Trump’s knack for finding controversy
US President Donald Trump has found himself in yet another firestorm of controversy. This time over his seeming support for white supremacists.
Mr. Trump is no stranger to controversy. It’s either controversy seeks him out or he seeks out controversy.
The egotistical and narcissistic US president isn’t shy about getting involved in arguments over sensitive issues. This time he got in hot water again by appearing to side with white supremacists who “invaded” the southern city of Charlottesville, Virginia, after that city decided to tear down a statue of Confederate general Robert E. Lee.
Lee was a famous general who fought on the rebel side of the American Civil War that wanted to secede from the United States of America. To this day, he is a hero to whites in the American South. Thus the violent reaction of southern whites, also labeled as neo-Nazis, to the toppling down of a monument to Lee.
A large number of protesting white people, mostly male, marched on Charlottesville last August 12. They were met there by a counter-protest by a multiracial crowd. It was during the confrontation between the two sides that a white man drove his car into the counter-protesting crowd, killing a young white woman, Heather Heyer, and injuring several others.
That exacerbated the already explosive racial situation, with the mostly male white supremacists beating up some of the counter-protesters. They also continued their march, shouting slogans like “Jews will not replace us!” which were reminiscent of the Adolf Hitler era in Germany where Jews, homosexuals, and other “undesirable people” were rounded up in the millions and gassed to death.
Condemnation of the white supremacist rally and the death of a counterprotester, Miss Heyer, reverberated across the United States and other countries, saying that modern-day Nazism has no place in today’s world.
President Trump made things worse when he condemned the death and violence in Charlottesville but added that the fault lay on “both sides.” He elaborated that not all of the white rallyists were neo-Nazis and that there were “fine people” among them.
The reaction came swiftly against Trump’s statement, with people saying that there are “no good neo-Nazis.” Trump then changed his stand and called out the white supremacists. But two days later he went back to his initial reaction, insisting again that both sides were responsible for the deadly incident.
As I write this, the controversy is still peaking. Several big company CEOs on Trump’s business advisory council quit the council, showing signs that even his supporters are now abandoning him. From around the world, commentators lashed at Trump for his seeming racist attitude and stand. US media were generally indignant, too. So far, the reaction from Trump’s fellow Republicans has been muted.
Trump has a knack for putting himself in the vortex of controversy. He’s already in trouble for signs that his campaign staff had colluded with Russian operatives in trying to influence the outcome of the US election last November. That controversy has morphed into separate investigations by the US Congress and by an independent special prosecutor.
In the Charlottesville incident, Trump appears to have deliberately chosen to back the white supremacists because they are a part of his political base that elected him president. This base is composed of undereducated, unemployed, and alienated whites in America.
Only seven months in the presidency, Trump is already wallowing in low popularity numbers below 30 percent. Thus he’s struggling to keep his base support, lest his survey numbers dip further.
That’s the reason for his obstinate support for the white supremacists, including members of the racist Klu Klux Klan (KKK), notorious for killing black Americans, especially in the South, up to the 1960s, hiding behind their trademark hoods and torches.
Some US commentators have said that with Trump’s support in the wake of the Charlottesville incident, the KKK needs no masks or hoods anymore, that they are now in the open, defiant with their neo-Nazi slogans and hatred of non-whites in America.
At this writing, it’s uncertain how long the Charlottesville controversy will stay in the news and how deep Mr. Trump is in trouble. But it seems it’s just a matter of time that he will find himself in deeper trouble and be in danger of losing his job.
*** Tantrum Ergo. Internet connection via PLDT DSL has been on and off too many times. Forget about fast service, how could a company that makes a lot of money off its customers fail to provide even just consistent service?