The 19th of June is Juneteenth.
It celebrates one date in a series of dates at the end of the Civil War when African Americans who were slaves gained their freedom in either legal or pragmatic terms.
That freedom did not, of course, end racial violence. One example of racial violence was the Tulsa Massacre, in Tulsa, Oklahoma. You can go read about it. Nobody really knows how bad it was. Thousands of African American people were burned out of their homes, interned, wounded or killed. Whites died as well. That happened at the end of May, 1921.
We are having a pandemic and there are concerns that large indoor gatherings would spread the infection.
We are having a revolution in which Americans are being forced to come to terms with deeply ingraned, systemic, and systematic racism that involves the widespread incarceration and murder of African Americans, many men. The number of African Americans incarcerated and killed each year in America exceeds that which occurred at the Tulsa Massacre, or approximately so, by my estimation.
So, naturally, Donald Trump is planning a huge indoor rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on Juneteenth.
The White House has issued a statement that Trump’s choice of Juneteenth for this rally is entirely a coincidence. They also issued a statement that Trump chose Juneteenth because African Americans are very “near and dear” to his heart.
Three thoughts come to mind.
1) People who reject science, and are willing to embrace Trump’s anti-science yammering, are walking into a death trap. Have a nice death trap. Shame on you for the people you will secondarily infect. Do not come near me or my family after this rally.
2) With enough people in a large venue inside, breathing, Trump will have maximal chance of being infected with the virus and getting COVID-19. This rally could kill him. It would be the end of a long national nightmare. We can only hope this is a suicide rally for Trump, because he is killing us and that has to top.
3) It would be funny if very few people showed up at the rally. It is possible. Such things have happened before.
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Amen.
Excellent post. Trump’s abhorrent policies are not only killing Americans, they are annihilating the environment. He has perfected this wretched balancing act of stuffing wads of cash into the pockets of the mega-rich while appealing to his cult-worshipping base with his borderline racist, nativist, hate-filled incendiary rhetoric, all the while shafting them.
Using the pandemic and civil unrest as cover, Trump and his neofascist regime have been quietly gutting America’s environmental laws, thereby making it easier for corporations to use the air and water as open sewers, tearing open public lands for development, destroying ecosystems and obliterating populations of rare species.
Yes indeed Greg, your national nightmare needs to stop.
I was thinking of attending the rally and then joining CHAZ and the Minneapolis looters, but I feel it would be inappropriate to get on a plane after being infected.
On June 5th, once again using the pandemic as cover to revitalize the economy, Agent Orange signed an executive order waiving reviews necessary for construction projects under the Endangered Species Act, the National Environment Policy Act and the Clean Water Act. In effect, he is telling corporations and developers that they can do whatever the hell they like with no government constraints, and that natural habitats and wildlife are totally expendable. Trump is eviscerating a century of environmental protection to stuff the pockets of the elites. The corporate deep state has never had such a champion as POTUS as they do with Trump. Once upon a time the US was the envy of the world when it came to nature conservation and environmental policy. Now it is a laughingstock.
As Eric Holthaus said in response to this announcement, “Holy shit”.
The November election is the most important one in US history. Trump and his goons must be turfed out. The future depends on it.