President Donald Trump couldn’t leave well enough alone. After taking his time putting out a statement about the rallies, confrontations, violence and murder in Charlottesville…he doesn’t address the real meat of the problem. And after two days of pressure from nearly every sector in America…he finally comes out in a prepared statement and condemns hatred and racism and the neo-Nazis and KKK marches…only to walk it back during an off the cuff statement a day later. He should be ashamed of himself…all the rest of us are ashamed of him.
The rally to ‘protest’ removal of a statue of Confederate Army General Robert E. Lee was made up of Nazis, Ku Klux Klan members, members of alt-right groups and white supremacists. They carried Confederate Flags, Nazi flags and other representative fascist banners and torches. They were often dressed in paramilitary gear, body armor, helmets and carried shields, poles, and semi-automatic weapons. They chanted racist and anti-Semitic chants and Nazi slogans. They obviously wanted to intimidate their audience or even better provoke them into confrontation and violence. There were no ‘fine people’ in attendance in their ranks. If you were in attendance you were a Nazi, KKK member, alt-right provocateur, or a fellow traveler (google it if you don’t recognize the term). The question now is, which one are you President Trump?
There is no moral equivalency between this group and the counter protestors. President Trump can’t label them as the flip side of his imaginary coin. They were doing what needs to be done in the face of fascism…what every American needs to do from here on in: Stare it down. Don’t let it take deeper root. Let everyone know that these ideas and these actions have no place in our America of the 21st Century. We’ve already paid in blood during the Civil War and the Second World War for the right to deny this movement from ever seeing the light of day again.
And President Trump dared…dared…to compare George Washington and Thomas Jefferson to Robert E. Lee. Two men who gave up a great deal of their fortune and risked their lives to lead the revolution against Great Britain. Who helped create the founding documents that President Trump has vowed to defend. And then they went on to become two of the earliest and greatest presidents in our young country’s history. And he compares them to an insurrectionist who did everything in his power to destroy the United States of America. For that comparison alone I consider President Donald Trump to be a traitor.
edited 8/17/17 for grammar and punctuation.
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