Who We Are Up Against: A Follow Up

On November 8th, I wrote a post entitled Who We Are Up Against.  In this post, I addressed my frustrations with those who still think Donald Trump is doing a good job as President. Who are these people, I wondered.


By way of example, I cited a feature posted on Politico which interviewed some Trump supporters in Johnstown, PA. I was aghast at the willful ignorance of the residents interviewed in this piece about why they supported Trump in the first place and continue to do so now.


Also aghast: the leaders of Johnstown, PA. In an open letter to Politico, the mayor and 14 other community leaders took issue with reporter Michael Kruse and his portrayal of their town, "by taking the hateful words of those few and elevating them into a story labeled 'a letter from Johnstown'." 


The open letter from Johnstown's leaders extols the virtues of their community and various progressive things that are happening there. They take exception to the negative light cast on their town by the people Kruse interviewed. Especially some very explicitly racist comments made at the close of the piece by the Trump supporters he interviewed. 


Kudos to the good people of Johnstown and the good things they are doing for their town. But I didn't see Kruse's piece as an indictment of Johnstown. Hell, I didn't even see it as an indictment of the people he talked to. They said what they said and he reported it accordingly.


Me, I will judge them: they are small minded, ignorant, racist morons. The sad truth is they exist. They exist in Johnstown, PA and they exist in towns and cities all over this country. And they exist in sufficient quantities to put that small minded, ignorant, racist moron with the gopher on his head in the White House.


Yes, good people of Johnstown, PA, there is more to your town than the small minded, ignorant, racist morons who dwell among you. But that is the point, I think: that no matter how much good we may find in any part of our country, there will be small minded, ignorant, racist morons somewhere in there. And as we have so tragically seen in the last year, we ignore them at our peril. 


It is imperative to shine a light on our shame less it thrive in the shadows of fear, hatred and ignorance.