“What caused Donald Trump?” Surprise! It’s not what you think
New data disproves the mainstream chatter and assumptions
Gallup interviewed 87,428 Americans and were able to fine tune where support for Trump is coming from (who and where). It’s the driving cause behind his rise and will remain long after he has faded into the sunset over one of his golf courses.
Watch this five minute video as Ezra Klein of Vox Media describes the problem.
Video (5:37)
Video: Vox Media
SIDE NOTE: Our recent postings have been overly weighted to coverage of Donald Trump for one good reason. The narcissistic, bigoted, xenophobic, non-tax-paying billionaire is unworthy of visiting the Oval Office let alone occupying it, and he deserves no more respect than what he gives to others. None!
Trump isn’t likely to win, enough Americans aren’t that stupid (see Tom Friedman’s NYT column, “Trump? How could we?”). But his candidacy has ripped a veneer off of American society that should now be deeply examined by people in leadership positions who care more about their country than their self-serving needs in politics, business and the world.
“People are the worst”
Coming 2027
My personal history is the stuff they write books about. And that's what I am doing. The working title, "Chains of My Father: Marry White."
"The ghostly image of the tragic mulatto trapped between two worlds." - Barack Obama
This perspicacious line from the Prologue of Barack Obama's "Dream from My Father" wrenched my aspiration into action. I started writing, furiously. Unlike Obama's perspective, my pain had been for the opposite reason: I was not seen by whites as a "tragic mulatto," rather I lived every day of my childhood hoping whites were not "searching my eyes for some telltale sign" that I WAS mulatto. This is my story.
It's historical fiction because I cannot find enough records to substantiate all facets of the story. I've combed the genealogy, traveled to my father and grandparents' birthplace, walked the graveyards, searched the churches and ... well, all the facts aren't there. I've written three books based on the genealogy of other families but my ancestors emerged from a journey of too much slavery and too few records.
In Grenada, West Indies, my paternal, 3x great grandmother was a "freed slave" and my grandmother, Amelia, was born to a mixed race slave named Mary (we do not know her last name) and a white, French plantation owner, Fredric de Poullain. Amelia was raised in the "Big House" and in adulthood attempted to escape her black heritage by disowning her mother, telling her, "Get out and never come back." Amelia, the mother of twelve children, enshrined the family in her ancestors' commandment, "Marry white." Many did, including my father marrying mother a lovely, white, Anglo-Saxon protestant born in England. They met in Canada where my dad studied and became a doctor.
It has taken seven generations to be free of the stigma of black heritage but today my children embrace it. Unfortunately, the past 250 years have been a wasteland of bigotry and racism, but, on closer look, we see not only the brutality, fear and violence but the self-respect, dignity, love, perseverance and indomitable spirit.
The depth of historic perspective and the human inspiration has created a trilogy and as of this writing I have only arrived at the beginning of the 20th century. 1900 is the year my father was born and the beginning of Book III, and he's pushing me to make sure our story is published by the summer of 2027.
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