Eugene Robinson: Trump can’t ‘soften’ bigotry

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trump-cant-soften-bigotry/2016/09/01/b6aaf8b0-706f-11e6-9705-23e51a2f424d_story.html?postshare=3521472775630601&tid=ss_tw&utm_term=.b3110baaffd4

Trump can’t ‘soften’ bigotry
By Eugene Robinson Opinion writer September 1 at 7:34 PM


Donald Trump’s diatribe on immigration Wednesday night dispelled any conceivable doubt: He is a dangerous demagogue who rejects the values of openness and inclusion that made this country great. Rarely has an American politician given such an un-American speech.

Foreigners who come here seeking a better life are the scapegoats he blames for problems real and imagined. Never mind that Trump’s mother was an immigrant, or that two of his three wives came from overseas. Ronald Reagan saw this country as a shining city on a hill; Trump wants us to cower in fear behind a Berlin-style wall. Reagan invited millions of undocumented immigrants to stay and contribute to their adopted land; Trump wants to round them up, all 11 million, and ship them home.

That’s what he wants his loyal followers to believe, at least. Like any effective demagogue, Trump is fluent in doublespeak.

snip//

Earlier in the day, Trump tried his best to sound sober and statesmanlike in his meeting with Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto. By evening, though, he was back to insisting that Mexico would pay for the border wall, although “they don’t know it yet.” And on Thursday morning, Trump was again touting a “softening” in his immigration views.

But you can’t soften bigotry. You can’t soften jingoism. You can’t soften Trump’s naked appeal to anger and resentment. You can’t soften the fact that he rejects American exceptionalism, which is based on creed, in favor of tribalism based on ethnic purity.

He can’t be George Wallace one day and Thomas Jefferson the next.