How Much More of Trump's Insanity Are We Willing to Take?

By Charles Pierce, Esquire

12 January 18

Reflections on the morning after President* Trump's "shithole" comments.

t or near the end of business on Thursday, as the entire world—even the shitholes—knows by now, via The Washington Post, the president* provided a perfect ending to another day in our lunatic paradise.

Trump questioned why the United States would want people from nations such as Haiti, while being briefed on changes to the visa lottery system. According to the aide, when the group came to discussing immigration from Africa Trump asked why we want all these people from "all these shithole countries" and that the U.S. should have more people from places like Norway. The White House issued a statement that did not deny the remarks. "Certain Washington politicians choose to fight for foreign countries, but President Trump will always fight for the American people," White House Deputy Press Secretary Raj Shah told NBC Thursday afternoon, part of a lengthy statement that did not directly dispute the language reportedly used in the meeting. "He will always reject temporary, weak and dangerous stopgap measures that threaten the lives of hardworking Americans, and undercut immigrants who seek a better life in the United States through a legal pathway."

Some of the initial reactions to the president*’s diatribe were predictably revolting. White House aides burbled that these remarks would play well to The Base. (Economic anxiety has many faces, as we know.) On Thursday night, a ragged band of apologists for the president* fanned out to the cable shows. All of them eventually found themselves arguing that, hey, if you like places like that, why don’t you go live there? It was pathetic.

By Friday morning, the president* (or someone like him) was back tweeting bullshit about how the Democrats were to blame for the immigration impasse, about how he never said what his own staff declined to deny, and some completely surreal nonsense about how the Obama administration sold the American Embassy in London for “peanuts,” and that’s why he won’t be going to Great Britain any time soon.

(Not that it matters in the great scheme of things, but the Bush Administration sold the embassy in 2008 because of security concerns.)

Also, Jake Tapper of CNN tweeted that he had a source familiar with the meeting who told him that the president* was referring only to countries in Africa as shitholes. But even Tapper’s source told him that the president* did ask why we “needed” more Haitians and that they should be “taken out” of whatever deal, if any, is finally reached. This certainly doesn’t make anything better, but it might explain why the president*’s denials Friday morning were limited to his alleged remarks on Haiti. And, as for why we don’t see many people immigrating here from Norway, I can’t explain it either. Why don't more of those nice white folks give up national healthcare, a guaranteed pension, sickness and survivor benefits, and free college to come here and be embarrassed on a daily basis by a vulgar talking yam? There's just no understanding some people.

Even if Tapper’s right, the remarks remain racist, ignorant, and dangerous. As to the latter, right now, there are 6,000 American soldiers stationed all over Africa in places like Niger, where four Americans were killed from ambush last fall, and Mali, as well as in Cameroon, and in Somalia and Djibouti, on the eastern side of the continent. There has been an American military presence in Djibouti for longer than anywhere else in Africa. The country needs cooperation from these countries in fighting terrorist groups like Boko Haram and what’s left of al Qaeda. By allowing the American military into their country, these governments put bullseyes on themselves. This is what they get in return? And we probably shouldn’t forget that some of the countries in this hemisphere remain devastated at least partly because of American military meddling over the past century.

In addition, according to The New York Times, the Norwegians are outraged at having been drawn into the president*’s psychoses uninvited. I mean, there they were, laying in supplies in preparation to watch their countrymen kick the world’s ass at the Winter Olympics when suddenly, they get dragooned into whatever twisted drama is playing out in the president*’s mind this week.

“The real White House: Trump calls Haiti and African countries ‘shithole’ countries to the face of members of Congress, and uses Norway to prove his racism,” wrote Andreas Wiese, a newspaper commentator who manages the House of Literature, a popular cultural center in Oslo, Norway’s capital.

Helge Ogrim, a veteran journalist who used to cover the United States for the Norwegian News Agency, said of Mr. Trump’s latest remark: “It falls into a pattern of nativist and very unpleasant language from a poorly qualified president, if not worse. President Trump seems to relish in derogatory remarks about others and praise for himself. This incident, just after his blunder with the fictional ‘F-52’ planes, further lowers the respect for his office and for the U.S. abroad.”

Is it that hard to stay friendly with Norwegians? Really?

And, of course, outside of Haitian-American Congresswoman Mia Love of Utah, most Republicans have gone quiet on the whole business. Orrin Hatch, for example, screwed his courage to the sticking place and demanded “a more detailed explanation” of the president*’s remarks, and James Lankford of Oklahoma pronounced himself to be disappointed “if the remarks are accurate.”

I’m truly not sure how long the institutions of government can withstand this daily insanity. The executive branch is a chew-toy. The legislative majorities seem willing to cooperate in their own institutional destruction. There has been some pushback on the lower levels of the federal court system. But, for 30 years, by fair means and foul, the Republicans have been arranging things to produce a one-party corporate state. Now, they have it, or something close to it, except that a half-senile, racist old bag of guts got elected to run it, which is not something they planned on. This modern, caucasian reboot of The Emperor Jones is overlong and incoherent, and Robert Mueller is beating on those drums so loudly that it’s distracting the lead actors.

Up here in the Commonwealth (God save it!), we have a rising political star named Linda Dorcena Forry. She represents the First Suffolk District in the state senate and is currently the assistant majority leader. She also is the child of Haitian immigrants. On Thursday, she released a statement concerning the president*’s remarks.

I have received inquiries asking for my reaction to the president's latest racist slur directed against Haitians and people of African descent worldwide. I am really getting tired of having to do this. I have to express first how demoralizing and upsetting it is to have to register my outrage about hateful remarks made by my own president. And then to have to do it again. And again. The president's words are ignorant and repulsive and an affront to decency and to history.

Like many, I would like to believe that Trump represents the last gasp of a racist worldview that has been in retreat, here in America, since the fall of Jim Crow. Sadly, his views and his presidency serve to embolden other hateful people and to diminish our nation's position as a power for good, for decency, for democracy. Those who enable and normalize his behavior are every bit as culpable as the president himself.

As leaders and as people of free-will, I call upon all Americans to denounce his statements. I'm very disappointed in us, the people of the United States, who saw fit to elect an ignorant, mean-spirited, white supremacist to the most powerful office in the world. This is a very sad time for our country. I ask that the people of Haiti and the African diaspora worldwide keep us in their prayers.

Finally, tonight is the eve of a heart wrenching anniversary for Haiti, for our hemisphere and for all people. Eight years ago tomorrow, Haiti suffered one of the greatest natural catastrophes of the modern age when an earthquake struck on Jan. 12, 2010. Hundreds of thousands of people died. So many more were maimed and left homeless for years to come. Haiti is still working hard to recover and to grieve. On behalf of my family and my constituents here in Boston, I extend my deepest condolences to the families of the victims of the Jan. 12 disaster, who are tonight thinking of their loved ones they have lost. We will always be with you.

This is how leaders talk. This is how presidents used to talk. Goddamn us for forgetting that.