The Imperial Presidency

So is he or isn’t he? A racist that is. And do we the American people care?  The dictionary defines racism as a belief that one race is inherently superior to all other races. The belief is manifestly dangerous when it enters the sphere of public policy, and begins to affect the rules by which citizens lead their lives.  During the period when slavery existed worldwide, Caucasian peoples, generally of European origin saw fit to treat other humans of different races as property, as distinct from humans. As such, they felt able to treat the human property as they saw fit, including elimination of those property-humans.

In other cases, e.g., the British Empire, the Caucasians from Britain traveled to other places on our globe and claimed ownership over everything therein, including the peoples who occupied those foreign climes. So, while the peoples of the Indian Subcontinent may not have been slaves per se, they could not operate independently from the new owners of their land.  Racism continued to operate in such places fostered by the illusion (belief) that the British (White) race was inherently superior to the local (non-white) and therefore deserved to control the land and all its occupants.  Thus, in 1857, the revolt by Indians against their British masters became known among Indians as the First War of Independence, whereas the British overlords referred to that same war as the Great Indian Mutiny.  Perspective is all.

In this country, slavery was the defining context for American racism. One was either European or a slave (largely from Africa). At the time, there were no competing races to interfere with the purity of the racist concept.  And then came the Great War—the “Civil War” of the 1860s. One side, largely the Northern states within that new United States decided that slavery should no longer exist. The Southern states then rebelled and began shooting at the North. The ending we all now know resulted in considerable bloodshed—it is estimated that 620,000 died in that conflict, perhaps the largest in the history of American warfare, although there is some dispute about whether the losses in Vietnam equal or exceed that number.

But the problem is that the war may have settled the argument about whether slavery was legal or illegal, but it never really resolved the underlying issue of racism. Even if you agreed that it was now illegal to own slaves, it did not mean you would agree that, therefore, all races were equal in all respects. Quite the contrary. Within the southern region of the US, racism continued unabated. And, racism existed in all states and regions—see all areas formerly claimed by Native Americans, and subsequently claimed by Caucasians of European descent.

Growing up in midtown Manhattan during the 1930s and 1940s, I virtually never encountered a person of color. African Americans all lived north of 125^th Street in Harlem.  Then I moved to New City Park in Rockland County, NY. Again, no people of color. I think in my elementary school, we had not one single person of color. Then I went to high school in Spring Valley, NY. Again, few, very few people of color.  And all this whiteness was not because slaves were still maintained in the North. No, it is because northern whites did not wish to live next to northern people of color. Racism? You betcha.

Oddly (odd to me) we had army units during every war we fought, consisting mainly of segregated units. During WWII alone we had 125,000 African American soldiers in distinguished fighting units. For a brief history, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_history_of_African_Americans.

Despite the fact that these units were segregated by race, the soldiers died in combat, regardless of their race. But we should be clear, it was racism that kept these units apart from their white counterparts. 

Now, that Donald Trump issue.  It seems fairly clear that the Donald’s entire family has always operated from a base of racism.  Nicholas Kristof recently wrote a useful article in the New York Times about the Trump family racism.  It can be viewed at: 

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/17/opinion/donald-trump-racist.html. Also, The Atlantic published a piece on the Trump family racism, which describes the same issues as Kristof identified. It can be viewed at: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/06/trump-racism-comments/588067/

As these and other articles make clear Trump’s racism is born and bred. His family was racist and he simply adopted these family traits, and carried them over into his businesses. Note that housing has traditionally been the touchstone of racism.  Entire housing units, or housing developments have been denied to people of color. In the case of Trump, housing units developed and operated by Trump were racist by design and operated as such.

And Trump’s problem in denying the racism, (“I don’t have a racist bone in my body”--see the Kristof article specifically) is that he lies almost every time he opens his mouth. The truth-watchers (PolitiFact and others) stopped counting after he passed his 10,000^th lie while in office. So, for Trump to decry the calls of racism is somewhere between laughable and outrageous.

But the more important question, beyond whether Trump is a racist (he is), is the same question about the American people.  There seem to be several types of people in America:

Hard-Core Racists (KKK lovers) – the folks who think the wrong side won the Civil War, and that folks of a different color, but especially African-Americans, should not be living here, and maybe should “go home”, despite the fact that Georgia might well be “home”.  You know them. They refuse to live within any community that houses people of color, hate the fact that schools are even vaguely integrated, and refuse to have anything to do with such folks.

Ordinary Racists – many Americans do not practice their racism openly and would be offended were the term applied to them.  But they still prefer living in communities that are largely devoid of people of color, and seek out schools for their kids that are predominantly, if not completely white. Charter schools are largely a direct response to such people.  They are polite when encountering people of color, but prefer not mixing socially or even in business settings. They will not create scenes when encountering black folks, but they prefer not encountering them.

Largely non-Racist—many (percentages would be handy, but . . .) Americans who are largely free of racism. While they might not seek out communities of color within which to house themselves, they do not shy away from housing communities that have a black component. They will send their kids to integrated schools, and will mix easily both socially and in business with people of mixed race.  These are the folks who voted for Barack Obama, and who continue to think that Obama was a successful president.

I assume there is some component of our population that simply has no racial bias at all. They treat everyone equally, regardless of skin color.  Percentages would be nice, but I assume this group is fairly small.

Now, growing up in this country, I have also observed a concept that may not be racist, but operates in similar ways. Many folks who migrated to the US from many different countries have often tended to seek out others of the same characteristics, be they color, language, or ethnic background. Thus, within many cities, German villages emerged, or Chinatowns, or Irish neighborhoods, or Hispanic neighborhoods. People feel more comfortable with other folks who seem to be like them. I once spoke with a Hispanic man who functioned as a translator. He attended a large meeting of sales people in Los Angeles, and came away with the conviction that these people never needed to speak/learn English, because they lived their lives entirely within Hispanic communities.

Similarly, African Americans have learned to be cautious in all aspects of their lives. They know they are at greater risk than white Americans. Over time, they may well seem themselves to be racist. Mainly, it is a defensive style of living, borne of many years/decades of life experiences in which their communities suffer different fates than their white community counterparts.  Thus, “driving while black”, “dining while black”, and other similar tropes have arisen in our language to describe the plight of African Americans in encounters with our various police forces.

At any one time, these differing racist views coalesce and produce different political environments. Groups such as the KKK and white supremacists, like Neo-Nazi’s have arisen and taken on a political identity. In most previous Administrations, these groups were marginalized and considered “undesirables”.  Now, with our current Trump Administration, these groups seem to form the core of the supporters. Others, the “not-quite full racists”, or the MAGAHeads, join in to forge a new hard core Trump support group, one that hopes to re-elect him in 2020.  They are the ones now chanting “Send her back”, thus replacing the “Lock her up” chants of his 2016 campaigns.  But it is the same campaign strategy—define his opposition as evil, Anti-Americans, who should be either in prison, or kicked out of the country. “This country is for whites only” seems to be their campaign slogan, or motto.

And now that Fox News has given up all pretense at being a neutral news organization, they can now turn up their own amplifiers and broadcast his message as though it was coming directly from Trump’s mouth.  He has a full-time political PR firm at his disposal 24-7, and it doesn’t even cost him any campaign money.

So, it seems clear that not only is Trump a racist, but his entire campaign is a racist trope.

Now that is a damning thought, assuming I am accurate. But it may not be the worst we can deduce from the Trump campaign. We need to remember that Trump is the compleat narcissist. By that I mean that all of his actions and reactions are derived from his immense sense of self. In his world, he is the only human that matters. Nobody else is of even the slightest concern.  If, in the course of pursuing some end in which he is interested, someone or some set of somebodies, gets hurt, he does not care. He is the only thing that matters. In his eyes, he can do no wrong.  And, his desires are what matters. Nothing else.

Now, what does that mean with a US President? I think it means that he views himself as somehow above the US Presidency. That he views as simply a high level job. What he may want is to be a king-emperor, in fact if not in title.  He may see himself, now that he has been elevated to the Presidency, as an historic figure, who will forever be remembered reverently.  And I think he may do anything to so elevate himself into that historic picture. He may in some fashion declare a war—think Iran. He may act so as to corrupt our election process to yield his desired objective—him elevated for another four years.  And then he may begin acting to remain longer than four years in that high office.

His entire campaign is built on creating in the minds of his supporters a fear and a hatred of the other, and “the other” is anyone who fails to fully support Donald Trump. He casts them as traitors to the country—anyone who does not support his every whim is, therefore a Traitor.

This folks, is the stuff of radical dictators everywhere in history. It is the stuff of absolute monarchs. It is the stuff of fascist dictators, such as Hitler and Mussolini.  It is the stuff of the Iranian Ayatollah. It is the stuff of Kim in North Korea, of MBS in Saudi Arabia.  It has no relationship to any of our past presidents—NONE.  He has placed himself in a class, the likes of whom we have never seen in this country.

He is an existential threat to the security of our very democracy.  He is not simply the “worst president in our history”.  He is in a different class, a class that degrades to the point of elimination the very concept of our Presidency.

The fact that his republican allies in Congress support him is a sign that our entire system is now at risk. This is not simply a political disagreement over policy. It is a battle for survival of our nation.

We dare not lose this battle.