Friday, August 18, 2017

The Lies Surrounding Trump's Post-Charlottesville Comments

This article first appeared in Eagle Rising.


For some reason, I have gotten on the mailing list for some left-wing organizations, like Barack Obama's Organizing for Action. The reason I don't unsubscribe is because they often unwittingly give me ammunition to write about the inanities they send me.

Like this from some group called  The Courage Campaign. That's a lafffer  right there, but it gets even better.

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From: Susannah Hook-Rodgers, Courage Campaign couragecampaign

Date: Wednesday, August 16, 2017 2:07 PM

To: (deleted)

Subject: Impeachment



"In only 12 hours, over 50,000 Courage Campaign members voiced the call for Trump’s immediate impeachment. His unwillingness to unequivocally condemn the white supremacists and Neo-Nazis who rioted in Charlottesville this past weekend -- injuring dozens and killing Heather D. Heyer -- proves once and for all that he is unfit to lead our nation. We have catapulted beyond the line of enough is enough. Demand that congress take immediate steps to impeach Trump.

 For more, please see William’s email below."

~ Susannah

Dear Friend,

 "The 45th President of the United States, Donald Trump, just defended torch-bearing Neo-Nazis who marched through a university campus to protect a statue of a secessionist traitor, instigated a race riot, and assaulted a crowd of peaceful protesters with a vehicle -- injuring more than a dozen people and killing an innocent woman in the process.(1)

 There is no longer simply a legal case to impeach Donald Trump. There is now a moral imperative. Every Republican in the House of Representatives and Senate must now understand this reality. Every day they do not act, they own this President’s actions.

 The President of the United States -- the supposed leader of the free world -- just publicly, shamelessly, and embarrassingly stood with the white supremacists and Neo-Nazis who rioted in Charlottesville. Every day the Republican Congress fails to impeach Donald Trump for the crimes to which he’s effectively already confessed -- namely obstruction of justice -- is a day that the Republican Congress endorses this President’s ruinous leadership.

 We live in a country where nearly anyone who publicly stands with Nazis would lose their jobs. It’s long past time that Donald Trump should lose his. Today, Courage Campaign calls for the impeachment of President Donald Trump. We will ask every member of Congress to go on record supporting Trump’s impeachment, and we will hold accountable members of any party who refuse the call -- especially Republicans, who so clearly hold the power to impeach.

 Sign the petition calling for the impeachment of President Donald Trump.

 Impeachment is more than a legal process -- it’s a political one. That’s why President Gerald Ford, who completed Richard Nixon’s term when the latter resigned in disgrace, said, "An impeachable offense is whatever a majority of the House of Representatives considers it to be at a given moment in history."(2)

 Donald Trump has done many things -- from revealing classified information to Russians to openly admitting that he fired FBI Director James Comey in order to obstruct the Russia investigation -- that might merit impeachment on legal grounds.(3) But convincing the Republican House of Representatives to vote to ratify articles of impeachment seemed entirely out of reach -- until now.

 Today, Donald Trump gave comfort to Neo-Nazis and white supremacists by once again blaming “both sides” for Saturday’s violence. Trump practically blamed peaceful protesters for being hit by a car when he said, “There is another side. There was a group on this side, you can call them the left. You have just called them the left, that came violently attacking the other group. You can say what you want. That’s the way it is.”(4)

 David Duke, the former Ku Klux Klan leader, thanked Trump for the “honesty and courage” it took to blame both sides for Saturday’s ugly violence.(5) Richard Spencer, the white supremacist who coined the term “alt-right” said that “only a dumb person” would believe that Trump was seriously denouncing the racists and anti-semites who terrorized Charlottesville.(6)

 Trump’s pathetic moral equivocation that “many sides” were at fault for Saturday’s violence has been condemned by people across the political spectrum, including by Republicans. Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner, who leads Senate Republicans’ 2018 campaign efforts, noted Trump’s failure to directly call out Saturday’s “evil” as “white supremacists” and “domestic terrorism.”(7) And Speaker Paul Ryan tweeted that “there can be no moral ambiguity” on white supremacy.(8)

 Republicans like Ryan and Gardner talk big now, but they can’t have it both ways. Their words will be empty so long as they continue to support Donald Trump’s immoral presidency through their actions -- and inaction.

 Sign the petition calling for the impeachment of President Donald Trump."

 Yours in the fight,

William Winters



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Where to begin? First of all, do these people have any clue as to what is needed to impeach a president? High crimes and misdemeanors-not because you don't like something he said.

But worse is the total mischaracterization of what President Trump has said about Chalottesville in the days after the incident.

"The 45th President of the United States, Donald Trump, just defended torch-bearing Neo-Nazis who marched through a university campus to protect a statue of a secessionist traitor, instigated a race riot, and assaulted a crowd of peaceful protesters with a vehicle -- injuring more than a dozen people and killing an innocent woman in the process."

 "The President of the United States -- the supposed leader of the free world -- just publicly, shamelessly, and embarrassingly stood with the white supremacists and Neo-Nazis who rioted in Charlottesville." 

 That is absurd. Trump has been clumsy, to be sure, but he has not defended the people who put on that rally in Charlottesville-though he has said that some people who were present on both sides were innocent. More importantly, he has condemned the KKK and neo-Naxzis. he has condemned David Duke-as he did repeatedly during the campaign after Duke endorsed his candidacy. He has condemned racism. What more can he say?

"Every day the Republican Congress fails to impeach Donald Trump for the crimes to which he’s effectively already confessed -- namely obstruction of justice -- is a day that the Republican Congress endorses this President’s ruinous leadership."

 What?! The attorney general has announced that they are investigating the car attacker, James Fields, and any associates who may share in his crime. Where is the obstruction?

"Today, Donald Trump gave comfort to Neo-Nazis and white supremacists by once again blaming “both sides” for Saturday’s violence. Trump practically blamed peaceful protesters for being hit by a car when he said, “There is another side. There was a group on this side, you can call them the left. You have just called them the left, that came violently attacking the other group. You can say what you want. That’s the way it is.”

 It is a fact that two groups of people traveled to Charlottesville to do battle on the streets. There was the racists and anti-semitic forces of David Duke and other speakers like the despicable Jew-hater Chris Cantwell, and the leftist forces of ANTIFA and Black Lives Matter. There was mutual combat on both sides. While ANTIFA did not directly kill anybody (like Fields), anybody who was fighting and engaging in violence that day has blood on his or her hands for the two police officers who died in the helicopter crash. As he often does, Trump did not choose his words carefully, but there was guilt to pass around that day.

Let me be clear: Even if I thought that  a statue of Robert E. Lee should be left standing, I would not have joined that rally once I knew that people like Duke and Cantwell were involved. Once you see someone holding a Nazi flag, it is time to turn around and go home.

That being said, it is outrageous to see this tragic event being used to hammer President Trump. He may have many faults, but he is not a racist, and he is not an anti-semite. This man has been in the public spotlight for 4 decades, and he was not known as a racist. It is an unfair charge. Worse yet, aside from this silly group that calls itself courageous, our mainstream media is resorting to the same tactics. It is beyond disgraceful.
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