In a recent article in the Independent, Noah Berlatsky comments on the speech by Donald Trump’s defence lawyer Bruce Castor, one that has been universally castigated as bumbling and incompetent. Berlatsky strikingly states that: “the truth is that Castor could have stood up for two hours and made farting noises with his underarm, and his client would still be acquitted.” Republican senators have already indicated that they will vote to acquit before hearing the evidence, never mind weighing up, the merits of the case. The GOP is a white identity party, committed to traditional hierarchies of race, gender, sexuality, religion, and wealth. Trump is their perfect president because he shows “that the only qualification for rule is to be white, straight, Christian, male and rich”.
Ta-Nehisi Coates 2017 article “The First White President” for the Atlantic argued that Trump is “a white man who would not be president were it not for this fact” – meaning he was the president who had no qualifications, talents, accomplishments, or experience to his name other than his identity as a wealthy white man.
Berlatsky continues: “White supremacy is not actually an ideology of superiority. It’s at base an ideology of entitled inefficacy. The Trump ethos is that the most incompetent, foolish, evil white man in the country is worthy to rule simply because he is a white man.” Protecting that privilege seems to matter more to Republican senators than the rights and wrongs of the January 6 Capitol invasion and Trump’s role in inciting it, even though theirs were among the lives endangered.
Read the full article here.
