I agree with many things McWhorter says, but I still don't quite understand his hostility and contempt towards Trump and DeSantis. He's undoubtedly on the left, but can we please recognize their accomplishments with some degree of honesty and truth? Are we able to set aside politics and ego, and recognize the obvious?
It's exceptionally difficult to reshape the NYC skyline. It is true Fred Trump built an empire, but they were predominantly developers in queens. They had no real estate in Manhattan, and the Manhattan elite looked down upon his family. They were not "insiders". They were outsiders, competitors of the elite, and they were targeted viciously by the city councilors, who were working on behalf of the establishment, and who sought to take his family down a peg or two. In short, they were not respected, never respected by the powers that be in NYC, except for his uncle who was a scholar at MIT, and for this reason his father told him to NEVER develop properties there. Despite this warning, and despite the tremendous battle with city officials, and much to the chagrin of the elite, he was very successful.
It's also worth pointing out that when Tesla died, the FBI called on Trumps uncle to review the documents found in his hotel room. And as the old saying goes, the apple doesn't fall that far from the tree.
Desantis, on the other hand, is a Harvard educated lawyer.
There is nothing stupid about negotiating a billion dollar property development, in which you have to convince, and often bribe, ten different parties to agree. Anyone who visits his properties can see that they are some of the most fantastic developments in the world. I think the people of this country would be much less divided if we could have constructive dialogue around DJT; people have every right to dislike him, and to dislike his politics, but let's stop propagating a fantasy world of fiction.
Liam, if there's one thing I could ask John, it would be this: "As the objective analyst par excellence that you usually are, why do you then find it so hard to separate Trump the obnoxious grandstander from Trump's policies? Why have you never acknowledged that one of Trump's First Acts liberated more than 5600 black men who had been incarcerated beyond reasonable time for minor crimes? Why do the Trump-created opportunity zones get blithely disregarded by you? Why does the assured federal funding for HBCUs, an unprecedented occurrence until then, fail to resonate with you? Why did the employment of more Black people than ever before, and their subsequent rise to the next rung of the economic ladder not seemingly matter to you? Why does asking for voter ID seem racist to you, in a country of 10 million illegal immigrants with the power to turn an election? When juxtaposed with a candidate who offered an effusive, glowing eulogy at the funeral of Robert Byrd, infamous Grand Kleagle of the KKK not too long ago, why would you, an educated Black man, consider this person the superior candidate? Why would you, an academic who claims to consider living in Mars as preferable to living in a culture where society is brainwashed by a media hellbent on determinedly viewing everything through a lens of race, succumb to the same media claptrap when it comes to Trump? Why did you convince yourself (and later, Glenn) that J6 was an intolerable threat to our nation, when in reality, it was a ragtag bunch of half-witted idiots, with more hair than sense, dressed in ill-fitting costumes bought at the Dollar store prancing through the Halls of Congress, before being summarily ejected within a couple of hours, seem more of a dastardly threat than the businesses of thousands of Black shop-owners in Portland and Minneapolis burnt and looted and robbed out of existence?"
I can understand an abstention from voting, but to vehemently excoriate a candidate with such passion, seems terribly out of character.
Your question about Trump is the right one. The people who claim he's a traitor or criminal can never offer a single example to back up either claim. He's been investigated by half the country and nothing has happened; instead, we find out that things like the collusion story were false. Yes, he's obnoxious. He's always been obnoxious. He was obnoxious when Oprah had him on, when Morning Joe couldn't stop interviewing him, when various politicians went to him hats in hand, etc. He's the one guy of whom no one can claim to be surprised at what we got.
Yes, Alex, Trump's larger-than-life persona positively reveled in stirring controversy, but to be fair to him, the media never let up on him from the word go, so it was somewhat understandable. What's really surprising is the reaction of people like John, and later Glenn, who claim to abhor CRT, support school choice, reject the 1619 project, denounce wokeness and tech censorship, and yet not realize that they were actually in total agreement with Trump on all those issues, in contrast to Biden who is vehemently against the same issues! It's all the more inexplicable as John and Glenn are not your average Joe, but remarkably intelligent academicians who are not usually taken in by media hype.
I agree with many things McWhorter says, but I still don't quite understand his hostility and contempt towards Trump and DeSantis. He's undoubtedly on the left, but can we please recognize their accomplishments with some degree of honesty and truth? Are we able to set aside politics and ego, and recognize the obvious?
It's exceptionally difficult to reshape the NYC skyline. It is true Fred Trump built an empire, but they were predominantly developers in queens. They had no real estate in Manhattan, and the Manhattan elite looked down upon his family. They were not "insiders". They were outsiders, competitors of the elite, and they were targeted viciously by the city councilors, who were working on behalf of the establishment, and who sought to take his family down a peg or two. In short, they were not respected, never respected by the powers that be in NYC, except for his uncle who was a scholar at MIT, and for this reason his father told him to NEVER develop properties there. Despite this warning, and despite the tremendous battle with city officials, and much to the chagrin of the elite, he was very successful.
It's also worth pointing out that when Tesla died, the FBI called on Trumps uncle to review the documents found in his hotel room. And as the old saying goes, the apple doesn't fall that far from the tree.
Desantis, on the other hand, is a Harvard educated lawyer.
There is nothing stupid about negotiating a billion dollar property development, in which you have to convince, and often bribe, ten different parties to agree. Anyone who visits his properties can see that they are some of the most fantastic developments in the world. I think the people of this country would be much less divided if we could have constructive dialogue around DJT; people have every right to dislike him, and to dislike his politics, but let's stop propagating a fantasy world of fiction.
Liam, if there's one thing I could ask John, it would be this: "As the objective analyst par excellence that you usually are, why do you then find it so hard to separate Trump the obnoxious grandstander from Trump's policies? Why have you never acknowledged that one of Trump's First Acts liberated more than 5600 black men who had been incarcerated beyond reasonable time for minor crimes? Why do the Trump-created opportunity zones get blithely disregarded by you? Why does the assured federal funding for HBCUs, an unprecedented occurrence until then, fail to resonate with you? Why did the employment of more Black people than ever before, and their subsequent rise to the next rung of the economic ladder not seemingly matter to you? Why does asking for voter ID seem racist to you, in a country of 10 million illegal immigrants with the power to turn an election? When juxtaposed with a candidate who offered an effusive, glowing eulogy at the funeral of Robert Byrd, infamous Grand Kleagle of the KKK not too long ago, why would you, an educated Black man, consider this person the superior candidate? Why would you, an academic who claims to consider living in Mars as preferable to living in a culture where society is brainwashed by a media hellbent on determinedly viewing everything through a lens of race, succumb to the same media claptrap when it comes to Trump? Why did you convince yourself (and later, Glenn) that J6 was an intolerable threat to our nation, when in reality, it was a ragtag bunch of half-witted idiots, with more hair than sense, dressed in ill-fitting costumes bought at the Dollar store prancing through the Halls of Congress, before being summarily ejected within a couple of hours, seem more of a dastardly threat than the businesses of thousands of Black shop-owners in Portland and Minneapolis burnt and looted and robbed out of existence?"
I can understand an abstention from voting, but to vehemently excoriate a candidate with such passion, seems terribly out of character.
Really good points! What say you John?!
Your question about Trump is the right one. The people who claim he's a traitor or criminal can never offer a single example to back up either claim. He's been investigated by half the country and nothing has happened; instead, we find out that things like the collusion story were false. Yes, he's obnoxious. He's always been obnoxious. He was obnoxious when Oprah had him on, when Morning Joe couldn't stop interviewing him, when various politicians went to him hats in hand, etc. He's the one guy of whom no one can claim to be surprised at what we got.
Yes, Alex, Trump's larger-than-life persona positively reveled in stirring controversy, but to be fair to him, the media never let up on him from the word go, so it was somewhat understandable. What's really surprising is the reaction of people like John, and later Glenn, who claim to abhor CRT, support school choice, reject the 1619 project, denounce wokeness and tech censorship, and yet not realize that they were actually in total agreement with Trump on all those issues, in contrast to Biden who is vehemently against the same issues! It's all the more inexplicable as John and Glenn are not your average Joe, but remarkably intelligent academicians who are not usually taken in by media hype.