Cagle World

Let’s talk about Claudine Gay, the first Black person and just the second woman to serve as Harvard University’s president, who resigned after months of turmoil.

Many on the conservative right celebrated Gay’s resignation with delirious fanfare. Christopher Rufo, the far-right activist and charlatan, obnoxiously announced Gay’s exit by tweeting the word “SCALPED.” In a Wall Street Journal op-ed, he gleefully cited it as a case study in how conservatives can successfully manhandle left-wing institutions.

Initially, it appeared that even after a less than satisfying appearance on Capitol Hill as part of an inquiry on antisemitism — which resulted in the resignation of former University of Pennsylvania president Liz Magill — Gay still maintained the solid support of the Harvard Governing Board .

Her position became more tenuous when the conservative Washington Free Beacon published additional stories that questioned her academic writings. The stream of revelations fueled growing discord among Harvard’s students and faculty, some of whom argued that the institution was embracing a double standard for its president that it would not allow for a typical undergraduate student.

To be sure, the responses of all three women were problematic. Instead of following the advice of misplaced overcoaching and endemically diplomatic legal counsel, they should have emphatically denounced genocide against any ethnic group and vilified racism, antisemitism, Islamophobia, and other forms of hate speech.

However, Republican New York Rep. Elise Stefanik hypocritically and obscenely accused these women of intolerance, considering she’s a staunch supporter of the great replacement theory. As Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin, who is Jewish, so deftly stated, “as a Trump supporter, Stefanik has no standing to criticize anyone on antisemitism. Trump was the one who saw ‘very fine people’ on both sides of the antisemitic riot . . . in Charlottesville in 2017.”

The truth is allegations of academic misconduct, racial and religious intolerance, and other related issues notwithstanding, the primary targets of the right  are diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives. The other issues were smokescreens. In fact, Rufo, major Harvard donor William Aikman and other individuals who ruthlessly targeted Gay overtly and arrogantly publicly stated as much.

The conservative right and more than a few neoliberals view DEI as the sinister two-headed dragon that benefits and rewards “supposedly undeserving and incompetent people.” These are code words (in fact bullhorns) for non-whites and in certain cases, women, and the attack on DEI initiatives is a useful tool they can exploit, manipulate and perversely weaponize for their self-serving sinister agendas.

Conservatives have long used a racist playbook as a guide to political victory. In the mid-1960s, the far right seized control of the Republican Party from the moderate Rockefeller wing. Richard Nixon’s Southern strategy guided the party in 1968 and 1972 Ronald Reagan invoked “big Black Bucks and welfare queens” during his 1980 campaign in Philadelphia, Mississippi, the site of the murder of three civil rights workers in 1964 for defending universal human rights. There was also George H. W. Bush’s racist stereotyping of Willie Horton in 1988 and the Obama birther conspiracy theories in 2008.

We are now at the beginning of another crucial election year in an America that remains heavily politically polarized. The white grievance that Donald Trump and his campaign intentionally and sinisterly agitated during his victory in 2016 have returned in 2024 with an additional list of fresh faces whose targets remain largely the same: women, non-whites, immigrants, and those deemed “other.”

Right-wing conservatives consider the resignation of Claudine Gay, being both Black and female, as a double triumph for their larger agenda.

In a recent New York Times op-ed, the former Harvard president wrote, “The campaign against me was about more than one university and one leader. This was merely a single skirmish in a broader war to unravel public faith in pillars of American society . For the opportunists driving cynicism about our institutions, no single victory or toppled leader exhausts their zeal.”

Her words certainly seem prophetic at the moment. Those of us committed to fairness and equality for all citizens, as opposed to a select few, must ensure that such a statement fails to reach fruition.

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Copyright 2024 Elwood Watson, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate

Elwood Watson is a professor of history, Black studies, and gender and sexuality studies at East Tennessee State University. He is also an author and public speaker.

Americans routinely plugged into the news cycle are aware of the fact that much ado was made about something (yes something) when Nikki Haley responded to a question from an audience member at a New Hampshire town about the cause of the Civil War.

The Republican presidential candidate awkwardly (arguably intentionally) sidestepped the real issue that resulted in one of our nation’s most pivotal events – slavery!

Rather than confront the truth head on and provide an honest response to the questioner, Haley attempted to dance around with the skill of a fish riding on a bicycle and fell flat on her butt. The intense commentary and backlash that followed her intellectually dishonest remarks had the former governor and United Nations ambassador feverishly backtracking, and the story is still percolating in the political arena.

Not surprisingly, Haley went on defense and offense, initially conceding that “of course, the Civil war was about slavery!” while simultaneously accusing the questioner of being a “Democratic plant.”

Haley’s horrendous response gave her political rivals the opportunity to seize on her foolish behavior. The ever acerbic Chris Christie wasted no time chastising Haley, making it clear that slavery was the major factor that resulted in the Civil War. Period. Even Ron “slavery was really not all that bad for Black people “DeSantis had the unmitigated gall to weigh in, levying criticism of Haley.

How could a person who was once the governor of South Carolina, the state that led the initiative to begin the war at Fort Sumner in 1861, be so unaware of such a pivotal, indisputable reality? Taking such a shameful position is classic political double speak. It is a prime example of cowardice. Most people know that slavery was one of the most pernicious vices known to mankind. It is a retrograde factor that has been deeply embedded in the fabric of our nation.

Although she is a Republican, Nikki Haley is still a person of color. She is the child of Indian immigrants. Her birth name is Nimrata Randhawa. Thus, it is perplexing (at least to me) that as a non-white person and woman would fiercely embrace a political party that often denounces, demonizes, and disrespects nearly everything she represents.

Besides a burning desire to be president, what would prompt her to engage in such demeaning antics? Self-hatred? Political expediency? Some other motive? What gives? Inquiring, socially-conscious minds want to know.

To be sure, no group of people – that includes non-white people – are monolithic. In fact, there are indeed people of color who are conservative in their political affiliation. That being said, even those individuals of racial minority groups (at least a notable percentage of them) are likely to be very apprehensive in supporting a party that at this current state is largely sponsored and represents far-right wing white nationalism.

Deep down, something tells me Nikki Haley and many other of her right-wing cohorts know the real truth. Such twisted and dishonest mental gymnastics are a sad reality.

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Copyright 2024 Elwood Watson, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate

Elwood Watson is a professor of history, Black studies, and gender and sexuality studies at East Tennessee State University. He is also an author and public speaker.

Latchkey kids. Slackers. Caffeine lovers. Grunge. That’s how a lot of people have referred to Generation X, the 46 million Americans, like myself, who were born between 1965 and 1980.

We were a generation that has been perennially pegged as cynical, self-indulgent, aimless, contrarian, and often peripheral when it comes to life and other everyday matters. But if we’re being honest, there are a lot of good reasons why many of us are cynical and disillusioned with life. Turmoil and instability have been major factors in some of our lives.

Gen Xers have been directly affected by downturns in the economy, perennial wars, deadly sexually transmitted diseases, and parents’ divorces. Moreover, we have frequently been eclipsed by some of our parents – the baby boomers (1946–1964), millennials (1980–1998), and occasionally even by others of us whose parents and grandparents are members of the silent generation (1925–1945), the group legendary journalists Tom Brokaw refers to as the greatest generation.

Did Gen X ever live in a period marked by stability? Most of us lived in times of chronically high levels of instability and a chilling degree of ambivalence. Despite that, we endure, we adapt, and we drive the culture, even if our own cultural moment as the “flavor of the month” in the early 1990s was brief.

From a sexual standpoint, fatal sexually transmitted diseases, such as herpes and the AIDS virus, confronted segments of our generation with a demonstrably high degree of ruthlessness and despair. A number of us saw friends, colleagues and in some cases, a loved one fall victim to such maladies.

This sort of marginalization has always been a part of our unorthodox history. When the oldest Baby Boomers turned 60 in 2006, numerous magazines ran cover stories that both celebrated and analyzed the supposed impact of what such a distinctive milestone actually meant. Conversely, outside of some obscure, diminutive op-ed pieces, no major mainstream publications ran similar stories when Gen X hit their half-century milestone in 2015. The perception of the often overlooked, frequently neglected middle child syndrome validated itself.

While Boomers continue to influence culture and society by embracing new age philosophies, religions, and predominantly left-leaning politics, Gen X has adopted a much more iconoclastic political spirit. This is evident in our diverse political views. Polls conducted over the better part of the past decade have indicated that many of the older Gen Xers lean towards conservatism, while younger members of our cohort identify with a more liberal ideology.

We are a group of men and women who readily embraced a pluralistic culture, from our pre-teen years well into early adulthood and beyond, as evidenced by a diverse selection of movies ranging from “The Breakfast Club” to “Reality Bites” to the iconic “Boyz in the Hood,” directed by the late John Singleton.

We were the children of rap, new wave, alternative, and MTV. We were raised in a post-Kennedy, post-Watergate, post-Vietnam world. Unlike our Boomer predecessors, most of us never had idealistic dreams of changing the world, nor did we grow up in a world with an obsessive dependency on helicopter parents, unlike our Millennial successors. In short, we grew up looking at the world head-on, neither up at it idealistically, nor down on it as a larger force that should take care of us.

It will be interesting to witness what type of reception the oldest Gen Xers will receive from the larger pop culture when they turn 60 in 2025. Will the pattern of being disregarded continue or will we be pleasantly acknowledged? Time will tell in short order.

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Copyright 2023 Elwood Watson, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate

Elwood Watson is a professor of history, Black studies, and gender and sexuality studies at East Tennessee State University. He is also an author and public speaker.

Most of us are aware of Donald Trump’s habit of routinely espousing devious and derogatory rhetoric. What we apparently were unaware of was the boundaries he was willing cross, and his willingness to parrot the words of one of the most sadistic and scurrilous human beings to ever walk this earth.

During a campaign stop at a hockey rink New Hampshire last week, Trump echoed the words of Adolf Hitler with comments about migrants from mostly Africa, Asia and South America “poisoning the blood of our country.” This phrase is mentioned a number of times in Hitler’s book “Mein Kampf” to describe the “influx of foreign blood” as “poison.”

When asked about such problematic remarks, most Republicans refused to respond. Lindsey Graham, the South Carolina senator who flip flops with the frequency of a weathervane, said, “We’re talking about language. I could care less what language people use as long as we get it right.”

On the contrary, Chris Christie, one of Trump’s most diehard critics on the right, wasted no time going after Trump, “He’s disgusting,” Christie said. “And what he’s doing is dog-whistling to Americans who feel absolutely under stress and strain from the economy and from the conflicts around the world.”

Christie is one the few Republican politicians who have any semblance of a political spine. After all, did Graham believe that Trump was “right” in the language he espoused? If so, what was he spot on about? The fact that Republican presidential candidates Nikki Haley and Vivek Ramaswamy – both the products of immigration themselves – refused to weigh in on the issue demonstrates how low the party of Lincoln has sunk.

The Biden campaign wasted little time in seizing on such rancid commentary, slamming Trump for parroting Hitler, praising Kim Jong Un, and quoting Vladimir Putin.

“Trump is not shying away from his plan to lock up millions of people into detention camps and continues to lie about that time when Joe Biden obliterated him by over 7 million votes three years ago,” Biden’s campaign said in a statement. “Echoing the grotesque rhetoric of fascists and violent white supremacists and threatening to oppress those who disagree with the government are dangerous attacks on the dignity and rights of all Americans, on our democracy, and on public safety,”

While I agree with the Biden White house that such rhetoric is deplorable, the reality is there are many Americans who concur with Trump’s perverse assessment. These men and women see America as a nation by, of and for white people, and that everyone else is not entitled to reside within its borders and have no right to partake in its advantages.

If reelected, Trump has vowed to complete the border wall, reimplement travel bans and spearhead mass deportation efforts. He has also pledged to outlaw birthright citizenship for those born to immigrants living in the country illegally. Thus, whenever Donald Trump gleefully embraces such “blood and soil” rhetoric at rallies on the campaign trail, it is eagerly anticipated catnip for his diehard MAGA supporters to feast upon.

Racial, gender and cultural politics have always been at the forefront of American society. Think slavery, suffrage, civil rights. Today the dissension is splintered across several issues, including immigration, race, abortion, sexuality, free speech, and religious freedom.

The current Republican Party has become so rapacious and amoral in its blind thirst for power, they seem determined to nullify any election outcomes or social movements not conducive to their agenda. We have already seen the GOP engage in this sort of undemocratic activity with voter suppression and the restrictive election laws they have enacted.

Republicans made the decision decades ago to forgo all efforts to win over the votes an ever-increasing non-white, racially diverse, left-leaning populace. Instead, they have decided to repress all entities whose ideology does not square with theirs.

The acrimonious rhetoric of the far right betrays an undeniable truth – they are terrified their stronghold on the current state of affairs will erode if they are unable to manipulate the laws and future elections. Thus, they are attempting to establish a form of minority rule, a sort-of “Jim Crow 2” for the 21st century.

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Copyright 2023 Elwood Watson, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate

Elwood Watson is a professor of history, Black studies, and gender and sexuality studies at East Tennessee State University. He is also an author and public speaker.

The late author Maya Angelou once stated, “When people show you who they are, believe them.”

Nowhere is that saying more applicable than the latest rantings of Donald Trump.

The former president was asked twice during a Fox News town hall last week if he would rule out any abuse of power as retribution against his critics if he ends up returning to the White House.

“Except for day one,” Trump responded, noting he would use his presidential powers to close the southern border with Mexico and expand oil drilling. “After that, I’m not a dictator.”

No one should be caught off guard by such rhetoric coming from Trump. The twice-impeached former commander-in-chief has made it clear he is still seething about being voted out during the 2020 election. He is storming mad at Mike Pence, his former vice president, for refusing to falsely certify the election results in his favor. The emotions Trump harbors toward his Republican rivals are volcanic levels of seething anger.

The current Republican presidential frontrunner has scurrilously attacked his opponents  —  referring to them as “vermin”  —  and has made it clear in no uncertain terms he intends to seek revenge against all who have “wronged” him.

Trump has all but directly stated that one of his major goals during his second term is to fire major segments of the federal bureaucracy and target his rivals for prosecution. The comments have alarmed Democrats and become a chief election argument for Joe Biden as he prepares for a potential round two match against Trump.

“Donald Trump has been telling us exactly what he will do if he’s reelected and tonight, he said he will be a dictator on day one. Americans should believe him,” Biden campaign manager Julie Chavez Rodriguez said in a statement.

Last week, Biden told campaign donors he wasn’t sure he’d be running for reelection if Donald Trump wasn’t also in the race, warning that democracy is “more at risk in 2024.” In response, Trump has falsely claimed Biden is the “destroyer of American democracy” as he repeated his longstanding and entirely baseless contention that the four criminal indictments against him show Biden is misusing the federal justice system to damage his chief political rival. Moreover, to pacify the current president’s detractors, Trump has promised to prosecute Biden if he wins.

For the record, Biden has not been involved in any of the more than 90 federal indictments Trump is facing.

From a historical perspective, autocratic leaders rarely change once they return to power. The danger lies in the fact that too many journalists, political observers, pundits, and ordinary folk appear to be under the impression that since the nation did not end up succumbing to fascist state during his first term, that we have nothing to be all that concerned about if Trump gets a second term.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Escaping death the first time does not mean that a person should tempt faith the second time around.

This is also the same president who was able to appoint three Supreme Court justices in one term. These justices – Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett – along with Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, and occasional swing voter John Roberts would all but likely concur with him on items like immigration, voting rights, and abortion, just to name a few.

The majority of Republican politicians would submit to his demands, out of agreement, fear or resignation. After all, Trump has outlasted, cowered into submission or engineered successful efforts in defeating leading Republican lawmakers who have independent standing and demonstrated any degree of defiance toward opposing him.

The aforementioned realities and possibilities hardly provide any degree of inspiration for those of us who previously had faith in our system of checks and balances. That’s why it is crucial that those of us who are committed to the preservation of American democracy fight like hell to preserve it.

After all, faith and hope may be all we have left if Trump is successful in securing reelection next November.

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Copyright 2023 Elwood Watson, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate

Elwood Watson is a professor of history, Black studies, and gender and sexuality studies at East Tennessee State University. He is also an author and public speaker.

Do as I say, not as I do. This sort of Victorian philosophy seems to be par for the course among many of the so-called family values conservatives.

Recent reports that Christian Ziegler, the husband of Moms for Liberty co-founder Bridget Ziegler, is under police investigation in Sarasota, Fla. following a rape allegation sent shockwaves through the right-wing echo chamber while eliciting eye rolls from many progressives and others on the cultural left.

Local reporters for the Florida Trident interviewed a woman who said she was involved in a “three-year consensual ménage à trois sexual relationship” with the Zieglers, who have conceded that such a relationship took place. Furthermore, the report states she had been alone with Christian Ziegler, chair of the Florida GOP, the night of the alleged rape.

So far, Christian Ziegler has not been charged, and is resisting growing bipartisan calls from Governor Ron DeSantis and state Democrats to step down.

“I don’t see how he can continue with that investigation ongoing given the gravity of those situations,” DeSantis said. “He’s innocent till proven guilty, but we just can’t have a party chair that is under that type of scrutiny.”

The fact that Christopher and Bridgett Ziegler, both high level officials in Florida politics, were having group sex with a woman have led to accusations of hypocrisy from Democrats and LGBTQ groups.

“As leaders in the Florida GOP and Moms for Liberty, the Zieglers have made a habit out of attacking anything they perceive as going against ‘family values’ — be it reproductive rights or the existence of LGBTQ+ Floridians,” Florida Democratic Party chair Nikki Fried said in a statement. “The level of hypocrisy in this situation is stunning.”

We have seen similar narratives in prior situations, men and women who wildly hurl stones while residing in fractured glass houses. Remember Jerry Falwell Jr. anyone?

Groups like Moms for Liberty and their socially conservative co-horts often target everyone from drag queens to school officials of being sympathetic to sexual predators and similar deviants. Just last month, a similar story exposed a Philadelphia organizer for Moms of Liberty for his 2012 conviction of sexual abuse of a 14-year-old boy.

Moms for Liberty, founded in 2021, originally focused on opposition to pandemic-era restrictions in schools, but has since expanded to supporting parents’ rights to ban books they deem inappropriate from classrooms and school libraries. The group has managed to emerge as a pivotal voice in Republican politics, with many candidates jockeying to earn endorsements from the organization.

One major reason why DeSantis and other GOP politicians seem to be so eager to cut their ties is due to the fact Moms for Liberty has ended up being bad news from a political standpoint. The group’s Orwellian agenda of banning books and bullying LGBTQ students and teachers turned out to be vehemently unpopular. Being publicly linked to Moms for Liberty hurt Republicans in the midterms, most notably in school board races, where Democrats won overwhelmingly in districts that the group had targeted for takeovers.

Moms for Liberty is hardly an aberration. Such groups have deep roots in American history, like the grassroots workers who maintained the system of racial segregation and Jim Crow.

There has always been a segment of Americans — primary white — who have harbored rabid levels of hostility and hatred toward individuals they view and perceive as “the other.” These men and women were largely forced to discuss and reaffirm their racist and bigoted viewpoints with like-minded individuals. For much of our recent history, their outpourings were confined to secret conferences, white supremacist communications, underground newsletters, obscure far-right magazines and radio programs and in more recent decades, the darkest corners of the web.

With permission of the politically-infected racist and acidic climate of the Trump years, such rhetoric and sentiments were granted permissive license to expose and express themselves in the larger public domain, and have been eagerly embraced by those who identify with such a regressive value system.

It is incumbent upon those of us determined to reside in an America where diversity of all facets are allowed to flourish without fear of being harmed or silenced. The future of democracy, as we know it, may very well depend on it.

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Copyright 2023 Elwood Watson, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate

Elwood Watson is a professor of history, Black studies, and gender and sexuality studies at East Tennessee State University. He is also an author and public speaker.

Waterloo. The apocalypse. The Titanic. These are just some of the terms observers are employing to describe the current state of the Republican party.

For many, there is a deep-seated sentiment the party of Abraham Lincoln is coming apart at the seams and imploding at Armageddon-like speed.

Talk of political parties facing impending doom is nothing new. Similar rhetoric was levied toward the Democratic Party in the mid-1980s after it had endured consecutive losses at the presidential level, including a massive 49-state rout in 1984. Such a misguided prediction failed to reach fruition, as the Democrats recaptured the White House in 1992 under the leadership of Bill Clinton and managed to occupy a sizable number of congressional seats for much of the decade.

That being said, it does appear the Republican party does seem to be engaging in a level of infighting and dysfunction that has even the most cynical observers stepping back and taking notice.

What is even more striking — or amusing, depending on your point of view — is rather than looking inward to find the root of such problems, many members of the party establishment seem to be looking for scapegoats. President Biden, radical leftists, Darth Vader, Frankenstein, the Grinch that stole Christmas, you name it. In their eyes, the rapid unraveling of the party is the fault of everyone but the GOP itself.

Of all the supposed suspects, Trump is the nauseating symptom that arouses the ire of many loyal GOP establishment voters. To this Reaganite segment of voters, the former president has managed to regressively transform the party and caused unprecedented havoc within its ranks.

Trump has served as a sort of ruthless, callous villain causing the traditional establishment segment of the Republican party to either cry out in blood curling pain or curl up in the fetal position out of fear and despair. But the cold, hard reality is the current dilemma that Republicans are facing is that the problem lies within the party itself. Period.

Republican lawmakers have significantly contributed to the less than stellar public image of the party. Recent elections occurred at a moment when House Republicans have behaved in a manner that has caused considerable apprehension among the public, thanks to the party’s inability to effectively govern. Such Hemingway levels of drama have affected perceptions of Republicans in the House and put their already slim majority at risk.

Several years after his ascendancy to the presidency, it comes as no surprise many Republicans still find the vehemently racist, sexist, and xenophobic rhetoric routinely hurling from the habitually wayward mouth of Donald Trump very appealing.

Neoliberalism, unchecked globalization, outsourcing, stagnant wages and limited economic mobility have had a dramatic effect on the livelihood of these men and women. However, the fact is that such undeniable factors have affected many of the same groups of people they point the finger at and blame for their current predicament. Rather than being cognizant of this fact, it appears to be easier to revert to a “it’s their fault, not mine” mentality.

That’s because Trump is speaking their language. He generously throws out the fresh red meat and employs the not-so-subtle dog whistles (some would argue bullhorns) to a disaffected base of voters who harbor anger, resentment and frustration due to the fact they largely feel threatened and marginalized.

The misguided commonality these voters share with the larger GOP base is they are under the illusion (or rather delusion) that their problems have been caused by minorities, feminists, immigrants, gays and lesbians — basically anyone who doesn’t fall within a white, Christian conservative category they believe to be real Americans.

In their minds, such groups are the supposed “others” who are the cause of America’s decline. They are seen as problematic and must be taken care of in one manner or another. This is the demographic of men and women who continue to embrace Trump as their savior as he consistently promises to “get them to the promised land.”

As the old saying goes, “old habits can be hard to break.”

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Copyright 2023 Elwood Watson, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate

Elwood Watson is a professor of history, Black studies, and gender and sexuality studies at East Tennessee State University. He is also an author and public speaker.

Donald Trump is telling us he’s a threat to democracy. We just have to listen.

Earlier this month on his Truth Social website,  Trump threatened to “expel” and “cast out” government workers who oppose his radical views, describing them as a “sick political class” that hates the country. The 2024 election, he wrote, “is our final battle.”

Sound apocalyptic to you?

The former president’s use of the words “cast out” elicited a chorus of praise from his most loyal constituency: white evangelicals. That sort of term is commonly used by evangelicals, Pentecostals and more radical Christians to describe the exorcism of demonic forces. Such demons could be as diverse as sexual to educational to political in nature.

Trump knows that these communities, particularly their older members, harbor beliefs deeply etched in the right-wing anti-communism of the Cold War era. Differing political ideologies – communism, socialism, and Marxism – were seen not only anti-American, but also anti-Christian.

Trump’s continued support from white evangelicals demonstrates how much they embrace his desire to abolish democracy and reconstruct a xenophobic government in their own image. To them, Trump is the answer, their salvation.

For the past several years since Trump was elected, leaders of and subscribers to this political segment of American politics have engaged in the most destructive rhetoric publicly expressed by paranoid citizens since the days of the early McCarthy era. During the height of the Black power era, even President Richard Nixon’s infamous “southern strategy” of the late 1960s and early 1970s, which was able to successfully garner the support of the region by manipulating racist whites fearful and resentful of the civil rights movement, did not seem so overtly hostile in its aims.

The face that minorities have managed to secure Supreme Court seats and live in the White House have driven a number of these “Leave it to Beaver” fans mad with paranoia. In the idolized post-World War II suburbia they pine for, non-white people were absent from the top echelons of power in the U.S.

Trump’s acidic rhetoric is seen as a license by his followers to demean and disregard others just as he does. He portrays others as existential threats, determined to destroy everything his MAGA base admires about America. It signals to his supporters that disregarding basic human restraint and destroying your perceived enemies “by any means necessary” is permissible.

While there are some conservatives who have denounced the tactics of their more extreme brethren, they seem to be isolated voices in the wilderness rather than taken seriously among Republicans as rational voices of reason.

The current Republican Party has become so rapacious in its blind thirst for power, its members seem determined to attack and nullify any movements not conducive to their dystopian agenda. We have already witnessed the party engage in this sort of undemocratic activity with voter suppression and the duplicative election laws they have enacted.

The acrimonious rhetoric of the far right betrays the undeniable truth that they are terrified and aware that their stronghold on the current state of affairs will erode if they are unable to manipulate the laws and future elections. Thus, they are attempting to establish a form of minority rule.

If democracy is to survive, they must be stoped.

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Copyright 2023 Elwood Watson, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate

Elwood Watson is a professor of history, Black studies, and gender and sexuality studies at East Tennessee State University. He is also an author and public speaker.

Recently, I was heading home from a local coffeehouse. Along the way, at one specific intersection, there were a few men in a pickup truck with a Confederate flag. Two men were sitting in the back of the truck, and one of them proceeded to yell at me, “Do you see this flag?!”

I rolled down my window and delivered a blunt commentary to the guy, letting my emotions get the best of me. He responded with “White power” at the same moment the truck took off and headed down the highway. I was angry and irritated, and let out a loud yell to release my anger.

The Confederate flag is viewed as a symbol of oppression that has been deeply embraced and embedded by the darker forces of our nation. It’s searing and oppressive representation has had a profoundly negative impact on people of color.

Initially, the flag represented 19th century Southern culture to preserve slavery and White supremacy. Later on, the Ku Klux Klan embraced the flag. The same was true of the White Citizens’ Councils and other white supremacist groups made up of upscale, prominent people who steadfastly opposed integration.

The flag experienced a fierce amount of promotion as the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 60s advanced throughout much of the nation. After the Supreme Court’s 1954 landmark decision in Brown v. Board of Education, white Southerners employed the Confederate flag to physically and psychologically intimidate civil rights activists and demonstrate states’ willingness to protect segregation by any means necessary.

As Black Americans continued to amass political power, such gains challenged and upended the social order. Debates concerning the history of the flag over the past 60-plus years have resulted in ongoing controversies at the local, state and national level. In response to such upheaval, there have been a number of notable attempts to obscure the flag’s profile in any arena that could be identified as public property. In 2020, NASCAR banned the Confederate flag from being displayed at all of its events and properties.

Despite such efforts, over the past several years, the flag has been brazenly touted and displayed at Trump rallies and other conservative right-wing events.

No matter how often its supporters attempt to modify, codify, defend or protect its meaning or legacy, the truth is there is nothing redemptive about the Confederate flag. It is a searing symbol of hate, violence, pain, and oppression. There is nothing admirable about its sinister and rapacious history and  nothing ambiguous about its scurrilous message.

No amount of perverse denial or disingenuous revisionist history desperately promoted by some on the right can or will alter this unalterable fact.

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Copyright 2023 Elwood Watson, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate

Elwood Watson is a professor of history, Black studies, and gender and sexuality studies at East Tennessee State University. He is also an author and public speaker.

Thought the level of civil discourse in Congress could not get any worse? Guess what, it has! It now appears America’s top legislative body has become the political equivalent of the WWE.

Earlier this week, Oklahoma Republican Sen. Markwayne Mullin nearly got into a fistfight with labor union leader Sean O’Brien in the middle of a Senate committee hearing.

“Sir, this is a time, this is a place. You want to run your mouth, we can be two consenting adults, we can finish it here,” Mullin said during the hearing.

“OK, that’s fine. Perfect,” O’Brien shot back.

“You want to do it now?” Mullin asked. “Stand your butt up then.”

“You stand your butt up,” O’Brien responded, prompting Mullin to stand up from his chair.

Vermont senator Bernie Sanders, the chairman of the committee, was forced to step in, admonishing Mullin, telling him, “You’re a United States senator!”

The message was clear: Sanders was telling his senate colleague that due to his position, he needed to rise above such behavior.

Sad to say, this was not the only juvenile behavior that occurred that day. California Republican Rep. Kevin McCarthy, the former Speaker of the House, got into an absurd spat by apparently elbowing his colleague, Tennessee Rep. Tim Burchett, in the back.

“Why’d you elbow me in the back, Kevin?” Burchett yelled at the former speaker, according to audio of the exchange. “Hey Kevin, you got any guts!? Jerk.”

Burchett then chased after the 58-year-old McCarthy, who denied he’d done anything untoward.

“I didn’t elbow you in the back,” McCarthy said, according to NPR congressional correspondent Claudia Grisales.

“You got no guts, you did so … the reporter said it right there, what kind of chicken move is that?” Burchett said before adding: “You’re pathetic, man, you are so pathetic.”

“What a jerk,” Burchett repeated before telling McCarthy in a parting shot: “You need security, Kevin.”

Grisales, who was talking with Burchett at the time, tweeted that the impact almost knocked Burchett directly into her.

Oh, by the way, did I mention Republican Rep. James Comer, the chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, referred Florida Democratic Rep. Jared Moskowitz as a “Smurf?!” Talk about men behaving badly, madly, and sadly.

It wasn’t just the boys who were showing their behinds that day, so to speak. Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, never one to forgo engaging in the lowest levels of rancid, regressive civility, called fellow Republican Rep. Darrell Issa a “p‑‑‑‑,” after he attacked her for lacking the “maturity and experience” to understand the proper way to bring an impeachment vote against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. This is hardly surprising given her dismal track record on this issue.

While neither party can claim total innocence as far as behavioral perfection is concerned, at the moment, the vast majority of unhinged, retrograde antics are coming from Republicans. But such dysfunctional rancor isn’t solely the province of the 21st century politicans.

Violence was routinely commonplace in the pre-Civil War era, when, the nation was bitterly divided over the issue of slavery. Multiple institutions were struggling — and failing — to stay united. The telegraph was the major media of the era. Large segments of the media, as is the case today, sensationalized the struggle to promote their cause and increase their profits.

Congressional bullying was useful in those fraught decades, and the proponents of slavery, the majority of them being Southerners, engaged in such aggressive actions eagerly and shamelessly. They tended to be armed and ready to fight. Every Congress was composed of its fair share of goonish bullies who defended the institution of slavery with threats and violence. Some of these thugs brashly garnished weapons in plain view as a warning to those who would consider challenging them. Not surprisingly, their constituents preferred that they took such confrontational positions. To them, they were unyielding efforts to maintain Southern dominance.

We are centuries away from such semi-primitiveness. It is downright shameful to see members of Congress denigrating themselves in such a manner. Politicians, or any of us who are supposedly adults, cannot allow juvenile instincts to overtake more rational judgments. Although, I guess the operative word here is adults.

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Copyright 2023 Elwood Watson, distributed by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate

Elwood Watson is a professor of history, Black studies, and gender and sexuality studies at East Tennessee State University. He is also an author and public speaker.