People don’t ask that question
I still say we need better filters. I still say a head of state should know some basics before being allowed to touch the controls. I still say one of those basics should be some knowledge of the history of the state in question.
Behold the current occupant of the US one:
President Donald Trump is causing an uproar again this morning after a bizarre interview where he praised President Andrew Jackson and questioned the reason behind the Civil War. His remarks were from a radio conversation with Sirius XM’s Salena Zito on Monday morning.
“I mean had Andrew Jackson been a little later you wouldn’t have had the Civil War. He was a really tough person, but he had a big heart,” Trump said, despite the fact that Jackson was behind Indian removal, the Trail of Tears and owned about 150 slaves.
Does Trump’s description remind you of anything? A really tough person with a big heart? I know, that’s too easy – it’s Trump’s idea of his own precious self. It’s his translation of “a mean vindictive sexist racist shit who can get sentimental over individuals.”
But more to the point…a president of the US really should have a better grasp of US history than that. We already knew that – he has no clue who Frederick Douglass was, he has no clue what John Lewis did, he thinks Lincoln’s real name is Honest Abe – but still this is horrifying.
“He was really angry at that he saw what was happening with regard to the Civil War, he said, ‘There’s no reason for this,'” Trump added. Jackson died in 1845. The Civil War began in 1861.
“People don’t realize, you know, the Civil War, if you think about it, why?,” he added, seeming to forget the basic curriculum of an American history class. “People don’t ask that question, but why was there a Civil War? Why could that one not have been worked out?” Hint: slavery. Another hint: “states’ rights.”
His belief that people don’t ask that question is another thundering error. Of course they do.
He should be instantly impeached on the grounds of hopeless ignorance and inability to learn.
Maybe he could be persuaded to give Frederick Douglass a major cabinet appointment. A dead man couldn’t possibly do a worse job than the people he has already appointed.
The president of the United States in simply uninterested in the United States. Its history, its culture, its laws… He has other things to worry about, I guess. Say what you will about Obama’s missteps and shortcomings—or Clinton’s—but he was a person who was interested in the world. He was a scholar, a person with an active, disciplined mind. He considered questions and arrived at conclusions. Trump has never considered anything outside of any profit to him and his.
Quite so, which is one of the very worst things about him, especially as a president. A president with no interest in the history and nature of the country he aspires to tell what to do…it’s just no good.
Judging from some of the video clips, I’m not sure he has ever considered this, either. He just sort of expects it to happen. I suspect other people have been doing most of the work for him because he is not capable of doing it himself, and he assumes profit just happens, as long as there are no taxes to take ‘his’ money away.
This is one man who cannot in any sense of the word be described as having an “active and disciplined mind”.
A decent description of a parasite.