Some vital perspective

In an online forum, a professor asks where to place Trump on a list of world leaders.  Most likely blinded by Trump derangement syndrome, the professor concludes Trump comes in ahead of Stalin.  Another forum participant has a better analysis:

Professor ZZZ asks: “[W]here [would] you put Trump?”

No new, major land war(s) in Asia—so Trump is ahead of LBJ.

No missile crisis risking an exchange of nuclear weapons with a superpower—so Trump is ahead of JFK.

No wars of national conquest—so Trump is ahead of Polk (Texas) and McKinley (Philippines, Cuba).

No move to war after foreign power made full, reasonable efforts to amicably settle reasons for dispute—so Trump is ahead of Madison (War of 1812). Under Madison, we burned down the capital of British North America (York/Toronto), and they returned the favor in Washington. So Trump beats Madison.

No wars against native American tribes—so Trump is ahead of [fill in the blank—many such presidents could be listed here].

No wars based on poor intelligence or to prop up foreign absolute monarchies—so Trump is ahead of both Bush I and Bush II.

Trump has not interned 100,000s of US citizens based on race—so Trump is ahead of FDR.

Trump has not allowed a U.S. state or territory to go into civil war and then allow its government to be hijacked by the brigands who engineered the civil war—so Trump is ahead of Buchanan (Bleeding Kansas).

I still don’t know why President Clinton blew up an aspirin factory or why Secretary Clinton permitted NATO forces and materiel to blow up Libya—so Trump probably comes out ahead of both of them too.

Trump is ahead of Woodrow Wilson: World War I, and his resegregation of the federal civil service. I grant you that being ahead of Wilson is not saying much…but then, the nation survived Wilson, and no one today thinks of Wilson as having lowered the bar vis-a-vis future presidents. ((I do… he was more openly hostile to the Constitution than any president before him — Jemison)) Professor ZZZ seems to be worried about this. He wrote: “Having a POTUS so publicly awful along those lines lowers the horrible bar so dramatically that we will pay for years to come.” Really?—Will we pay for it in years to come, or is this just a shabby slippery slope-type argument? …

If words and pretty speeches are the measure of a president, then Trump comes up short. The question is whether that is the correct standard for measuring presidents in a dangerous world.

This is why knowing history is indispensable — it provides essential context within which to understand the present.  As for the last point in the quote, I remind those who gauge world leaders mainly by their oratory that Adolph Hitler was a rather gifted and mesmerizing speaker by all accounts.  For all his bluster and distracting patterns of speech, Trump has consistently pursued exactly what he promised to do during his campaigning.  In a world rightfully cynical about politicians who routinely fail to do that, this performance counts for a lot among his supporters.  It’s the key reason many voters are willing to overlook the baggage of Trump’s many personal shortcomings.  That our self-professed elites can’t understand that says more about them than it does Trump or his supporters.

A final thought: it appears Trump has survived one of the most nefarious political plots ever contrived against a president.  If that’s the case, and he successfully brings to public account the unelected bureaucracy that attempted it, his administration may well be remembered as one of the most consequential in our nation’s history.

(H/T: Instapundit)

A one-way ticket

Democrats must be concerned about internal polling indicating Trump’s policy successes are pulling away minority votes:

Democratic New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker introduced a bill Monday that would establish a commission to study the impact of slavery on the black community and propose slavery reparations initiatives.

Sen. Booker tweeted in reference to the bill he will be backing in the Senate, saying, “I am proud to introduce legislation that will finally address many of our country’s policies—rooted in a history of slavery and white supremacy—that continue to erode Black communities, perpetuate racism and implicit bias, and widen the racial wealth gap.”

“Senator Spartacus” obviously doesn’t see the irony inherent in a Black U.S. Senator complaining that blacks just can’t get ahead in this country, less than three years after a Black man left the Oval Office.  That said, let’s examine his complaint:

Few things “erode Black communities” like the twin scourges of welfare and abortion. Both are practically sacraments to leftists.  And both have devastated the nuclear family, which study after study shows is vital to social and economic mobility.  The advocacy of abortion in America, in particular, has demonstrably racist origins.  As for the welfare legacy of the Great Society, let’s review the thoughts of its architect, Democratic President Lyndon Johnson:

These Negroes, they’re getting pretty uppity these days and that’s a problem for us since they’ve got something now they never had before, the political pull to back up their uppityness. Now we’ve got to do something about this, we’ve got to give them a little something, just enough to quiet them down, not enough to make a difference.

No amount of monetary compensation can undo the damage that two generations of government paternalism has caused the Black community.  Only by leaving Uncle Sam’s plantation and its slave mentality of perpetual victimhood, and taking personal ownership of their community’s fate, is there any chance for improvement.  (The same is true for all Americans, not just Blacks.)  Reparations are the exact opposite of that.  It’s “enough to quiet them down, not enough to make a difference.”  Of course, it’s good for buying votes, though, which is the real point.

At the same time, reparations represent an injustice to the rest of Americans.  Inevitably, it will open the door for demands by the Native Americans, Hawaiians, the Chinese and others, each with their own legitimate historical grievances.  The fabric of our society will become even more frayed as each group jostles for its share of the loot.

And where will that loot come from?  Largely from the White Devils, of course.  After all, we pale skins are the root of all evil — our college professors told us so.  Sarcasm aside, I’m the first in my family history ever to go to college.  My ancestors were hardscrabble, not wealthy, and none ever owned slaves, even though they were eeeeeeeevil Southerners.  It wasn’t my white skin that got me through college.  It was my parents ensuring I made use of my high school education, and instilling the work ethic that allowed me to work and go to school at the same time.  If he had any sense, Spartacus would see why I’m less than enthused at the prospect of being taxed to pay for others’ historical sins.  Apparently to the Democrats, I’m a “deplorable,” a “bitter clinger,” and a cash cow for redistribution schemes.  I wonder why they’re having a hard time connecting with my demographic these days.

We need a different vision if this country is to survive, a century and a half after it nearly tore itself apart.  (Today, by the way, is the anniversary of the effective end of that cataclysm.)  I’m reminded of a line from the movie Kingdom of Heaven:

“We fight over an offense we did not give against those who were not alive to be offended.”

We are at a crossroads.  Either we acknowledge our shared history — good and bad — has led all Americans to where we are now, which is a place of privilege beyond compare to most of the world’s population.  Or we begin fighting over the scraps of that heritage, and in the process tear apart what remains of it.  We can no longer afford would-be leaders who use grievance-mongering for personal advancement (I’m looking at you, Southern Poverty Law Center).

Which is why I’ll say this: there is one form of reparation I would support, and one only.  The original offense of the slavers was to forcefully remove Africans from their home and transport them to the Americas.  If any slave’s descendants truly believe this country is irreparably unjust to them, I support funding a one-way ticket to whatever African country they choose.  I don’t expect a mad clamor to take up such an offer, however.  Anyone with eyes can see that even the poorest of families in the most violent of Democratic-run cities like Chicago or Baltimore still has more opportunity and more to be thankful for than the vast majority of their distant relatives overseas.  Deep down, Senator Spartacus and his ilk know it.

And that, I submit, is reparations enough.  If it isn’t, by all means book the flight, bill Uncle Sam, and leave your U.S. passport on the way out the door.