What if Donald Trump is what America is all about?
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
President Donald Trump walks away after stepping off Marine One, on the South Lawn of the White House, Sunday, November 11, 2018, in Washington, DC
AP Photo/Alex Brandon
In this learned piece, Professor Delbanco writes passionately about the long US history of human suffering that had come before the cruel behaviours and policies of the democratically elected President Donald Trump, focusing specifically on slavery.
"Even free black people in the North ..." we learn in this piece, "found their lives infused with terror of being seized and deported on the pretext that they had once belonged to someone in the South. The Fugitive Slave Act forced them to dread every footstep on the stairs and every knock on the door. As for the millions still in bondage in the South, it deepened the despair of the already desperate."
Delbanco also points to some crucial events in the later history of the United States, such as Abraham Lincoln's call for "re-adoption" of to the Declaration of Independence, the New Deal of the 1930s, and the Civil Rights Movement as attempts to right the terrorising wrongs of slavery.
His excellent essay and his recent book from which it is drawn, The War Before the War: Fugitive Slaves and the Struggle for America's Soul From the Revolution to the Civil War (2018), seem to rest on the assumption that the "American Soul" is something quintessentially good and even noble, sublime, and beautiful to behold, and yet there are dark forces trying to take it over and spoil it.
But with due diligence and persistent struggle and perhaps even the grace of God, so this assumption goes, Americans will someday get there and win the noble battle for the "American Soul".
Might the opposite be true?
This widely accepted idea of the benign essence of the "American soul" , however, has never been questioned and the opposite assumption - that it is not intrinsically good - has never been critically examined.
So might it be that exactly the opposite proposition is true: That this "American soul" might, in fact, be precisely what we now see in Trump and Trumpism, institutionalised not just in the heinous history of slavery but even earlier than that - in the genocidal history of American conquest and slaughter of native peoples?
And that the whole sustained history of US thuggish militarism on almost every continent on planet earth, waging wars, toppling regimes, instigating military coups is its natural manifestation?
We may, in fact, be hard pressed to find a single moment in American history when hateful racism, sexism, militarism, and xenophobia have not been entirely definitive to this "American soul".
Could this "American soul" perhaps be something entirely diabolical, perturbed, vicious, vindictive, monstrously greedy from the get-go?
With far less historical erudition and far more political rhetoric liberal politicians ranging from Barack Obama to Hillary Clinton to Bernie Sanders keep telling Americans what Trump is doing "is not what America is all about."
Campaigning against Donald Trump during the midterm elections, Obama went out and loudly declared : "We helped spread a commitment to certain values and principles like the rule of law and human rights and democracy and the notion of the inherent dignity and worth of every individual."
Really? Is that what the US has done around the globe? Who exactly is this "We"? Would that "We" include the US president who gave billions of dollars to Israel to slaughter Palestinians with ease and to the Saudis to commit war crimes in Yemen; and would it include the president before him who left Iraq and Afghanistan in ruins?
We seriously need to examine this American soul business and wonder what makes it so murderously detrimental to world peace, and while we are at it rediscover what is this "America really about".
Not just Democrats and former and current officials but human rights organisations also believe Trump is antithetical to American values. "Trump Abandons American Values at UN," this according to Human Rights First's Senior Vice President for Policy Rob Berschinski.
But Trump and Trumpism are as American as mom and apple pie - and an entire racist and xenophobic history of the US is there to verify it. And if the structurally corrupt Democratic Party under the leadership of Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi, and Chuck Schumer are supposed to be the alternative to that truth, then the Afghans, Iraqis, Palestinians, and Yemenis brutalised identically under both Republicans and Democrats may have something to say about the matter.
Disunited states?
Soon after Professor Delbanco's learned essay, the Democrats gained control of the House while the Senate remained in the solid command of the Republicans.
The hardcore Clintonite Nancy Pelosi and her comrade, the even more morally compromised Chuck Schumer, were now the revolutionary icons of "resistance" to Mitch McConnell and his club of 50 plus racist firebrand elite protecting the wealthy and the powerful 1 percent for the foreseeable future. We were led to be happy that the deeply corrupt Democrats had a modest victory over the corrupt Republicans.
So where does this American soul reside these days: In Trump's White House, in Mitch McConnell's Senate, in Nancy Pelosi's House, or in Brett Kavanaugh's Supreme Court?
Despite the liberal media's insistence to contrary, this midterm elections in no way, shape, or form was a repudiation of Donald Trump or any so-called "blue wave" or anything of the sort. It was a very basic and in fact dismal and cliche midterm swing historically integral to US elections.
It is crucial for us not to fall into the trap of thinking the enemies of the Trumpian loonies are the friends of any progressive politics. In the US you run away from neo-con Trumpian terror and you find yourself in the bosom of the neoliberal Clintonite cabal.
One quick look at the red-blooded electoral map of the US after the midterm elections shows this, in fact, is certainly not - as liberals love to say - a divided country. It is a solidly and unmistakably racist, sexist, xenophobic and violent country obsessed with domestic gun violence and foreign conquest with a few pockets of wishy-washy liberal resistance here or there.
From Brazil to Saudi Arabia to Israel to the racist, xenophobic, proto-fascist parties in Europe - they all have a solid ally in all the three branches of the US government.
From the earliest stages of the rise of Donald Trump I have argued that contrary to the liberal contingencies of opposition to his brand of blunt and fascistic politics he is "the real deal": American politics stripped to its bare essence, shorn of all its democratic pretensions and neoliberal niceties.
For eight years Barack Obama was the face of the duplicitous politics of shedding public tears for schoolchildren being shot in the US, before retiring to a back room at the White House to send more arms to Israel and Saudi Arabia to slaughter Palestinian and Yemeni children.
The liberals are very happy as they should be that a few moderately progressive women, a couple of Muslims and new immigrants among them, have joined the Congress. No doubt, if this trend continues maybe in 150 years or so, we might even have a Muslim version of Nancy Pelosi or Hillary Clinton!
This kind of cathartic identity politics will blind us to the real issues facing us globally.
Breaking through the cliche bifurcation
"The two Americas are on a collision course today," declared the headlines of a typical essay on the midterm elections. On one side stand "young people and minority voters and unusually broad resistance among college-educated white voters, especially women. That threatens Republicans with widespread losses in well-educated, often racially diverse, suburbs in major metropolitan areas around the country."
Good to know. What about the other side? "On the other side, Trump retains strong support among evangelical, rural and non-college-educated white voters, including women."
The very epistemic foundation of this bifurcation, which is now very popular among pollster and public opinion pundits, assumes that the proclivity of those voting against Trump does not see anything beyond the Obama-Clinton axis which has an equally horrid history of militarism abroad and corporate corruption at home.
There is nothing in the DNA or "blood" of any people, Americans included, that makes them constitutionally susceptible to latent and blatant fascism. Millions upon millions of Americans gathered around the most progressive figure in recent US politics, Bernie Sanders, in the hope of liberating themselves from the shackles of this gridlock of corrupt corporate politics.
But the Democratic party machinery made sure Sanders did not have a chance to be the Democratic nominee for the 2016 presidential race. Right now, two years into the calamity called Trump, there are talks of Hillary Clinton running for the White House again in 2020. She and the entirety of the Democratic party establishment never heard of the word shame.
Unless and until much wider horizons of political possibilities are opened to the left of Bernie Sanders and beyond, the US will remain exactly in the combined image of Donald Trump at the White House, Mitch McConnell at the Senate, Nancy Pelosi at the House, and Brett Kavanaugh at the Supreme Court - and the mob of racist white supremacists that Steve Bannon and Steven Miller have mobilised for them. For if history has any lesson to teach, that - until further notice - is what America "is really about", and that indeed is the very quintessence of "the American soul".
Hamid Dabashi is the Hagop Kevorkian Professor of Iranian Studies and Comparative Literature at Columbia University.
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I rarely agree with Al Jazeera, but it's a good source for unconventional thinking.
I had copied the exact same snip from the article that you did.
The article was a brutal characterization of the United States. I cannot find much that I would disagree with but if Trump is a representation of the true soul of America I might as well kill myself now.
I think the seed goes too far... but it's healthy to take a slap from time to time.
I don't know, Bob. It sure feels like we took a wrong turn somewhere.
I do think the piece is a window into how some Countries view America. We have done the horrible things that the author writes about. I choose to believe it was for the right reasons but I'm coming to terms that the piece may be spot on. How selfish and fucked up does a person have to be to vote for and support Donald Trump? He is the ugly American.
This is how America is viewed by some countries and that in itself is enough to feel shame.
You've summed up my feelings pretty precisely.
The perspective deserves to be publicized.
There are still more 'good souls' than 'bad souls' but we used to think the good far outnumbered the bad. Trump has shown us that the numbers are much closer than we previously thought.
You've pointed out exactly why I'm so angry. I never would have thought that there were so many citizens who have no moral or ethical standards. I always thought we all were raised with solid principles but I've been blind. We are not all good people. Many are just like Donald Trump and they cast their vote and support for the man that represents exactly who they are.
I didn't, next......
BTW: Hilary Clinton and Donald Trump are not the same but keep telling yourself they are if it makes you feel better.
I'm not going to debate this issue with you. I think the facts speak for themselves and you are anti facts. I'm leaving it at that because I really don't enjoy breaking bad on people. I'm actually really a nice person.
Well, I'm the daughter of a marine so yes, I can be pretty wicked when provoked. It's a dark side of me that I don't like to reveal.
That's why I avoid having discussions with some delicate members here. I don't want to hurt their feelings.
Not saying you're delicate but I don't like to unleash the beast.
You go Girl - Semper Fi.
What disappointed me the most, and sealed the deal, was when they turned on Mueller in favor of Trump. The right chose the worst of their own over the best of their own, and even turned against the rule of law. Mueller is the most squeaky clean boy scout this country is capable of producing. There is simply no excuse for turning on an American hero like Mueller to protect a sleazy conman like Trump, none whatsoever.
Very well put.
WE agree.....
But the interesting part, we stand on opposite sides of the question, don't we.... nobody on your side thinks there is any moral standard to those on this side, as we think the same thing in the other direction....
So how does one resolve the question?
Excellent question!
The answer is something you always talk about, Bob, bad faith. The right does not think the left has no morals, in fact, they deride them FOR having morals. They use the term 'bleeding heart' in a sneering manner, as if empathy for your fellow humans is something worthy of ridicule and scorn.
The right know that the left are far more moral than they are, that the left cares for all people and wants America to be good. That isn't what the right wants, they want a swaggering, loud-mouthed, bigoted bully representing America, and they finally have their wish.
Perhaps.
But NM's question wasn't "Who is right?" I very much doubt that any NT discussion on such a topic would last more than a few seconds, before it would degenerate.
NM asked about "resolution".
One possible approach would be to discuss "morality" while excluding all political references.
ooohhh, that's HARD bob.... no one wants to let go of their political hate...... Probably cause if they did, they would have to actually look at how alike we are rather than concentrate on the divisions in their straining obsessions for power
I've been bleating over and over about how opposition to Trump has nothing to do with left/right politics, but of course, the Trumpright pretends to not believe it. More bad faith...
Is that why you are constantly bleating about politics and political hate when pointing the finger?
That may be your belief but my side isn’t supporting a lying thieving mysoginistic wife cheating racist con man.
Other than that we see eye to eye.
That's a great argument for trying it!
PJ - Clinton is no longer President.
That's a five on the Truth-o-meter.
There are still a few conservatives who hold democratic principles above all... and there may be a few liberals who are ready to imagine the possibility of a reasonable Trump policy.
But almost all conservatives are now hard-core, with the obligatory climate change denial, anti-abortion, and all the other bullet-points.
Since Trumpism presents no policies other than to undo everything that Obama did, and to fulfill the eternal Republican obligation of servitude to the ultra-rich... there simply aren't any Trumpist policies which liberals might even consider.
Now we're hearing "judicial reform". There may be enough "something for everyone" for this to get traction.
Hahahahahaha, good one 1st
Thank You PJ - just wanted to add some levity to this continuous broken record.
70 year old corrupt woman as their president.
But it is okay that you support a man who is a draft dodger, serial adulterer, sexualizes his own daughters and gives other men permission to also do so, has gone bankrupt multiple times, refuses to pay contractors, has illegal workers in his resorts, has run scams from low grade beef to a university that had no more merit than a stick of gum, plays kissy face with the worse of the worse in world leaders, uses money from his own foundation as if it is his personal piggy bank, lies continually, and is also corrupt. Okie Dokie.
Well, when you say stuff like that, I tend to just clam up and don't feel like talking because there's nothing worth saying
I feel ya girl, me too...... It just gets old and weary......
Do some honest research on this career asshole, and you might change your opinion.
Hi Bob,
[Deleted]
Interesting that you posted a piece from Al Jizz, maybe, but when I look at the actual author, all mystery faded away instantly....
Hamid Dabashi? wow several steps to the left of Stalin? Mao?
Has NOTHING nice to say about Obama in fact he alludes to Obama being nothing more than one further step on the road for American imperialism.....
Pure hardcore muslim socialist.
Mystery solved.
But is the seed wrong?
I don't want to live in a bubble of unanimity... I want diversity in what I read.
The seed goes too far, but it presents a perspective we won't get from American media.
Yeah a perspective of complete and abject hate for everything America stands for.
Interesting that he lives in America, works in America, and was educated in America.
It's a shame he doesn't live anywhere else, then he would be subject to the hate he has spewed against the nation that gave him everything he has....
His perspective is shared by a few billion people.
It's useful to know that....
personally, I would have to see proof of that claim.....
That’s the problem with nation turned in on itself.
Hey look, Bob is back!
[Deleted]
Could this "American soul" perhaps be something entirely diabolical, perturbed, vicious, vindictive, monstrously greedy from the get-go?
It could be But I think there is much left out of this description, America also has freedom, compassion, empathy, a sense of justice, freedom of speech, freedom of choice and we used to respect honesty and truth. We've also helped many nations as well as done what we thought was best for the world other times. Yes we have been the policeman if the world, But better us than them I say.
Not too long ago cooperation could have been included as well.
In reality ya have the good and the bad. That's life. America is no different.
And the blame for the assault on freedom, compassion, empathy, a sense of justice, freedom of speech, freedom of choice, truth and honesty, is shared equally by both sides? There is no more right vs. left anymore, Steve, actual conservatism has nothing to do with what America's right stands for anymore. Today it's a battle between right wrong, and if the election of Trump hasn't shown you which is which, nothing ever will.
As an environmental scientist I deplore his scientific ignorance and his apparent glee at rolling back all environmental safeguards. I detest Trump, his history, his lies and his smug empty boasts.
Trump picked the most anti-environment/pro big oil oriented cretin on the planet to head up the EPA.
There are many reasons to hate Trump, but his disregard for environmental health is why I do.
That's a good starting place
Explain in detail where and why Trump is wrong. I'm not talking about his personality, which is deplorable, but the programs and policies he believes in.
More appropriate, since your comment implies that you believe in "the programs and policies he believes in" … post a specific such list … one-by-one … and I will specifically address each one.
I don't want to jump over Wally, but let's start with American Sovereignty.
You know what it means - A nation controlling it's own borders. Stop using race. The Mexican people don't want illegal immigrants in Mexico.
So why is Trump wrong about that?
I explained that Trump has violated America’s own law regarding the right to petition for asylum and temporary protected status ... and how he has made it “a crime” to do so by blocking legal entry.
If you can’t accept accurate answers to your questions, don’t bother asking them of me.
No, he has not violated he law. If they illegally enter the US, they are not eligible for asylum. Keeping them out and making them get in line and follow and wait for the legal processes might get them asylum.
THIS IS TROUBLING! MOST TROUBLING ARE THE NT MEMBERS WHO THREATEN THIS ON THE SITE!*
Senate Republican warns of civil war if Democrats continue supporting the Federal government
This is not the first time Republicans have beat their prone-to- violence base to the punch and threaten ed bloodshed if they fail to get what they want. In 2012 the Virginia Republican Party threatened that conservatives would launch a violent, bloody rebellion if President Barack Obama won re - election , and no small number of Trump advocates have warned of a violent civil war if t he cretin was ever held accountable for the many high crimes and misdemeanors he and his family are involved in.
Mike Lee, besides being a typical Republican, is a Utah Libertarian malcontent in the mold of those filthy rich Libertarian malcontents Charles and David Koch. Anyone familiar with the Utah Mormon attempts to seize public land owned by the Federal government (see Bundy Ranch Standoff : Oregon wildlife refuge takeover ) may believe that federal land ownership issue is the extent of Lee’s close affiliation with the Koch brothers , but that belief would be dead wrong.
* I do not wish to derail Bob's seeded article, so, at this point, I will not further comment on my heading.
Then you shouldn't have made the comment. How about getting back to the question that YOU asked?
That's not your call, Vic … and you have been given a response.
I'm not making that call. Your response was unresponsive, so I will ask you again - Do you believe that America has the right to determine who enters?
It's nothing to be afraid of. We would all like to know. After all it was you who asked to show something Trump was right about. So back it up.
I don't have all day to wait for your response, so as I leave to do a few errands, I'll put you down as unwilling to answer the question of whether the United States of America has a right to determine who enters the country.
Good afternoon.
PS: Trump was 100% right.
Blocking them how? And explain in detail just what those legal rights non citizens have. And where, when, under what conditions, and who do they "petition" to?
You seem to confuse "tone" with factual information you don't care to have presented to you; I give back what I get.
You mean you don't know?
You don't know yet you seem to believe everything Trump has to say about immigrants who come to seek asylum or temporary protected status?
How can you take a Trumpian position against individuals pursuing asylum or protected status when you have to ask about SQUARE ONE?
Affirmative Asylum Processing with USCIS
Defensive Asylum Processing with EOIR
Key Differences Between “Affirmative” and “Defensive” Asylum Process
Trump keeps making it harder for people to seek asylum legally
It’s legal to seek asylum at an official border crossing. But border agents are blocking people from getting that far.
It's like a township putting up a traffic light, telling them it's legal to go on GREEN, then shutting off the GREEN, keeping on the RED LIGHT, then, when someone MUST GO THROUGH THE RED LIGHT TO GET WHERE THEY'RE LEGALLY ENTITLED TO GO … charging them with TRAFFIC VIOLATION.
YOU MEAN YOU HAD TO ASK ABOUT THE THINGS YOU SEEM TO BE AGAINST … without knowing that you've been lied to by the man who insisted you should be against them?
That's frightening!
Now you can justifiably call me "snarky" … or the bumper sticker … not for giving you the time and respect of answering your question, however.
Every American should watch this speech. It would also help if it were played in every high school and to 7th and 8th graders as well. It is from last week in the US congress.
This photo says a lot about a certain element of Americans.
The Russians must have purchased the gop. They sure act like they own them...
A pair of valedictorians from The Trump College of Zeal-Without-Knowledge …
Some individuals don't know when they've embarrassed themselves.
Yeah - you see a couple of them on the FP CONTINUOUSLY.
Neither of whom would own one of those t-shirts.
Other than that, hope you are well.
The picture of the Russian t-shirt guys … might be photoshopped …
… there seems to be very few drool stains.
And all the words are spelled correctly.
Wow, real enlightened commentary there, maybe next we will hear about their obvious elocution issues....
Of course from an elevated superior educated level of course.......
I think you're onto these guys, Mac, they look the part but they're probably liberal plants. These aren't Trumpists, I bet their mamas aren't even their sisters too!
Any so-called "American" who overtly displays his identity preference to be that of a foreign, hostile power, one that committed acts of espionage against our democracy … over an American political party … is deserving of scathing satire.
Demonstrating a bit of "elevated superior educated level" … I enter into the record an informal, yet recognized definition of the word "drool," as follows …
"to make an excessive and obvious show of pleasure or desire"
Just look at those faces as they demonstrate their MAGA grins of pleasure at giving visual aid and comfort to one of America's enemies.
We are on the precipice of a bombshell (in addition to the others that Trumpians believe have not begun to explode -- although they have and continue to do so ), that being the COOPERATION AGREEMENT OF A RUSSIAN SPY, incarcerated for months (in the same prison as Paul Manafort), who CONSPIRED WITH THE NRA to funnel laundered money, all or part of $30 million into the Trump Campaign! Her close associate, a Russian BANK CEO and close associate of Putin, recently "retired" and, for some yet unknown reason, can not be found.
As for how I personally mock the inane and unconscionable behaviors of individuals in the news, I don't mock members who post that with which I disagree … while I am hit regularly by several members who only want to "attack the messenger" while virtually never attempting to viably rebut the message.
You and I have serious political differences … and we express ourselves in specific conjunction with those differences; fire away, my friend and I will fire back …
… makes life interesting.
My friend, you have outdone yourself, that response is dripping with salivating salacious sarcasm......
I couldn't top that in twelve years.....
I tip my topper to you....
I'm flattered …
Beyond that, the paragraph about the Russian spy, the NRA and the "retired" and gone-missing banker … is factual.
While Trumpians, under other circumstances might attempt to foist such a rationale, in this instance, it would not be viable … for a pair of reasons …
1) Trumpians likely agree with the treasonous stupidity touted on the t-shirts, and …
2) One can easily spot a "liberal plant" by the intelligent-looking eyes that give the "plant" away despite the trappings formulating the disguise-du-Trumpian.
NO fucking chance in this case!
Do you recall the days of "I'd rather be dead than red," when McCarthyism was a badge of honor for conservative-castigaters-of-caliginous boogie men and scapegoats they could blame for lives that didn't go the way they had hoped?
In Trump World, it's all that can fit on a bumper sticker, "fake news" dismissiveness, and … a testimonial awarded by "The Man Behind the Curtain" at the Donald Trump College of Zeal-Without-Knowledge.
Take cover … here likely comes the ad hoc ad hominem barrage.
When I read this part for some reason it took on the personality of Burgess Meredith.
I ripped off part of my rant from the Wizard of Oz … not Burgess Meredith, rather …
But, the rest of the rant was my original editorial content and style as back in the day when I was a newspaper editor and author of a pair of books on political stupidity, hypocrisy, insanity and mean-spiritedness.
I was thinking of Meredith's role as the Penguin in Batman when he'd get started on his sentences filled with the letter P.
To those two asshats....don't let the door hit ya where the good lord split ya. Move to Russia already.
I know those guys remember the Cold War years because they are as old or older than I am.
Unbelievable!
Trumpism will forevermore be a historic lowpoint of The American Experiment...
This Trump experiment reminds me of something I left in the fridge for way too long.
If only!
Roughly one-third of the American people now self-identify with Trump. It's going to get worse.
American values. What exactly are American values? Are they the fine sounding words we hear preached from on high? Are they the actions of brutes we see on the street?
I am often accused of not having Texas values. But what are Texas values? To me they are independence, but this seems to be abhorrent to so many other Texans.
America was a pretty populous country before those whose descendants would be Americans arrived. So believe America's values are based on empire building first and foremost.
After our little empire was fairly well established, then we could talk about hard work and and helping your neighbor and one nation under someone's god. But we have never been one nation. We have always been a nation divided. White, black, brown and the rest. We have always been a nation divided. We are a nation divided by a common Declaration of Independence. One side believes it has a divine right to rule. The rest, not so much.
Yeah, that would be the Democrats....
Projecting again. Or gaslighting. Whatever we call it, its republicans thinking they have the divine right. Look at Wisconsin. And North Carolina. And Michigan.
Love to hear your examples.
I wasn't thinking along party lines. I rarely do. I was thinking Patrician versus non-patrician.
It’s true - this country’s deplorables made themselves far more visible with the advent of Trump. Hats off to Bob for even thinking about debating it in this backwardsassed forum.
As they say, life imitates art. First, the scourge of ‘reality’ tv was born. Then came the saturation of our culture with stupid vampire movies. Then came the fascination with Hollywood zombie narratives. Then came Trump, a real life embodiment of all three of those.