Donald Trump may have saved his ire for others, but black people aren't fooled

[applegrove]

Donald Trump may have saved his ire for others, but black people aren't fooled

by Rebecca Carroll, the Guardian

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jun/02/donald-trump-black-people-racism-latinos-muslims-campaign

"SNIP...........


Presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump has been fairly straightforward regarding how he feels in general about black people in America – he failed to swiftly and effectively disavow former KKK grand wizard David Duke in May, referred to the Black Lives Matter movement as “trouble” last fall, and during the course of his campaign other things have surfaced, such as his idea to air a “white v black” season of The Apprentice.

Publicly, however, his most brazen racist remarks have been directed primarily at Muslims (a relatively small percentage of whom are black) and Mexicans. If it’s a backhanded political strategy to court the black vote (which he will ultimately need), he has underestimated the strength of our bond with other groups who have been marginalized and discriminated against.

Still, it’s oddly perplexing that in a country whose culture is so firmly rooted in systemic anti-black racism, Trump, who never hesitates to snatch the low hanging fruit of bigotry, hasn’t gone into hyper-drive about black people in America – all the standard black people tropes seem right in his wheelhouse. Of course, just as President Richard Nixon’s use of the term “silent majority” was widely understood as code for “white people”, Trump’s campaign slogan “Make America Great Again” refers to a racially divided past. Alongside his marquee plan to build a border wall to keep immigrants out of the United States, it’s pretty clearly that what he means by that is Make America White Again. But black folks still don’t seem to really be on his radar – as either a problem or a target market.

Is it because the Latino population has become the largest minority group and will only continue to grow, whereas the black population is not expected to change to any great degree? Or does Trump feels like his biggest contingency – the white working class – might feel Latino immigrants are more direct competition when it comes to all the jobs Trump claims he will create? Is it because mass incarceration, the main repressive tactic used against black people in America, is ludicrously expensive and also losing political support among both Republicans and Democrats? But that would be strange given that Trump’s proposed “solution” to Latino immigration – mass deportation – would also cost millions.

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[libodem]

1. Blue Lives Matter

Has attempted to co opt, Black Lives Matter, into standoff, over which side one is on. This is really reckless retorhic to pit one against each other. It's no accident that law enforcement vs young men of color, is the choice.

It's either okay with you that, cops are allowed to shoot you with your hands up, your back turned and running, holding anything, already down, etc or you don't value blue lives.

Trayvon Martin, is my hero, in this war on kids by LE.
Zimmerman was allowed to be cast in an authority role and to get away with murder. It has snowballed ever since. With us or agaist us? Who is this other IF they dont mean POC?

See if that doesn't give you some sense of your white privilege?

[Eleanors38]

2. He goes after Latinos/Latinas because most think they are "recent"....

Bullshit, of course, but most Americans see only relatively recent immigration (over the last 30-40 yrs), and staunchly refuse to look at the real history (can you say Desoto? It ain't just a car in Vertigo). This makes them an easier target as a myth of recent "threat" can be manufactured. IMO, blacks have had time to reveal their history in terms of fundamental resistance to both de jure and de facto apartheid and a whole freakin' war. Latinos have that history as well, but MLK was such a fundamental world figure in liberation politics that African-Americans could rely on his work and then the work of the Panthers and Malcolm X to present a broad, television-driven battlefield summed up by Tennessee Ernie Ford: "One fist of iron, the other of steel; if the right one doesn't get you, then the left one weeel." (M. Travis.)

Trump is afraid to go there.