Obama’s Presidency Led To Trump’s White Nationalist Populism

When the “Taxed Enough Already” protest signs started appearing just after Barack Obama’s first inauguration, we should have seen this coming. When those protest signs turned into a conservative political coalition called the Tea Party, we should have seen this coming. When Donald Trump presided over the “birther” freak show, we should have seen this coming.

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Donald Trump Supporters: Make America White Again

At a rally today in Ohio, Donald Trump said in response to protesters, “We cannot let our First Amendment rights be taken away from us folks.” This is an appeal to people (yes, white people) who feel persecuted. Of course, they are not being persecuted, but often people believe disagreement, particularly from an out-group, is the same as persecution.

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Yes Conservatives, The Police Can Be Wrong, Even If It Crushes Your World

Sorry conservatives, but the police are human beings, just like the people they protect and serve. And that means they are fallible just like other members of the community. Yes, the police can harm instead of serve. Yes, the police can commit crimes. And yes, sometimes the police can just be pricks, provoking a community that is grieving the death of an unarmed 18-year-old.

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Can’t We All Just Get Along?

How many times have we heard those of power and privilege tell the people they’re walking all over to stop complaining because they don’t like hearing such hostility? It’s like whites in the 1960s reading about the latest race riot in the newspaper, sighing, and asking their black maid, “Why we can’t just all get along?” When the maid tries to calmly explain a few points that the protesters are making, then the whites make her and her comrades out to be rabble-rousers who can’t just be happy living in peace with their neighbors. Then the whites reply with something like, “Why can’t you just go back to being like you were 20 years ago in the 1940s when I was a kid? Growing up I never heard blacks complaining all the time like this. Why are you suddenly trying to make things so difficult for everyone?”

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Observation of the Day: Conservatives Fear Social Justice

Conservatives who respond in opposition to social justice are not behaving with a clearly defined philosophy or ideology. Conservatives who oppose or deflect away from any discussion of equal rights or miscarriages of justice do so out of fear. And this fear fuels their backlash against change in social order. Their neat little world is rocked, as they thrash about in response.

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Bill Maher: Bill O’Reilly, Republicans, Don’t Hear What Obama Says

On Friday’s Real Time on HBO, host Bill Maher compared President Obama’s statement on African-American men and crime with Bill O’Reilly’s statement about statistical evidence on blacks and homicide. One Friday earlier, President Obama said, “Now, this isn’t to say that the African-American community is naive about the fact that African-American young men are disproportionately involved in the criminal justice system.” Obama said this during his much talked about and unscripted remarks on Trayvon Martin, the Zimmerman not-guilty verdict, and race relations in America.

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Racializing Black-On-Black Crime, A Means To Demonize African-Americans

To listen to many on the Right, we are never to include a racial component in any crime until we eradicate so-called “black-on-black” crime. Conservatives believe the liberal media should not focus on a black victim, portrayed by conservative media as the guilty party, and should instead focus its attention on inner-city black-on-black crime. According to conservative media, we aren’t talking about blacks killing other blacks enough. Until we meet our quota in reporting blacks being murdered by other blacks, we are not allowed to talk about any other crime and the potential that race may have played a role.

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