Trump and the US

by B. R. GOWANI

Donald Trump’s 2016 victory (not by popular vote) against Hillary Clinton began a new era in that a crooked businessman. with no political experience but full of bull shit and open racism, was able to capture the highest office in the country.

Now, four years later, Trump may lose the election to the former vice president Joe Biden but by a small margin, i.e., by less than 4 million votes – it’s a big achievement for Trump. He has, after all, not done much for most of his supporters except incite them against immigrants, Muslims, Mexicans, and liberals, thus bringing out their wild instincts. He has instead killed many of them, including his opponents, through careless mishandling of COVID-19. Trump fared better in counties with high COVID-19 related deaths than his performance in 2016! Yes, it is true! Go figure!

Trump is not a religiously inclined person otherwise he could start a new religion: he would just have to declare to his followers that he’s the Father of God (son of god or prophet would still be a subordinate and against Trump’s Mount Everest kind of ego.) He would probably be very successful – financially and with number of followers.

Now its clear as daylight that there is an almost 50/50 split in the country between the Republicans and Democrats. The election result shows 50% of the population hates Trump. But then Donald Trump is nothing but a mini copy of US values.

Some examples:

• Trump, a bigot/misogynist himself, formed his cabinet by picking his secretaries and advisors from the stinkiest trash cans. His advisor, Stephen Miller, whose mother’s ancestors came to the US from the Russian empire, was the brain behind Muslim ban and anti-immigrant policies.
• The US picks its friends in a similar manner: it supports the worst of brutal tyrants including Indonesia’s Suharto, Zaire’s Mobutu Sese Seko, Iran’s Reza Shah Pahlavi, Chile’s Augusto Pinochet, Pakistan’s Zia-ul-Haq, Cuba’s Fulgencio Batista, Saudi Arabia’s Mohammad bin Salman.

• Trump has a global platform to convey his cruelty. His regime separated thousands of children from their parents entering the US without proper documents between July 1, 2017, and June 26, 2018. Although under court orders some were reunited with their parents. However, the court appointed lawyers have failed to find parents of 545 children.

• The US took thousands of Native American children and put them in boarding schools, away from their families. The aim was to cut them off from their native culture and indoctrinate them with Western values, language, and customs. This went on for decades. Disregard for their welfare, maltreatment, and deaths of these children became a norm. Many of the 350 schools were church-run, and all of them were government-funded.

• Trump doesn’t believe in giving out anything except where he has something to gain.

• Ditto with the US. Every kind of aid, loan, grant given by the US to foreign countries has many strings attached and has short or long term US interests involved and has hefty interest payment involved.
• Trump lives in luxury at other people’s expense.
• US elite live in luxury at the expense of the working class, undocumented workers, and third world labor and resources.
• Trump wants people from Norway to immigrate to the US instead of people from the “shithole” (Trump’s label) countries.
• In early 1800s, US wanted to devour more native land for the white people to spread out. So, President Andrew Jackson created the inhuman Trail of Tears that uprooted a hundred thousand natives and murdered fifteen thousand innocent lives. His
  vicious rationalization:

“They [the Natives, the Cherokee tribe] have neither the intelligence, the industry, the moral habits, nor the desire of improvement which are essential to any change in their condition. Established in the midst of another and superior race, they must necessarily yield to the force of circumstances and ere long disappear.”

• Trump doesn’t believe in rules and regulations of any kind that hinder or reduce profit of corporations, including those polluting the environment. He pulled out of the Paris Agreement on climate-the only country to do so. His four years have seen weakening or undoing of up to 70 environment rules and regulations.
• Likewise, the US opposes any restrictions on its violence or looting of other countries’ resources/labor or of waging wars or any restrictions on any of its activities by the United Nations or any other international organization. The US also disallows any restrictions on its favorite nation at the United Nations and has vetoed over 40 resolutions on Israel.
• Trump loves cheap/free labor, never misses an opportunity to steal and cheat. The 68-story Trump Tower in New York was built with cheap labor. 150 Polish workers, most illegal, did back-breaking 10-12 hours workday with little pay, many times were unpaid for weeks and had no money to buy food or pay rent. Trump and his contractors were sued for union pension violations associated with the construction of the Tower. Attorney Wendy Sloan put it this way:

“It’s constructed on the blood, sweat and tears of the Polish Brigades, as they were known in the industry.”

• So does the US. The United States is built on a land stolen from the Native Americans – who were either killed or thrown in reservation camps, and when those reservations were needed because of newly found natural resources or for expansion purposes, the Natives were again pushed into other reservations, while killing those who resisted the US roguishness.

• United States was built with black slave, Chinese “coolie,” and white indentured labor. (But the white indentured laborers didn’t suffer torture and racism which black slaves endured.)

• Trump is responsible for the deaths of more than 240,000 people who lost their lives to COVID-19 because no national mandate to control the virus was issued, and the Center for Disease Control guidelines were constantly ridiculed. Mind you, Trump follows US policies of bombing (Syria, Afghanistan), and imposing economic embargoes and sanctions (Venezuela, Cuba, Iran), against foreign countries.

• The US has killed millions of people worldwide through overt and/or covert wars in order to control the foreign countries’ natural resources, including oil, and to kill leaders who tried to follow policies not liked by the US but beneficial to their people. Check out William Blum’s Killing Hope and Noam Chomsky’s Year 501: The Conquest Continues.

Trump and the United States are similar in their arrogance, plunder/looting/stealing, inhumanity and indifference to human life, so then, why does 50% of US population hate Trump so much but not the United States?

So, what is that? It’s Trump’s in-the-face kind of personality, mostly very transparent, he verbalizes his thoughts and plans out loud; though later, may deny it half-heartedly knowing fully well that his original thought has been firmly planted in the minds of his audience.

Another reason is his tyrannical nature. Up until now, the US system has mostly run smoothly because both parties are totally supported by the moneyed class, including big corporations and Wall Street. Trump is a hard core capitalist too. But he is an anomaly; he doesn’t want to work with his party or the opposition. He wants an absolute power. The governments in the US have maintained a facade of “democracy” within the country and have gone to wars or overthrew governments in other countries in the guise of “humanitarianism” and promoting “democracy.” Where as Trump doesn’t conceal his real intentions when achieving his objectives.

Also, Trump doesn’t discriminate between foreign and domestic: he treats, rather mistreats, and kills everyone without discrimination: is an equal opportunity killer.

Trump committed a grave mistake in attacking the homeland by letting thousands die due to his ignoring the Coronavirus.

He created marked division in the country due to his bilious rhetoric, continual lies, and by belittling as many people who he could.

The state of the US division now may be at a point of no-return. It is highly doubtful that anyone can now unite the citizenry.

Ironic it may be, but it took a plain speaking crooked president to starkly point out the US thuggery mindset that has prevailed in US policies, by using those tactics domestically and openly declaring them for all to understand and see.

One example: during an interview with Fox TV’s Bill O’ Reilly on February 4, 2017, O’Reilly pointed out that “Putin’s a killer,” Trump was quick to counter with the following:

“There are a lot of killers. We’ve got a lot of killers. What do you think — our country’s so innocent? You think our country’s so innocent?”

Now you can’t find a more truthful president than Trump who, while in office, points out the true criminal and violent nature of his own country. That’s a no-no from the establishment, the hypocritical dominant news media, and the Democratic leadership.

B. R. Gowani can be reached at brgowani@hotmail.com