Lewis just found a way to use Trump's Tweets against him: Expect others to do this now too
I don't think Zimmerman is seeing the whole picture here. Lewis just taught Trump a lesson. People can use Trump's tweets against him just as effectively as he can tweet against people. By getting Trump to react to Lewis' stance he might have just destroyed Trump's presidency completely in the long run.
Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.) was the target of Donald Trump’s Twitter tirade after saying he was not a “legitimate president.”
(JOSHUA ROBERTS/REUTERS)
Representative John Lewis is a genuine American hero. One of the
original Freedom Riders, Lewis was beaten nearly to death by white
supremacists as he campaigned for civil rights in the South.
Donald J. Trump is a bully, a narcissist, and a liar. After Lewis said
that he was not a “legitimate president,” the notoriously thin-skinned
President-elect tweeted false information about Lewis’ congressional
district and claimed that Lewis was “all talk” and “no action.”
Nevertheless, Lewis was wrong to say that Trump won’t be our rightful
leader. Indeed, Lewis’ remark sunk to the level of . . . Donald J.
Trump. It played fast and loose with the facts, and it placed Lewis’
enemy — in this case, Trump himself — beyond the pale of decency and
dignity. It rendered Trump not just as an opponent but as a fraud, who
obtained his power via underhanded means.
And Lewis simply doesn’t know whether that’s true. "I think the
Russians participated in helping this man get elected,” Lewis said in an
interview with NBC’s “Meet the Press,” which was aired on Sunday. “And
they helped destroy the candidacy of Hillary Clinton.” Trump cancels MLK day visit to African American history museum
Really? The Russians did attempt to undermine Clinton, of course, as a
declassified intelligence report by three security agencies confirmed
earlier this month. But that’s very different from saying that their
intervention affected “political processes” or swung the election to
Trump, as the same report emphasized.
Nobody — including John Lewis — has any idea whether the Russians’
efforts had their desired effect. The Senate Intelligence Committee
recently announced that it would investigate alleged ties between Russia
and members of Trump’s campaign, which is exactly what it should do.
But even if we uncover links of that sort, we might never know if they
actually altered the outcome in November.
Pretending otherwise is worse than deceptive. It undermines our
institutions, just as the Russians hoped. And it also echoes Donald
Trump, who spent much of his campaign complaining that the election was
“rigged.” He also insisted that our government had failed
African-Americans, whom he repeatedly described as mired in destitution
and violence.
Trump was at it again in his reply to Lewis, claiming that the
congressman’s Atlanta district was “in horrible shape and falling apart
(not to mention crime infested).” Yes, there are pockets of poverty and
crime in Lewis’ district, which is majority African-American. But it
also includes the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the
Georgia Institute of Technology, the busiest airport in the world, and
many other markers of growth and prosperity. If Obama personified Dr. King's dream, Trump is his nightmare
Throughout his campaign, Trump suggested the political system was “rigged.”
(Evan Vucci/AP)
And as far as Lewis being all talk and no action . . . that’s plainly
absurd, another one of Trump’s unfounded Twitter gems. Let’s leave aside
what Lewis has or hasn’t done for his Congressional district, and think
about what he has done for his country. He gave his blood — and,
almost, his life — to challenge racism, the biggest blot on our
collective soul. No action? Please.
Now, more than at any time in our recent past, it’s our country that we
all need to think about. That’s what President Obama said the day after
the election, congratulating Trump on his victory and calling on
Americans to join hands across their differences. “We have to remember
that we’re actually all on one team,” Obama said. “We’re not Democrats
first. We’re not Republicans first. We are Americans first.”
Obama repeated those themes in his stunning farewell address last week
in Chicago, where he quoted Atticus Finch from “To Kill a Mockingbird.”
“You never really understand a person until you consider things from his
point of view,” Finch says, in the passage Obama quoted, “until you
climb into his skin and walk around in it.”
But to do that, you have to show more respect for your opponents than
Donald Trump has displayed. He consistently dismisses his foes as
illegitimate, not just ill-advised. And that’s why it was so sad (to use
one of Trump’s own favorite adjectives) to see John Lewis doing the
same thing. President-elect Donald Trump calls Rep. John Lewis 'sad!'
Obama’s final speech also quoted George Washington’s farewell address,
which urged Americans to protect the “sacred ties” between them. “We
weaken those ties when we define some of us as more American than
others; when we write off the whole system as inevitably corrupt, and
blame the leaders without examining our own role in electing them.”
Donald Trump devoted much of his campaign to defining immigrants and
Muslims as somehow less than American, and to suggesting that the whole
political system was corrupt. But he wrong. For good or ill, we made
Trump our President. It’s time to stop blaming the Russians — or anyone
else — for that. Jonathan Zimmerman teaches education and history at the University
of Pennsylvania. He is the author of “Campus Politics: What Everyone
Needs to Know” (Oxford University Press).
No comments:
Post a Comment