Time to Treat Trump as an Enemy of the State

[peggysue2]

Because that's what he is.

As a number of our journalists run to the defense of Sarah Huckabee Sanders, a woman who lies every f**cking day for this Creature, they might tap into the interview at Salon where Reza Aslan lays down some very inconvenient truths about Donald Trump and his odious supporters.

Take a stand now or stand down forever.

Because this is the only issue that matters and underscores the importance of our upcoming elections in November and in 2020.

Everything else is a distraction.




https://www.salon.com/2018/04/30/fired-cnn-host-reza-aslan-its-time-to-treat-donald-trump-as-an-enemy-of-the-state/

[nature-lover]

1. Linked article is well worth the read.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

2. Great article! Reza Aslan gets it.

There’s this notion ... that you have to respect the office even if you don’t respect the man. This is part of American political culture. And yet we’re talking about a man, in Trump, who is shitting on the office on a regular basis. Right? But we have to respect the office.

I think what happens, in this attempt to maintain political norms in the face of someone who has overturned all of those norms so disastrously, are, for example, these arguments about whether we should refer to Trump’s lies as actually being what they are -- which is lies -- and not as "untruths," "mistakes," "alternative facts" or some other verbiage. A wise man once said that the only reason our system in America works is that it’s based on the notion of shame. A lot of what we think are legal restrictions on the office of the presidency are not actually legal restrictions. They’re actually moral restrictions that the founders didn’t bother to put in writing because they simply assumed that shame would keep a person from abusing the powers of the presidency. They did not recognize the possibility of an absolutely and utterly shameless man being in this position.

CNN fired him when, after the June 2017 London Bridge attack, he called Trump "a piece of shit" and a "man baby" for the way he responded, which was to push his anti-Muslim travel ban and criticize Mayor Sadiq Khan. Aslan said of the cancellation, "I am not a journalist. I am a social commentator and scholar. And so I agree with CNN that it is best that we part ways."

[dalton99a]

4. +1

[peggysue2]

10. Aslan definitely gets it and . . .

paid the price for speaking out. This interview is a really good read, a chilling wake-up call for all of us. I encourage everyone to read the full text. Aslan zeroes in on the whole evangelical Christian, white nationalist danger that too many people are discounting when, in fact, they represent 100 million Americans, 75% of whom support the Imposter-in-Chief.

Is Trump an enemy of the State? Yes, and so are his enablers.

[dalton99a]

3. Unprecedented treachery is what we have

And Tom Perez said it

[peggysue2]

12. And we need to start . . .

repeating those words, again and again. Perez is on the mark.

[asiliveandbreathe]

5. A most vile ugly POS who has stained America....his appearance everywhere is

disgusting...let's talk how disgusting..start in Michigan and work our way back - if you can do it without puking...I am embarrassed by those amerikans who support this pos....history will not be kind..

Put these deplorable amerikans on the other side of our borders...and let those who have faced (what these deplorables could NEVER do) a long journey just to survive ....with nothing but the clothes on their back...

[peggysue2]

13. Agreed!

I think he makes a point about recent immigrants seeing the danger more clearly than native born citizens because often an immigrant's memories are of what he/she left behind--societies and institutions eaten from the inside out. Turkey is a very good--if not chilling--example of how quickly this corruption can take hold.

We have a chance of routing out the rot. But only if we act quickly.

[pandr32]

6. I would add "way passed" in front of your subject

...because he is an enemy of America and everything we stand for. He has no regard for our traditions, Constitution, our branches of government, the role America has played in the world, or Americans. We are being exploited to benefit himself, his family and his supporters--not to mention his foreign allies (not ours).

[peggysue2]

14. I'd have no problem with that

I just picked up the title from the original article

[pandr32]

22. Again we slam into the problem with the press

It almost sounds like he is just beginning to be a problem. No--he showed his true colors while campaigning and the press wanted the perception of a horse race against the finest candidate ever.

[peggysue2]

24. Agree again, panda

And Aslan smacked up against this early on when he criticized Trump and then his series was given the boot. Aslan was considered the offensive entity for speaking the simple truth.

It sounds like a bad joke.

As for the 2016 election? The tar and feathering of Hillary Clinton was a disgrace then and still is. The whataboutism of 'but, but her emails' looks downright ludicrous now. It's part of the reason that we read these headlines about Clinton not being helpful or refusing to 'go away.' She is a constant reminder of what too much of the press refused to do--actual journalism, investigative digging, research, etc. It's why Wolf chafed their tender sensibilities Saturday night; she had the nerve to point at them as part of the problem.

Btw, (as you probably know) Hillary Clinton has refused to take the advice of shutting up, sitting down or going away. She delivered a really strong speech at a PEN conference recently--PEN World Voices Festival--with a followup interview led by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichi, who says she thinks of Clinton as Auntie Hillary. That comment made me smile. They ran the speech/interview on Book TV this weekend. It's probably up on You Tube for anyone interested. It was good.

[pandr32]

29. Perfectly said

[Shrike47]

7. The article is well worth reading.

[peggysue2]

15. It is!

[poboy2]

8. Traitors, by definition, are enemies of the state. He is a traitor. -nt

[peggysue2]

16. That, too

[triron]

9. Kudos to Salon.

[peggysue2]

18. I agree

One of the better articles at Salon, particularly after their run with the infamous Ha Ha Goodman.

[Blue_Tires]

11. Been doing that since before he was elected

[peggysue2]

19. He has.

Unfortunately, the press barely skimmed the surface of the Trumpster's financial fraud, racist attitudes, shit-stirring and/or unfitness for office. Instead, he received points for his 'entertainment' value.

We're now living with that mistake.

[smirkymonkey]

17. Kicking for later reading!

[BobTheSubgenius]

20. That he is, peggysue...

...and it is long past time to take a stand. Better late than never, but many months ago would have been better.

[peggysue2]

25. Absolutely agree, Bob

And strongest stand we can make is in November with record-breaking numbers of American citizens exercising their constitutional voting rights.

That's the way we win. Really it's the only way we win; standing up and being counted.

[PatrickforO]

21. One of the haunting things I read in this Salon article, the most haunting thing,

is that Aslan doesn't believe we can recover from Trump.

We are walking a razor sharp pathway. If we lose our focus, our balance, then the abyss opens before us eagerly, waiting for us to go into freefall.

This is why the carping amongst ourselves in which we regularly engage must ultimately take a back seat to the primary objective, which is to somehow jettison the American Empire and take back the American Republic.

And, to do that, we must jettison the Republican party - break it so that the racist extremists crawl back under their rocks.

To begin with, as Garrett78 has said quite eloquently in other posts, we have to have a genuine, honest discussion about racism, genocide, slavery and the current state of white privilege.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=10555340

Here's an excerpt:

Don't shy away from those things. Embrace them...over and over and over again. Scream it from the rooftops. Again and again and again. Instead of taking persons of color for granted, reward persons of color for saving us all from disasters such as Roy Moore. And do so because it's the right thing to do. Do so because we believe in justice. Do so because we know injustices that are seemingly of the past continue to haunt us, continue to impact the present. Do so because we recognize the truth in James Baldwin's words: "History is not the past. It is the present. We carry our history with us. We *are* our history. If we pretend otherwise, we literally are criminals."

And keep talking about the systemic nature of what led to the Me Too movement. These are not isolated incidents carried out by a few bad apples. This is a systemic, cultural problem that requires us to ask questions such as, "How do we need to change the way we raise boys in this society, so as to best address toxic masculinity and objectification?"

And, of course, push for single-payer health insurance, fight to reverse wage stagnation and the growing wealth disparity, promote unionization and labor rights, equal pay for women, increased paid family leave, etc. Remind people that the Democratic Party platform is the cure for economic anxiety.

And talk about toxic science denial. Talk about the desperate need to stop anthropogenic global warming.

And push for media reform. Talk about how the bullshit "liberal media" campaign of the last several decades, as well as a misplaced prioritization of ratings, has successfully resulted in an infotainment industry that promotes false equivalencies and treats all statements as equally valid opinions (as if there are no facts and there are no falsehoods). Advocate for media literacy to be taught in schools.

Forget about going out of our way to win over so-called Reagan Democrats or Trump voters. If they wake up, great. But Democrats need to focus on the above points, GOTV and win. Win. Win. Win. Otherwise, we're all screwed.

[peggysue2]

28. What I took from his comments is . . .

that we're unlikely to fully recover. We've lost our moral authority and it will take a very long time to regain that. If we ever do.

The most chilling point for me was the urgency of the message, the way Americans simply do not believe we could be seriously compromised, that our Institutions are somehow invincible to outside damage or in-country betrayal. Clearly, those Institutions we've always taken for granted are under daily assault and damage. And the damage is beginning to show.

Yes, the Republican Party must be defeated at all levels because they've been completely taken over by the most toxic elements in the country. Also agree that we need that honest conversation on race, class, slavery, genocide, ect. However, we also need a country left standing in which to have that conversation which is why Garrett87's comments on GOTV and win, win, win is so important.

Our signature lines should all read:

Vote as if your lives depended on it. Because they do.

That's not merely a catchy phrase. It's chillingly true.

[Hortensis]

30. Raised eyebrows here: "Aslan doesn't believe we can recover

from Trump"

I didn't read the article and now know I won't. There's a far bigger market for gloom-and-doom messages, and that's why we're flooded with them. These people all have rent to pay.

That, plus it takes wisdom to pull heads out of the group hole, look around, take notes,and disagree with the group. And it takes the courage and character to accept the lower incomes that being closed out of the pop market into more thoughtful ones usually means.

Seriously for this tedious message, hasn't the resilience our government has displayed so far been encouraging? They haven't been able to destroy even the ACA.

How about all the people marching in the streets, outnumbered many times over by those newly resolute at home? After finally betraying the goals they've been working toward, the Republicans and people controlling them are going to lose power big time in November.

As for the nazi types, they were always here. They've been newly energized, but now that we see them, they'll end up running for the cracks and shadows again.

Let's face it, there isn't one person here who sees himself as among the presumably permanently degraded Americans that author's imagining. That's also something to take note of and think about.

As of course, even though awareness is only somewhat raised, these days even 10% newly awake and aware voter warriors will constitute a major wave. And it may well be significantly more.

[PunkinPi]

23. K&R nt

[pansypoo53219]

26. sarah fuckabee is a bully. just like spicer. just like the moron in chief.

[KY_EnviroGuy]

27. K & R for Reza. n/t