Citizen Cartwright

Why ‘Trump voters love him more than before’

This is the online headline of a New York Times opinion article involving four of its conservative columnists — David Brooks, Ross Douthat, David French and Bret Stephens.

 

They were asked why more registered voters think America is on the right track than at any point since 2004, according to a recent NBC News poll (90 percent of Republicans like his performance; 4 percent of Democrats do).

 

Here are some excerpts:

 

David Brooks says: “Sixty percent believe ‘the system is broken.’ Sixty-nine percent believe the ‘political and economic elite don’t care about hard-working people.’… They get this from media consumption. ... If those are your priors, then you’re going to be happy with a president who wields a wrecking ball.”

 

“Trump policies are not 100 percent wrong; they are just overreactions. Destroying an agency rather than fixing what is wrong and saving what is right.”

 

“As a matter of principle, Democrats should be screaming bloody murder about Trump’s threat to the Constitution. As a matter of political tactics, I think they’re better off emphasizing Trumpian incompetence. Determining the constitutionality of some act requires a law degree, but incompetence is something we all recognize — and there is a lot of it.”

 

Bret Stephens: “The sort of inside-the-Beltway moves that feel like political earthquakes to a certain kind of Washington insider leave Trump voters somewhere between indifferent and pleased.”

 

Ross Douthat: “This sense of things may change as Trump pushes the envelope of presidential power or as the right embraces its own forms of censoriousness. Indeed, already you can see some factions that aligned with Trump because they were anti-woke start to break away or critique MAGA excesses.”

 

David French: “There’s a strong undercurrent of raw animosity in our politics. Republicans and Democrats have very negative views of each other, and many Republicans (sadly!) want their opponents to suffer. They’re actually happy to see people lose their jobs or to see nonprofits lose funding if those people are perceived as part of the ‘deep state’ or RINOs.”

 

“Many Republicans dislike foreign aid. Or loathe elite universities. Or hate big liberal law firms.”

 

“If you’re watching Fox News or other right-wing outlets, you’re hearing a lot of stories about strange, ‘woke’ programs funded by USAID. They don’t know about the lives that are saved or the lives that are at risk.”

 

“I sincerely doubt that most Republicans think or believe that Trump has done anything illegal so far. Right-wing media is full of legal talking heads telling their loyal audiences that the various district judges are lawless. The right is even attacking Amy Coney Barrett, calling her a grifter or a RINO for exercising her independent judgment.”

“That means they won’t know, much less care, about any given political controversy until it affects them personally.”

 

“If the economy tanks, MAGA will stay with Trump, but we know from the 2020 election that enough voters will step off the Trump train to swing the balance of power back to the Democrats.”

Martin Luther King’s daughter on sharing his holiday with Trump inauguration

On this federal holiday, I’d like to check in with you just briefly as we begin our day.

Martin Luther King’s daughter, Bernice King, head of the King Center in Atlanta, recently posted this on Instagram:

“I’ve read posts encouraging people to, on MLKDay, tune in to The King Center’s MLK, Jr. Beloved Community Commemorative Service instead of being attentive to the inauguration. 

“Do both. 

“l certainly understand the desire to tune out rhetoric, ideology, and policies with which we passionately disagree and which contradict the spirit of the Beloved Community. 

“However, we must pay attention to what President-Elect Trump speaks on that day, even if by transcript and video later. 

“We cannot develop a love-centered strategy for addressing language and legislation if we are not also strategic in our listening and leadership. This is not the time for ignorance. 

“Earlier on MLK Day, watch and listen to our Commemorative Service at 9am EST.

“We will lift my father’s life, legacy and teachings with focus on a mission that we believe is possible: Protecting Freedom, Justice, and Democracy in the Spirit of Nonviolence365 (Kingian Nonviolence). 

“Contrary to common misconceptions about Kingian Nonviolence, it is not passive and it does not cower before injustice and abusive power. It employs Six Principles and Six Steps to plan for doing the following: 

1. Educate about and eradicate hate and injustice without soiling our souls by being hateful and unjust

 

2. Explore the root issues of the social ills and sustained inhumane ideologies that are causing our collective destruction 

3. Entwine our efforts to change or transform systems and institutions that discriminate against and violate people based on race, gender, religion, sexual identity, nationality, ethnicity, etc. 

4. Engage in creating the Beloved Community, about which my mother, Coretta Scott King, said: “The Beloved Community is a realistic vision of an achievable society, one in which problems and conflict exist, but are resolved peacefully and without bitterness. In the Beloved Community, caring and compassion drive political policies that support the worldwide elimination of poverty and hunger and all forms of bigotry and violence.’” 

In pain but not suffering

Recently, I’ve been getting migraine headaches. They’re not terrible, but I admit to dreading that they’ll start when I’m working on this blog. They can make it hard to see and to read, adding to the deadline adventure, to say the least.

 

One thing that helps me is the Buddhist idea that while pain in this life is inevitable, suffering is not. The Buddha said pain is like being shot with an arrow. And resisting the pain is like shooting oneself with a second arrow.

 

I like this, from Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh:

 

"Breathing in, I smile. I smile to everything, even to my suffering, to my difficulties. Breathing out, I release and let go. This is the practice of freedom. Breathing in, I become aware of any unpleasant feelings. Breathing out, I hold these feelings with kindness.”

 

I’m grateful that a free, online “Buddhist wisdom for life summit” is running today through Oct. 2, with 35 Buddhist teachers and scholars sharing ways to help us meet life’s challenges.

Making your holidays as original as you want

Travel travails, preachy politics and tedious traditions may have led you to change, or want to change, your approach to the holidays.

 

Here are ideas on updating traditions while being sensitive to the emotions that may be involved, from Vox.

Developing our personal resilience in challenging times

In my own effort to look at what’s happening in our world in a balanced way, I’ve found some free online webinars to be helpful.

 

And one of them is coming up next month. From Sept. 13 to 18, 2022, you can watch online presentations by 36 top authors, scientists, mindfulness and compassion teachers, trauma experts, habit-change specialists, mindset and performance coaches, and self-care experts in health, well-being, and relationships. The presentations are produced by the Heart Mind Institute and Wisdom for Life.

 

Here are more information and the free sign-up.

You’re invited to a free global resilience series

Developing and sustaining the individual and collective resilience we need to meet our increasingly complex global challenges takes practice.

 

And the Heart Mind Institute is hosting six days of free online talks, starting March 29, by 35 neuroscientists, trauma experts, self-compassion and mindfulness teachers, indigenous leaders and others.

 

I came across last year’s series and was particularly impressed by presenters including Dan Siegel, Ron Siegel, Chris Germer and Thema Bryant.

 

You can sign up here.

Yes, this is a holiday to be grateful, but what about that Pilgrim part?

It's the 400th anniversary of the first Pilgrim Thanksgiving.

 

And as they have since 1970, indigenous people and their allies will be gathering in Plymouth, Mass., to commemorate a National Day of Mourning.

 

So, since this blog is about being an informed citizen, let’s take a look at an exhibit at the Smithsonian’s American Indian Museum on the National Mall titled "Nation to Nation: Treaties Between the United States and American Indian Nations.”

 

The exhibit "documents the history of treaty making between American Indians and the United States, from the days of the early republic, when treaties were considered by both sides to be serious, diplomatic agreements based on the recognition of each nation’s sovereignty, to the U.S. government’s use in the 19th century of coercive treaties to dispossess Native Americans of their lands, to the 20th century, when Indian Nations successfully fought court and legislative battles for federal recognition of their treaty rights,” the museum says.

 

I hope you have a chance to watch these videos from the exhibit:

 

"Nation to Nation" exhibit introduction, 4 minutes

"The 'Indian Problem,'" 12 minutes

"Sovereign Rights, Sovereign People," 5 minutes

Note to readers

President Biden signed legislation Thursday making Juneteenth a federal holiday, enshrining June 19 as the national day to commemorate the end of slavery in the United States.

 

“All Americans can feel the power of this day, and learn from our history,” he said at a White House ceremony, noting that it's the first national holiday established since Martin Luther King’s Birthday in 1983.

Biden said signing the law was one of the greatest honors he'll have as president.

The law takes effect immediately, making Friday the first federal Juneteenth holiday, since June 19 is a Saturday this year.

 

I take federal holidays off, so I’ll see you next on Monday, June 21. Warm wishes for this holiday weekend!

Understanding the politics of fear

Former Sen. Joseph R. McCarthy, R-Wis., has been dead for 63 years, but the political tools and techniques he pioneered are as fresh as today’s headlines, says the Free Library of Philadelphia, one of the world’s biggest public library systems.

 

So, “as Americans struggle to understand the long-term impact of a presidential administration like no other, the Free Library is proud to present a virtual lecture series in which some of the nation’s most respected historians, thinkers and commentators explore the life of an American demagogue and the dangerous legacy he left behind,” says a library blog post.

 

To sign up for this free online series:

 

— “The Rise of Tail Gunner Joe,” with frequent PBS commentator Richard Norton Smith, on Wednesday, March 10, at 7:30 p.m. click here.  
 
— “The Man Who Knew Everything: J. Edgar Hoover and Joe McCarthy,” with Beverly Gage, Yale historian and author of a forthcoming biography of Hoover, on Wednesday, March 24, at 7:30 p.m., click here.   
 
— “Dangerous Friends: How a Friendship With McCarthy Blighted the Lives of John and Robert Kennedy,” with David Nasaw, biographer of Joseph P. Kennedy, on Wednesday, April 7, at 7:30 p.m., click here.  
 
— “Death By a Thousand Cuts: How a Broken Promise and a Boston Brahmin Destroyed Joe McCarthy,” with Peter Siskind of Arcadia University, an expert on 20th-century American politics, on Wednesday, April 28, at 7:30 p.m., click here.
 
— “The Strange Afterlife of Roy Cohn,” with Vanity Fair investigative journalist Marie Brenner, on Monday, May 10, at 7:30 p.m., click here.

Note to readers

Even before this time of disease, Thanksgiving was a time of dis-ease for many of us Americans. Some have had problems with a celebration at odds with the facts about Europeans’ interactions with Native Americans. Others have dreaded the interactions with their dysfunctional family. And others have resented cooking on demand, and the resulting food comas.

In 2020, there’s the additional dis-ease of celebrations in person and the loneliness — or fear of loneliness — in spending the day alone. For those of us with electronic access, there’s the option of being present in absentia. There are the options of treating ourselves to the bath, binge-watch or book we normally don’t have time for. There are the options of reframing (looking differently at the situation), acceptance and gratitude for the myriad things we do have to be thankful for.

No matter what, please know that my warm wishes are with you.

See you on Monday, Nov. 30.