@old europe,
old europe wrote:
Well, I was also going to point out the laughable hypocrisy (and possibly irony) involved in whining and complaining about the use of a phrase like "uneducated white males" - calling it an "unctious[sic] conddescending[sic] phrase" - while simultaneously rejoicing in the "taunting daily tweets" of the guy who has made a career out of condescending, insulting, and offending people.
Oh I believe there is a significant difference between the respective actions. The "uneducated white males" thing was an endlessly repeated, self-serving rationalization that well illustrated the underlying conceit, and lack of awareness of the crowd which embraced it so assiduously. A very revealing slip. Trump's tweets are a somewhat new feature of political discorse that he used very effectively, initally to bypass a largely hostile Republican Party establishment, and later in the campaign a hostile Liberal Media one. Now he is using it to distract and waste the energies of a badly disorganized Democrat party that appears to be leaderless and stuck in an odd but intense state of indignation, denial and rationalization. At the same time he has made significant progress in reunifying the Republican party, delivering a clear message to the American people, and in assembling what appears to be a very capable team of strong, accomplished appointees who appear to reinforce his message and expressed intentions.
All of this is, of course, only promise and appearance now. The next six months will tell us a lot..
old europe wrote:
However, I'll admit that I might not have sufficient knowledge of American history to say whether this is just an aberration, or whether the standards of American conservatives have always been this low (or possibly lower). So I'll defer to your superior knowledge and experience when putting the current, incredibly low standards of American conservatives regarding what passes as Presidential behavior into a wider societal and historical context.
Nice formulation: very much in character. History is indeed a severe judge, and both the common humanity and the differing prejudices and perspectives of peoples everywhere are evident in it. You still reflect the Ruropean views of Americans that can be seen throughout the literature of the last two centuries, and we are still trying to work out the awful legacy of colonialism and the work of Lloyd George and Gorges Clemenceau in the Middle East.
