What Exactly Do You Mean By . . .

In the spirit of Jake Tapper, when he asked Martin O'Malley what exactly he meant by "fight" when the former Maryland governor vowed to fight against the alt-right when Donald Trump became President (and did Tapper finally figure it out?), I'd like to ask Trump a few questions about what he meant by what he recently said about Charlottesville.

Both sides were responsible for violence?  What exactly do you mean by "both sides" here, Trump?  How were the counter-demonstrators responsible?  Because they were simply there?  Because they were asking to be attacked by merely demonstrating peacefully?

The alt-left?  What exactly do you mean by "alt-left" here, Trump?  An alternative left?  That's a redundancy!  The center of American politics has been moved so far toward conservatism that all of the left is alternative!  That's why the most liberal Democrat isn't even a Democrat - he's Bernie Sanders!  

You're upset that there are beautiful statues being removed because they honor Confederate leaders?  What exactly do you mean by "beautiful statues" here, Trump?  They're an embarrassment to this country by celebrating a would-be nation founded on the premise of preserving slavery.  They are not beautiful landmarks.  The Bonwit Teller store in Manhattan - now that was a beautiful landmark!  Too bad you had to destroy it to build your ugly tower!

Some of the people who went to Charlottesville to out to protest the removal of its Robert E. Lee statue were "fine people?"   What exactly do you mean by "fine people" here, Trump?  They were Klansmen and neo-Nazis!  They were white nationalists carrying torches on the University of Virginia campus - and I don't think they were trying out for an Olympic torch run!  People like that are not fine people!  They're not even human!

Steve Bannon is a good person?  What exactly do you mean by "good person" here, Trump?  He is a contemptible person who sowed all the seeds of hatred in this political climate! If he's such a good person, why did you fire him?  

You actually said also, and I quote, "I own actually one of the largest wineries in the United States, it is in Charlottesville."  What exactly do you mean by . . . any of that, Trump?  No one cares about your damn winery!  A young woman, Heather Heyer, is dead for demonstrating against you, and you're talking about . . . wine?  

Trump, please resign the office of the Presidency effective immediately!  And you know exactly what I mean by "immediately" here. 

After Charlottesville

Charlottesville may very turn to be the tipping point for the man Martin O'Malley called "that racist, immigrant-bashing carnival barker, Donald J. Trump."  The melee in that Virginia town over the removal of a Robert E. Lee statue that led to the death of anti-Trump protester Heather Heyer won't convince many of the people who voted for Trump in November 2016 to change their minds about him - in fact, it may make them more fervently for him - but it could finally put some teeth and muscle into the so-called "resistance."  It may very well energize those of us who can't bear to have Trump in the White House or the Republicans in charge of Congress and two-thirds of the states and make us even more determined to reverse a tide that is currently drowning us.  The energy is already showing up places like Lexington, Kentucky, where Mayor Jim Gray - who unsuccessfully challenged Rand Paul for his Senate seat in 2016 - made a move to get all of the city's Confederate monuments taken down immediately.  

Never mind the Democrats and their better deal.  This goes beyond party.  If the party of Franklin D. Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy isn't up to the task of stopping Trump, we're going to have to go it alone.  If we can use what's left of the Democratic Party as a vehicle for taking our country back from the Breitbart crowd, that's fine.  But we're going to have to be prepared to find another outlet if that doesn't work out.  

So call a convention.  Get a new movement started.  Get behind someone who wants to run for office that you believe in.  Run for office yourself, if you're so inclined.  But just remember, taking down statues of Lee and Jackson (Andrew or Stonewall?  you make the call) and renaming parks and streets is the easy part.  Health care, equality, criminal justice reform, and so many other concerns are at stake here.  Speak out on a blog.  Organize.  Do something!       

And quickly, before World War III breaks out in Korea. :-(

Charlottesville

What have we come to?

The far-right demonstration in Charlottesville, Virginia yesterday wasn't so much a rally as it was a mob.  The white nationalists who marched to protest the removal of a statue of Robert E. Lee weren't looking for trouble, they were there to cause trouble.   That they did.  The showed the ugly hatred, bigotry, and intolerance that Donald Trump has stoked for the past two years.  There were Southern Crosses and Nazi flags on display along with the hateful rhetoric against people of color, non-Christians, secular humanists, and anyone else that offends the American far right.  When counter-protesters attempted to be heard, one right-winger responded by driving a car into the anti-Trump crowd, as much an act of terror as flying panes it buildings.  Three people are reported dead.  And all this at the home of the University of Virginia, founded by Thomas Jefferson as a parting git to his state for the pursuit of intellectual and analytical rigor.      

To think that Bill Maher was cracking jokes about this scheduled rally the day before it took place.  But it's no laughing matter now. 

While Trump has noncommitally condemned the violence in Charlottesville and refused to aim his comments directly at the reactionaries who instigated the melee, Virginia governor Terry McAuliffe has declared a state of emergency.  This is happening as Trump plans to face down North Korea and maybe start a war with Venezuela.

Love trumps hate?  No more reconciliation with the alt-right.  "Now is not the time for reconciliation," Martin O'Malley said back in January 2017. "Dietrich Bonhoeffer didn't reconcile with the Nazis. Martin Luther King didn't reconcile with the KKK."

Now we take a stand against the forces of darkness.