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Mr. President, Be Best!
President Trump’s poorly aimed Tweet early Monday morning diminished a weekend worth of public goodwill. He must, for the first time, apologize. He must apologize or lose all. This ain’t 12-dimensional chess, and this isn’t 2016, as he recognized in his speeches this past weekend. Now he needs to Be Best! He was right to tweet against NASCAR, but erred badly in naming the only black driver in the top racing circuit rather than the Suits in the NASCAR boardroom. He needs to make this right before the week is out, and could win bigly in so doing.
Here are some of President Trump’s great words from Saturday’s Salute to America:
The more you lie, the more you slander, the more you try to demean and divide, the more we will work hard to tell the truth. And we will win. (Applause.) The more you lie and demean and collude, the more credibility you lose. We want to bring the country together, and a free and open media will make this task a very easy one. Our country will be united. After all, what do we want? We want a strong military, great education, housing, low taxes, law and order. We want safety, we want equal justice, we want religious liberty, we want faith and family, and living in a great communities and happy communities and safe communities. And we want great jobs and we want to be respected by the rest of the world; not taken advantage of by the rest of the world, which has gone on for decade after decade. We should all want the same thing. How can it be any different than those things?
The more bitter you become, the more we will appeal to love and patriotism, and the more we will rise above your hate to build a better future for every child in our great country.
Here is a passage from President Trump’s remarks at Mount Rushmore:
THE PRESIDENT: One of their political weapons is “Cancel Culture” — driving people from their jobs, shaming dissenters, and demanding total submission from anyone who disagrees. This is the very definition of totalitarianism, and it is completely alien to our culture and our values, and it has absolutely no place in the United States of America. (Applause.) This attack on our liberty, our magnificent liberty, must be stopped, and it will be stopped very quickly. We will expose this dangerous movement, protect our nation’s children, end this radical assault, and preserve our beloved American way of life. (Applause.)
In our schools, our newsrooms, even our corporate boardrooms, there is a new far-left fascism that demands absolute allegiance. If you do not speak its language, perform its rituals, recite its mantras, and follow its commandments, then you will be censored, banished, blacklisted, persecuted, and punished. It’s not going to happen to us. (Applause.)
Make no mistake: this left-wing cultural revolution is designed to overthrow the American Revolution. In so doing, they would destroy the very civilization that rescued billions from poverty, disease, violence, and hunger, and that lifted humanity to new heights of achievement, discovery, and progress.
To make this possible, they are determined to tear down every statue, symbol, and memory of our national heritage.
These are genuinely Trumpian words and thoughts, just as the Berlin Wall speech was Reagan through and through. Peter Robinson was not a puppet master putting great words in the mouth of a B-list actor. Whoever wrote the Rushmore and Salute to America speeches fed off of the energy and ideas of the man, Donald J. Trump. Any honest observer who bothers to scan back over the decades will find the man consistently holding a fundamental love for America and an outrage against the shame of forgotten Americans of every hue being neglected and done wrong by politicians. It was Donald J. Trump, not Reagan or the Bushes, who formally asked for the votes of African Americans and proposed a specific set of policies, a New Deal for Black America, in 2016.
So, early Monday morning, it was entirely appropriate for the president to go on offense against a corporate target that had peddled the hoax of white supremacy in its fans and even in its employees. NASCAR had the internal knowledge to instantly confirm or deny the “hate crime” story they themselves created. Bubba Wallace should be understood at being used, misled, by the NASCAR suits who were looking to deflect heat from their unpopular ban of the rebel flag, a flag long associated with the regional outlaw origins of the sport, moonshine runners who souped up “stock” cars to both carry a large liquid load and evade the law with speed and handling. Instead, President Trump misaimed:
Has @BubbaWallace apologized to all of those great NASCAR drivers & officials who came to his aid, stood by his side, & were willing to sacrifice everything for him, only to find out that the whole thing was just another HOAX? That & Flag decision has caused lowest ratings EVER!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 6, 2020
This let Bubba Wallace throw the president’s words back in his face. I take the ratings claim as true. A tweet may be both true and politically self-defeating. Grant that Bubba Wallace is complicit and happy to ride the political corporate wave. Grant that the Hodge Twins are entirely on target. Bubba Wallace’s pinned tweet from 2017 points out his singular status within the first ranks of NASCAR:
There is only 1 driver from an African American background at the top level of our sport..I am the 1. You're not gonna stop hearing about "the black driver" for years. Embrace it, accept it and enjoy the journey..
— Bubba Wallace (@BubbaWallace) November 8, 2017
So, President Trump named the only black driver and said he was the one who needed to apologize. This is a complete loser tweet. Kayleigh McEnany turned this lemon into lemonade with the unwitting help of the White House press jackals, but President Trump cannot afford to be burning bridges to the very black and independent voters he seeks in his tough reelection fight. Bubba Wallace and the NASCAR Suits happily assumed the moral high ground, turning the president’s fine words from Saturday back on him:
Bubba Wallace is no Colin Kaepernick. First, Kaepernick was no pioneer, no standout. The hard work of breaking down NFL racism was done by other men who proved that black men had the brains and leadership to be winning quarterbacks. Second, Wallace is not wearing gear depicting police as pigs or posturing while cut from the racing circuit. No, he has not won yet, like Danica Patrick, but he is a serious competitor. The culture war issue rests in the corporate head shed, not in a young athlete losing his way in his sport. So, President Trump misjudged if he thought success lay in targeting a player, however his press secretary tried to explain the written words.
Yes, the White House press corps was unhinged. Yes, they fell into the trap laid over the past three weeks by Kayleigh McEnany. After Kayleigh McEnany ripped them a new one, CBS News reported on the other black lives, the inconvenient deaths on our Democrat-ruled city streets. Well, they give it two minutes:
Over the Fourth of July weekend, cities across the country saw widespread outbursts of violence. Dozens of people were shot, and at least five children died. Mark Strassmann reports.
ABC News gave it 3:49 on their Monday evening broadcast:
So, now we have the beginning of an acknowledgment of the carnage on our streets, thanks to the president and to his press secretary. What President Trump must do to clean up and go on to win is make a move towards a daring young man and pivot against the corporate Suits. He should tweet a simple apology along the lines of:
I said it wrong: @BubbaWallace has nothing to apologize for. NASCAR corporate bosses do. It should not have taken days and FBI resources.
NASCAR bosses had the security video and control of all employees. Should have solved the mystery and reassured their great young driver @BubbaWallace on Day One.
My apologies to @BubbaWallace and nothing but wishes of success in his racing career. I invite him and other athletes to join in a “Cease Fire” campaign for our great cities.
The president should then start turning corporate posturing and support for a Marxist front group into support for communities burned down and riddled with bullets. He should launch a “Cease Fire” public campaign for our cities. Ask Jim Brown to lead it.
To prevent future misfires, President Trump should take words from his speech, and his wife’s words, and make them his smartphone wallpaper:
Appeal to love and patriotism
Rise above their hate
Build a better future
Be Best!
Published in Politics
Exactly. Thank you, @lowtech-redneck, for saying what I was thinking.
Agreed. Lots of NT Trump concern trolling but probably misdirected
There are two versions of “the noose.” I saw the original photo and the loop was a bowline, a knot I have tied a thousand times. Recently, I saw another photo and this time the loop was gone and a real noose, not of white clothesline as the original was, but hemp and formed as a real noose.
That second one was provided by NASCAR. I’ve never seen the actual FBI photos of the “crime scene.” So, consider me suspicious of NASCAR.
Who knows why Trump does some of the things he does. I often wonder as I watch him fly around all over the place and attend this meeting or that, constantly involved in his job, how does he have time to get in twitter fights with nobodies? And why does he get in a twitter fight with a nobody? He could say everything he wanted to say about a particular person in a particular incident without ever mentioning that person by name and everyone would know exactly who he was tweeting about and why. I do it all the time right here on Ricochet. I understand that Trump may feel a certain patriarchy towards Nascar fans as predominantly his supporters. That’s great! So just say that in a tweet. “I support the loyal and patriotic fans of Nascar and am glad it was proven, as I always knew it would be, that racism is not an issue with these great people. It’s a shame that such a simple thing can get blown out of proportion and cause so much unneeded stress.” Or something to that effect. Bam, slap, thud…match over, move on. Good post @cliffordbrown.
I don’t get what this is about as I don’t follow NASCAR and have never heard of any of these people so don’t quite understood what all the commotion is about. As far as a noose in the garage goes, I have one in mine. It’s used to lift the garage door if the electricity goes out during a storm. What’s the big deal?
Don’t EVER say that in public @goldwaterwoman. All of your friends will ostracize you and you will lose your prestigious corner office at work. Doncha know?
Color me stupid, but I still don’t understand. Don’t all electric garages have a rope or a chain up near the mechanism that lifts the garage door available to use if the motor is unavailable? How is that racist?
It’s not. That’s the point. I was just joking with you. However, in this situation the rope was tied in such a way that it looked exactly like one would imagine a noose to look. Some question whether that noose-looking rope was actually there, or whether it was just a length of rope tied in a loop at the bottom to make a handle for easier grabbing. The driver at the forefront of this story never actually saw the rope himself. He was told about it by one of his mechanics. It is difficult to keep up with all the victims these days.
As usual, Conservative Tree House is on the case.
BLUF:
Meaning a loop that closes when the rope is pulled or a weight is hanging from the loop. As opposed to a knot tied (perhaps with extra turns to help it hang down) with a loop that cannot close, because you don’t want it to since you’re repeatedly pulling on the loop.
Forget it, Cliff. Unfortunately, because he is a 9 year old boy, Trump is utterly incapable of the discipline required to think through the easily foreseeable consequences of his words or actions. Everything is about immediate emotional gratification.
Sadly, he can make a great speech like the Mt. Rushmore event, then undo every bit of it with one asinine tweet. That is why a senile mediocrity serial plagiarizer like Biden is likely to eat Trump’s lunch (to the severe detriment of all that is good), media bias or none.
We had a similar experience in Minnesota with Gov. Jesse Ventura. After 4 years, everyone was eager to end the circus.
It seems to be that this is much ado about nothing.
The original photo of the loop in the pull down rope is almost gone. I found one blurry version.
The photo on the right shows the loop cut off. The left is hard to see and clearer versions are now gone.
This is now the version that is everywhere and is NOT the original loop
Sounds like a moderate case of NT to me.
I agree with Duane and I’m voting for Trump. Most people are not ideologues and most don’t follow politics closely. People who are much closer to Trump on policy than to the D’s will not vote for him simply because they can’t stand him and the chaos he creates around him. I’m now running into more and more who voted for him last time around but are totally fed up with his act. It’s frustrating as I try to convince people to support him. I hope he pulls it out. But every event like this just makes it harder.
Or a significant case of sober thinking. Trump is his own worst enemy.
My only hope is that the Democrats will prove to be their own worst enemies as they have often done in the past.
I’m not sure that was an apology. It sounded to me more like a fake-but-accurate claim. Maybe I didn’t hear it right.
Didn’t he say in essence, It was true, but now I see it wasn’t true, but the spirit of it is true and exists today, and so, yes, it’s true.
Conspiracy theory, eh? You something’s wrong when a conspiracy theory makes the most sense.
I agree the tweet was not Trump’s best move. It would have been better to go after NASCAR who I think were pandering mightily.
On the other hand, I am aware of about 63 million people who are ready to crawl over broken glass to vote for Trump.
All these “conservatives” who are going to vote for Biden out of disgust with Trump’s tweets are rare on the ground and mostly products of imagination.
Not quite. First he went on Don Lemon to double down.
Don Lemon is an awful person. Also guilty of sexual assault.
I do not think this is wild speculation. I think the Suits did need a distraction and justification as they got fan blowback on the Confederate battle flag ban.
We have tragic heroes.
Yes. And. NASCAR had all the evidence and has corporate security. They could have reviewed the security camera footage and come to the correct conclusion in a matter of hours on the first day, but that would have deprived the Suits of a bit of woke public theater.
Actually, that is like the original loop, if you look very closely. From outside, top left photo, you see the loose end pointing left, from the inside, bottom left, it points right. It could not be an actual hangman’s knot, as that would slide shut and pinch your hand as you pulled on it to close the door. It has the form, not the function.
The knot here is a uni-knot, visually the same as a hangman’s knot but a non-slip knot.
My father shares that their WSJ deliver man is a black man who, unsolicited called out to Dad “We gotta put Trump back in office!” This is in the “woke” part of Washington state.
Bubba Watson is a junior member of a large organization. That organization has gone left, like most corporations. He also faces enormous pressure, as the only black driver in the top division, to “represent” the “correct” views. I think it best to focus on the Suits and give the young driver a way to go the positive direction of a Jim Brown, focussing on reducing violence in the community.