Just desserts
Lost in Trump’s remarks
“Above all else, we must remember this truth: No matter our color, creed, religion or political party, we are all Americans first. We love our country. We love our God. We love our flag. We’re proud of our country. We’re proud of who we are. So we want to get the situation straightened out in Charlottesville, and we want to study it. And we want to see what we’re doing wrong as a country, where things like this can happen.”
The above is an excerpt from the president’s remarks in the immediate aftermath of the Charlottesville race riots. I don’t think it will survive the firestorm of demonization that’s more likely to go down in history.
Words can’t convey how truly sad that is.
While just about everything else he said that night was ignorant, insensitive, inappropriate and reflective of a racist outlook, it was also typically white American. On the other hand, the above was not only statesmanlike, it appears to be heartfelt and hopeful.
In the House of Representatives, U.S. Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) has been submitting a bill (H.R. 40), every year for years, that is intended to do exactly as the president advocated in his muchreviled speech. Conyers’ bill calls for Congress to recognize there is a problem stemming from slavery and continuing racial discrimination, to study it and propose remedies.
The bill has languished because we live in a racist country that’s willing to live with its effects and affect deep regret (or not), rather than open up a can of worms.
John Costello McFarland
Charlie Sykes presents himself as a responsible conservative on national television. He protests the behavior of President Donald Trump and indicates we should have known that Trump had a limited view of American democracy.
Sykes and other radio talk show hosts, such as Rush Limbaugh, have been running down our government and its services to society non-stop. Education has been one of their primary recipients. They have demonstrated little regard for the facts and now we are reaping a harvest from disenchanted Americans who wanted change, even if it is presented under the guise of white nationalism, David Duke and the Ku Klux Klan, neoNazi torch parades and the “alt-right” agenda.
I’ll bet the Cadillac Republicans inWaukesha County are not offended by President Trump’s hateful behavior.
After all, they played a major role in getting him elected in Wisconsin.
Herbert Grover
Gresham Email your letters to jsedit@jrn.com or mail them to Letters to the Editor, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, P.O. Box 371, Milwaukee, WI 53201-0371. Letters are limited to 200 words and may be edited.