29 Nov 2016

Scott Alexander on Trump’s Alleged Racism

Trump 65 Comments

Someone posted this long post (is there any other kind?) from Scott Alexander in the comments a while ago. It is a simply PHENOMENAL refutation of what “everybody knows” about Trump being a flaming racist.

I didn’t read it until I was on a business trip and was stuck with my conscience and my phone (so I turned to my phone, naturally). But it was way better than I thought it would be, and it even keeps getting better in the post itself. Some excerpts:

This is just a tiny representative sample, but the rest is very similar. Trump has gone from campaign stop to campaign stop talking about how much he likes and respects minorities and wants to fight for them.

And if you believe he’s lying, fine. Yet I notice that people accusing Trump of racism use the word “openly” like a tic. He’s never just “racist” or “white supremacist”. He’s always “openly racist” and “openly white supremacist”. Trump is openly racist, openly racist, openly racist, openly racist, openly racist, openly racist, openly racist. Trump is running on pure white supremacy, has thrown off the last pretense that his campaign is not about bigotry, has the slogan Make American Openly White Supremacist Again, is an openly white supremacist nominee, etc, etc, etc. And I’ve seen a few dozen articles like this where people say that “the bright side of a Trump victory is that finally America admitted its racism out in the open so nobody can pretend it’s not there anymore.”

This, I think, is the first level of crying wolf. What if, one day, there is a candidate who hates black people so much that he doesn’t go on a campaign stop to a traditionally black church in Detroit, talk about all of the contributions black people have made to America, promise to fight for black people, and say that his campaign is about opposing racism in all its forms? What if there’s a candidate who does something more like, say, go to a KKK meeting and say that black people are inferior and only whites are real Americans?

We might want to use words like “openly racist” or “openly white supremacist” to describe him. And at that point, nobody will listen, because we wasted “openly white supremacist” on the guy who tweets pictures of himself eating a taco on Cinco de Mayo while saying “I love Hispanics!”

and

So the mainstream narrative is that Trump is okay with alienating minorities (= 118 million people), whites who abhor racism and would never vote for a racist (if even 20% of whites, = 40 million people), most of the media, most business, and most foreign countries – in order to win the support of about 50,000 poorly organized and generally dysfunctional people, many of whom are too young to vote anyway.

Caring about who the KKK or the alt-right supports is a lot like caring about who Satanists support. It’s not something you would do if you wanted to understand real political forces. It’s only something you would do if you want to connect an opposing candidate to the most outrageous caricature of evil you can find on short notice.

and make sure you consider this angle, if you dislike Trump and are really really sure he’s not just a jerk, but also a racist:

I don’t think people appreciate how weird this guy is. His weird way of speaking. His catchphrases like “haters and losers!” or “Sad!”. His tendency to avoid perfectly reasonable questions in favor of meandering tangents about Mar-a-Lago. The ability to bait him into saying basically anything just by telling him people who don’t like him think he shouldn’t.

If you insist that Trump would have to be racist to say or do whatever awful thing he just said or did, you are giving him too much credit. Trump is just randomly and bizarrely terrible. Sometimes his random and bizarre terribleness is about white people, and then we laugh it off. Sometimes it’s about minorities, and then we interpret it as racism.

Before closing, I have to mention one thing. In his zeal to prove how non-anti-Semitic Trump is, Scott Alexander gives a throwaway remark about Pat Buchanan:

Listen. Trump is going to be approximately as racist as every other American president. Maybe I’m wrong and he’ll be a bit more. Maybe he’ll surprise us and be a bit less. But most likely he’ll be about as racist as Ronald Reagan, who employed Holocaust denier Pat Buchanan as a senior advisor. Or about as racist as George Bush with his famous Willie Horton ad. Or about as racist as Bill “superpredator” Clinton, who took a photo op in front of a group of chained black men in the birthplace of the KKK.

Unfortunately, here Alexander has fallen prey to the same type of slander that says Trump is “openly white supremacist.” Here’s Wikipedia’s treatment of (part of) Buchanan’s book, Churchill, Hitler, and the Unnecessary War:

Buchanan claims that Hitler’s ambitions were confined only to Eastern Europe, and citing such historians as Ian Kershaw, Andreas Hillgruber and Richard J. Evans, states that Hitler wanted an anti-Soviet alliance with Britain.[46] Buchanan maintains that British leaders of the 1930s were influenced by “Germanophobia”, leading them to suspect that Germany was out to conquer the world.[47] Citing John Lukacs, Buchanan maintains that Operation Barbarossa was not part of any long-range master plan on the part of Hitler, but was instead an attempt by Hitler to force Britain to make peace by eliminating Britain’s last hope of victory – bringing the Soviet Union into the war on the Allied side.[48] Buchanan argues that the Holocaust only developed the scale it did because Hitler’s invasion of Poland and then Russia meant that he had within his control most European Jews, which would not have been the case otherwise. Buchanan argues that if Churchill had accepted Hitler’s peace offer of 1940, the severity of the Holocaust would have been immensely less.

Now let me ask you two questions:

(1) Does the above count as “Holocaust denial”?

(2) Can you totally see how some people would smear Buchanan as a “Holocaust denier” because of the above?

You’ve started down a great path, Mr. Alexander…keep walking.

P.S. This post was inspired by a libertarian whom I shared Alexander’s post with, but I don’t know if he wants me naming him.

65 Responses to “Scott Alexander on Trump’s Alleged Racism”

  1. Khodge says:

    We’re well beyond crying wolf. Is there anyone who can articulate the many different uses of “racism” and come up with a coherent definition?

    On the other hand, it is unfair to call Trump “randomly and bizarrely terrible” when you are discussing his language. That his brain cannot control his tongue does not show that his actions are out of control.s

  2. Daniel Kuehn says:

    I think people treat this question for Trump (and the alt-right) too simplistically and I’ve said so in the past, but a lot of this is pretty weak – particularly the claim that we shouldn’t care about who the KKK supports. The KKK and neo-Nazis don’t exactly have a history of enthusiastically supporting Republican candidates the way they have in this election, nor do they so explicitly talk about how politicians are on the same wavelength the way they do about Trump. What incentive do they have to offer this sort of support for Trump when they haven’t for Romney, McCain, Bush, etc.? What’s the story – that they’ve been duped by the MSM?

    It’s not as if this is something that Daily Kos invented in a secret meeting in mid-2015 either. Trump was sued by Nixon’s DOJ – Nixon! – for discriminatory practices and there’s all kinds of stuff that’s popped up about practices at his casinos and with his accountants.

    I definitely think people should talk precisely on this stuff and not brand everyone as being the same as the KKK, but the case for Trump’s racism is pretty strong and I’m surprised you think this is “phenomenal”. The only real open question for me is how sincere vs. opportunistic it is.

    • E. Harding says:

      “but the case for Trump’s racism is pretty strong”

      -No, it’s pretty skimpy.

      “What’s the story – that they’ve been duped by the MSM?”

      -The understanding on the alt-right is that full-throated American nationalism is a good temporary placeholder for White nationalism, and that it’s infinitely better than its mainstream substitutes -c*ckservatism and Clintonism- as well as more common fringe ideologies, most notably, Christian conservatism and far leftism, for the future of the White race on the North American continent.

      “Trump was sued by Nixon’s DOJ – Nixon! – for discriminatory practices”

      -Nixon was a flaming liberal by modern GOP standards, you do realize that? Of course, McGovern was also certainly far-right, at least on social issues, by modern standards. And, in any case, coming up from some hoary chestnut from four decades ago is hardly a “strong case”.

      • Daniel Kuehn says:

        Nixon was liberal in many ways but he wouldn’t pass a racial sensitivity training, that’s all I mean.

        • E. Harding says:

          The dude initiated “racial goals and timetables” for Affirmative Action. Even the standard-issue Republican of today would have some spine to stand against this.

      • Daniel Kuehn says:

        Also note that you’ve switched from the KKK and neo-Nazis to the alt-right. I wasn’t talking about the alt-right. I think their affinities are much clearer and more broadly accepted right?

        • E. Harding says:

          The alt-right is a very broad tent, so KKK and Neo-Nazis are a part.

          • Daniel Kuehn says:

            Right, it is a broad tent. That’s the whole problem with switching from something specific to something much more general.

            • E. Harding says:

              It’s not a problem in the context I used it.

    • Jim says:

      So much yet again for “facts and other stubborn things.” I think you should take this Scott Adams article to heart – http://blog.dilbert.com/post/153821538056/about-pizzagate .

      It’s frustrating talking to someone that insists on facts, but makes arguments with no logical connection to them.

      E.g.: What are the missing premises that would make this syllogism sound?:
      P1) The KKK supported Trump
      P2)

      C) Therefore, Trump is a racist.

      Did you fill them/it in based on confirmation bias? Do they/it have any empirical basis?

      There aren’t a lot of options for the missing premises:

      P2)”The KKK would only support an ACTUAL racist.”

      implying the KKK knows he’s a racist. Apparently the KKK knows
      something secret about him that there’s no other evidence for since bringing that evidence up would have made this line of reasoning moot.

      Note, “P2′) the KKK THINKS he’s a racist” doesn’t make the syllogism sound.

      Also, P2 is obviously false unless the ONLY reason a racist organization would support a presidential candidate would be because he’s a racist. But that’s just STUPID on the face of it. A racist, white nationalist (or, for that matter, a non-racist white-nationalist organization) would *enthusiastically* support the first ostensible nationalist candidate in a generation, regardless of whether or not he’s a racist.

      S1) Hillary must be a communist since the communist party supported her.

      Yes. That actually sounds really stupid doesn’t it? Now you know exactly how I felt when I read your comment. To what do we chalk up the dissonance to? Scott Adams gave you the answer.

      Trump’s real-estate company, while practicing what ALL real estate companies did in the 1970s as routine business (avoid selling to black people because of a fear of lowering property values) makes him personally a racist? This assumes 1) The very widely held belief in the 1970s, right or wrong, that black families lowered property values in a neighborhood, WASN’T the actual reason (that is, the assumption that real-estate buyers of high value properties where actually the racists). AND 2) That he approved or even knew about the policy prior to the complaint being lodged.

      (1) is laughable even if (2) is provable (which, when I looked into it – I could find no evidence of).

      • Harold says:

        Scott Adams was doing so well until he said “half the residents of the United States concluded that Trump was the next Hitler.” In the context of crying wolf and confirmation bias that is amusing.

        My concern is not so much that Trump is a racist, but that he has encouraged racism. When he refers to “the people Mexico sends” as rapists, that is encouraging racism. Whether he personally is racist is somewhat besides the point if he is prepared to use racism to achieve his ends.

        So to slightly amend Daniel’s statement, the case for Trump’s encouraging racism is very strong.

        That translates very easily into a sensible syllogism for the KKK.
        The KKK supported trump
        The KKK will only support racist policies
        Therefore the KKK believe Trump’s policies are racist.

        The KKK may be wrong, as Trump lies so readily, but he nevertheless is encouraging racism by encouraging the KKK and their ilk.

        • Daniel Kuehn says:

          This is kind of what I was getting at when I said I’m not sure how much of it is sincere vs. opportunistic. I put a positive probability on it being sincere for sure, but it’s not quite as clear on that count.

        • Daniel Kuehn says:

          When we’re at the point of asking whether he’s really a racist or whether he just wants America to be a more racist place to a certain extent we’re splitting hairs anyway.

  3. Daniel Kuehn says:

    I’m surprised you highlight the showing up at black churches thing too. I wouldn’t have pegged you as someone so easily swayed by standard baby-kissing and palm-pressing.

    If the point is just that Trump isn’t actively fomenting a race war, I’ll concur on that – he’s not.

    • Bob Murphy says:

      If the point is just that Trump isn’t actively fomenting a race war, I’ll concur on that – he’s not.

      The point is that Trump is not “openly white supremacist.” Which is what his critics have been calling him.

      I don’t know what else to do except say, “The point is, what Scott’s post was about.”

      • Daniel Kuehn says:

        I agree he’s not white supremacist but I think it’s pretty clear he’s racist (maybe somewhat opportunistically – hard to say). I see a difference between those two, and the latter is all I’ve claimed but perhaps Scott sees them as synonymous. He’s said a lot of things that clearly put him there, the KKK endorsements matter a lot, and baby-kissing is standard fare for politicians and I’d think shouldn’t sway us that much.

        • Jim says:

          “Clear?” The KKK supported him (see my comment above) … and he got more black votes than Mitt Romney or McCain. Of course, the KKKs endorsement, in spite of his denials, is evidence of racism. But the black support is what? We just pass on that.

          He’s a racist because the KKK supports him.
          He’s not a racist because more blacks support him.

          Both of these statements are ridiculous. You give credence to one with significant cognitive effort in post-hoc rationalization, and choose to ignore the other one. They’re the same argument.

          • Daniel Kuehn says:

            re: “You give credence to one with significant cognitive effort in post-hoc rationalization, and choose to ignore the other one. ”

            I’ve got eight detailed comments on here and you’re mad at me for not anticipating an additional point that was never raised by anyone yet?

            • Jim says:

              No. I supposed you could rightly accuse me of assuming you DID anticipate it. But I see your point.

          • Andrew_FL says:

            “he got more black votes than Mitt Romney or McCain”

            I don’t suppose you have got some information on the actual numbers not available to us lesser mortals, but a greater percentage of the black vote is not “more black votes”

            Romney got six percent of the black vote which was thirteen percent of the electorate (according to exit polling, in both cases) which works out to ~1,006,866 black votes.

            McCain got four percent of the black vote which was also thirteen percent of the electorate. With the size of the electorate in 2008 that amounts to ~682,832 black votes.

            We don’t have the total vote counts officially in to gauge the size of the electorate in 2016, but Trump got eight percent of a smaller *twelve* percent of the electorate. Based on the vote totals so far, that’s maybe 200 thousand more votes. Note that such polls have a 4 percentage point margin of error-which amounts, again with vote totals so far, to plus or minus 5.3 million votes. Statistically speaking, evidence that Trump actually got more black votes is essentially nonexistent.

            • Andrew_FL says:

              And by the way while I’m at it, Bush got eleven percent of the eleven percent of the electorate that was black in 2004 which is about 1,479,768 a number which beats where I’d currently estimate Trump’s number by…about 200 thousand votes.

              • Jim says:

                Sorry. It was something I read in multiple places and could very well have misinterpreted “percent’ of the black vote as “more black votes.”

                If I find otherwise I’ll post back here.

    • Bob Murphy says:

      I wouldn’t have pegged you as someone so easily swayed by standard baby-kissing and palm-pressing.

      And I wouldn’t have pegged you as someone who would ignore Scott Alexander when he explicitly says, “Now you might say Trump is just lying. OK but…” (not exact quote)

      Scott Alexander despises Trump. Why is it so hard for you to believe that Alexander (and I) mean it when we say, “People are launching accusations against Trump that make no sense at all.” Why do you have to hunt for something deeper?

      Imagine if Fox News said for months, “Hillary Clinton openly admits she gave intelligence to foreign powers in her private email server. Hillary Clinton puts it out in the open: She intentionally killed Americans in Benghazi. Clinton confirms she hires pedophiles.” Wouldn’t that be something worth refuting?

      • Daniel Kuehn says:

        Hmmm… maybe I’m not being clear but I’m not hunting for anything deep I’m just saying getting up in front of a black church in an election season and talking nice isn’t proof of anything at all. It’s not lying per se – he might even believe it, it’s just how politicians operate. Racists frequently think they’ve got everybody’s best interests at heart.

        Scott’s example there is very carefully chosen, I’m guessing. Trump hasn’t been all that racist regarding African Americans. Most of the “open” stuff during the campaign has been directed at Muslims and Latinos. So Scott mentions “black church” and then asks where the open racism is and everybody searches their memory of the campaign for open attacks on blacks and it’s not there because it really didn’t happen (that I know of).

        • Dan says:

          “Hmmm… maybe I’m not being clear but I’m not hunting for anything deep I’m just saying getting up in front of a black church in an election season and talking nice isn’t proof of anything at all.”

          Daniel, if someone says X is openly racist, but X says he loves minorities and wants to fight for them openly, then that doesn’t make much sense. So showing examples of Trump going to black churches or speaking positively of minorities openly would be a good way to disprove the accusation of him being openly racist.

          And Scott acknowledged that you might believe Trump is lying, but those examples are still good to show he isn’t openly racist.

          • Daniel Kuehn says:

            First, no. David Duke says he doesn’t hate minorities openly. Are we really second guessing whether Duke is “openly racist”. Racists often think they’re not racist.

            Second, I never said Trump is “openly racist”. I just said he’s racist. You are confusing what Scott is arguing against in other people that are not me and what I’ve said.

            • Bob Murphy says:

              Ahh Daniel, back to the good old days. These are the kinds of “what?!?!!?” arguments I remember…

              You wrote:

              David Duke says he doesn’t hate minorities openly. Are we really second guessing whether Duke is “openly racist”.

              He was like the Grand Wizard of the KKK. I went to his website briefly, but then realized I don’t want that on my browsing history. I am quite sure if you looked through the public statements of Duke, you would find openly racist statements.

              There really *are* white supremacists. I’ve seen them on Twitter, and once in a blue moon they email me (to point out that I’m a dupe for believing the “Zionist media” etc.). Trump is not an openly white supremacist. What I think happened is that the leftists thought they’d ruin him with their usual smears of “racist misogynist bigot,” that didn’t work, and so they had to up the ante.

              Second, I never said Trump is “openly racist”. I just said he’s racist. You are confusing what Scott is arguing against in other people that are not me and what I’ve said.

              Daniel, it sure sounds like you are saying here, “You are confusing what the point of Scott’s post is, with a totally separate point that I am making when I say I don’t understand why Bob likes Scott’s post.”

              • Daniel Kuehn says:

                Right Duke has openly racist statements so pointing out to him acting like a non-openly racist person doesn’t do much!

                On this: “Trump is not an openly white supremacist.”

                I’ve said he’s not a white supremacist and I’ve never said he’s “openly racist”. As I said to one of the other commenters – stop confusing me saying “Scott’s argument is pretty weak” with me saying “I agree with all the people Scott is linking to in everything they say about Trump”.

            • Dan says:

              “First, no. David Duke says he doesn’t hate minorities openly. Are we really second guessing whether Duke is “openly racist”. Racists often think they’re not racist.”

              OK, but if I was going to make a case that David Duke wasn’t openly racist then showing quotes of him praising minorities or kissing black babies would be a good approach. It wouldn’t work, obviously, because he has quotes like this:

              “White people don’t need a law against rape, but if you fill this room up with your normal black bucks, you would, because niggers are basically primitive animals.” David Duke

              But that doesn’t change the fact that showing instances where a person openly disputes being racist, openly praises minorities, etc. is a good way to defend against accusations of being openly racist.

              I mean, if someone is accused of murder, a good way to defend against that would be to try to establish an alibi. Even if the person is quilty, and the alibi is weak and full of holes, it is still smart to try to establish an alibi.

        • Dan says:

          “Scott’s example there is very carefully chosen, I’m guessing. Trump hasn’t been all that racist regarding African Americans. Most of the “open” stuff during the campaign has been directed at Muslims and Latinos. So Scott mentions “black church” and then asks where the open racism is and everybody searches their memory of the campaign for open attacks on blacks and it’s not there because it really didn’t happen (that I know of).”

          See, you had to put “open” in quotation marks because you realize, at least subconsciously, that saying he is openly racist against Muslims and Latinos isn’t correct. That he would openly deny that he is racist against those two groups.

          • Daniel Kuehn says:

            Dude, not subconsciously I have not offered the argument that Trump is openly racist.

            Just because I think Scott’s post is weak doesn’t mean I am arguing everything that the people he links to are arguing.

            • Bob Murphy says:

              DK wrote:

              Dude, not subconsciously I have not offered the argument that Trump is openly racist.
              Just because I think Scott’s post is weak doesn’t mean I am arguing everything that the people he links to are arguing.

              The beauty of this is breathtaking. An analogy:

              “Dude, I’m not denying that the sum of the squares of the two legs of a right triangle is equal to the square of the hypotenuse. Just because I think Pythagorus’ proof is weak doesn’t mean I deny its validity.”

              • Daniel Kuehn says:

                I’m saying he argues a good point badly. I lead with how I think people are way too simplistic about Trump and the alt-right on this.

                You smack down people arguing a good point badly all the time – why is this so hard to swallow?

        • Jim says:

          “Trump hasn’t been all that racist regarding African Americans. Most of the “open” stuff during the campaign has been directed at Muslims and Latinos.”

          Islam is not a race. It’s an ideology. And I don’t think it’s racist to hate an ideology. I take it you’re no fan of the KKK. YOU RACIST!

          PLEASE look up the “All Mexicans are rapists and murders” quote. This has been added to my lithiums test to detect low-information leftists. The full set of questions is now:

          1) Who said “I can see Russia from my house
          2) Do women make $0.77 for every dollar a man makes for the same work
          3) Did Trump say “All Mexicans are rapists.”

          If you answer “Sarah Palin” to (1) OR “YES” to (2) or (3) then “you might be a low information leftist.”

          Trump said “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best. They’re not sending you. They’re not sending you. They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.”

          Now, you can consider this abrasive; but you can’t consider it racist. He doesn’t say “Mexicans are rapists” He STARTED the statement by saying “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best. They’re not sending you.”

          If I took all of the Mexicans in prison for rape and sent them to the US and someone in the US said what Trump said, THEY’D BE 100% CORRECT because it’s NOT A RACIST STATEMENT.

          • Daniel Kuehn says:

            Well nothing is a “race” it’s kind of a made up concept to begin with. And it’s not an ideology, it’s a religion. “Racism” is pretty widely used to discuss hatred of people-groups. If you had that kind of hatred for a nationality (which is not a distinct race) it could easily get labeled racism. Anti-semitism is often shuffled under racism frequently. This is really something you want to make a big deal of?

            • Jim says:

              Again, the amorphous term ‘racism’ now apparently refers to criticism (‘hatred’ is part of your projection on Trump based on your confirmation bias and requires access to his subjective experience given any lack of an explicit statement) of “people groups.” So criticizing the religion (Islam is a whole life and world view MUCH better called an ideology than a religion but it make NO DIFFERENCE to my point) and the people who act out those religious dictates is now ‘racist.’

              Of course, this makes criticism of ANY view, and the people that hold that view, ‘racist’ … which is exactly the way the left applies it these days.

            • Craw says:

              The point is that Trump did not even make a generalization about a nationality. He talked about a specific group of people, and in doing so made plain he did not intend his remarks to be a generalization. Imagine you are a French civilian in 1945 and the American army comes to town. You notice that America seems to send a lot of men, not a lot of women, and a lot of youngsters, not senior citizens. If you then said to a town hall in Des Moines said “America is not sending us its average citizens, it’s sending young men” . Is it sensible to say you were generalizing about Americans?

          • Daniel Kuehn says:

            When did I say Trump said all Mexicans were rapists?

            I pass your test with flying colors by the way.

          • Harold says:

            Trump did not call all Mexicans rapists. He referred to Mexican migrants coming to the USA using that term. That is a reasonable interpretation of “when Mexico sends its people.”

            When people talk of a large group and say they are this or that they may intend different things. Commonly it means that the term typifies that group, not necessarily that every member of that group is this or that. Greyhounds are fast, trees are tall, eskimos live in igloos, fat people are jolly. They may not be right, but that is often the meaning. If the group is a minority at whom discrimination is levelled and the term is derogatory then this is almost always the meaning. Jews are misers, Native Americans are drunkards, Mexicans are lazy, Mexican migrants are rapists. In this context it almost never means that there exist among the group some individuals that are such and such, although such constructions may be grammatically correct.

            “If I took all the Mexicans in prison for rape….because its not a racist statement” If you did that then it would not be a racist statement. But nobody did that, so it is a racist statement.

            • Jim says:

              So I guess racist means any derogatory statement of a class of people, regardless of the discriminator that defines that class. One wonder what the term “race” is doing as part of “racist” but nothing in leftist rationale surprises me anymore.

              Give what up until this year would have been a generally accepted definition of the term ‘racist’ for your statement to be true the “people coming across the boarder” would be a DIFFERENT RACE than the people staying in Mexico.

              • Harold says:

                You are arguing that we should use the term bigoted instead? As Daniel said said, is this something you want to make a big deal of?

              • Jim says:

                Yes. Being ‘bigoted’ against a group of people with a much higher propensity (as verified by the statistics) toward violent crime (as a group. #notall) BECAUSE they have a propensity toward violent crime is PERFECTLY RATIONAL.

                Being ‘bigoted’ against a group of people because you think the color of their skin is an indication of their propensity toward violent crime on an individual basis is ‘racist’ and IRRATIONAL.

                It becomes difficult to think clearly about these things when the terms are used in an intentionally ambiguous manner in order to paint someone’s RATIONAL statement as an EVIL/IRRATIONAL statement. Then again, I no longer have very high expectations of clarity in public discourse anymore.

              • Harold says:

                OK JIm, I might have missed the stats that show that Mexican migrants to the USA have a “much higher propensity” to be rapists. You will of course be able to point me to the data.

              • Craw says:

                Wasn’t Trump talking about those here in contravention of the immigration laws, so aren’t they the relevant population, not all Mexicans who migrated?

              • Jim says:

                Yes Craw, that’s exactly right. I also wasn’t referring to Mexican legal immigrants. I meant illegals. Harold is welcome to do a few simple google searches and you’ll notice 3 things. 1) Mexican ILLEGAL immigrants commit more crimes. 2) All refutations of this point confuse legal immigrants with illegal immigrants. 3) In general, the crime rate among Hispanics is much higher than average population (see FBI stats).

              • Jim says:

                … and I should note, this is the first time I think I ever agreed with Craw. 🙂

              • Harold says:

                He said “when Mexico sends its people” That does not mean illegals only. You may construe it that way, but that is not what it means.

              • Jim says:

                That’s hyper-grasping. That’s exactly what he meant (illegals). Why do you think nearly 30% of hispanics voted for him?

          • Jim says:

            E.g. (on point 3) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_and_crime_in_the_United_States see the section on “Crime Trends.” Again, this data is also available from the FBI website.

  4. Bob Murphy says:

    Daniel,

    Last thing from me. Feel free to say whatever else you want.

    Here is an early statement from Scott Alexander, which I think summarizes the entire purpose of his post:

    “I have a different perspective. Back in October 2015, I wrote that the picture of Trump as “the white power candidate” and “the first openly white supremacist candidate to have a shot at the Presidency in the modern era” was overblown. I said that “the media narrative that Trump is doing some kind of special appeal-to-white-voters voodoo is unsupported by any polling data”, and predicted that…”

    It sounds to me like you agree with 100% with this, right? In which case, you agree 100% with Scott’s post.

    Now, I think really the problem you have, is that in my title here, I said “Trump’s Alleged Racism” and not “Trump’s Allegedly Open Racism.” If I had added that single word, would you be high-fiving me instead of being baffled?

    • Daniel Kuehn says:

      I agree 100% with this (with the qualification that I don’t know the survey data that well so he may be misleading on that), but I think a lot of the arguments in the post are weak.

  5. Andrew Keen says:

    The KKK and neo-Nazis don’t exactly have a history of enthusiastically supporting Republican candidates

    Where do you get your news? This is a very common left-wing tactic. Find some way to link your opponent to the KKK. Imply guilt by association. Force them to disavow all day every day until the connection sets in subconsciously. Leftists are just mad that it didn’t work as well this time. Why was Hillary never asked to disavow Robert Byrd? Why was Trump asked to disavow David Duke dozens of times even though Duke never endorsed Trump? Where does all this “the KKK supports Trump” come from anyway? Is the KKK putting out press releases? Does the KKK have any public figureheads? Can anyone name a single active KKK member?

    It’s hard to continue to take this stuff seriously when leftists keep digging up the same dead and buried hate groups cycle after cycle.

    • Harold says:

      I m not that well up on this stuff, but wasn’t Obama expected to disavow Pastor Wright?

      “Why was Trump asked to disavow David Duke dozens of times”

      I don’t know for certain, but one reason I keep getting asked to do something is because I haven’t done it yet.

      • Bob Murphy says:

        I don’t know for certain, but one reason I keep getting asked to do something is because I haven’t done it yet.

        Harold, did you read Scott’s post? He explicitly tackled this claim about Trump.

        Scott lists examples where Trump explicitly disavowed Duke. The one thing (Scott claims) that was weird is when he didn’t do it during a live interview, then disavowed Duke within 24 hours of the interview.

        Are you disputing Scott’s history? If not, do you agree you will stop repeating the false claim that “Trump refused to disavow David Duke”?

        The contribution of Scott’s post is to document just how false the media narrative about Trump is. I personally thought that Trump refused to disavow Duke too, for example. Turns out that that was completely made up (unless Scott is lying).

      • Craw says:

        This is really dishonest. Trump had already disavowed Duke.

        But two can play this game. Let’s imagine I repeatedly ask you not to lie Harold. Perhaps several of us could simply ask that you not lie. We don’t accuse you of lying, we don’t cite any lies, we simply ask. Then we discuss why people keep asking you not to lie.

      • Harold says:

        OK, sorry. It was something of a joke. As an excuse, as you say it was a very long post and you didn’t quote that bit.

        Some of his repudiations were weak and qualified. “I don’t need his endorsement; I certainly wouldn’t want his endorsement. I don’t need anyone’s endorsement.””

        “Asked whether he would repudiate the endorsement, Trump said “Sure, I would if that would make you feel better.” ”

        Specifically avoiding any mention of why he repudiates him. He does not want the endorsement because he does not need ANY endorsement. He will repudiate it not because he believes it, but if it would make the interviewer happy.

        Trump did say on other occasions that he did repudiate the endorsement, so he has certainly done so.

        What is interesting is comparing this to his response earlier. In 2000 Trump knew all about Duke, called him a bigot and said clearly he did not want to be associated with him. This time around he equivocates and excuses for quite a while. Why the change? You do surely have to acknowledge that that is something worth examining, and one answer was that he thought he could gain the racists support by doing so.

        • Bob Murphy says:

          Harold wrote:

          “Some of [Trump’s] repudiations [of David Duke] were weak and qualified. “I don’t need his endorsement; I certainly wouldn’t want his endorsement. I don’t need anyone’s endorsement.””

          “Asked whether he would repudiate the endorsement, Trump said “Sure, I would if that would make you feel better.” ”

          Specifically avoiding any mention of why he repudiates him. He does not want the endorsement because he does not need ANY endorsement. He will repudiate it not because he believes it, but if it would make the interviewer happy.

          Trump did say on other occasions that he did repudiate the endorsement, so he has certainly done so.

          What is interesting is comparing this to his response earlier. In 2000 Trump knew all about Duke, called him a bigot and said clearly he did not want to be associated with him. This time around he equivocates and excuses for quite a while. Why the change? You do surely have to acknowledge that that is something worth examining, and one answer was that he thought he could gain the racists support by doing so.”

          Harold, for someone who earlier implied that Trump refused to repudiate Duke, your argument above is a pretty big shift, wouldn’t you agree? Can you see why some of us might conclude it’s pointless to argue with you?

          • Harold says:

            As I said, my implication that Trump had not repudiated Duke was a poor attempt at a joke. Yes I agree my position above is a big shift. I do not wish to defend the idea that Trump refused to repudiate Duke. I hope that my acknowledgement of this may lead you to conclude that there may be point in arguing with me. If I make a mistake I hope to acknowledge it, hence I opened my last comment with OK, sorry.

            My persistent and apparently annoying probing is through a genuine attempt to understand other’s positions and to explain mine, obviously not always successfully.

  6. Rory says:

    “Right Duke has openly racist statements so pointing out to him acting like a non-openly racist person doesn’t do much!”

    Daniel, I think this is the type of thing that leads to confusion on Bob/Scott’s side. Duke doesn’t act like an open racist, but has openly racist statements that we can take to prove him to be a racist. Trump does not act openly racist, and has no openly racist statements (I assume you agree with both these points as you have said you don’t believe him to be *openly* racist, “merely” racist). However, taking away the “openly” piece really takes the wind out of the sails here; at bottom, the bar one has to clear to be a racist without being “openly racist” seems to be pure conjecture, which doesn’t really seem to make for the damning case that has anti-Trumpers on the left and right taking to their fainting couches. This may go to your point about splitting hairs; if you believe that someone has skirted the borders of being kinda-sorta racist for 30-40 years but falls just short of voicing literal racist statements or committing violence against minorities, is that person really not “open” about their racism?

    But then this is what is so weird to me about this whole situation: on one hand you have dog whistle theory, which as discussed in Scott’s piece is a whole bunch of presumably non-racists imagining what might appeal to actual racists, and immediately sniffing out these apparently poorly coded secret messages. Yet on the other hand you have Trump neither saying or doing anything explicitly racist, and indeed being at least rhetorically and outwardly non-racist, but it seems you would dismiss that as demographic apple-polishing. In this scenario, can we say that the actions or statements of Trump have any actual bearing on our judgement of him? I would say it’s fine if you want to say that you believe he’s a racist or you believe he’s intentionally pandering to them, but that is not some small qualification from “openly racist” – that is the most watered down version I can think of that still puts you in the rhetorical ballpark. Perspective on that, not just claims of “open racism” are what I took to be the greater point of Scott’s piece.

    Trump kisses black babies, shakes hands at black churches, and pledges to eliminate crime and poverty, but also says that he wants to make America great for Americans. You seem to say that you just know the former is pandering and the latter is indicative of racism, meanwhile saying that Scott’s piece is weak because he gets Trump cleared of racism charges on the “openly” technicality. I would say (and I think Bob would too) that then indicting him for being a racist instead of openly racist doesn’t give you a lower bar to clear, it just means you have an even shakier case of purely circumstantial evidence.

  7. Craw says:

    The shorter Harold: “No. I won’t give up my toy!”
    The shorter Kuehn: “But, association!”

  8. Dyspeptic says:

    Of course Trump is a racist because any good progressive race baiter can tell you that all white people are hopelessly racist (except progressive white race baiters of course). In fact, only white people are racist. All other racial groups are congenitally incapable of racism. It’s a moral failing that is unique to white folks along with homophobia, xenophobia, sexism and anti-Semitism. Furthermore there is nothing racist in believing that only one race can be racist and that all other races are imbued with moral superiority at birth because they are simply incapable of racism.

    After reading many of the arguments on this post I didn’t notice any attempts to define what racism actually means. Bigotry and racism are not the same thing. A bigot might refer to his black neighbor with some racially disparaging term in private without believing that the neighbor should be systematically oppressed by law or custom. If you believe everyone has the same individual rights regardless of race then you are not a racist. But you could be a bigot.

    My definition of racism is this: A belief that some racial group is inferior to ones own and that such inferiority justifies a legal and political regime of oppression against said group because in some fundamental way they must be de-humanized. But hey, what do I know, I’m white and I didn’t vote for Hillary, so I must be racist too.

    • Harold says:

      Dyspeptic, are you sure that the belief that all white people are hopelessly racist and only white people are capable of racism is standard belief of progressives? This is an absurd position and sounds to me like a straw man, but maybe I just don’t move in those circles.

      Personally, I believe the former has a grain of truth but it applies equally to all races. I believe we are all inclined to fear and suspicion of “outsiders” and we are all adept at justifying and rationalising our fears. Thus we are all inclined to racism, but not hopelessly so as we can, with thought and consideration, overcome our instinctive responses.

      The reason why racism by whites gets more attention in the USA is because whites are more powerful and can do more harm with their racism.

      In Africa there is what is called tribalism. This is abhorrent also, and the Rwanda massacres surely display this to everyone. It seems pointless to get hung up on whether we should call this family of bigotry racism, xenophobia, tribalism or something else. It is simply a distraction. The term racism acts as a reasonable catch all for normal discourse.

      As to your definition of racism, it is certainly one possible definition, but not one I think is shared by most people. I think most people believe one can be racist without legal and political oppression.

      Take someone who says “I don’t like blacks, wouldn’t employ blacks, wouldn’t let my daughter marry a black, wouldn’t have a black in my home or my club, but hey, yeah, they should not be treated differently by the law”.

      I think most people would say that person was racist, but they are not by your definition.

      • Craw says:

        I am asking you not to lie Harold. I am not suggesting this comment of yours contain any lies. I am just asking you not to lie. I also ask you not kill yourself, or any household pets. But, please Harold do not lie.

        See how the game is played?

        • Harold says:

          Craw, I withdraw my implication that Trump did not repudiate Duke. Can’t promise anything on the domestic pet thing if that dog has done it in the bathroom again. Can we end this particular game now?

          • Bob Murphy says:

            Harold wrote: “Can’t promise anything on the domestic pet thing if that dog has done it in the bathroom again. Can we end this particular game now?

            Oh I can’t stay mad at you…

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