think it’s fair to wonder what President Abraham Lincoln would think today of the political party that carries his name.

media news, national news, political news

KKK newspaper ‘endorses’ Trump: enough said

donald

Hillary Rodham Clinton has loaded up on newspaper endorsements.

Donald J. Trump has gotten, well, just a few of them.

Then he received a most telling send-off from — I trust y’all are sitting down for this one — the official newspaper of the Ku Klux Klan.

This one takes my breath away.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-politics/wp/2016/11/01/the-kkks-official-newspaper-has-endorsed-donald-trump-for-president/

Check this out from the Washington Post:

“While Trump wants to make America great again, we have to ask ourselves, ‘What made America great in the first place?’ ” the article continues. “The short answer to that is simple. America was great not because of what our forefathers did — but because of who our forefathers were.

“America was founded as a White Christian Republic. And as a White Christian Republic it became great.”

I guess the publisher of the Crusader needs to read the U.S. Constitution, which he obviously hasn’t read. The “forefathers” created a secular nation … but I digress.

The Crusader speaks for the Klan, arguably the nation’s most infamous hate group.

The guy who runs the Crusader said the paper isn’t “endorsing” Trump. OK, but the paper sure likes what the Republican presidential nominee is peddling.

I’m out.