Friday, January 12, 2018

Era of fake news begat a phony president

What makes a phony president? He tweets but does not lead. He doesn't read. He doesn't make any effort to understand any sides of issues. He has no patience with complexity. He takes outrageous and outlandish positions. If his positions find resonance with his so-called base, he stands by them. If the outcry and criticism far overwhelm the support from his base, he simply deny ever making those positions.

Take the most recent example where he labeled certain 3rd world countries where the citizens are mostly dark-skinned as sh*thole places. The public reaction was swift and the outraged was overwhelming. The phony president on the next day promptly denied ever expressing sentiments of bigotry.

The senator from the opposition party at the meeting when Mr. Phony uttered racist statements claimed that the president did so more than once. Other senators of his own party allowed as how he really did make those offensive remarks. Then there were two loyal senators that plead suffering from dementia and "could not" recall hearing those remarks.

Is the phony president's show of racism designed to please his constituents and solidify his base? Or he simply doesn't care if Americans think of him as a racist? As if to double down, he also praise the Norwegians as the kind of immigrants he would welcome. Perhaps he thinks such praise will get him the Nobel Peace prize--said prize is awarded by Norway.

It must gall him that his predecessor, whose father was African, was given the Peace prize. Why not him?

See "Shithole Nationalism" for a superb analysis from Africa.

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