Just when you think it can’t happen in YOUR town, well … it happens. Our odiferous president came to Utica, NY this past week, barking his acrid endorsement of our congressional representative, Claudia Tenney (a.k.a she who claims the $1.5 trillion in rich people tax cuts have “already paid for themselves”) at the old Hotel Utica. He was greeted by what was, by most estimations, the largest public demonstration in recent memory – somewhere between 1,700 and 2,000 people holding signs, raising their voices, pulling a large duck-like inflatable man-baby Trump replica. Back in 2003, just before the start of the Iraq war, we had what was for Utica a large demonstration downtown that was probably 200 or 250 people – nothing like this.
Trump attended a fundraiser for Tenney that was supposed to be a closed-door, no-press event, but at some point they allowed pool reporters in to record his remarks, which were about typical. It amounts to the Democrats wanting to raise your taxes, open the borders wide, and take away your guns. Of course, the president was talking to a crowd of heavy-wallet donors: the cheap seats were $1,000 and sponsors paid $15,000. So, for once, he may be right about Democrats wanting to raise the taxes of the people in that room – they richly deserve it.
No comments from the president on the recent media tour of his former advisor and reality television co-star, Omarosa (whose name sounds like Elvis spoke it). The celebrity has released some recordings of conversations in the White House and on the phone with Trump, Kelly, and others. She has also claimed that Trump has used the N-word a number of times on his dumb-ass NBC show and as president. This is more reality-show fodder, of course, and particularly meaningless, as evidence of this kind would prove nothing that we don’t already know. Donald Trump is a racist and a bigot; we don’t need to hear him using that special word to know that much. He has been spouting bigoted rhetoric since day one of his campaign and long before. He has engaged in the equivalent of blood libel against muslims and refugees from the global south. He has elevated notorious racists to key posts in his administration and apologized for white supremacists.
People can get used to just about anything. But with an administration like this, normalization amounts to complicity. Glad to see so many of my neighbors making their voices heard.
luv u,
jp
As reported by Chris Hayes and commented on by the folks at 
The shit storm is usually a smokescreen, a bit of grimy flash powder to distract most of us from what the administration is actually doing and to excite that grisly some of us who get off on targeting dark people. When the president hammers hard on his core themes, you know he’s worried about something. I’m expecting a major attack on Muslims soon – maybe Somali refugees, since they conveniently pull together the various attributes that make for great racist demagoguery: Islam, marked immigration status, dark skin, head scarfs, non-Norwegian sounding names, strange language, etc. He has already singled them out more than once as President, I believe, and certainly during the 2016 campaign.
“A new tide of optimism was already sweeping across our land,” he tells us, referring to a year ago, then jumped right in with the anecdotes and the guests of honor. “We always will pull through together, always.” Runs through a litany of lifesavers, mostly from disasters of our own making, through climate change, gun violence, etc. “The state of our union is strong because our people are strong. And together we are building a safe and strong and proud America.” Platitude.
There is also the fact that the President doesn’t understand policy, isn’t interested in it, and is incapable of delving any deeper than the surface of any political issue. He is kind of a blank slate, though he does obviously have deep-rooted visceral prejudices. Third-rate thinkers (and ninth-rate speechwriters) like Stephen Miller can scrawl their alt-right graffiti on the guy and he will repeat whatever they tell him. Retrograde bigots like General Kelly and Tom Cotton guide Trump like he’s their senile uncle. So the President’s feint towards compromise last Tuesday was transformed into the spectacle of last Thursday, when Trump denigrated an entire continent as well as the ex-colony that was a primary source of France’s wealth.
Of course, as police chiefs all over Texas and, really, across the nation know, the effect of this broad policy will be the precise opposite of what Trump, Sessions, and Abbott claim. It doesn’t take a criminologist to understand how this works. The police don’t have omniscience; they rely on people who see something to say something, as the slogan goes. Without the cooperation of people in the community, they can’t effectively do their jobs. Undocumented aliens are not going to step forward if they believe that police will detain them because of their immigration status. The Texas Governor can assure them all he wants that if they haven’t committed a crime they have nothing to fear – that obviously counts for nothing. The police would be severely constrained by this law. If they don’t report undocumented individuals to ICE, they can be fined and even prosecuted. So what the hell is Abbott talking about?
The thing is, Trump is a mirror to the Republican base, as 
The thing is, you need to listen to their rhetoric. They’re talking about “illegal immigrants”. They’re echoing the applause lines of our own crackpot politicians. No surprise, because we’re witnessing the same experience on our own southern border. People fleeing from the neoliberal aftermath of our bankrupt Central America policy, starting with support for decades of regressive, kelptocratic Mexican governments to our serial interventions in El Salvador, Honduras, Guatemala, and elsewhere, pouring into this country in hope of a better life. And we’ve got freaks like Donald Trump calling them rapists, murderers, etc., and not just him. Those Hungarian xenophobes? Turns out, they are us.
First, Trump. As someone who was once a contract employee of this individual (yes, he can say that I too took money from him at some point), I know this guy is more than just a cartoon show for our amusement. What he says and does can have real consequences for people who don’t ride in limos and private jets. So when he talks about forcing 11 million people to leave the country, understand that he is articulating a point of view that is held by a very vocal, substantial minority of Americans. There’s nothing ‘silent’ about this ‘majority’. They want ethnic cleansing.
Trouble is, Republicans ALWAYS have their hair on fire. It kind of devalues burning hair. All of this gas about how the president is going to poison the well by acting in this fashion; that Congress is ready to work with the president, but that this will screw it up. Hoo boy. If the president were to take them at their word on this at this point, I would worry for his sanity. They have been like Lucy and the football more times than I can count. Honestly, I don’t know why Republicans don’t like this guy. He’s basically Eisenhower with rhetorical skills. His immigration announcement was full of a lot of “pull yourself up by the bootstraps” clap trap. He’s deported more immigrants than any previous president. Sounds like their type.