New York Times (Editorial)
March 14, 2016
After
a weekend of violence at his rallies, Donald Trump arrived in Florida
for a rally in Boca Raton on Sunday night, crowing at “how well we
handled” those confrontations, because “nobody
got hurt,” apparently meaning nobody got killed. Standing in an
open-air amphitheater filled with thousands of supporters and surrounded
by scores of police officers, this season’s version of George Wallace
coyly asked, “Do we have a protester, anyone?” and
“Is there a disrupter in the house?”
This
is the new measure of Mr. Trump’s vile presidential campaign: stand
behind a security cordon, stir up racially charged viciousness and
attacks, then talk about how it symbolizes “love”
from people who “want to see America be made great again.”
After
violence erupted at his rallies in North Carolina, Chicago and Ohio in
recent days, Mr. Trump has offered only defiance and further incitement.
“I love you,” he said over and over on
Sunday in Florida. “We have a massive situation going on.”
Earlier
on Sunday, in the same wink-wink manner with which he had “disavowed”
the Ku Klux Klan, Mr. Trump said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that he
doesn’t condone violence, even as he justified
and encouraged it. He defended the supporter who punched a young
protester in the face in North Carolina last week and who said afterward
that maybe he’d have to “kill him” next time, saying, “He obviously
loves this country and maybe he doesn’t like seeing
what’s happening to the country.”
Here’s a medley of Mr. Trump’s comments condoning violence over the past few weeks:
“I’d like to punch him in the face, I’ll tell you.”
“In the good old days this doesn’t happen, because they used to treat them very, very rough.”
“I
love the old days. You know what they used to do to guys like that when
they were in a place like this? They’d be carried out on a stretcher,
folks.”
“If
you see somebody getting ready to throw a tomato, knock the crap out of
them, would ya? Seriously. Just knock the hell out of them.”
Trump’s History of Encouraging Violence
It’s
instructive to watch the video of Mr. Trump cowering as a protester
stormed the stage in Ohio, then returning to the lectern to turn up the
heat. He demonizes protesters at his rallies
as “vicious,” and on Sunday several times he repeated the lie that the
man who stormed the stage in Ohio was linked to ISIS.
Protesting
in front of the Boca Raton rally on Sunday, Kate Newton and Elizabeth
Versalie, both in their 50s, said they had to speak out. They turned up
at the amphitheater two hours before
the rally and were denied entry when security guards saw their signs,
which said “Stop the Hate.”
“It’s
all about standing up for freedom of speech for us,” Ms. Versalie said.
“Nobody should be running a campaign on fear and bigotry.”
Sunday’s
rally was peaceful. But it is surreal to be in a political gathering of
several thousand people and not see one banner nor hear one
uninterrupted voice of dissent. Why should there
be, when Mr. Trump has declared open season on all who disagree with
him?
The
other striking aspect of these rallies is how affable the crowd is —
until the Trump campaign cranks up the intolerance. Waiting hours for
their candidate to arrive, supporters snapped
photos of one another, chatted and cooed at babies in their parents’
arms. But when Mr. Trump and his warm-up crew, led Sunday by an aide,
Stephen Miller, had the stage, a different undercurrent could be felt.
There was an onstage tribute to people “murdered
by illegal immigrants.” As a few protesters were ejected, Mr. Miller
ranted into the mike: “You just heard a mother whose child was murdered
and you want to sow chaos? What kind of person are you?”
Mr.
Trump’s calls to violence are the sickest part of the con that is his
presidential campaign. Yes, some people who attend his rallies are
bigots; others are simply upset with a nation,
or a life, that’s dealt them a bad hand.
But
Mr. Trump, who blathered on about “winning” on Sunday, has not a single
solid, truthful idea about how to address the roots of this seething
anger. He is basking in the energy created
by turning one American against another, hoping hatred will propel him
to the Republican nomination.
For more information, go to: www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com
No comments:
Post a Comment