[ad_1]
By Sean Yoes, Baltimore AFRO Editor, [email protected]
On Oct. 25, Gregory Bush, a 51-year-old White man walked into a Kroger grocery store in Louisville, Kentucky and gunned down Maurice Stallard, a 69-year-old Black man and then walked out to the Kroger parking lot and shot Vicki Lee Jones, a 67-year-old Black woman to death. Bush was allegedly confronted by another armed bystander who shot at him causing him to flee. According to the New York Times, Steve Zinninger, the armed bystander’s son claimed Bush told his father, “Don’t shoot me and I won’t shoot you…Whites don’t kill Whites.” According to police moments before Bush murdered two Black elders at Kroger, he forcibly attempted to enter the 185-year-old First Baptist Church of Jeffersontown, which is a suburb of Louisville, (presumably to continue the diabolical work of Dylan Roof). But, fortunately the historic Black church’s doors were locked.
Three days earlier, on Oct. 22 Cesar Sayoc, a 56-year-old Trump zealot allegedly delivered a pipe bomb to progressive billionaire George Soros. By Oct. 26 when he was captured, Sayoc, the so-called “MAGA bomber” had delivered more than a dozen mail bombs to other prime members of Trump’s enemies list, including: President Barack Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and President Bill Clinton, Attorney General Eric Holder, actor Robert De Niro, progressive billionaire Tom Steyer, Rep. Maxine Waters (two bombs), Sen. Kamala Harris, former Director of Intelligence James Clapper, former Director of the CIA John Brennan, Vice-President Joe Biden (two bombs) and Sen. Cory Booker.
The day after Sayoc was captured in Florida, Robert Bowers, a 47-year-old White man with a history of virulent anti-semitic rants on social media, delivered one final tirade before unleashing the most deadly attack on American Jews in the country’s history. “HIAS likes to bring invaders in that kill our people. I can’t sit by and watch my people get slaughtered. Screw your optics, I’m going in,” Bowers wrote via Gab, the social media bastion of last resort for anti-semites, racists, homophobes, xenophobes, sociopaths and sub-humans of every stripe.
Moments after his post, Bowers “went in” armed with an AR-15, and at least three handguns and killed 11 people worshipping at the Tree of Life Synagogue in the idyllic Squirrel Hill neighborhood of Pittsburgh, ripping a venerable Jewish community apart.
From October 22 to Oct. 27 we witnessed the culmination of the fears of millions; a six-day cyclone of American race hate, which thrives in an atmosphere of intolerance supercharged by the racist rhetoric of the 45th President of the United States. But, Trump went further when he delivered marching orders to his faithful foot soldiers.
On the day that bomb was delivered to Soros (the leader of an international Jewish cabal, in the minds of the extreme right) Trump, during a rally in Houston for Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, proudly proclaimed he is a (White) nationalist. “You know, they have a word, it sort of became old-fashioned,” Trump said. “It’s called a nationalist…we’re not supposed to use that word. You know what I am? I’m a nationalist. OK? I’m a nationalist.”
No kidding genius.
Let’s be clear, in the midst of one of the darkest periods of racist violence and intolerance in American history, the most ill-equipped, least curious, most criminal man ever to occupy the White House has finally proclaimed what so many of us have known all along; he is a White nationalist. If you don’t believe me, you can certainly believe David Duke on this one. “Trump IS a Nationalist and he does believe in the rights of all Americans – But the difference in Trump is that he ALSO Defends the Rights and Heritage of White People & White people love him for it!” wrote Duke on Twitter following Trump’s proclamation of nationalism in Houston.
Once again Trump and Duke, the grand kleagle emeritus are on the same page. But, Trump is in alignment with a multitude of his hate-filled White brothers. When Bowers posted about HIAS (Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society) before he went on his murderous rampage, he was reflecting his rage against an organization that has championed immigration for more than a century. In previous posts, Bowers ranted against the so-called “caravan of invaders” creeping towards the United States Southern border, the foundation of Trump’s closing argument as we head to the midterms on Nov. 6. The terms “invaders” and “infestation,” are talking points that have been seized upon by Trump, the right wing and State TV (aka Fox News) to describe and simultaneously dehumanize men, women and children literally running for their lives from murder, mayhem and tyranny in Central America.
What more do we need to see, what more do we need to hear before we realize the true “enemy of the people” is Donald John Trump?
Sean Yoes is the Baltimore editor of the AFRO and the author of Baltimore After Freddie Gray: Real Stories From One of America’s Great Imperiled Cities.
[ad_2]
Source link