Somebody must have locked The Donald in the basement this morning long enough to issue a statement in his name that sounds nothing like him. It was bland enough to not piss anybody off, in other words.
Except for one thing.
According to Aaron Blake, the statement included the line “The senseless, tragic deaths of two motorists in Louisiana and Minnesota reminds us how much more needs to be done.” This outraged many wingnuts, who refuse to believe  Alton Sterling and Philando Castile didn’t deserve to die. “I thought Trump supported LE [law enforcement]” mourned one guy.
It is clear that the shooter(s) was not affiliated with Black Lives Matter. BLM has issued a statement disavowing the shootings, and also saying,
Black activists have raised the call for an end to violence, not an escalation of it. Yesterday’s attack was the result of the actions of a lone gunman. To assign the actions of one person to an entire movement is dangerous and irresponsible. We continue our efforts to bring about a better world for all of us.
Some People literally didn’t get the memo. A lot of voices — coming entirely from the Right, from what I see — are calling for escalating violence. For example —
Most notably, Former Illinois Congressman Joe Walsh went on a tweetstorm against the Black Lives Matter movement, and cryptically warned, “This now war. Watch out Obama. Watch out black lives punks. Real America is coming for you.†Because apparently the president of the United States is not “real America. 
… Naturally, self-proclaimed “Internet supervillain,†Breitbart’s Milo Yiannopoulos, also immediately leapt into the fray, declaring Thursday night, “Black Lives Matter now gunning down police officers. Time to classify it as a terrorist organization. We need President @realDonaldTrump.†Drudge Report, likewise, swiftly announced “Black Lives Kill.†And The Blaze’s Tomi Lahren tweeted, then deleted, “Meet the new KKK, they call themselves ‘Black Lives Matter’ but make no mistake, their goals are far from equality.â€
And then there’s this:
Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick called protesters who ran away from the hail of bullets that rained down on Downtown Dallas on Thursday night “hypocrites” during an interview Friday on Fox News.
“All those protesters last night, they turned around and ran the other way expecting the men and women in blue to protect them. What hypocrites!” an audibly emotional Patrick said.
If I believed in hell, I’d want there to be a special room where people like Lt. Gov. Patrick will be forced to write “I’m sorry I was such an idiot” on a blackboard for the rest of eternity. With bad chalk.
I differ on Lt. Gov. Patrick, maha.
I want him to write that for all of eternity with the the blood from the remainder of his Satan-severed p*enis, with flames of Hell all around him, while incubi and sucubi pour molten gold into every orifice and sweat-pore!
Preferably, incubi and sucubi of the minority persuasion!
The lunatic white supremacist fringe will now consider this their New Civil War, and will declare open-season on minorities and Muslims.
Violece is never the answer.
Too bad that “MORAN!” in Dallas didn’t learn from previous civil rights actions, from India, to the US, to South Africa.
He didn’t help!
He poured napalm on what was already a quietly raging racial fire.
Stupid, stupid, stupid…
Oh, and evil!
Every day I get closer to going to Canada and claiming refugee status as a persecuted minority whose life is in danger. I am female, elderly and heaven help me, GAY! 3 strikes against me right there. I’m also disabled, a fire eating liberal and just about fed up with this country. My own country! My own country which I love!! This country has, among others, gone stark staring NUTS! If I were still young, I’d saddle up, sling my rifle on my saddle and go into battle, so to speak, but those years are long gone. This is such a sad thing. I never thought it would come to this and look here… it has.
I hate the heat, but I’m looking into maybe emigrating to Cuba in a few years.
I’ve actually looked into it, and right now, it’s difficult – but not impossible.
I can be “”El Blanco Diablo,” ogling the beautiful lasses on the beaches of Havana.
An old, fat, sweaty mess like me can’t do much more than look anymore…
This week, I’ll send in forms to renew my expired passport – just in case…
Wonder when the rightwingnuts will realize that they are, by logical extension, declaring Faux Snooze, the NRA, every police department in this country, etc. as terrorist organizations…
Certainly not in our lifetimes!
Both “Black Lives Matter” and its diversionary retort “All Lives Matter” are aspirational, not descriptive. More descriptive, right now, would be #BLMBNTTP: Black Lives Matter But Not To The Police.
In the short run the realistic assessment is #SBNALM: Some But Not All Lives Matter. But in the long run realism reverses to #ALMOND: All Lives Matter Or None Do.
Trumps says…”Our nation has become too divided”. Gee, I wonder why? Do you think it could have anything to do with some people advocating for the inclusion of torture as an acceptable behaviour in our national character? Or a candidate for the Presidency of the United States pridefully boasting about building a wall that will only stand as a symbol of failure to the values that generations of Americans aspired to uphold.
Trump is a self centered egotistical fucking mess. A buffoon of the highest order. He stands contrary to any value or any decency most of us Americans have ever held dear, and yet, he has the audacity, or rather the stupidity to try to pontificate some grand knowledge about us being a divided nation while it’s the likes of him and the morons who wallow in his divisive rhetoric that are causing the division that has suddenly come to Trump’s awareness.
Trump is a big blowhard bag of shit with a hairdo like a cockatiel.
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-CdDGkqv2I4o/VjPAci8V6sI/AAAAAAAAMY4/ObJIZuFATTA/s1600/donald-trump-updo.jpg
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/07/is-america-repeating-the-mistakes-of-1968/490568/
Trump kicked off his campaign and endeared himself to the bigot wing of the right by declaring “Mexicans” are “rapists and murderers.” Repeatedly. How anyone can take him seriously when he pearl clutches now about the divisions in our nation is just laughable. And I imagine some of his more deluded supporters, who have cheered on every statement of hatred from Trump will cheer this on too, and not see the contradictions. They really think that just calling the target of their racism a racist is enough to completely absolve them.
Trump has worked ceaselessly and deliberately to “Make America Hate Again,” to get the votes of white people, and has had some success with it, although I believe the level of support he has is amplified by a media all too willing to give him a platform and fan the flames for ratings.
csm,
tRUMP’s campaign announcement made Uncle Ronnie’s at Philadelphia, Mississippi, seem like a civil rights speech!
Gulag, that speech by Reagan was a turning point. You can draw a straight trajectory from then to now. At the time the social successes of the Civil Rights movement were still fresh, and social mores had started to change with respect to open expressions of bigotry. What Reagan did by speaking in Philadelphia, MS, of all places, was declare that racism and hatred was as American as apple pie. It began the process of a social re-normalization of racism in public practice and speech. Trump is the culmination of it.
Some who know him have said Trump is not a racist. Others have said hatred and bigotry is an act, to get white votes. It has been asked, what does this say about someone who would say hateful things they supposedly don’t believe? What doesn’t get asked, but is more troubling is the answer to the question, what does the popularity, such as it is, of a man like Trump, among the segment of whites, say about America?
For some diversion, not quite on the level of Swami’s links.
https://youtu.be/CceQISThDYQ
As I’ve probably written before, a few years back, we hatched the plan to move to the EU at my wife’s retirement. Things hadn’t gotten so bad that we were running from anything, just “lookin’ for adventure,” as the old song went. Now, of course, there seems to be a bit of trouble everywhere. So, it’s a bit up in the air.
But, I bet Buddhasteps and CUND have similar feelings, and the question, where do I feel most at home? Notice I didn’t write “where is home?” The USA will always be home, I was born here, and I love this country. But, the culture has drifted so far away from my sensibilities, that it no longer feels like home. I live in the rural south. I admire the people I live near, even though I don’t share many of their passions. Sometimes I go west to Seattle or Portland, and the world seems to recover its sanity, until the militiamen come out of hiding and it all goes wrong again. But, “the days are long and the years are short,” if you find a place that nourishes your soul and excites your mind, that’s your home, go discover it. I hope that I have the courage for one last big adventure.
I figure I can die in a familiar place, or so far from home that I’m the only one to look back over a life that took a very long path. For me one is like a Norman Rockwell painting and the other is like Tennyson’s “Ulysses.” It’s no contest.
“Je me lance vers la gloire!”*
*No I am not feeling “Psychokiller-ish,” although I like the song, it’s just I’m not feeling risk averse at the moment.
Portugal?
http://www.cheapestdestinationsblog.com/2014/09/10/what-it-costs-to-live-in-portugal/
http://www.expatarrivals.com/portugal/moving-to-portugal
It consoled me that Newt Gingrich, of all people said “If you are a normal white American … you don’t understand being black in America” – about the only intelligent thing I’ve ever heard him say, but something that should be common knowledge for anybody whose spent decades in the South.
Gulag, why Cuba? Would like to hear more. You know spanish?
..where do I feel most at home? Notice I didn’t write “where is home?†The USA will always be home, I was born here, and I love this country. But, the culture has drifted so far away from my sensibilities, that it no longer feels like home.
I work with white people who fled South Africa, after apartheid ended. They left because the country was literally falling apart and becoming too dangerous to live in – frequent power failures for example, because the infrastructure was no longer maintained adequately. Rampant crime – they were burglared despite living in a complex that was surrounded by an electric fence. Even today you read about “farm murders” – an epidemic of killings that happen out in the countryside. The country’s money, flag, national anthem had all changed.
South Africa is a radical example of the culture has drifted so far from my sensibilities you wrote above.
Countries change; one of my spiritual teachers said that if you live long enough, you’ll see everything – from a golden age to chaos.
Sara Robinson was one of my favorite writers on the internet, she used to post at Orcinus. In an effort to emigrate to Canada – which failed – she lived there for several years, and noted you can take the girl out of America, but you cannot take America out of the girl. There will always be the idea of America, even if the country by that name is going through its shadow material. At least for a few more generations.
OT- Trump, Clinton or giant meteor destroying the Earth? Here’s what people said they’d prefer
The Giant Meteor’s slogan? “Just End it Already”.
I used to read Sara Robinson all the time! She’s really great, but, somehow, I fell out of the habit, I’ll have to get back into it. Thanks for the link MB.
“if you live long enough, you’ll see everything – from a golden age to chaos.” Boy, it sure seems like it doesn’t it?
God, the Joe Walsh tweets are such great examples of someone writing stupid, racist crap, and being totally oblivious to it. I wish there weren’t so many other great examples.
CSM – I think Portugal has possibilities. I used to frequent a site called “Blue homes,” which had real estate listings from all over Europe. The downside was that a lot of the listings were people trying to catch the big fish with their second home. The prices were high. There are better sites. It’s really interesting to see what’s out there.
HOME—one of my favorite words. It brings to mind too many quotes/cliches to list here. But one of my favorites by Thomas Wolfe is “You can’t go home again”. He wrote that book after he tried going home, didn’t work, he got depressed, got pneumonia and died.
Hope I don’t sound preachy but for me home is connection with God. If we have that, we can be “at home” anywhere. Adventures are great but that is going away from home. We are all on a great adventure with our incarnation on this earth and are trying to find our way back home to our source. I was born in Indiana and left there in my late 30s. It does not feel like home to me and I will never go there again. Okay, even though I said I wouldn’t: “Home is where the heart is”.
I’m going back to Indiana/ Indiana here I come…
…not.
moonbat,
I LOVE Baseball!
So do the Cubans!
As for learning the language, I’m fairly adept at learninng one, so, if ÃŒ focus , I can add Cuban-Spanish to go along with my Americsn-English, Russian, Ukraininan, and German.