Becoming Normal? Modifying His Agenda? Failing?
NO! Trump Doubles Down at Harrisburg
May 4, 2017 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us
If you think the “gravity” of the presidency is bringing Trump to his “senses” and turning him into a “normal” president…
that Bannon and the fascists have been sidelined…
that Trump’s presidency is failing and the resistance is “winning”…
that Trump is just a buffoon…
Then you need to listen to Trump’s speech in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania last Saturday and come to your senses!
Trump marked the first 100 days of his presidency by flying to a rally of supporters in Harrisburg and doubling down on his fascist agenda. “Make no mistake,” he bellowed. “We are just beginning in our fight to make America great again.” He gave a bellicose speech aimed at whipping up and solidifying a fascist base behind his program—the fascist remaking of U.S. society and governance.
Attacking Liberals and the Media: “time to drain the swamp”
Trump started by denouncing the media as a “disgrace” and, along with the Washington establishment and their Hollywood supporters, part of a “swamp” that needed to be “drained.” He bragged about skipping the White House Correspondents' Dinner, an annual ritual of ruling class fellowship taking place that evening that presidents usually attend. He told his audience of “lock-her-up,” “build-the-wall,” “USA, USA, USA” racists, xenophobes and misogynists that he would much rather be with them—the “much better people.”
This wasn’t just Trump venting. Destroying the pillars of the existing liberal bourgeois order like the media is a key part of consolidating fascist rule, with its open terrorism and disregard for the rule of law, people’s basic rights, and truth itself.
Depicting Immigrants as “Criminals” That Need to Be “Eradicated”
The attack on the media was a warm-up for going after the rest of the world. “We are not going to let other countries take advantage of us anymore,” he said—as if America, grown rich and powerful off exploiting the land, labor, and resources of countries across the globe, is the one being taken advantage of. Then in remarks barely covered in the mainstream media, Trump launched into a vitriolic assault on immigrants, especially those from Mexico and Central and Latin America. This was on the eve of nationwide May 1 demonstrations in support of the rights and humanity of immigrants. Trump claimed that violent “transnational gangs” were responsible for drugs and “illegals” that are “pouring in” to the U.S. He declared, “We are eradicating the criminals and cartels that have infiltrated our country.”
But his real target is all immigrants, the millions whose blood and bones have been crucial building blocks of this country and all its wealth and power, right up to this very moment. “We need safety, we need cameras, we need all of the things we’re going to be putting in. We need the wall and we will build the wall,” he declared, to chants of “Build the wall! Build the wall!”
Trump's Fascist Poetry Reading
And there was even worse—Trump’s fascist poetry reading. Trump introduced the poem “The Snake” as a story “having to do with our borders and people coming in,” and how careful the U.S. had to be. He dedicated it to the enforcers now terrorizing millions of immigrants, thanking General Kelly (head of Homeland Security), the Border Patrol, and the ICE agents “for doing such an incredible job.”
The poem is about a “tender woman” who nourishes a sick snake back to health—only to be repaid for her generosity by a vicious bite. Trump has used the poem as a metaphor for what he insists is the need to guard against Islamic State jihadists, “terrorist” Syrian refugees, and now Mexicans—or really any immigrants or even any foreign-born people. The message: America has been kind to foreigners, but they’ve turned around and bitten the hand that’s fed them—and become criminal terrorists, drug dealers, and rapists.
“Big” doesn’t begin to describe this lie. Millions and millions have been forced to flee their countries by the bombs America has dropped, the death squads it’s organized, and exploitation it’s exported—whether in Africa, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Mexico, or Central and South America. Now Trump—in the midst of the greatest global refugee crisis since World War 2, perhaps ever—is forging a fascist base willing to support all the cruelty, brutality and murder that the U.S. rulers may be compelled to further unleash. Within this country, he’s giving them a blank check to look at anyone who wasn’t born in America (and for much of his base, anyone who isn’t white) as a “snake”—a potential enemy, against which anything goes.
How is this different from the way the Nazis labeled Jewish people and others “vermin” in Hitler’s Germany, and incited mobs to attack them? And what did that lead to?
Trump’s 100th day speech underscores the reality that he’s heading up a fascist regime, which is attempting to rapidly consolidate power and carry forward its agenda. Watch the speech yourself and think about its logic and direction. And then act. This fascist regime must be driven out before it can fully consolidate. That is going to require millions of ordinary people acting in extraordinary ways, outside the framework of politics as usual.
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