THE ABSURD TIMES

We thought you should have this.  Best to use the link:

ZCommunications

Chomsky on Trump Recently, Noam Chomsky wrote about the new book RPS/2044: "Basing himself on a lifetime of dedicated and highly productive activism and many years of detailed inquiry into the kind of society to which we should aspire, Mike Albert has now undertaken a novel and imaginative approach to leading us to think seriously about these fundamental issues and concerns – which may fade under the impact of immediate demands but should be prominent in our minds as we develop ways to deal with concerns of the moment  More than anyone I know, Mike has emphasized the need to relate long-term vision to devising practical strategies for today.  This imaginative oral history from the future is a provocative and most welcome contribution to this urgent and ever-present task." In an interview conducted by David Barsamian excerpted from Global Discontents: Conversations on the Rising Threats to Democracy, the new book by Noam Chomsky and David Barsamian to be published this December, CHomsky said the following about Trump and immediate social issues: —�  David Barsamian: You have spoken about the difference between Trump's buffoonery, which gets endlessly covered by the media, and the actual policies he is striving to enact, which receive less attention. Do you think he has any coherent economic, political, or international policy goals? What has Trump actually managed to accomplish in his first months in office?  Noam Chomsky: There is a diversionary process under way, perhaps just a natural result of the propensities of the figure at center stage and those doing the work behind the curtains. At one level, Trump's antics ensure that attention is focused on him, and it makes little difference how. Who even remembers the charge that millions of illegal immigrants voted for Clinton, depriving the pathetic little man of his Grand Victory? Or the accusation that Obama had wiretapped Trump Tower? The claims themselves don't really matter. It's enough that attention is diverted from what is happening in the background. There, out of the spotlight, the most savage fringe of the Republican Party is carefully advancing policies designed to enrich their true constituency: the Constituency of private power and wealth, "the masters of mankind," to borrow Adam Smith's phrase. These policies will harm the irrelevant general population and devastate future generations, but that's of little concern to the Republicans. They've been trying to push through similarly destructive legislation for years. Paul Ryan, for example, has long been advertising his ideal of virtually eliminating the federal government, apart from service to the Constituency -- though in the past he's wrapped his proposals in spreadsheets so they would look wonkish to commentators. Now, while attention is focused on Trump's latest mad doings, the Ryan gang and the executive branch are ramming through legislation and orders that undermine workers' rights, cripple consumer protections, and severely harm rural communities. They seek to devastate health programs, revoking the taxes that pay for them in order to further enrich their Constituency, and to eviscerate the Dodd-Frank Act, which imposed some much-needed constraints on the predatory financial system that grew during the neoliberal period. That's just a sample of how the wrecking ball is being wielded by the newly empowered Republican Party. Indeed, it is no longer a political party in the traditional sense. Conservative political analysts Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein have described it more accurately as a "radical insurgency," one that has abandoned normal parliamentary politics. Much of this is being carried out stealthily, in closed sessions, with as little public notice as possible. Other Republican policies are more open, such as pulling out of the Paris climate agreement, thereby isolating the U.S. as a pariah state that refuses to participate in international efforts to confront looming environmental disaster. Even worse, they are intent on maximizing the use of fossil fuels, including the most dangerous; dismantling regulations; and sharply cutting back on research and development of alternative energy sources, which will soon be necessary for decent survival. The reasons behind the policies are a mix. Some are simply service to the Constituency. Others are of little concern to the "masters of mankind" but are designed to hold on to segments of the voting bloc that the Republicans have cobbled together, since Republican policies have shifted so far to the right that their actual proposals would not attract voters. For example, terminating support for family planning is not service to the Constituency. Indeed, that group may mostly support family planning. But terminating that support appeals to the evangelical Christian base -- voters who close their eyes to the fact that they are effectively advocating more unwanted pregnancies and, therefore, increasing the frequency of resort to abortion, under harmful and even lethal conditions. Not all of the damage can be blamed on the con man who is nominally in charge, on his outlandish appointments, or on the congressional forces he has unleashed. Some of the most dangerous developments under Trump trace back to Obama initiatives -- initiatives passed, to be sure, under pressure from the Republican Congress. The most dangerous of these has barely been reported. A very important study in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, published in March 2017, reveals that the Obama nuclear weapons modernization program has increased "the overall killing power of existing US ballistic missile forces by a factor of roughly three -- and it creates exactly what one would expect to see, if a nuclear-armed state were planning to have the capacity to fight and win a nuclear war by disarming enemies with a surprise first strike." As the analysts point out, this new capacity undermines the strategic stability on which human survival depends. And the chilling record of near disaster and reckless behavior of leaders in past years only shows how fragile our survival is. Now this program is being carried forward under Trump. These developments, along with the threat of environmental disaster, cast a dark shadow over everything else -- and are barely discussed, while attention is claimed by the performances of the showman at center stage. Whether Trump has any idea what he and his henchmen are up to is not clear. Perhaps he is completely authentic: an ignorant, thin-skinned megalomaniac whose only ideology is himself. But what is happening under the rule of the extremist wing of the Republican organization is all too plain. Barsamian: Do you see any encouraging activity on the Democrats' side? Or is it time to begin thinking about a third party?  Chomsky: There is a lot to think about. The most remarkable feature of the 2016 election was the Bernie Sanders campaign, which broke the pattern set by over a century of U.S. political history. A substantial body of political science research convincingly establishes that elections are pretty much bought; campaign funding alone is a remarkably good predictor of electability, for Congress as well as for the presidency. It also predicts the decisions of elected officials. Correspondingly, a considerable majority of the electorate -- those lower on the income scale -- are effectively disenfranchised, in that their representatives disregard their preferences. In this light, there is little surprise in the victory of a billionaire TV star with substantial media backing: direct backing from the leading cable channel, Rupert Murdoch's Fox, and from highly influential right-wing talk radio; indirect but lavish backing from the rest of the major media, which was entranced by Trump's antics and the advertising revenue that poured in. The Sanders campaign, on the other hand, broke sharply from the prevailing model. Sanders was barely known. He had virtually no support from the main funding sources, was ignored or derided by the media, and labeled himself with the scare word "socialist." Yet he is now the most popular political figure in the country by a large margin. At the very least, the success of the Sanders campaign shows that many options can be pursued even within the stultifying two-party framework, with all of the institutional barriers to breaking free of it. During the Obama years, the Democratic Party disintegrated at the local and state levels. The party had largely abandoned the working class years earlier, even more so with Clinton trade and fiscal policies that undermined U.S. manufacturing and the fairly stable employment it provided. There is no dearth of progressive policy proposals. The program developed by Robert Pollin in his book Greening the Global Economy is one very promising approach. Gar Alperovitz's work on building an authentic democracy based on worker self-management is another. Practical implementations of these approaches and related ideas are taking shape in many different ways. Popular organizations, some of them outgrowths of the Sanders campaign, are actively engaged in taking advantage of the many opportunities that are available. At the same time, the established two-party framework, though venerable, is by no means graven in stone. It's no secret that in recent years, traditional political institutions have been declining in the industrial democracies, under the impact of what is called "populism." That term is used rather loosely to refer to the wave of discontent, anger, and contempt for institutions that has accompanied the neoliberal assault of the past generation, which led to stagnation for the majority alongside a spectacular concentration of wealth in the hands of a few. Functioning democracy erodes as a natural effect of the concentration of economic power, which translates at once to political power by familiar means, but also for deeper and more principled reasons. The doctrinal pretense is that the transfer of decision-making from the public sector to the "market" contributes to individual freedom, but the reality is different. The transfer is from public institutions, in which voters have some say, insofar as democracy is functioning, to private tyrannies -- the corporations that dominate the economy -- in which voters have no say at all. In Europe, there is an even more direct method of undermining the threat of democracy: placing crucial decisions in the hands of the unelected troika -- the International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank, and the European Commission -- which heeds the northern banks and the creditor community, not the voting population. These policies are dedicated to making sure that society no longer exists, Margaret Thatcher's famous description of the world she perceived -- or, more accurately, hoped to create: one where there is no society, only individuals. This was Thatcher's unwitting paraphrase of Marx's bitter condemnation of repression in France, which left society as a "sack of potatoes," an amorphous mass that cannot function. In the contemporary case, the tyrant is not an autocratic ruler -- in the West, at least -- but concentrations of private power. The collapse of centrist governing institutions has been evident in elections: in France in mid-2017 and in the United States a few months earlier, where the two candidates who mobilized popular forces were Sanders and Trump -- though Trump wasted no time in demonstrating the fraudulence of his "populism" by quickly ensuring that the harshest elements of the old establishment would be firmly ensconced in power in the luxuriating "swamp." These processes might lead to a breakdown of the rigid American system of one-party business rule with two competing factions, with varying voting blocs over time. They might provide an opportunity for a genuine "people's party" to emerge, a party where the voting bloc is the actual constituency, and the guiding values merit respect. Barsamian: Trump's first foreign trip was to Saudi Arabia. What significance do you see in that, and what does it mean for broader Middle East policies? And what do you make of Trump's animus toward Iran? Chomsky: Saudi Arabia is the kind of place where Trump feels right at home: a brutal dictatorship, miserably repressive (notoriously so for women's rights, but in many other areas as well), the leading producer of oil (now being overtaken by the United States), and with plenty of money. The trip produced promises of massive weapons sales -- greatly cheering the Constituency -- and vague intimations of other Saudi gifts. One of the consequences was that Trump's Saudi friends were given a green light to escalate their disgraceful atrocities in Yemen and to discipline Qatar, which has been a shade too independent of the Saudi masters. Iran is a factor there. Qatar shares a natural gas field with Iran and has commercial and cultural relations with it, frowned upon by the Saudis and their deeply reactionary associates. Iran has long been regarded by U.S. leaders, and by U.S. media commentary, as extraordinarily dangerous, perhaps the most dangerous country on the planet. This goes back to well before Trump. In the doctrinal system, Iran is a dual menace: it is the leading supporter of terrorism, and its nuclear programs pose an existential threat to Israel, if not the whole world. It is so dangerous that Obama had to install an advanced air defense system near the Russian border to protect Europe from Iranian nuclear weapons -- which don't exist, and which, in any case, Iranian leaders would use only if possessed by a desire to be instantly incinerated in return. That's the doctrinal system. In the real world, Iranian support for terrorism translates to support for Hezbollah, whose major crime is that it is the sole deterrent to yet another destructive Israeli invasion of Lebanon, and for Hamas, which won a free election in the Gaza Strip -- a crime that instantly elicited harsh sanctions and led the U.S. government to prepare a military coup. Both organizations, it is true, can be charged with terrorist acts, though not anywhere near the amount of terrorism that stems from Saudi Arabia's involvement in the formation and actions of jihadi networks. As for Iran's nuclear weapons programs, U.S. intelligence has confirmed what anyone can easily figure out for themselves: if they exist, they are part of Iran's deterrent strategy. There is also the unmentionable fact that any concern about Iranian weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) could be alleviated by the simple means of heeding Iran's call to establish a WMD-free zone in the Middle East. Such a zone is strongly supported by the Arab states and most of the rest of the world and is blocked primarily by the United States, which wishes to protect Israel's WMD capabilities. Since the doctrinal system falls apart on inspection, we are left with the task of finding the true reasons for U.S. animus toward Iran. Possibilities readily come to mind. The United States and Israel cannot tolerate an independent force in a region that they take to be theirs by right. An Iran with a nuclear deterrent is unacceptable to rogue states that want to rampage however they wish throughout the Middle East. But there is more to it than that. Iran cannot be forgiven for overthrowing the dictator installed by Washington in a military coup in 1953, a coup that destroyed Iran's parliamentary regime and its unconscionable belief that Iran might have some claim on its own natural resources. The world is too complex for any simple description, but this seems to me the core of the tale. It also wouldn't hurt to recall that in the past six decades, scarcely a day has passed when Washington was not tormenting Iranians. After the 1953 military coup came U.S. support for a dictator described by Amnesty International as a leading violator of fundamental human rights. Immediately after his overthrow came the U.S.-backed invasion of Iran by Saddam Hussein, no small matter. Hundreds of thousands of Iranians were killed, many by chemical weapons. Reagan's support for his friend Saddam was so extreme that when Iraq attacked a U.S. ship, the USS Stark, killing 37 American sailors, it received only a light tap on the wrist in response. Reagan also sought to blame Iran for Saddam's horrendous chemical warfare attacks on Iraqi Kurds. Eventually, the United States intervened directly in the Iran-Iraq War, leading to Iran's bitter capitulation. Afterward, George H. W. Bush invited Iraqi nuclear engineers to the United States for advanced training in nuclear weapons production -- an extraordinary threat to Iran, quite apart from its other implications. And, of course, Washington has been the driving force behind harsh sanctions against Iran that continue to the present day. Trump, for his part, has joined the harshest and most repressive dictators in shouting imprecations at Iran. As it happens, Iran held an election during his Middle East travel extravaganza -- an election which, however flawed, would be unthinkable in the land of his Saudi hosts, who also happen to be the source of the radical Islamism that is poisoning the region. But U.S. animus against Iran goes far beyond Trump himself. It includes those regarded as the "adults" in the Trump administration, like James "Mad Dog" Mattis, the secretary of defense. And it stretches a long way into the past. Barsamian: What are the strategic issues where Korea is concerned? Can anything be done to defuse the growing conflict?  Chomsky: Korea has been a festering problem since the end of World War II, when the hopes of Koreans for unification of the peninsula were blocked by the intervention of the great powers, the United States bearing primary responsibility. The North Korean dictatorship may well win the prize for brutality and repression, but it is seeking and to some extent carrying out economic development, despite the overwhelming burden of a huge military system. That system includes, of course, a growing arsenal of nuclear weapons and missiles, which pose a threat to the region and, in the longer term, to countries beyond -- but its function is to be a deterrent, one that the North Korean regime is unlikely to abandon as long as it remains under threat of destruction. Today, we are instructed that the great challenge faced by the world is how to compel North Korea to freeze these nuclear and missile programs. Perhaps we should resort to more sanctions, cyberwar, intimidation; to the deployment of the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) anti-missile system, which China regards as a serious threat to its own interests; perhaps even to direct attack on North Korea -- which, it is understood, would elicit retaliation by massed artillery, devastating Seoul and much of South Korea even without the use of nuclear weapons. But there is another option, one that seems to be ignored: we could simply accept North Korea's offer to do what we are demanding. China and North Korea have already proposed that North Korea freeze its nuclear and missile programs. The proposal, though, was rejected at once by Washington, just as it had been two years earlier, because it includes a quid pro quo: it calls on the United States to halt its threatening military exercises on North Korea's borders, including simulated nuclear-bombing attacks by B-52s. The Chinese-North Korean proposal is hardly unreasonable. North Koreans remember well that their country was literally flattened by U.S. bombing, and many may recall how U.S. forces bombed major dams when there were no other targets left. There were gleeful reports in American military publications about the exciting spectacle of a huge flood of water wiping out the rice crops on which "the Asian" depends for survival. They are very much worth reading, a useful part of historical memory. The offer to freeze North Korea's nuclear and missile programs in return for an end to highly provocative actions on North Korea's border could be the basis for more far-reaching negotiations, which could radically reduce the nuclear threat and perhaps even bring the North Korea crisis to an end. Contrary to much inflamed commentary, there are good reasons to think such negotiations might succeed. Yet even though the North Korean programs are constantly described as perhaps the greatest threat we face, the Chinese-North Korean proposal is unacceptable to Washington, and is rejected by U.S. commentators with impressive unanimity. This is another entry in the shameful and depressing record of near-reflexive preference for force when peaceful options may well be available. The 2017 South Korean elections may offer a ray of hope. Newly elected President Moon Jae-in seems intent on reversing the harsh confrontationist policies of his predecessor. He has called for exploring diplomatic options and taking steps toward reconciliation, which is surely an improvement over the angry fist-waving that might lead to real disaster. Barsamian: You have in the past expressed concern about the European Union. What do you think will happen as Europe becomes less tied to the U.S. and the U.K.?  Chomsky: The E.U. has fundamental problems, notably the single currency with no political union. It also has many positive features. There are some sensible ideas aimed at saving what is good and improving what is harmful. Yanis Varoufakis's DiEM25 initiative for a democratic Europe is a promising approach. The U.K. has often been a U.S. surrogate in European politics. Brexit might encourage Europe to take a more independent role in world affairs, a course that might be accelerated by Trump policies that increasingly isolate us from the world. While he is shouting loudly and waving an enormous stick, China could take the lead on global energy policies while extending its influence to the west and, ultimately, to Europe, based on the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and the New Silk Road. That Europe might become an independent "third force" has been a matter of concern to U.S. planners since World War II. There have long been discussions of something like a Gaullist  conception  of  Europe  from  the  Atlantic  to  the  Urals  or, in more recent years, Gorbachev's vision of a common Europe from Brussels to Vladivostok. Whatever happens, Germany is sure to retain a dominant role in European affairs. It is rather startling to hear a conservative German chancellor, Angela Merkel, lecturing her U.S. counterpart on human rights, and taking the lead, at least for a time, in confronting the refugee issue, Europe's deep moral crisis. On the other hand, Germany's insistence on austerity and paranoia about inflation and its policy of promoting exports by limiting domestic consumption have no slight responsibility for Europe's economic distress, particularly the dire situation of the peripheral economies. In the best case, however, which is not beyond imagination, Germany could influence Europe to become a generally positive force in world affairs. Barsamian: What do you make of the conflict between the Trump administration and the U.S. intelligence communities? Do you believe in the "deep state"? Chomsky: There is a national security bureaucracy that has persisted since World War II. And national security analysts, in and out of government, have been appalled by many of Trump's wild forays. Their concerns are shared by the highly credible experts who set the Doomsday Clock, advanced to two and a half minutes to midnight as soon as Trump took office -- the closest it has been to terminal disaster since 1953, when the U.S. and USSR exploded thermonuclear weapons. But I see little sign that it goes beyond that, that there is any secret "deep state" conspiracy.  Barsamian: To conclude, as we look forward to your 89th birthday, I wonder: Do you have a theory of longevity?  Chomsky: Yes, it's simple, really. If you're riding a bicycle and you don't want to fall off, you have to keep going -- fast. Noam Chomsky is the author of numerous bestselling political works, including Hegemony or Survival and Failed States. A laureate professor at the University of Arizona and professor emeritus of linguistics and philosophy at MIT, he is widely credited with having revolutionized modern linguistics. His newest book (with David Barsamian) is Global Discontents: Conversations on the Rising Threats to Democracy (Metropolitan Books, December 2017) from which this piece was excerpted.  He lives in Tucson, Arizona. David Barsamian is the award-winning founder and director of Alternative Radio, an independent syndicated radio program. In addition to his 10 books with Noam Chomsky, his works include books with Tariq Ali, Howard Zinn, Edward Said, Arundhati Roy, and Richard Wolff. He lives in Boulder, Colorado. This article first appeared on TomDispatch.com, a weblog of the Nation Institute, which offers a steady flow of alternate sources, news, and opinion from Tom Engelhardt, long time editor in publishing, co-founder of the American Empire Project, author of The End of Victory Culture, as of a novel, The Last Days of Publishing. His latest book is Shadow Government: Surveillance, Secret Wars, and a Global Security State in a Single-Superpower World (Haymarket Books). Call to action

THE ABSURD TIMES

What we are all about:

Seems to fit:

Palestine: just a reminder

Trump the Vulgar

So, what does vulgar mean?  It does not mean swear words.  What we have in mind is something between that and what the original term "Vulgate" meant when books were published in languages other than Latin so the "common" people could read them. 

Our President gave the most vulgar speech by a U.S. President in the history of the United Nations.  At the time, we simply stated: "Friends, Delegates, and Heads of State.  Lend me your ears!  He doth not speak for me nor doth he in my manner, this man of Orange."  That is enough.

Someone very prescient suggested that, instead of the National Anthem, which was made a tradition in football in 2009, perhaps a stirring rendition of the Bill of Rights would be appropriate:  At least a summary of some of the key points.  That is what it is all about, anyway.

Once in high school several of us were sent to the discipline office, run by the Vice Principal, who had also been my baseball coach.  Since the idea was to investigate a lack of patriotism, we were asked why we did not sing it.  Several answers where: 1) the range is too wide and I can not hit all of those notes, 2) it is scored in the key of X but was played in Y, and 3), mine, "it is one long rhetorical question to which the only logical answer is 'no'."  After he thought a bit about that, he said all we had to do was mouth the words and "fake it".  I started to protest, but he stopped me immediately, saying, "Hold on, I know you are very good at faking hitters out and you can at least fake out the monitor there."  That was the end of that. 

Have we officially recognized Global Warming yet?

North Korea in protest called our President a "dotard," leading to the intense online search for definitions by the U.S. citizenry.  The BBC immediately knew that it meant and how to pronounce it (showoffs) and the major U.S. Networks caught on in a matter of hours.  I pointed out that it "does not rhyme with not!  That seemed to help.

Someone mentioned that, thus, North Korea has done more to advance American literacy than Betsy Devoss (our Secretary of Education and sister of Blackwater owner).  It is said that she had something to do with not shooting bears near a high school and has also made it easier for college guys to rape people, it seems.

Much has been made of Putin interfering with the election.  Well, yes, what do you expect?  He had no desire to see Clinton elected and was able to screw up the U.S. well with Trump.  What would you expect?  He's happy.  And if you are so upset with the hacking of Podesta's e-mails, his account was on AOL and his password was PASSWORD.  He had also been warned ahead of time by the FBI.  We have not yet decided which was more disturbing, AOL or the lousy password.  Also, much has been said about Russia spending 100K on Facebook Ads.  What a huge sum compared to donations given to Trump by Billionaires.  Why, it almost amounts to 20 seconds of their earned income.  Many who voted for Trump in the key states (Wisconsin, Michigan, and even Pennsylvania), had voted for Obama in 2008.  This was not the case with his "base".

Nuclear disarmament in Korea?  I think that the lesson of Saddam and Gaddafi will make North Korea think twice, if even once.  Even if we think we can easily shoot down one of the armed missiles, they could rig it so that it would explode prior to impact emitting an Electromagnetic pulse that would fry a great deal of electronic equipment on the west coast.  Well, before you dismiss the idea, remember that Trump lost the entire west coast in the last election.

You may wish to reflect upon the last great international nuclear crisis, the Cuban missile crisis.  At that time, the opposing leaders were Mikita Kruschev (who survived Stalin and became leader of the Soviet Union) and JFK to be remember forever.  Today we have a 32 year old kid who kills his Uncles, brothers, and whomever to stay in power and who never led a country and our President whose governmental service is limited to what we have seen since the inauguration, a dotard.  Things look grim indeed.

One final observation before we leave you with a very apt discussion of the NFL v. Trump, who obviously does not know what "Mother" means to many of these players, as he does not understand their culture.  Colin's (#7) mother tweeted:  "Guess that makes me a proud 'bitch'." 

From Democracy Now:

In the biggest display of athletic defiance in years, football teams across the nation protested President Donald Trump after he attacked the NFL, NBA and some of their most popular athletes for daring to draw attention to racism and police violence. We look at the unprecedented role of political activism among athletes under the Trump presidency and the politics of playing the national anthem at games. We speak with Dr. Harry Edwards, professor emeritus of sociology at the University of California, Berkeley, and the author of several books, including "The Revolt of the Black Athlete," reissued this year for its 50th anniversary edition. He was the architect of the 1968 Olympic Project for Human Rights and is a longtime staff consultant with the San Francisco 49ers. We're also joined by Dave Zirin, sports editor for The Nation magazine, who notes that playing the national anthem before games has a long and hallowed history that goes back to the days of "Jersey Shore" and Justin Bieber.

---

Transcript

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: In the biggest display of athletic defiance for decades, football teams across the nation protested President Donald Trump after he attacked the NFL, NBAand some of their most popular athletes for daring to draw attention to racism and police violence by taking the knee during the national anthem. At a campaign rally in Huntsville, Alabama, Friday evening, Trump lashed out at players who have joined this growing protest movement, that, well, in its latest incarnation was started by the former 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick, against racial injustice, kneeling during the national anthem. Trump made the comments while stumping for Senator Luther Strange to replace Jeff Sessions in a close Republican primary in Alabama.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Wouldn't you love to see one of these NFL owners, when somebody disrespects our flag, to say, "Get that son of a bitch off the field right now. Out. He's fired. He's fired!"? Wouldn't you love it?

AUDIENCE: U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.!

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: You know, some owner is going to do that. He's going to say, "That guy that disrespects our flag, he's fired." And that owner—they don't know it. They don't know. They're friends of mine, many of them. They don't know. They'll be the most popular person for a week. They'll be the most popular person in this country, because that's a total disrespect of our heritage. That's a total disrespect of everything that we stand for, OK?

AMY GOODMAN: Trump's speech took place in the city of Huntsville, a couple hours from where Alabama's Governor George Wallace openly embraced segregation in his 1963 inaugural address. During his remarks, Trump urged football fans to turn off their TVs when athletes protest during the national anthem.

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: But you know what's hurting the game more than that? When people like yourselves turn on television and you see those people taking the knee when they're playing our great national anthem.

AUDIENCE: Boo!

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: The only thing you could do better is if you see it, even if it's one player, leave the stadium. I guarantee, things will stop. Things will stop. Just pick up and leave. Pick up and leave.

AMY GOODMAN: Trump's comments come immediately—well, Trump's comments immediately drew outrage and criticism. NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell said in a statement, quote, "Divisive comments like these demonstrate an unfortunate lack of respect." The NFL Players Association President Eric Winston said Trump's comments were, quote, "a slap in the face to the civil rights heroes of the past and present." Former NFL wide receiver Anquan Boldin told ABC News he and other athletes are concerned about Trump's "hate speech."

ANQUAN BOLDIN: I think the president's words are real divisive. I don't like the hate speech that is coming out of his mouth. Neither do the players in the locker room. So, I think, as a league, we need to stand together and show that we're all about uniting one another and not the divisive rhetoric that's coming out of the mouth of the president.

AMY GOODMAN: Ahead of a series of NFL games Sunday, Trump again urged football fans to boycott NFL games unless clubs punish players who protest during the national anthem. He tweeted, "If NFL fans refuse to go to games until players stop disrespecting our Flag & Country, you will see change take place fast. Fire or suspend! NFLattendance and ratings are WAY DOWN. Boring games yes, but many stay away because they love our country. League should back U.S."

Trump's comments sparked nationwide protests, with players on most teams participating in some form of protest ahead of Sunday games. NFL players who kneeled and locked arms during the national anthem included members of the Buffalo Bills, Denver Broncos, New Orleans Saints, Miami Dolphins, Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Cleveland Browns, Philadelphia Eagles, New York Giants. Super Bowl champions New England Patriots also protested, with white quarterback Tom Brady interlocking arms with teammates of color as others kneeled. Several players and staff from the Jacksonville Jaguars and Baltimore Ravens also knelt in defiance [ahead] of a game in London. Journalist Shaun King noted 27 players and staff from both teams participated in the protest, making it the "most ever in one game," he wrote. And nearly the entire Pittsburgh Steelers team sat out the national anthem in the locker room ahead of their game against the Chicago Bears, who stood on the sidelines with their arms locked in solidarity.

Meanwhile, during game one of the WNBA Finals, the Lynx linked arms during the national anthem, while the Sparks stayed in their locker room.

The protests spread to baseball teams, as well, with the Oakland Athletics' Bruce Maxwell becoming the first Major League player to kneel during the national anthem, on Saturday night. Maxwell was born on an Army base; his father is in the military. He told reporters he was, quote, "kneeling for people that don't have a voice."

And on Saturday, legendary musician Stevie Wonder joined protesting athletes by kneeling on stage before his performance at the Global Citizen Festival.

Meanwhile, Trump also took aim at the NBA, rescinding an invitation to basketball champions the Golden State Warriors to visit the White House, after the team's star player, Steph Curry, said he would not attend. Curry told reporters he and some of his teammates disagree with Trump and, quote, "the things that he's said and the things that he hasn't said in the right times." In response, Trump tweeted, quote, "Going to the White House is considered a great honor for a championship team. Stephen Curry is hesitating, therefore invitation is withdrawn!" This is Curry responding to Trump's Twitter attack.

STEPHEN CURRY: It's kind of, I mean, surreal, to be honest. I mean, just I don't know why he feels the need to target certain individuals, you know, rather than others. I have an idea of why, but it's kind of—it's just kind of beneath, I think, a leader of a country to go that route. It's not what leaders do. So, like I said, we have amazing people in this league that have spoken up on both sides of the conversation. The amount of support and encouragement I saw this morning around the league was unbelievable, from all types of players.

AMY GOODMAN: The Golden State Warriors say they'll visit Washington, D.C., but skip the White House and instead, quote, "celebrate equality, diversity and inclusion," unquote. Trump's tweet also drew a sharp rebuke from NBA superstar LeBron James, one of the nation's best-known athletes. He tweeted at Trump, quote, "U bum @StephenCurry30 already said he ain't going! So therefore ain't no invite. Going to White House was a great honor until you showed up!" James posted this video on his Instagram account on Saturday. As of Sunday evening, it had been viewed over 2 million times.

LEBRON JAMES: You look at him kind of asking, you know, the NFL owners to get rid of players off the field because they're exercising their rights, and that's not right. And then, you know, when I wake up, I see that a colleague of mine has been uninvited—of something that he said he didn't even want to go to in the first place—you know, to the White House. You know, that's just something I can't stand for, man. And we've got, you know, Jemele Hill and Colin Kaepernick, and, you know, all these people are speaking up, and it's for the greater cause. It's for us to all come together. It's not about a division. It's not about dividing. We, as American people, need to actually just come together even more stronger, man, because this is a very critical time. And me being in the position I am, I had to voice this to y'all. So, love y'all, man.

AMY GOODMAN: Basketball star LeBron James. Meanwhile, Sunday, even some of the anthem singers participated in the protests during the NFL games. In Motown, before the Lions game at Ford Field, singer Rico Lavelle performed "The Star-Spangled Banner," pausing between "home of the" and "brave" to drop to his right knee and raise his left hand in a fist, a move that recalled the Black Power salute of U.S. Olympians John Carlos and Tommie Smith at the 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City.

RICO LAVELLE: [singing] For the land of the free and the home of the brave.

AMY GOODMAN: When we come back from break, we'll be joined by three guests: Dr. Harry Edwards, professor emeritus of sociology, University of California, Berkeley, adviser to Colin Kaepernick; we'll also be speaking with sportswriter Dave Zirin; and we'll be speaking with former NFL star Donté Stallworth. This is Democracy Now! Back in a minute.

[break]

AMY GOODMAN: That's Stevie Wonder performing Saturday night at the Global Citizen concert in Central Park. That was after he took both knees, as he said it, for America and for the world. This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I'm Amy Goodman.

In the biggest display of athletic defiance in years, sports teams across the nation—football, baseball and basketball—protested President Donald Trump after he attacked the NFL, the NBA and some of their most popular athletes for daring to draw attention to racism and police violence.

We go now to get response. We're joined by three people. In Palo Alto, California, we're joined by Dr. Harry Edwards, professor emeritus of sociology at University of California, Berkeley, author of a number of books, including The Revolt of the Black Athlete, reissued this year for its 50th anniversary edition. He was the architect of the 1968 Olympic Project for Human Rights, longtime staff consultant with the San Francisco 49ers, where he worked with Colin Kaepernick. In Washington, D.C., we're joined by Donté Stallworth, a sports commentator, former NFL player who spent 10 years in the league. And also with us, Dave Zirin, a sports editor for The Nation magazine. His latest piece, "For the NFL, It was 'Choose Your Side Sunday.'"

We welcome you all to Democracy Now! Harry Edwards, let's begin with you. Have you seen anything like this, in one day, yesterday, what happened across this country and beyond?

HARRY EDWARDS: Oh, absolutely not. I mean, in the 1960s, you had pockets of athletes who were engaged in political activities, some of the greatest sports personalities in the history of this country, but there was nothing on this scale. Mr. Trump has managed to precipitate something that all of us, activists and intellectuals and media types, would never have been able to achieve, through his ignorance, impulsiveness and vindictiveness. And so, what he has done—if anybody is leading this movement, it's Mr. Trump. He has done more to put it on track and to move it forward than any other individual in history.

AMY GOODMAN: I mean, President Trump has managed to do something that hasn't happened in quite a while, like Roger Goodell, the head of the NFL, being united with players? Talk about the response of the predominantly almost all-white coaches, the staff and the players. Describe what we saw yesterday, from game to game, whether the players stayed back in the locker room for the anthem or went down on knee or locked arms, like Tom Brady, not usually seen in solidarity in this way, who talked about President Trump as being disrespectful.

HARRY EDWARDS: Well, Mr. Trump, first of all, threw the owners under the bus. The owners, who had been supporting him, all of a sudden had to choose between him—and the alt-right and that cheap applause that he got in Alabama—and their own players. And they knew, from the moment that he made those statements, if they didn't stand up on the right side of these issues and join their players, they've signed their last free agent, they probably would have a great deal of difficulty signing their draft choices, and they would have tremendous problems in their locker room because of the perception of what the owner stood for who took Mr. Trump's advice.

Again, this demonstrates Mr. Trump's utter ignorance of the dynamics of athletics in this country, particularly at the elite levels, what holds teams together, what motivates them and what they consider to be important and critical in terms of their own involvement in this great American sports institution. So, again, like in almost every other area that he has entered, he shows an abysmal ignorance of what is important, what's going on, and he doesn't hesitate to throw even his closest associates and supporters under the bus.

And I will say something else: We haven't heard the last of him in the sports arena. And so, we had better prepare ourselves to respond objectively, collectively, in unity, because, going forward, he's going to continue this vindictive tirade that he's been on.

AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to turn to the former NFL head coach, like head of the New York Jets, Rex Ryan, well-known Trump supporter. Speaking Sunday on ESPN, Ryan blasted Trump for his criticism of NFL players, saying he's appalled by Trump's comments.

REX RYAN: Like I'm [bleep] off. I'll be honest with you, you know, because I supported Donald Trump. You know, I sat back, and when he asked me to introduce him at a rally, you know, in Buffalo, I did that. But I'm reading these comments, and it's appalling to me. And I'm sure it's appalling to almost any citizen in our country. It should be. I mean, you know, calling our players SOBs and all that kind of stuff? That's not the—that's not the men that I know. The men that I know in the locker room, I'm proud of. I'm proud to be associated with those people. And it's just so—you know, I apologize for being [bleep] off, but guess what. That's it. Because, right away, I'm associated with what Donald Trump stands for and all that, because, you know, I introduced him. I never signed up for that. I never wanted that.

AMY GOODMAN: Dave Zirin, you've been covering sports and protest for a long time. Describe everything that we saw yesterday. I mean, we're not only talking about the NFL—NBA, cheerleaders, the actual anthem singers themselves, WNBA, as well, women's basketball.

DAVE ZIRIN: Yeah. And first and foremost, Amy, I just want to say what an honor it is to do this show with Dr. Harry Edwards. It's impossible—he said it's impossible to think about this moment happening without Donald Trump. I think it's impossible to see this moment happening without the work of Dr. Harry Edwards over the last five decades.

I will say this. Donald Trump thought he knew what he was doing in Huntsville, Alabama. He has a tremendous ability to speak to the worst instincts of his audience. And I'm sure, in his lizard brain, he looked at that audience of senior—white senior citizens' council in Alabama and said to himself, "You know what? I think that going after young black men will be a big win." And that's what he does. He goes after people of color. He goes after women. He goes after people that his base will celebrate their destruction.

And yet, what he did not understand, maybe because he never played the game of football, he did not understand that in football locker rooms they have what Seattle Seahawk Michael Bennett calls a brotherhood. And "brotherhood" could be seen as another word for solidarity. And it's kind of like a Spartacus thing, like "an injury to one is an injury to all" kind of thing.

And so, you think about what Donald Trump said at that rally and what NFL players and owners heard. You've got to take in the whole thing of what he said. First and foremost, he called the players SOBs, and he used the B-word. And that's going after players' mothers, and you just do not do that. Second, he went after their livelihoods, saying that they should be fired. Third of all, he went after their freedoms, their right to dissent.

And it also has to be said that Donald Trump, because he doesn't know the game, did not understand that the players who have been dissenting—and I'm talking about people like Malcolm Jenkins, Michael Bennett—they're not just individuals, they're not just people who are sitting during the anthem, they are people who are considered leaders in locker rooms, the most respected people in the National Football League. So he's going after people who a lot of these coaches love. They love having these guys in their locker room, because they're some of the most thoughtful people that they have.

And so, what Donald Trump spurred is remarkable. And I'd be remiss, Amy, if I did not read for your audience, just so people know how deep the politics of what we saw Sunday was, the statement made by the Seattle Seahawks in their refusal to come out for the national anthem. It's brief, and it's worth reading. This is what they said. They said, "We will not stand for the injustice that has plagued people of color in this country. Out of love for our country and in honor of the sacrifices made on our behalf, we unite to oppose those that would deny our most basic freedoms. We remain committed in continuing to work towards equality and justice for all." We have reached a point where protesting the anthem is an act that actually demands more unity than whatever it is that Donald Trump is saying from his bully pulpit.

AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to go to Michael Bennett himself, a Seattle Seahawk, NFLstar, appeared on Democracy Now! a few months ago, and I asked him about NFLquarterback Colin Kaepernick's decision to protest against racial oppression and police brutality by taking the knee during the pregame national anthem.

MICHAEL BENNETT: When he took that knee, it just—it just made me realize that, you know, when he did that and the way that he touched—made people speak around the world about this, it was like, "Wow! Athletes really do have this platform that a lot of people just want to hear." And when he made that decision to do that, I think it changed a lot of lives. I think it brought out some ugliness in people, but it also brought out some beauty in some people. And I think, for us, for me personally, it just challenged me to be—to even, you know, join him and try to make it—try to make everything in his message more—make it where people understand and they want to be a part of it, where young kids are speaking about it, too.

AMY GOODMAN: So that's Seattle Seahawk Michael Bennett speaking to us in February. Now, Dave Zirin, I wanted to ask you about the history of the playing of the national anthem. It wasn't always like this, was it? Weren't the teams usually in their locker rooms? Did this have to do with payment that the Pentagon made to the NFL to start recruiting more people, because young people watch football?

DAVE ZIRIN: Oh, Amy, playing the national anthem and having the teams line up before games, it has a long and hallowed history that goes back to the days of Jersey Shoreand Justin Bieber. I mean, we're talking 2009. I mean, Fast & Furious 4 came out in 2009. That's how long players have lined up for the anthem. And, yes, it comes out of a partnership between the Department of Defense and the National Football League. Everything you see at games, for years, until it was uncovered by Senator Jeff Flake from Arizona, everything you saw for years, like—

AMY GOODMAN: And John McCain, right?

DAVE ZIRIN: And John McCain, yes. And showing it in like—showing like the salute to the troop moment and all of these spectacles, they really were about recruitment for the armed forces, and they pay tens of millions of dollars to the National Football League to do these kinds of events, which speaks to, I think, this partnership that exists and how patriotism exists in these events. This is not some long tradition. I mean, this is something that's a very short tradition and one that was absolutely geared with post-9/11 war-on-terror concern about the recruitment levels for the armed forces and seeing the NFL as a way to shore up those numbers, and paying billionaires money to make this a reality. And, yes, this was only—this was something also that was hidden. It was discovered by the investigation of those Arizona senators. And I think that sort of gives the game away as far as what all this is about. I mean, Trump speaks about it as if it is this kind of long, hallowed tradition of players standing at attention for the anthem, when it's actually something very recent and very, I think, just monetary, in terms of the NFL's perspective.

HARRY EDWARDS: But—

AMY GOODMAN: Was that Harry Edwards?

HARRY EDWARDS: But, you know, the—uh-huh.

AMY GOODMAN: Go ahead.

HARRY EDWARDS: But, you know, it's not about the anthem.

DAVE ZIRIN: Yes.

HARRY EDWARDS: This is the part that we don't want to get hung up on. What Colin did was not an attack on the anthem. It was not an attack on the military. It was not even an attack on police. It was an attack on injustice. And he was no more against the anthem than he was against the soldiers who are in Afghanistan and in Iraq. And so, we don't want to get too tied up on the anthem and its place in sports and so forth. We want to look at the issues. Anything else is a red herring. That is what Colin was about. It's not even about Colin getting a quarterback job again. That's like saying that we should—that Montgomery—the Montgomery bus boycott movement should have been about Rosa Parks getting her seat back. It has to be about things much broader than that. And so, we want to understand the history and dynamics of the politics of the national anthem and how they're being played by people such as Trump, but we don't want to lose sight about what this struggle is about. It's about injustice in American society.

DAVE ZIRIN: Absolutely.

AMY GOODMAN: Dr. Harry Edwards, you are certainly speaking from personal experience. You're an adviser to Colin Kaepernick. And for people who haven't been following the whole controversy around him, after he first took the knee as a 49ers star, now not being able to get a job—I mean, I'm talking to you from New York, where a thousand people came out protesting outside of NFL headquarters. Talk about Colin's response right now to what we're seeing, the mass protests across the country.

HARRY EDWARDS: Colin Kaepernick is getting ready to play football. I think that that has been his commitment. All of this discussion about whether he wants to play—"Geez, is he willing to offer an apology?" An apology for what? He plays football. He is an activist in the struggle for human rights and justice in American society. Those two things are not contradictory. And so, this notion that perhaps he doesn't want to play anymore, perhaps he wants to be a civil rights leader instead, I mean, those two things are not contradictory.

So, a lot of that is simply rationalization for a reactionary culture, where owners, for whatever reason, are reluctant to give Colin Kaepernick the opportunity to play. The very idea that there are 96 quarterbacks in this league, including 32 clipboard holders, who are so much better than Colin Kaepernick, who took his team to three conference championships and a Super Bowl, that they are so much better than Colin Kaepernick, that he does not even deserve a chance for a tryout, is ludicrous. This is something that the league, along with siding with their players, within the very near future, is going to have to correct. Colin Kaepernick belongs at least on the field holding a clipboard. You can't make any other argument, especially given some of the performances that have shown up in the first three weeks by quarterbacks in this league. So, that's a challenge that the league is still confronted with. But what Colin Kaepernick is doing is preparing to play football, because that's one of the things that he does.

The original content of this program is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. Please attribute legal copies of this work to democracynow.org. Some of the work(s) that this program incorporates, however, may be separately licensed. For further information or additional permissions, contact us.