Alexandra Chalupa post on Trump rallies, as perspective in the mist of non stop gas lighting by D.J. Trump
Post on Trump Rally
Alexandra Chalupa
Journalist Katie McBride had to help out the Trump campaign with some basic math after campaign manager Brad Parscale boasted on Twitter yesterday that 300,000 tickets had been distributed for the Trump rally in Tulsa on June 19th at the Bank of Oklahoma Center. McBride pointed outs that the BOK stadium’s maximum capacity is 19,199.
In the old days, this would be a top story accompanied by calls for the campaign manager to be fired for promoting such blatant lies. But this type of deceit has been normalized and is likely being encouraged by the Oval Office occupant who spent his life lying about numbers, including inflating his wealth to make lists of the most wealthy people or to inflate his inauguration’s low turnout. In fact, recent news reports show that he demands his campaign manager feed him polling numbers that pacify him and not realistic numbers that send him spinning into tantrums. But none of this is normal and it’s not okay.
It’s also concerning that Donald Trump is holding an indoor rally during a pandemic and the chances he or others will be wearing masks to protect themselves or others, is zero. We’ve seen how he and Pence have taken large group photos with campaign staff and others, and no one wore masks despite COVID-19 cases increasing. His narcissism demands that he be worshiped among large crowds of followers cheering him on and despite the risks to them or their communities.
But one of the worst components of this Trump rally is that he chose to host it in Tulsa, Oklahoma on Juneteenth, an annual holiday commemorating the end of slavery in the United States, which has been celebrated by African-Americans since the late 1800s. Given Trump’s complete mishandling and racist remarks and dog whistles, including throughout the recent civic unrest throughout the nation when he encourage more force to be used against protestors demonstrating against police brutality and systemic racism. As the Black Lives Matter movement continues to grow, his campaign selected a date and location to increase tensions. It was announced today that he changed it to the day after due to so many people calling him out for the date.
He’s kicking off his summer rally in Tulsa on the 99th anniversary of the Tulsa Massacre, which took place on Memorial Day weekend and ended June 1, 1921. Back then, a district in Tulsa was called ‘Black Wall Street’ because it was the wealthiest African American community in the U.S. at the time. That weekend, a black teenage boy was accused of assaulting a white teenage girl. The accused was taken into custody and at the courthouse an angry mob of white residents showed up to demonstrate against him and rumors began to spread that the teenage boy was lynched; which spread to and alarmed the black community. Armed black residents came to the courthouse. A fight broke out with 12 people killed, and the tensions exploded into a race riot, with an angry, large mob of white people destroying the black neighborhoods. The national guard had to step in and martial law was declared. Hundreds were sent to the hospital, and while death tolls are still not certain, a commission report concluded it may have been about 300 killed, mostly black residents. 6,000 were temporarily displaced, and the property damage to the black community was so severe that in today’s numbers it was equivalent to about a $32 million loss.
Some have called the Tulsa massacre the single worst incident of racial violence in American history. Most of the black families left Tulsa after the incident. They weren’t compensated for the destruction to their property, the sudden and violent loss of their homes and belongings. Those who stayed were silent for decades as it wasn’t spoken about. It wasn’t until 75 years later that a state legislature commission was established to investigate the incident and find ways to compensate the families who were devastated in the massacre. This part of history is finally included in school curriculums starting in 2020. Trump’s intentional pick of this location and this date for his tradition hate-rally to be kicked off, has actually educated more people about this dark period of history than anything else, but it’s still not normal that a president would act this way.
There is nothing normal about a mentally unhinged, Putin installed and beholden, racist and treasonous president of the United States being allowed on a ballot to run for re-election, especially given his failed and lethally destructive leadership. His path of destruction includes a scorched earth campaign strategy to drive further divide in the country while fueling fear and hatred, and while deceiving all Americans, including those he’s calling on to fill a stadium in the midst of a deadly pandemic, on a day and at a location that weaponizes a history so that he can fan the flames as he tries to cause a civil war as a strategy to hold onto power because he’s scared he won’t be able to lie his way into another term of destruction
End of Ali Chalupa post
My comment. To the point, concise, and without the venom I have for this traitor POTUS
Andrew Beckwith, PhD