Monday, June 24, 2019
A Juxtaposition
What one Christian does is his own responsibility. What one Jew [Muslim] does is thrown back at all Jews [Muslims].
— Anne Frank, The Diary of a Young Girl (1944)
Being a person of neither creative nor mental ability, he mindlessly finds himself inspired by the actions of a man who, many years ago, like Trump, was driven by a fierce hatred for a group of people he considered threatening to his way of life. In Trump, this hatred manifests itself in Islamaphobia.
Both before and after becoming president, Trump’s anti-Muslim sentiments were well known. During the presidency of Barrack Obama, Trump repeatedly insinuated in public comments, that the president was secretly a Muslim. At a campaign rally in 2015, one of the attendees said to Trump, without being contradicted by Trump, that Mr. Obama is “not even an American.” The attendee went on to say: to the candidate: “We have a problem in this country; it’s called Muslims.” As the man spoke, Trump interjected: “we need this question.” The questioner then asked the candidate: “When can we get rid of them” to which Trump responded : “We’re going to be looking at that and plenty of other things.”
At a campaign rally in New Hampshire, Trump promised he would kick all Syrian refugees out of the country because they might be a secret army. “They could be ISIS. . . .This could be one of the great tactical ploys of all time. A 200,000-man army, maybe.”
Mid-way during his first year as president, Trump commented on the reported rise in crime in the UK and attributed the rise to what he called the “spread of radical Islamic terror.” Trump’s repeated attempt to impose what was called a Muslim ban, a ban repeatedly struck down by federal courts, are well known.
As observed at the outset, Trump was following in the footsteps of a well-known would-be world leader who perceived a threat posed by a group of people who were identified by the man who would become the leader of Germany-Adolph Hitler. Hitler didn’t care about Muslims, but he had plenty to say about Jews.
Hitler’s hatred of Jews was every bit the match for Trump’s hatred of Muslims. Examples of Hitler’s sentiments can be found in a Collection of Speeches 1922-1945. In a speech given by Hitler in Munich, Germany, on April 12, 1922 he gave vent to his hatred of Jews.
Discussing the idea that different races can be distinguished by their approaches to work, Hitler observed that in contrast to the Aryan, “The Jew regards work as the means to the exploitation of other peoples. . . .” Quoting Theodor Mommsen, Hitler continued, saying: “The Jew is the ferment of decomposition in peoples that means that the Jew destroys and must destroy because he completely lacks the conception of an activity which builds up the life of the community. And, therefore, it is beside the point whether the individual Jew is ‘decent’ or not. In himself he carries those characteristics which Nature has given him, and he cannot ever rid himself of those characteristics.”
Hitler’s hatred finds a mirror in Trump’s characterization of Muslims. In a Fox news interview on March 30, 2011, a time when Trump, like Hitler, had not yet risen to power, Trump was asked by Fox News Host, Bill O’Reilly, whether there was a “Muslim problem.” In response, echoing Hitler’s comments about Jews, Trump said: “Absolutely. I mean, I don’t notice Swedish people knocking down the World Trade Center. There is a Muslim problem in the world, and you know it and I know it.”
In a speech in Munich on July 28, 1922, describing the role of the Jew in German society, Hitler said: “It is a battle which began nearly 120 years ago, at the moment when the Jew was granted citizen rights in the European States. The political emancipation of the Jews was the beginning of an attack of delirium. For thereby they were given full citizen rights and equality for a people which was much more clearly and definitely a race apart than all others, that has always formed and will form a State within the State. . . . That did not happen perhaps at one blow, but it came about. . . first a little finger, then a second and a third. . . until at last a people that in the eighteenth century still appeared completely alien had won equal citizen-rights with ourselves.”
Mirroring Hitler’s comments about Jews, Trump told a Fox news interview on November 20, 2015, that he wanted a database for Syrian refugees entering the country because: “They’ve already started coming in . . .which is absolutely ridiculous. I think it’s a Trojan horse and plenty of problems are going to be caused.”
Like Trump, Hitler liked long speeches. His July 28, 1922 speech was approximately 6,140 words in length and would have taken over an hour for Hitler to deliver. Trump’s speech at his June 26 rally in Orlando lasted more than an hour.
It is a sad day for our country when comparisons between the leader of Nazi Germany, and the president of the United States, are apt. It is an even sadder day when no one seems to notice.
Wednesday, May 22, 2019
The Muslim and the Trump
Happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction. . . requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens. . . .
— George Washington,1790 Letter to the Newport Jewish Congregation
In these tumultuous times it is easy to lose sight of the many things that Donald Trump has in common with those who, at times, are our adversaries, as well as those who have a different approach to human rights from what many of us believe we, in the United States, have traditionally embraced. The most obvious is President Xi Jinping of China.
Because of the focus on tariffs , and the disagreements between Mr. Xi and Mr. Trump on issues pertaining to trade, it was easy to ignore the fact that they have one very important thing in common. It is a passion that has nothing to do with trade-it has to do with Muslims. Their feelings about Muslims are identical. How they are able to give them voice differs because of the rules of the countries over which they rule.
President Xi expressed his dislike for Muslims by creating concentration camps in western China where more than 1 million Muslims are confined. According to Amnesty International, “China has intensified its campaign of mass internment, intrusive surveillance, political indoctrination and forced cultural assimilation against the region’s Uighurs, Kazakhs and other predominantly Muslim ethnic groups. The inhabitants study communist propaganda and give thanks to President Xi.”
In addition to reeducating the Muslims, there have also been reports of waterboarding and other forms of torture being inflicted on the inhabitants of the camps. President Xi justifies the use of the concentration camps, and the brutal treatment accorded the residents by describing them as “re-education camps,” and pointing out that the inmates are being taught useful skills.
Like President Xi, Mr. Trump has no use for Muslims. He is, however, for the time being at least, somewhat constrained in how he deals with what he would describe as the Muslim problem. He cannot imprison and reeducate Muslims, but he can, and does, frequently express his dislike and distrust of them and spout lies in order to give vent to his hatred. .
Long before he became president Mr. Trump repeatedly suggested, disparagingly, that President Obama was secretly a Muslim. His dislike and mistrust of Muslims was most publicly on display when in one of the hundreds of lies he has spewed, he said that: “thousands and thousands” of Muslims cheered as they watched the collapse of the World Trade Center in 2001.
When a supporter at a campaign rally during the run-up to the 2016 election said that the United States had a problem with Muslims, Mr. Trump not only agreed, but, when the supporter asked when the country could get rid of the Muslims Mr. Trump said: “We’re going to be looking at a lot of different things.” He made good on his promise to the supporter.
Shortly after he was sworn into office, he issued Executive Order 13769 that became known as the Muslim ban or the travel ban. It was in place from January 27, 2017 until March 16, 2017. It was superseded by Executive order 1378, an order placing limits on entry into the United States from five majority Muslim countries.
It is not only in President Xi that Mr. Trump finds a companion spirit when the topic is Muslims. He recently hosted Viktor Orban, the right-wing prime minister of Hungary, at the White House.
In a 2017 interview with the German newspaper “Der Bild,” Mr. Orban said that the Hungarian people did not want to open their borders to foreign invaders. He said the refugees coming into Europe were not fleeing dangerous conditions in the countries from which they were fleeing, but were “Muslim invaders.”
In his opening speech in February 2019, when the campaign to select representatives to the European Parliament began, Mr. Orban told Hungarian voters they should defend Christian nations against immigration because immigration led to what he called the “virus of terrorism.” He said that those who “decide for immigration and migrants for whatever reason, in reality, are creating mixed-race nations. . . . Historic traditions in immigrant countries come to an end. . . .In such countries Christian-Muslim worlds are created with continually shrinking Christian proportions.” He said immigration: “lets in the virus of terrorism.”
During his meeting with Mr. Trump, in what should be called “the Offal Office,” Mr. Orban said: “And I would like to express that we are proud to stand together with the United States on fighting against illegal migration, terrorism and to protect and help the Christian communities all around the world.” In response Mr. Trump, a well-known member of the Christian community, praised the anti-Muslim Orban saying: “And you have been great with respect to Christian communities. You have really put a block up, and we appreciate that very much.” The “block” to which Mr. Trump was presumably referring, is the block that keeps Muslims out of Hungary.
Mr. Trump’s praise for Mr. Orban with respect to Christian communities suggests that Mr. Trump thinks the United States is a Christian nation. It is standing up for Christian communities that counts, and other communities are of less importance. Anyone observing what he has done since moving into the White House is not surprised that that’s what Mr. Trump believes, in the unlikely event he has ever given even a second’s thought to what he believes.
Tuesday, May 14, 2019
Smirking Pompeo
Suffer me that I may speak, and after I have spoken, mock on.
— The Book of Job, 21:3
No wonder Mr. Pompeo awkwardly laughed or, as it was described by some observers, “smirked,” when asked about the reports of the execution of four of the people with whom Mr. Trump and Mr. Pompeo had been negotiating a few shorts months ago. Their roles might have been reversed.
The smirk made its appearance when Mr. Pompeo was being interviewed on a Sunday news show, and was asked for his reaction to reports that life had not gone well for four of the people he had gotten to know during the two sessions North Korea’s Kim Jong Un and Donald Trump had conducted over the preceding 12 months.
The first session had been a phenomenal success and the second, although cut short, did not extinguish the flame of love that warmed Mr. Trumps’ heart whenever he thought of Mr. Kim.
After the first meeting in Singapore in June 2018, Mr. Trump said at a news conference that he and Mr. Kim had “developed a very special bond. People are going to be very impressed. People are going to be very happy. . . . I think our whole relationship with North Korea and the Korean Peninsula is going to be a very much different situation than it has in the past.” Describing Mr. Kim, Mr. Trump said he was: “a very talented man.”
Addressing the United Nations General Assembly in September 2018 and making reference to the historic meeting, Mr. Trump said in the manner of a child explaining the child’s affection for a person of whom the child’s parents disapprove: “He likes me, I like him. We get along. He wrote me two of the most beautiful letters. When I showed one of the letters-just one- to [Japanese] Prime Minister Abe, he said: ‘This is actually a groundbreaking letter.’
Prior to the February 2019 meeting in Singapore, , Mr. Trump, said of his relationship with Mr. Kim: “It’s a very interesting thing to say, but I’ve developed a very, very good relationship. We’ll see what that means. But he’s never had a relationship with anybody from this country and hasn’t had lots of relationships anywhere.”
Notwithstanding Mr. Trump’s ardor, the February 2019 summit was cut short by Mr. Trump because he and Mr. Kim could not come to an agreement on the United States lifting economic sanctions and on North Korea cutting back its nuclear arsenal. Mr. Trump explained that: “I’d much rather do it [a deal] right than do it fast.”
Mike Pompeo, the Secretary of State who accompanied Mr. Trump on the trip, commented on the early termination of the summit, saying: “We are certainly closer today [to an agreement] than we were 36 hours ago, and we were closer then, than we were a month or two before that.”
Success in negotiations with North Korea is a bit like beauty-it is in the eye of the beholder. What unconfirmed reports say happened in North Korea following the second meeting, suggests that Mr. Kim was not quite as pleased with its results as Mr. Pompeo had been. If reports are accurate, Mr. Kim attributed the failure of the talks to four of his representatives and to make sure such an embarrassing failure would not happen again, the negotiators were lined up in front of a firing squad and executed.
During an interview on an ABC news program, Mr. Pompeo was asked about the reported execution and in response, he simply smiled or, as some described it, smirked, while declining to add anything to the reports but saying: “It does appear that the next time we have serious conversations, my counterpart will be someone else.” Here is why Mr. Pompeo smirked.
He is mildly amused by the fact that those negotiators were working for a man whose retributive actions towards his negotiators, was so violent. Mr. Pompeo knows that those negotiators work for the same kind of manipulative, corrupt, and unpredictable tyrant as he. Mr. Pompeo smirked because he knows that it was only luck of the draw that he works for Mr. Trump who lacks the ability, if not the wish, to have those who displease him shot. If he could, he would. He can’t. Mr. Trump’s remedies for dealing with those who displease him is to utter the famous two-word phrase: “You’re fired.”
Mr. Pompeo smirked because he knows how much those who were shot would have preferred to be part of the corrupt Trump White House team rather than the corrupt North Korean entourage and he knows how lucky he is to be working for his nut job instead of the other one.
There is in truth, little to smirk about when the person who is smirking works for Trump instead of Kim. Both men are beneath contempt.