TAMIU professor looks at how history will view Trump
Laredo Morning Times
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Dr. Jerry Thompson/
January has been a month chockful of noteworthy historic moments including Georgia electing its first Black senator, Joe Biden being sworn in as the 46th president and Donald Trump becoming the first president to be impeached twice.
However, history books in the future will have plenty of content to review during the Trump administration’s four years.
On Wednesday Jan. 6, a terroristic attack by an alt-right, pro-Trump extremist mob on the U.S. Capitol left four dead including a Capitol police officer. That same week, Trump’s announcement of refusing to attend president-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration was another first.
We didn t all go home and watch walter cronkite. crossfire. on the left, james carville and paul begala. on the right, robert novak and tucker carlson. in the crossfire i remember when jon stewart went on crossfire. it was 2004. john kerry was the democratic presidential nominee facing george w. bush. and i thought, you know, watching it, i said, this is going to be a funny show. can i say something very quickly? why do we have to fight? the two of you, can t we just say something nice about john kerry, right now. i like john. i care about john kerry. and something about president bush. he ll be unemployed soon. anyone who enjoyed paying attention to the news and watched the daily show will forever remember jon stewart going on crossfire and reading those guys the riot act. you re doing theater when you should be doing debate. it s not honest.
Neither did john addams. they felt it led to divisiveness. the manchurian candidate couldn t destroy us faster than barack obama. critics now claim the administration is actually pressuring certain disabled veterans to, quote, hurry up and die. what you saw in the media universe in the 2000s was the splintering of the political audience. roger ailes had the brilliant idea of creating a network for conservatives, thus fox news. the controversy over john kerry and his vietnam war medals has just gotten worse. msnbc kind of stumbled into the idea of a liberal counterpart. people watch fox news thinking there s news in it. racists, loons and pinheads. there was no longer a shared, factual basis for our political views.
Emotionally grappling with the hard questions. 40% of americans have a gun in their home. only 16% believe gun ownership is an absolute right. only 9% believe it s an absolute wrong. there s a middle and we can win them. they presented both sides as real human beings that cared. not easy being my vice president, is it? no, sir. this is a valentine toward public service that i think people were hungry for. and so this was a group of people just trying to make the world better. alexander hamilton didn t think we should have political parties. neither did john addams. they felt political parties led to divisiveness. the manchurian candidate couldn t destroy us faster than barack obama. critics now claim the administration is actually pressuring certain disabled veterans to, quote, hurry up and die. what you saw in the media universe in the 2000s was the splintering of the political
George w. bush. and i thought, you know, watching it, i said, this is going to be a funny show. can i say something very quickly? why do we have to fight? the two of you, can t we just say something nice about john kerry, right now. i like john. i care about john kerry. and something about president bush. he ll be unemployed soon. i think anyone who enjoyed paying attention to the news and watched the daily show will forever remember jon stewart going on crossfire and reading those guys the riot act. you re doing theater when you should be doing debate. which would be great. it s not honest. what you do is partisan hackery. and i ll tell you why i know it. you had john kerry on your show and you sniff his throne and you accuse us of partisan hackery? the show that leads into me is puppets making crank phone calls. what is wrong with you?