Mic:
Donald Trump's "Star of David" Hillary Clinton Meme Was Created by White Supremacist
On Saturday, Donald Trump tweeted a meme that used dog-whistle anti-Semitism to announce that his political rival, "Crooked Hillary", had "made history." The meme Trump tweeted prominently featured the Star of David — a holy symbol of the Jewish religion that Nazis attempted to pervert by forcing Jews over the age of 6 to sew it onto their clothing during Hitler's reign.
Emblazoned onto the Star of David in Trump's meme are the words "Most Corrupt Candidate Ever!" The star lies atop a giant pile of money.
On Sunday, Mic discovered that Donald Trump's Twitter wasn't the first place the meme appeared. The image was previously featured on /pol/ — an Internet message board for the alt-right, a digital movement of neo-Nazis, anti-Semites, and white supremacists newly emboldened by the success of Donald Trump's rhetoric — as early as June 22, 2016, over a week before Donald Trump's team tweeted it.
Fortune:
DONALD TRUMP’S SOCIAL MEDIA TIES TO WHITE SUPREMACISTS
It’s more than just a couple of retweets.
Sam Levine:
Donald Trump Launches Blatantly Anti-Semitic Attack Against Hillary Clinton
This is not a dog whistle. It’s not subtle.
Jim Rutenberg isn’t any happier with CNN than I am:
It won’t smash the republic. Still, in a small but significant way, Mr. Lewandowski’s hiring represents a signal moment in political journalism’s evolving embrace of political operatives: A major mainstream news organization is using a commentator who is legally prohibited from sharing the unvarnished truth on the subject — Mr. Trump — he was hired to talk about.
Laura Silverman with a scary post:
Trump Supporters Flooded Me With Anti-Semitic Taunts & Death Threats Yesterday
So, okay. Let’s give Trump literally ALL the benefit of the doubt. Maybe he didn’t realize it was a Star of David – it wasn’t yellow, it was filled-in, it comes up in choices of automatic shapes. Or we can say Trump didn’t even know the tweet was going out. It didn’t get his approval.
But even assuming all of that – you know what any decent politician, or you know person, would’ve done after receiving a backlash that his attack was akin to Nazi propaganda? He would’ve apologized to the Jewish people. He could’ve even gotten away with one of those bullshit apologies where the person says, “I’m sorry if you felt attacked. I’m sorry if your feelings were hurt.”
But nothing. Radio silence. And why?
Because his supporters fucking loved it.
Philip Bump:
After several days spent parsing the meeting between Bill Clinton and Attorney General Loretta Lynch on the tarmac in Phoenix, news that Hillary Clinton had at last been interviewed by the FBI over the issue of the email server she used at the State Department should have given Donald Trump a welcome break from the spotlight.
And then Trump tweeted.
On Saturday morning, Trump's presidential campaign posted a detail from a recent Fox News poll on the social media network. The survey showed that a majority of Americans -- 58 percent -- thought use of the word "corrupt" to describe the presumptive Democratic nominee was accurate. This, Trump figured, made Clinton the "most corrupt candidate ever," as the tweet suggested. (For what it's worth: 45 percent of Americans thought the word applied to Trump.)
So that was the tweet, which included a picture of Clinton and, to her right, a six-pointed star with the words "Most Corrupt Candidate Ever!" superimposed over a backdrop of a pile of money.
Let’s note for the record: Bill Clinton’s ill-conceived meeting with Loretta Lynch was considered a “firestorm” because of bad optics. But, no, that’s not a firestorm. It’s “raised eyebrows” and maybe a “smack my forehead”.
What Trump did is a firestorm, a true one. And now amid rumors of “no indictment” (duh! who could have foreseen that except everyone not a Republican?), the FBI is wrapping up. But make no mistake: Trump is still not a normal candidate. Nice pivot, huh?
How Trump’s non-normal candidacy looks from the #Nevertrump non-alt-right (Weekly Standard):
All across the spectrum, I see symptoms of seduction. And I don't mean just among the truly besotted—even the "Never Hillary" crowd is afflicted.
It's important to understand this: You don't have to like Trump for your thoughts to be manipulated by him, and the disordered thinking is blocking our exit.
One issue, as others have pointed out, is that he's been "normalized." Republicans are the frog dropped in cold water. The burner was turned on, but it's heating up too slowly. "Oh, it's not that bad," they say as the water begins to boil.
But it's not just normalization. His stunning and unexpected victory in the primary infected everyone's thinking. That's a helpful way to look at it, in fact: like an infection. A cancer, even.
I've deconstructed pro-Trump arguments and sorted them into five general categories:
- The Superman Delusion
- Etch-a-Sketch Thinking
- The Rosa Parks Problem
- Pareidolia (or: The Virgin Mary in the Slice of Toast)
- He's Never Going to Leave Her
It's my experience that infected thinking can be treated and done so quite simply: People merely need to see the flaws in their perspectives.
Huffington Post:
GOP Operative Quits Trump Campaign Just Two Weeks Into The Job
He said working for Trump was an “interesting experience.”
Speaking of quitting (after screwing things up), move over Boris Johnson:
UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage says he is resigning as the head of the party, arguing his political ambition to have Britain leave the European Union has now been achieved.
It is the second time Farage resigns as the leader of the party, but he says this time it is definite.
Farage said Monday he will retain his seat in the European Parliament to see out the negotiations for Britain's exit from the EU following the country's June 23 vote to leave the bloc
On this day of freedom and independence let me link to an author who was vilified by the medical profession (he wasn’t allowed to speak at my graduation, despite being selected by the graduating class, for fear of alienating older alumni), Samuel Shem:
Samuel Shem, 34 Years After 'The House of God'
For better or worse, except in real danger, I don't seem to run on fear. Guilt, yes; fear, no.
It's a good thing, because my book The House of God enraged many among the older generation of doctors. I was maligned and disliked. The book was censored by medical school deans, who often kept me from speaking at their schools. None of it really bothered me, though. I was secure in the understanding that all I had done was tell the truth about medical training. ...
The theme of my speaking out is simple: the danger of isolation, the healing power of good connection. And any good connection is mutual.
I base a lot of my talks on what I've learned from The House of God. About how I've come to see it, and all my novels, as a "fiction of resistance," a way of resisting the injustices of a system.
It wasn't until years into my journey that I realized the importance of the fact that I and my fellow interns were products of the 1960s. We grew up in that unique lost period of American history -- beginning with FDR and ending with Reagan -- when we learned that if we saw an injustice, and got together and took action, we could bring about change. During my college years, we helped put the Civil Rights laws on the books and ended the Vietnam War. When we entered our internships we were a generation idealistic young docs. We soon were caught in the clash between the received wisdom of the medical system, and the call of the human heart. Our patients, and we, were being treated inhumanely. As Chuck the intern put it:
"How can we care for our patients, man, if nobody cares for us?"
That was a novel that every medical student read before internship. I’m sure there’s a lesson or two The House of God could still teach us, and not just about medicine.
PS I highlighted the connection part, because on its best days that’s what happens here. Yeah, yeah, primaries and pie fights, but people come back for the connection. 34 years ago, we didn’t have that.
Meanwhile, from Dana Milbank:
Et tu, Trey?
A day after the House Benghazi committee released a final report that left Hillary Clinton relatively unscathed, conservative activists — the conspiracy-minded ones who pressured House leaders to appoint the committee in the first place — rounded on Chairman Trey Gowdy for failing to deliver the goods.
“To say I was disappointed would be an understatement,” retired Adm. James “Ace” Lyons complained at a meeting Wednesday afternoon of the Citizens’ Commission on Benghazi, a coalition of far-right foreign- policy types. “Chairman Gowdy is not a stenographer. . . . He was there to make findings and conclusions. He had the information. He copped out, which is consistent that we’ve seen with all our congressional leadership.”
Retired Gen. Thomas McInerney agreed that “the American people want to know from a group that spent almost two years on it what the conclusions are. That’s what we pay you for, Mr. Gowdy.”
Dylan Matthews wants to celebrate the 4th by actually making you think about it:
This July 4, let's not mince words: American independence in 1776 was a monumental mistake. We should be mourning the fact that we left the United Kingdom, not cheering it.
Of course, evaluating the wisdom of the American Revolution means dealing with counterfactuals. As any historian would tell you, this is a messy business. We obviously can't be entirely sure how America would have fared if it had stayed in the British Empire longer, perhaps gaining independence a century or so later, along with Canada.
But I'm reasonably confident a world in which the revolution never happened would be better than the one we live in now, for three main reasons: Slavery would've been abolished earlier, American Indians would've faced rampant persecution but not the outright ethnic cleansing Andrew Jackson and other American leaders perpetrated, and America would have a parliamentary system of government that makes policymaking easier and lessens the risk of democratic collapse.
Oliver Willis:
Confidence Isn’t Complacency: Democrats Shouldn’t Be Afraid To Say & Believe Clinton Will Crush Trump
We know he’s a misogynist who is appealing to the worst racist and fascist elements in America in a way we haven’t seen this blatantly in decades. We’re well aware of the downside of a Trump victory, and there isn’t anyone with an ounce of seriousness on the left who thinks that huge issues aren’t at stake – choice, the Supreme Court, health care, immigration, national security – and on and on.
But we also know that the likelihood of victory is on our side, and we should stop acting like a gaggle of Eeyores, constantly beating ourselves up and rending garments like we’re down by 20 percentage points.
In reality we’re far closer to being on the winning side of an epic landslide that metaphorically punches hate, racism, misogyny, ignorance and a million other qualities emblematic of the worst of America right in its stupid face.
And we should act like it.
Act like a winner, and be a winner. Don’t act like a loser when you’re winning.
Trump is going to be toast, let’s get on with it.
I’m with him.
EJ Dionne celebrating diversity of opinion on this July 4th:
It is the birthright of all Americans to be patriotic in their own way, something worth remembering at a moment of great political division. Instead of challenging each other’s love of country, we should accept that deep affection can take different forms.
There is, of course, the option of setting politics aside altogether on the Fourth of July. Anyone who loves baseball, hot dogs, barbecues, fireworks and beaches as much as I do has no problem with that. Still, I’m not a fan of papering over our disagreements. It is far better to face and discuss them with at least a degree of mutual respect.
He’s telling you to be nice and kind to each other at all times. I agree. Now shut up and listen to him (and a New York good morning to you. Now shut up and listen to me).
David Frum with a sentiment for both parties:
I'm Still a Republican—and I'll Fight to Reclaim My Party
George Will is denouncing a GOP that has been ailing for years, but quitting won’t help—an American political party can only be reformed from within.