The NFL's "Black Lives Matter Moment" Shows Trump’s Growing Weakness

I will admit I am not a fan of professional sports, especially football.  I go to a friend's annual Super Bowl party for the social event aspect, but never the game.  To the extent I follow sports at all, it's at the college level, typically focused on my alma mater and that of my late parents. And growing up, I focused on individual sports like cross country, skiing, water skiing and surfing.  All of this is a roundabout way of saying that I'm not a fan of the NFL which is all about money and appeasing fans as opposed to sportsmanship.  As for NFL/football fans, if as much attention and time was placed on politics so as to elect decent politicians and on bettering our communities, the nation would be a far better place.  Thus, I found it interesting that outwardly the NFL altered its position on racial discrimination and embraced (somewhat insincerely, in my view) the Black Lives Matter cause.  I doubt that the move was motivated by any real conviction but instead due to (i) the shifting winds of public opinion and (ii) the flagging influence of the racist-in-chief in the White House.  A piece in New York Magazine looks at Trump's shrinking ability to intimidate the NFL.  Here are excerpts:

When NFL commissioner Roger Goodell admitted in an oddly low-res video on Friday evening that the league was wrong for “not listening to NFL players earlier” — and then actually uttered the phrase “Black Lives Matter” — it was widely seen as a cynical gesture from a company hack who finally acquiesced to public pressure, rather than a heartfelt gesture of genuine remorse.

Slate’s Joel Anderson saw Goodell’s pandering for what it was, writing, “Goodell’s empty gestures tell us nothing about what the NFL thinks of black lives. . . . . the NFL loves nothing more than a hollow branding opportunity. Goodell’s “admission” was yet another one.

What happened next should not have been surprising. On Sunday night, President Trump, tweeting through it as always, attempted to bust out one of his greatest hits.

[B]ack when the NFL-kneeling story line began, Trump muscled his way into the conversation by claiming that owners should “get that son of a bitch off the field right now” when players took a knee, and encouraging fans to leave the stadium when it happened. (A month later, his vice-president would do just that, at considerable taxpayer expense.) Goodell called Trump’s comments “divisive,” but ignored players’ requests that he support a racial equality program. Ultimately, Goodell caved to Trump and his supporters by banning kneeling altogether during the national anthem; nevertheless, Trump was back at it a year later, just to make sure Goodell remembered who held the leash. That Goodell acceded so quickly and totally to Trump three years ago is one of the reasons his statement on Friday felt so empty; nobody believes his platitudes anymore, nor should they.

[T]here is reason to think that this time will be different. That’s partly because Goodell and the NFL owners have witnessed the same shift in power and influence over the last fortnight that you and I can. And it’s partly because so much of the frustration with the NFL’s stance on Black Lives Matter has come from inside Goodell’s organization; a terrific Athletic piece details how a video made by NFL players, and produced internally by a “rogue” employee, forced Goodell’s hand. I wonder, though, if the bigger reason for Goodell’s new posture is even simpler: Goodell isn’t particularly scared of Trump anymore. There was a time when Goodell had to bob and weave along with every presidential broadside, when he had to pattern league policy around Trump’s Twitter mood swings. But the Trump of 2017 — or even of a few months ago — was a much more powerful Trump than the one we have before us now.

You could attach Trump’s diminishment in influence to the widespread condemnation and disgust with his gassing of protesters for a particularly lame-brained photo-op stunt last Monday. You could say it’s because of his lagging poll numbers generally, or the fact that Trump is looking more and more like a scared man hiding inside a black-fence-fortified prison of his own making. But one of the undeniable takeaways from the last week is that Trump looks weaker than he has at any time during his presidency. (We have reached the point of the cycle when aides are anonymously complaining that his wife is undermining him.) And when you are weak, no matter how much you might bluster and stomp your feet, people don’t fear you like they once did. Even someone as skittish as Goodell.

When Trump’s national anthem tweets were front-page news, the NFL owners and a few player representatives held a secret meeting, which the Times obtained audio of. What’s telling reading that story today is how terrified the league was of Trump:

If there’s a lesson the NFL earned from the entire debacle, it’s that Trump didn’t have the power back then that they feared he did … and that he definitely doesn’t have it now. Look at the week Drew Brees just had. On Wednesday, he told Yahoo Finance he would “never agree with anybody disrespecting the flag.” There has probably never been a time in NFL history, up until now, when  expressing that opinion would have constituted  a problem for Brees. But on Thursday, after an overwhelming uproar (including among his own teammates), Brees apologized, and then apologized again. That led Trump to tweet that he was a “big fan” of Brees but that he should have never said sorry,  and that “OLD GLORY is to be revered, cherished, and flown high.” But Brees, smartly, realized that Trump was nothing to be scared of. He went on Instagram and addressed the president directly: “We must stop talking about the flag and shift our attention to the real issues of systemic racial injustice, economic oppression, police brutality, and judicial & prison reform.”

That has to be a large part of the mindset of Goodell: While the safe thing three years ago might have been to capitulate to Trump, the safe thing now is to do the exact opposite. In 2017, you knew you had to deal with the president, one way or another, for the next three years. Now? Now you might be rid of him in a few months. And you’re aware — more aware than you were then — that his bark is a lot worse than his bite. This is the one trick he has, the Big Kneeling Threat. He’s beginning to look like an elderly coach trying to win in today’s NFL with the old T-formation playbook he used in the 1950s — in other words, like someone whose time has passed.

How is the league going to deal with Trump trying to turn this into a wedge issue once again? I think Goodell and the NFL are going to just ignore him. The players have shown the power they have in this situation, and their willingness to wield it. The fan base has shown it isn’t actually going to stop watching football because of Trump’s perpetual culture war.

The proper response, it’s becoming increasingly clear, is to either pretend he doesn’t exist — or maybe even to actively defy him. He’s not the Trump of three years ago. The movement and the people are more powerful than he is, and they always were. Roger Goodell knows that now. The NFL knows that now. Maybe, now, we all do.

Animus Towards Others - The Real Motivation of Trump's Base

Before the results from the elections on November 7, 2017, came in, Politico ran a piece that looked at Trump voters in southwest Pennsylvania and their continued allegiance to Trump despite the fact that Trump has to date delivered little if anything that is substantively making their lives better.  After some analysis, the piece gets down to what really continues to bind these voters to Trump: he displays animus towards the same people and ethnic groups that they despise.   The problem is, however, as Ed Gillespie discovered, on Tuesday, is that the animus that motivates Trump's base alienates a majority of voters.  A piece in Bear Drift, a conservative/GOP blog in Virginia looks at this other reality and the bind it will put on the GOP going forward.  First, here are excerpts from the Politico piece:

[P]olling continues to show that—in spite of unprecedented unpopularity—nearly all people who voted for Trump would do it again. But as I compared this year’s answers to last year’s responses it seemed clear that the basis of people’s support had morphed. Johnstown voters do not intend to hold the president accountable for the nonnegotiable pledges he made to them. It’s not that the people who made Trump president have generously moved the goalposts for him. It’s that they have eliminated the goalposts altogether.

This reality ought to get the attention of anyone who thinks they will win in 2018 or 2020 by running against Trump’s record. His supporters here, it turns out, are energized by his bombast and his animus more than any actual accomplishments. For them, it’s evidently not what he’s doing so much as it is the people he’s fighting. Trump is simply and unceasingly angry on their behalf, battling the people who vex them the worst—“obstructionist” Democrats, uncooperative establishment Republicans, the media, Black Lives Matter protesters and NFL players (boy oh boy do they hate kneeling NFL players) whom they see as ungrateful, disrespectful millionaires.  And they love him for this.

Del Signore said he’s been following politics far more than before because of Trump. Trump, he said, is just “more interesting.” So now he likes watching the news. “Ninety-nine percent of the time I watch Fox,” he said. “Sometimes I’ll be sitting there listening to all this Fox stuff, and I’ll say, ‘Maybe they aren’t right, maybe I’ll flip to CNN’—but every time I’ve found that Fox has been correct, and CNN is definitely fake news.”

There are some positives around here. Corsa Coal’s Acosta mine in neighboring Somerset County opened in June. So did Robindale Energy’s new Maple Springs mine. Rosebud Mining reportedly is working to reopen its facility in Cresson, but a company spokesman wouldn’t comment on the status of the project. The increased activity is largely the result of spiking Chinese demand. But even with potentially several hundred new jobs, the long-term outlook for coal is grim. An industry forecast last month from the BMI Mining Report projected coal production to grow by 6 percent and 2 percent this year and next year, respectively, but also noted: This “does not reflect an expectation for President Donald Trump to revive the sector and our longer-term view out to 2021 remains decidedly downbeat.”

But even this optimistic stance highlights some of the deep-seated troubles here. “Right now, if I could find 150 people, I’d put them to work,” Polacek said. He needs machinists. He needs welders. “But it’s hard to find people,” he said—people with the requisite skills, people who can pass a drug test.

“We just don’t have the workforce,” said Liston, the city manager. “If they are employable, and have a skill set, basically they already moved out of the area.”

Some of the later-in-life blue-collar workers who are still here can be loath to learn new trades. “We’ve heard when working with some of the miners that they are reluctant because they’re very accustomed to the mining industry,” said Linda Thomson, the president of JARI, a nonprofit economic development agency in Johnstown that provides precisely the kind of retraining, supported by a combination of private, state and federal funding, that could prepare somebody for a job in Polacek’s plant. “They really do want to go back into the mines. So we’ve seen resistance to some retraining.”

Johnstown and surrounding Cambria County, whiter, poorer and less educated than America overall, was famished for the message Trump delivered in person at War Memorial Arena last October. “Your government betrayed you, and I’m going to make it right,” he told them. . . . . It was what they so badly wanted to hear. On November 8, 2016, in Cambria County, Trump trounced Hillary Clinton by nearly 38 points.

By last week, though, John George told me that despite what they might have said, people here didn’t really believe Trump would make good on all his promises. “Deep down inside,” he said, “I don’t think anybody thought the steel mills were going to come back.”

Last week, he reported hearing for the past year at work, at Gautier Steel, exactly what I had been hearing in my conversations around town—a remarkable, undeniable, ongoing vehemence of support. . . . . So many people in so many other areas of the country watch with dismay and existential alarm Trump’s Twitter hijinks, his petty feuds, his penchant for butting into areas where the president has no explicit, policy-relevant role. All of that only animates his supporters here. For them, Trump is their megaphone. He is the scriptwriter. He is a singularly effective, intuitive creator of a limitless loop of grievance and discontent that keeps them in absolute lockstep.

More than anything, what seemed to upset the people I spoke with was the National Football League players who have knelt during the national anthem to protest police brutality and racial inequality.

“You’re not a fan of equality?” I asked.   “For people who deserve it and earn it,” he said. . . . . “Like NFL players?” I said. . . . . “Well,” Del Signore responded, “I hate to say what the majority of them are …” He stopped himself short of what I thought he was about to say. 

The NFL?  “Niggers for life,” Schilling said. “For life,” McCabe added.

Given this mind set, it is little wonder that new, forward thinking businesses have little desire to locate in Southwestern Pennsylvania.  That mindset is not limited to that region of Pennsylvania.  It is alive and well in Southwest Virginia.  The problem is that what animates the rural racist voters increasingly repels the majority of voters in the rest of Virginia.  Here are highlights from the Bearing Drift piece:

First, the Democrats did not win the election; the Republicans lost it.  As the Republican standard-bearer at the head of the ticket, Ed Gillespie committed three fatal errors.

·        He invited Trump to campaign for him, the President with the lowest approval rating in modern history after only ten months in office.  Trump’s low approval rating is not so much a result of his obnoxious personality, bullying, and lying, but because he has failed to deliver on any campaign promises, from building a southern border wall to repealing and replacing ObamaCare to returning manufacturing jobs to the U.S. from overseas. Ed bought into that failure when he invited Trump to appear with him at campaign rallies. By my observation, Gillespie started to decline in the polls after Trump came to Virginia to campaign for him.

·        Gillespie tried the old fear tactic of blaming illegal immigrant gang violence like MS-13 on “sanctuary city” Democratic politics.  The problem is that there are no sanctuary cities in Virginia.  A sanctuary city is one that has passed local laws that counter-act Federal laws on illegal immigrants, such as refusing ICE requests to detain illegals arrested for crimes.  A sanctuary city is not defined simply by the presence of immigrants, legal or illegal.

·        Gillespie bought into the failed Republican promise to repeal and replace ObamaCare.  Millions of Americans have entitlement benefits under the Affordable Health Care Act and, for all its faults, the Republicans have failed to propose an alternative entitlement. And once the government institutes an entitlement program, you cannot take it away without losing elections. Social Security is a case in point. It was launched in 1934 as a safety net for elderly poor.  Today it is a Federal pension program for the middle class.

“God, guns, and guts” plays well in the rural southside and southwest, but economic growth, traffic relief, and good public education is what excites voters in the voter-rich areas.  Cutting taxes for transportation improvements and diverting public school money to Christian academy school vouchers doesn’t get you votes there.

Third, the Republicans continue to send contradictory messages. Individual liberty and personal freedom are not enhanced by government restrictions on issues ranging from hunting on Sundays to having an abortion, the latter having been the law of the land for almost 50 years and continuing to be supported as such by the most conservative Supreme Court since the Great Depression.

Virginia is not so much turning blue as it is becoming anti-red. And that, along with Donald Trump in the White House, is why we had a record voter turn-out Tuesday despite awful weather conditions.

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Will the GOP learn that it needs to abandon the Trump base in many states if it hopes to win elections going forward?  I doubt it.  The Christofascists and white supremacists are now too entrenched in the party grassroots to be defied. 

When Does “Morality and Decency Kick In” for Trump Voters?

This post follows up on the theme of my post yesterday entitled The Trump Voter Paradox. If one listens to the bloviating of many, if not the majority, on the political right, the talk ad nausea about "Christian values" and "family values" as they support a Republican Party war long formulated by the likes of Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell against families, the sick, the poor, and sexual and racial minorities.  Now, Der Trumpenführer is taking the bigotry and hatred to new heights both through his manufactured hysteria about minority NFL players exercising their constitutional right to freedom of speech and expression to his, in my view, deliberate delay in expediting life saving aid to Puerto Rico. And despite all of this, his supporters - like true modern Day Pharisees - cheer him on. People are literally dying, yet Trump supporters are still whining about standing for the national anthem.  For the record, I support the players' refusal to stand.  Anyone not afford the Constitution's promise of equal protection under the law (which includes the LGBT community) has every reason to protest.  A piece in Salon looks at what I believe to be the moral bankruptcy and blatant racism of Trump supporters.  Here are excerpts:

On Monday, head coach of the San Antonio Spurs Gregg Popovich articulated his support of the ongoing national-anthem protests taking place across the sports world. In declaring his support of any players who should decide to participate, he — as he has before — drew a sharp line under the racial issues surrounding the remarks by Trump and the way people of color are treated in this country.

“Obviously, race is the elephant in the room, and we all understand that. Unless it is talked about constantly, it's not going to get better. . . . 'Oh, that again. They pulled the race card again. Why do we have to talk about that?' Well, because it's uncomfortable,” he said "They have our full support and no matter what they might want to do or not do is important to them, respected by us," Popovich said in support of protesters. "And there’s no recrimination no matter what might take place, unless it’s ridiculous egregious."

Popovich also commented on the response by the president more specifically and asked when Trump supporters would wake up. “I wonder what the people think about who voted for him, where their line is, how much they can take, where does the morality and decency kick in?”

Popovich is not the only one to take aim at Trump's remarks; in fact, the floodgates have opened for pro sports teams to take a stand (or knee) against him. Tony Dungy, former NFL player and coach, commented on the protests on "The Today Show" Sunday, specifically about the backlash and the shift in the tides.

“Up until yesterday, the players would want people to know, this was not about the flag, this was not about patriotism. In their opinion, it was about social change,” Dungy said. “But yesterday this was a group of our family got attacked and called names and said they were unpatriotic and should be fired for, what we feel, is demonstrating our first amendment right. We’re gonna [ . . . ] band together as a family and they reacted."

Sportscaster Dale Hansen used his position as a Vietnam Veteran to defend the protests, in opposition to those against the protests who claim that the action is disrespectful to veterans.“The young, black athletes are not disrespecting America or the military by taking a knee during the anthem,” Hanson said. “They are respecting the best thing about America. It’s a dog whistle to the racists among us to say otherwise." He condemned those who don’t believe in white privilege as well. “They, and all of us, should protest how black Americans are treated in this country. And if you don’t think white privilege is a fact, you don’t understand America.”

Perhaps the most scathing rebuke was from former tight end Shannon Sharpe on Undisputed, where he commented on the solidarity of the NFL and the hypocrisy of the people in power in the league. “This wasn’t a protest. This was unity. So, what are we showing solidarity against?” He continued. “We’re showing solidarity because President Trump challenged the very men. Wealthy, wealthy men, billionaires, and he told them, what you should do if someone protests, you should fire them. They don’t like being told what to do.”

 These self-styled "godly Christians" care more about a piece of cloth than travesties done to living, breathing  - at least until they are gunned down by police - individuals.  Indeed, these people are the antithesis of Christ's message.

Donald Trump and the Last Gasp of White Privilege

I apologize in advance for yet another post about Der  Trumpenführer, but the man makes it hard to focus on other things, especially since he embodies the worst aspects of American society and the latent racism that continues to plague so much of white, Christian, heterosexual America.  In the case of Trump, he was born to wealth and raised in what would seem to have been a racist household given his father's involvement with the KKK many decades ago.  Yet, despite his wealth, like so many of his supporters, he is brain dead when it comes to the grasping the privilege he inherited simply by virtue of the color of his skin.  Worse yet, like his supporters, he sees race relations as a zero sum gain.  If blacks and Hispanics secure equal rights under the law, under this warped view, it is taken to mean that somehow whites have lost something.  The concept of all doing better and the country doing better is a concept beyond their grasp.  In the wake of the controversy Trump has generated in his effort to stiffle the freedom of expression rights of minority players in the NFL,  San Antonio Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich provided what might be be the best take on the legitimacy of the NFL/police brutality protests.  Here are highlights via Joe Jervis' blog:

Race is the elephant in the room and we all understand that. Unless it is talked about constantly, it’s not going to get better. ‘Oh, they’re talking about that again. They pulled the race card again. Why do we have to talk about that?’

Well, because it’s uncomfortable. There has to be an uncomfortable element in the discourse for anything to change, whether it’s the LGBT movement, or women’s suffrage, race, it doesn’t matter.

People have to be made to feel uncomfortable, and especially white people, because we’re comfortable. We still have no clue what being born white means. And if you read some of the recent literature, you realize there really is no such thing as whiteness. We kind of made it up. That’s not my original thought, but it’s true.

It’s hard to sit down and decide that, yes, it’s like you’re at the 50-meter mark in a 100-meter dash. You’ve got that kind of a lead, yes, because you were born white. You have advantage that are systemically, culturally, psychologically rare. And they’ve been built up and cemented for hundreds of years.

But many people can’t look at it that way, because it’s too difficult. It can’t be something that’s on their plate on a daily basis. People want to hold their position, people want their status quo, people don’t want to give that up. Until it’s given up, it’s not going to be fixed.

I may be white, but being gay in a state that historically has been virulently anti-gay, has provided with a first hand knowledge that America's supposed promise of "liberty and justice for all" is a myth. Gays are lees than equal and often do not receive justice from bigoted legislators and judges.  If one is black, things are far, far worse. Yet if one complains, one is labeled as a whiner, a single issue voter, or according to Der  Trumpenführer, unpatriotic.  A piece in Sports Illustrated looks at why these NFL protests are not only appropriate but also an affirmation of the values that white Americans claim to support: free speech and the right to engage in peaceful protests.  Here are excerpts:

On Sept. 16, 1960, before a home game against the Athletics, Cleveland pitcher James (Mudcat) Grant was standing in the bullpen singing along with the national anthem. Grant decided to do a little barbering of the lyrics. He adjusted the last line to "This land is not so free/I can't go to Mississippi." This was some topical humor of a very high order: opposition to the civil rights movement was growing more violent, and, as had been the case since the Civil War, Mississippi was the cone of the volcano. 

The Indians' bullpen coach, a Texan named Ted Wilks, took exception to Grant's improvised lyrics and, according to Grant's account, called the pitcher a "black so and so." In reply, Grant told Wilks that Texas was worse than Russia. Grant then got dressed and left the park. The next day, Cleveland manager Jimmie Dykes suspended him for the season without pay. Wilks apologized but Grant refused to accept it. He would no longer accept that this racist invective was part of the cost of doing business as an African-American athlete in the U.S. I mention all this in support of one of several things to which you must stipulate if you're going to talk sensibly about the controversy that blew up over the weekend, and the ongoing controversy regarding displaced quarterback Colin Kaepernick, whose protest against police brutality is at the heart of what went on in stadiums all over the world:

1) The inclusion of a national anthem—any national anthem—in a sporting event necessarily politicizes that event. Historically, this is best demonstrated by protests at the Olympic Games. Everyone remembers Tommie Smith and John Carlos in Mexico City in 1968. But few remember Czechoslovakian gymnast Vera Caslavska, who bowed her head and looked away from the Soviet flag while sharing the top spot on the medal podium with the U.S.S.R.'s Larisa Petrik at the same Games, only two months after Soviet tanks crushed the Prague Spring revolt of 1968. When Caslavska got home, she was investigated by the new government and forbidden to travel or compete for several years.

2) The protests of today are not about the anthem or the flag or the troops, or even about Donald Trump. The protestors are high-profile African-American athletes raising awareness of how lower-profile African-Americans are often mistreated by police officers. 3) All effective protest is inconvenient and, in its own way, uncivil. The Boston Tea Party was an act of vandalism. Critics' appeal to "find a better way to protest" is really a call for self-sabotage, and it's a dodge that dates back to the Olive Branch Petition of 1775.

4) The wealthy athletes protesting worked much harder for their money than the president in question ever has for his.

In short, if you're going to perform national anthems, you're going to have politics. And if you have politics, you're going to have political statements and, this being the United States of America, those statements are not always going to make everyone comfortable. And once military-related promotions reached a level that made even John McCain uncomfortable, those statements had to get louder, if only to be heard over the fighter jets, and more garish, if only to be seen beyond the giant midfield flags.

The way to avoid this, of course, is to de-emphasize the anthem ritual, and return to the days before 2009 when it was common practice for teams to remain in the locker room while the anthem was played. . . . Unfortunately, today, it would take courage beyond that possessed by most owners and league commissioners to take this simple step.

This is why, over the weekend, we had so many owners framing the issue as a matter of standing behind their employees' free-speech rights. . . . Those same owners, along with commissioner Roger Goodell, don't want any part of the issue of why African-Americans end up dead on the pavement after traffic stops and other encounters with police officers. But ultimately the owners and commissioners may not have a choice: The real issue behind the protests has been out there all along.

The Racial Demagoguery of Donald Trump

Unfortunately, some in the media are still stating that economic conditions drove whites to vote for Donald Trump - even though post election studies have shown that latent racism was the true motivator for voting for an unfit and foul individual.  Since occupying the White House, Trump has continued to appeal to the racists in his base - as well as Christofascists, although most of those are racists from my years of following "family values" organizations that are always lily white - and shows no signs of letting up anytime soon as evidenced by his attacks this weekend on minority athletes.   A piece in the New Yorker - have you noticed how NYC based publications hate Trump with a passion - looks at the latest racist batshitery flowing from Trump.  Here are excerpts:

Every day, and in countless and unexpected ways, Donald Trump, . . . .  finds new ways to divide and demoralize his country and undermine the national interest. On Tuesday, he ranted from the lectern of the U.N. General Assembly about “Rocket Man” and the possibility of levelling North Korea. Now he has followed with an equally unhinged domestic performance at a rally, on Friday evening, in Huntsville, Alabama, where he set out to make African-American athletes the focus of national contempt.

In the midst of an eighty-minute speech intended to heighten the reëlection prospects of Senator Luther Johnson Strange III, Trump turned his attention to N.F.L. players, including the former 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick, and asked a mainly white crowd if “people like yourselves” agreed with his anger at “those people,” players who take a knee during the national anthem to protest racism.

“Wouldn’t you love to see one of these N.F.L. owners, when somebody disrespects our flag, to say, ‘Get that son of a bitch off the field right now, out, he’s fired!’ ” Trump continued.

“People like yourselves.” “Those people.” “Son of a bitch.” This was the same sort of racial signalling that followed the Fascist and white-supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. It is no longer a matter of “dog whistling.” This is a form of racial demagoguery broadcast at the volume of a klaxon. There is no need for Steve Bannon’s behind-the-scenes scriptwriting. Trump, who is desperate to distract his base from his myriad failures of policy, from health care to immigration, is perfectly capable of devising his racist rhetoric all on his own.

Trump is making clear his moral priorities. He is infinitely more offended by the sight of a black ballplayer quietly, peacefully protesting racism in the United States than he is by racism itself. Which, at this point, should come as no surprise to any but the willfully obtuse. Trump, who began his real-estate career with a series of discriminatory housing deals in New York City, and his political career with a racist calumny against Barack Obama, has repeatedly defined his Presidency with a rhetoric that signals solidarity to resentful souls who see the Other as the singular cause of their troubles. Trump stokes a bilious disdain for every African-American who dares raise a voice to protest the injustices of this country.

In addition to urging the N.F.L.’s owners to fire any politically impertinent players, Trump also disinvited the N.B.A. champions, the Golden State Warriors, from visiting the White House after one of the team’s stars, Stephen Curry, voiced hesitation about meeting with the President.

“Going to the White House was a great honor until you showed up!” LeBron James said. Many professional athletes tweeted in the same spirit as James, and even the N.F.L. commissioner, Roger Goodell, who has hardly been stalwart in the interests of his players, issued a statement calling Trump’s comments “divisive” and showing an “unfortunate lack of respect” for the league and its players. Compared to the N.B.A. commissioner, Adam Silver, who has been consistently anti-racist and supportive of the players’ right to protest, Goodell is a distinctly corporate figure, whose instinct is nearly always to side with the owners. (At least six N.F.L. owners each contributed a million dollars, or more, to Trump’s Inauguration fund, including Woody Johnson, of the Jets, Robert Kraft, of the Patriots, and Daniel Snyder, of the Redskins.)

What Trump is up to with this assault on athletes, particularly prominent black ones, is obvious; it is part of his larger culture war. Divide. Inflame. Confuse. Divert. And rule. He doesn’t care to grapple with complexity of any kind, whether it’s about the environment, or foreign affairs, or race, or the fact that a great American sport may, by its very nature, be irredeemable. Rather than embody any degree of dignity, knowledge, or unifying embrace, Trump is a man of ugliness, and the damage he does, speech after speech, tweet after tweet, deepens like a coastal shelf. Every day, his Presidency takes a toll on our national fabric. How is it possible to argue with the sentiment behind LeBron James’s concise tweet at Trump: “U Bum”? It isn’t.

Never in my life time did I think we'd see a mainstreaming of hatred flowing nonstop from the White House.

NBA and NFL Warn Texas that "Bathroom Bill" Could be Costly

One would think that the example of what happened to North Carolina after passage of HB2 - a heinous anti-LGBT, anti-civil rights bill backed by Republicans prostituting themselves to Christofascists - would chasten even the most whore like Republicans, but Texas Republicans seem hell bent to suffer similar economic consequences.  Now, both the NFL - which threatened that there would be no more Super Bowls held in Texas - has been joined by the NBA in issuing warnings to the state legislature.  Rational people would heed such warnings, but rationality and Christofascists and their political whores in the Republican Party are mutually exclusive.  LGBT Nation looks at the new NBA warnings to Texas.  Here are highlights:

The NBA is warning Texas over a proposed “bathroom bill” targeting transgender people that is similar to a North Carolina law that prompted the league to move the All-Star Game out of that state.

The NBA on Friday joined the NFL in suggesting that Texas will be overlooked for future big events if lawmakers pass a bill requiring people to use bathrooms that correspond to the sex on their birth certificate.

NBA spokesman Mike Bass says an environment where people are treated “fairly and equally” weighs heavily when the league chooses host locations. Texas has three NBA teams and has hosted three All-Star Games since 2006.

Charlotte was originally supposed to host the All-Star Game on Sunday. But the NBA moved the game to New Orleans after North Carolina adopted its “bathroom bill” last year.

It’s not as if Texas has not been warned before, either.

Texas House Speaker Joe Straus, a Republican, has voiced his opposition to the bill, calling it unequivocally bad for business.

This is a view shared by the Dallas Convention and Visitors Bureau, whose president Phillip Jones told lawmakers economic fallout is inevitable.  “This is not speculation. This is facts, based on what we’ve seen first-hand,” he said.

NFL To Georgia: No Super Bowl If Anti-LGBT RFRA Bill Isn't Vetoed

Georgia Republicans are about to learn that self-prostitution to Christofascists can carry a significant price.  Yesterday, the NFL said that, if the anti-gay "Religious Freedom Restoration Act" (RFRA) bill passed by the legislature isn't vetoed by the governor, Atlanta can kiss its Super Bowl bid goodbye.  The Atlanta Constitution has details:

If Georgia chooses to turn the “religious liberty” bill into law, be prepared: Atlanta may not get a Super Bowl.

That was the suggestion from the NFL on Friday when the league released a statement in response to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s question about whether the league had any position on Georgia House Bill 757.

The statement from league spokesman Brian McCarthy reads, “NFL policies emphasize tolerance and inclusiveness, and prohibit discrimination based on age, gender, race, religion, sexual orientation, or any other improper standard. Whether the laws and regulations of a state and local community are consistent with these policies would be one of many factors NFL owners may use to evaluate potential Super Bowl host sites.”

Falcons owner Arthur Blank has hoped to land multiple Super Bowls in the team’s new stadium, which is scheduled to open in 2017. The NFL has previously moved a Super Bowl from Arizona to the Rose Bowl near Los Angeles in the 1992 season after that state refused to recognize the Martin Luther King holiday.

New Evidence That Football Destroys Players' Brains

Charles Rex Arbogast/AP

I will confess at the outset that I am NOT a fan of football, especially at the pro-level for a number of reasons.  First, I see pro-football as the current incarnation of the Roman gladiatorial games of old.  In my view, the wider public should not get sport and entertainment out of seeing others injure one another.  And then there are the obscene salaries that pro-football players make that are totally out of any relation to their positive contributions to society.  Adding to my aggravation is the fact that many members of the public pay not attention to world events, politics and other things that really matter in where society and the globe are headed, yet they know every detail about dumb lug football players some of whom strike  me as having the same intellect as a Percheron or a  Clydesdale (maybe even less).  Now, with a grandson, I worry the he - or more likely his father - may want him to play football when he gets older.  Therefore, I am happy that more and more studies are revealing that the sport is inherently injurious to players. Mother Jones looks at new study findings:

A new joint study by the US Department of Veterans Affairs and Boston University found that 87 out of 91 former NFL players who donated their brains for examination showed signs of chronic traumatic encephalopathy, the degenerative brain disease also known as CTE. The report out of the nation's largest brain bank, which received a $1 million research grant from the NFL in 2010, supports prior research suggesting that playing football could have long-lasting neurological effects over the course of an athlete's life.

As reported first by Frontline:

In total, the [Boston University] lab has found CTE in the brain tissue in 131 out of 165 individuals who, before their deaths, played football either professionally, semi-professionally, in college or in high school.

Forty percent of those who tested positive were the offensive and defensive linemen who come into contact with one another on every play of a game, according to numbers shared by the brain bank with FRONTLINE. That finding supports past research suggesting that it's the repeat, more minor head trauma that occurs regularly in football that may pose the greatest risk to players, as opposed to just the sometimes violent collisions that cause concussions.

CTE can only be accurately identified posthumously, and it's important to remember that many of the ex-players who donated their brains to BU did so because they thought they might have the disease. Still, the results are more bad news for the NFL, which for years has been criticized over its handling of concussions and brain research. The league has long denied a link between the sport and long-term brain disease . . . but in April it gained approval for a $1 billion settlement with about 5,000 retired players, resolving concussion-related lawsuits.

Dr. Ann McKee, who is the chief neuropathologist at the brain bank, told Frontline: "People think that we're blowing this out of proportion, that this is a very rare disease and that we're sensationalizing it. My response is that where I sit, this is a very real disease. We have had no problem identifying it in hundreds of players."

The NFL's Wink and a Nod to Domestic Violence

I'm no fan of the NFL for any number of reasons, not the least of which is the homophobia that remains rampant throughout the league and its owners, coaches and players.  Yet another reason to view the NFL is its continued willingness to overlook bad behavior by players, especially when it comes to domestic and sexual violence.  Rather than worrying about Michael Sam's sexual orientation, the NFL needs to be purging its player ranks of thugs and criminals.  Perhaps recent bad publicity will finally force a much needed housecleaning. A piece in the New York Times looks at the NFL's sad record when it comes to players involved in domestic violence.  Here are highlights:

On April 10, 2007, after more than 50 National Football League players had been arrested in the previous football season, Commissioner Roger Goodell was widely hailed for instituting a newly stringent personal conduct policy. Mr. Goodell threatened to banish players for off-the-field transgressions and installed himself as the judge and jury presiding over every case.

Mr. Goodell insisted that he would mete out discipline without waiting for the judicial system.

“It is my job — not law enforcement’s job — to protect the National Football League,” he said at the time.

But in his role as the N.F.L.’s hard-bitten sheriff, Mr. Goodell appears to have had a major blind spot: domestic violence cases. Players charged with domestic violence routinely received considerably lighter punishments than players accused of other offenses, like drug use or drunken driving. Often, they were not punished at all. On Friday, seven years after he implemented the personal conduct policy, Mr. Goodell acknowledged publicly that it had failed and would be overhauled.

An examination of dozens of arrests of N.F.L. players since Mr. Goodell established his personal conduct policy in 2007 — and the fines and penalties doled out by the league — shows that suspensions of two to four games, and sometimes more, were far more likely for players arrested on drunken driving, marijuana possession or weapon charges. A vast majority of players charged with domestic violence crimes, if they were disciplined by the league at all, received one-game suspensions even after pleading guilty to lesser related charges or entering pretrial intervention programs.

 

The disparity in punishments within the league is illustrated in numerous cases.

“I don’t think the N.F.L. did anything more than give lip service to the notion that they were taking domestic abuse seriously,” said Ann DeLaney, an advocate for victims of domestic violence and the former executive director of the Julian Center in Indianapolis, a victim support group.  Referring to the Ray Rice case, Ms. DeLaney continued, “That’s what they did this time until it was caught on video.”

[T]he recent high-profile episodes have led to a firestorm of protest from inside and outside football.  Tyrone Thomas, a Washington lawyer who advises on sports cases, said the N.F.L. had always had the power to take a tougher tack in instances in which there were accusations of domestic violence, but had chosen not to. 

Besides the Rice case, the N.F.L. has also been harshly criticized for its handling of three other recent abuse cases — those of Adrian Peterson, a star running back for the Minnesota Vikings, who has been accused of injuring one of his children; Carolina Panthers defensive end Greg Hardy, who was convicted of assaulting his girlfriend; and San Francisco 49ers defensive end Ray McDonald, who was arrested last month on suspicion of domestic violence.

Nita Chaudhary, a founder of UltraViolet, a women’s rights advocacy group, remained critical of the N.F.L. on Friday despite Goodell’s pledge to revamp the league’s personal conduct policy and penalties. . . . . . We call on all of the N.F.L.’s sponsors to take a stand against domestic violence by withdrawing their support for the N.F.L. until Goodell is out of office.”

The root of the problem?  Likely the macho mindset that thinks being homophobic is fine also sees beating you wife/girlfriend as being fine too. 

Dallas Cowboys Plan to Sign Michael Sam to Practice Squad

Years ago when I lived in Houston, I began being a fan of the Dallas Cowboys because the Houston Oilers were nothing short of terrible - an embarrassment to the city of Houston.  When I moved back to Virginia, the abundance of obnoxious Washington Red Skin fans - most of whom had no ties whatsoever to Washington - made remaining a Cowboys fan look worthwhile.  Now, there may be another reason to cheer the Cowboys: the NFL is reporting that the Cowboys plan on signing Michael Sam to their practice team.  Here are some highlights from NFL.com:

Michael Sam's NFL journey isn't over yet.

The Dallas Cowboys plan to bring the free-agent defensive end in for a physical on Wednesday, a team source told NFL Media Insider Ian Rapoport. If the rookie passes, Sam will be added to the team's practice squad.

The seventh-round pick of the Rams cleared waivers on Sunday after St. Louis released him during their roster reduction to 53 men. NFL Media columnist Michael Silver reported that coach Jeff Fisher "remains a fan" but the Rams needed practice help at other positions due to injury concerns.

The NFL's first openly gay player racked up 2.5 sacks this preseason and led the Rams with six tackles in Thursday night's preseason loss to the Miami Dolphins.

The Cowboys spent Tuesday calling their own players to gauge reaction to making Sam a Cowboy. With the Rams out of the picture, Dallas looms as a solid fit for last year's SEC Co-Defensive Player of the Year because of the team's 4-3 scheme and a desperate need for help on defense.

Rams Sign Michael Sam To Four-Year Multi-Million Dollar Contract

The haters at the American Family Association will have to ramp up yet another unsuccessful boycott campaign in the wake of the St. Louis Rams' signing of a four year, multimillion dollar contract with openly gay Michael Sam (pictured above with his boyfriend).  The contract hopefully will put to rest for good the claims that no NFL team would ever sign an openly gay player.  The New Civil Rights Movement looks at this development. Here are some highlights:

The St. Louis Rams have signed Michael Sam to a four-year, $2.65 million dollar contract, officially making him the first openly gay player to be hired into a mainline professional sports team.

The Rams made the announcement yesterday afternoon, and in fact hired all eleven picks from their entire 2014 draft class.

Sam, who is 24, is guaranteed at least $46,000, according to Fox Sports. “Let’s do this!!” Sam tweeted after the news was announced.

In early February, Michael Sam announced that he is gay, not wanting to surprise a future employer. He has become a flash point for conservatives, one that exploded when he was drafted into the NFL last month. Sam, as many players do, kissed his significant other — in this case, a man — infuriating social conservatives who thought it was a ratings plot by ESPN.

Bigots Claim Rams' Draft of Gay Player Violated Their Religious Freedoms

The last few days have truly provided a bumper crop of examples of Christofascst lunacy as the godly folk have gone absolutely batshit crazy over gay marriage and the St. Louis Ram's drafting of Michael Sam.  What truly put the drooling, spittle flecked "godly folk" completely into crazy land was ESPN's broadcast of Michael Sam learning that he had been selected and the following kiss that he gave to his very attractive boyfriend.  Since Sam's draft, these folks have had nothing short of apoplexy and have gone berserk claiming that somehow the Rams and the NFL have trampled on their religious freedom.  How any of this amounts to an interference with their religious freedom rights isn't explained, particularly since if they find gays offense, then all they need do is to change the TV channel.  Christian Post provides an example of this unhinged batshitery:

Jack Burkman, head of the Washington, D.C. lobbying firm J.M. Burkman & Assoc. who is seeking to ban gays from the NFL, says he intends to build a national coalition to boycott any football franchise that picks openly gay football player Michael Sam in the NFL Draft, which starts Thursday at Radio City Music Hall in New York City.

In a release issued Thursday, Burkman said he would "leverage his political clout" to ensure that the franchise that selects the 6-foot-2, 260-pound defensive end from Missouri would get "roughed up financially."

"The NFL, like most of the rest of American business, is about to learn that when you trample the Christian community and Christian values there will be a terrible financial price to pay," said Burkman.

WWJD?  Obviously, not what Burkman is advocating.  As noted in the previous post, what is really going on is that the Christofascists are beginning to slowly realize that the tables are turning and it is they, not gays, who are about to be the ones shunned by decent society. A piece in Salon entitled "Michael Sam is the New Normal" looks at this process of the tables turning on the "godly folk" who at least in Virginia are 9 times out of 10 openly racist to boot:

It would have been historic even without the kiss. But while the critics continue their predictable frothing over Michael Sam’s emotional response this weekend to his NFL draft, it doesn’t change the fact that the world is a different place now because of it.

That he’d already scored an endorsement deal with Visa indicated that being gay doesn’t have to make a man sponsorship-averse, but it also didn’t guarantee a career – or indicate what that career would look like.

That changed on Saturday in the span of a phone call – and the moments immediately afterward. It happened not just with the Rams’ indication that the NFL is ready for an openly gay player, but in Sam’s tearful, bowled over response. It happened when he joyfully smooched his boyfriend Vito Cammisano — and in the way an entire roomful of jubilant friends and family witnessed the whole thing and supportively celebrated with them.

The partners of sports figures always tend to attract attention. The WAGS (women and girlfriends) are part of the culture of the NFL, a lusted-after collection of supermodels and actresses. It’s going to be different from here on in. Having now seen a photo of Cammisano shirtless, I fully support this new expansion of the pool to include husbands and boyfriends.

But that gay, interracial display of affection was guaranteed to blow a few gaskets. 

While that kiss might not do anything to open the hearts of the crazy YouTube ranters, it is a big step toward tolerance and equality. So if you’ve somehow managed to successfully avert your eyes for too long, or think that gay people are fine as long as they’re not being gay in front of you, go ahead and look. It’s not scary or strange. This is love. This is celebration. This is normal. And as long ago Harvey Milk said, “Once they realize that we are indeed their children, that we are indeed everywhere, every myth, every lie, every innuendo will be destroyed once and for all.”

Due to their sick psychological need to feel superior to others and their bizarre fear of any challenge to their fantasy world religious beliefs (I increasingly see it as a form of mental illness), Michael Sam, his boyfriend Vito and other gays who refuse to knuckle under to Christofascist dogma send this "godly folk" literally into a near mental breakdown.   The message, of course is that we need to maintain the pressure.  The more crazy the "godly folk" become, the sooner it will be that no one decent and moral gives them the time of day.  Which is exactly what they deserve.
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Michael Sam Drafted by the St. Louis Rams

In the last day of the NFL draft, openly gay Michael Sam was drafted by the St. Louis Rams, dispelling claims by homophobes that no team would draft an out gay player.  Kudos to the Rams.  And kudos to Michael Sam for his courage.  Amazingly, ESPN carried a video of Sam learning that he had been drafted and embracing and kissing his boyfriend.  I'm sure numerous heads exploded amongst the hate filled "godly folk."  Here are details from Out Sports:

Michael Sam has been drafted by the St. Louis Rams with the 249th pick in the 2014 NFL Draft. He is the first openly gay athlete selected in the NFL Draft and becomes the first openly gay active player in NFL history.

Analysts had largely predicted he would be drafted on the third day of the draft, with most saying he would be selected in the fifth round. When he came out in February, most analysts had him being selected in the third to fifth round. Going in the seventh round is not a stretch from the earlier predictions. Sam's subpar performance at the NFL Combine likely hurt his draft stock a bit.

Sam came out publicly in February to overwhelming support. He had been out as gay to his team at Missouri but had not made a public announcement until talk to Outsports, ESPN and the New York Times.

This week has been big for Sam. On Wednesday, ESPN announced he would be the recipient of the Arthur Ashe Courage Award. He also signed a deal with Visa, . . . .

It will be fascinating in the coming days to watch the reaction to the drafting of Sam. Some will point to his sexual orientation as the reason he wasn't drafted earlier.

Ultimately, Sam was selected in the NFL Draft, and that's what matters. He beat out thousands of other prospects for his ability to help a team. His character, his leadership, his onfield performance and his Combine performance were all weighed and the Rams made their selection when they thought they had to. His ability to sell jerseys and contribute to a national conversation were also likely taken into consideration, even though the team's coaches, owner and front office will likely dismiss that assertion.

Corporate America’s Gay-Rights Conversion

In the wake of the GOP debacle on Arizona's SB 1062 - a/k/a, the turn the gays away bill - one of the most interesting developments was the obvious miscalculation on the part of the Republican political whores who prostituted themselves to the Christofascists and "family values" crowd as to how corporate America would react, and react it did.  At least 83 major corporations and numerous chambers of commerce all read the GOP the riot act and threatened dire consequences if the bill was signed into law.  Even the homophobic NFL found the bill so distastefully that, as Sports Illustrated reports, investigations were set in motion on what needed to be done to move the Super Bowl out of Arizona.  I believe that increasingly the GOP is going to find itself having to decide whether it will (i)  prostitute itself to the Christofascists and alienate corporate America, or (ii) kick the Christofascist to the curb where they belong.  A piece in the Washington Post looks at the conversion of corporate America on the issue of gay rights.  Here are highlights:

[T]he defeat of the bill [SB 1062] in Arizona also revealed an evolution of sorts for Corporate America. 

Companies lined up against the legislation, with major corporations including American Airlines, Apple and Intel announcing their opposition. The NFL said it was following the situation closely, raising questions of whether it might pull the 2015 Super Bowl in Arizona if the bill became law. And dozens of local and national companies signed a letter to Gov. Brewer or made their own statements of opposition, citing the damage it would do to the local economy, their ability to seek the most talented workers, and tourism in the state. 

"If passed into law, these proposals would cause significant harm to many people and will result in job losses," read part of a statement from Delta Air Lines. "They would also violate Delta's core values of mutual respect and dignity."

While such economic arguments coming from business leaders may not be much of a surprise, their vocal and highly public role in the debate still represents a big shift — and a welcome one — from just a few years ago. For years, business leaders have eschewed social issues, grasping onto neutral stances to avoid criticism from shareholders or customer groups. 

 "What's changed even in the last five years is that business has gone from implementing policies aimed at their own employees to turning around and weighing in forcefully on public policy beyond the four walls of their business," says Deena Fidas, the director of the workplace equality program at Human Rights Campaign, an advocacy group for gay rights. "They've become legislative and social change agents." 

For instance, says Fidas, fewer than five businesses publicly came forward as supporters of same-sex marriage rights when Proposition 8, a ballot measure which would ban gay marriage in California, was up for a vote back in 2008. Yet last year, hundreds of large corporations signed a brief in favor of overturning the Defense of Marriage Act.

Obviously, the change in Corporate America mirrors the rapidly evolving shift in Americans' attitudes toward gay rights. Business leaders don't want to appear out of touch with their customers, a majority of whom now support same-sex marriage. And as a growing number of state judges strike down bans on gay marriage — including one in Texas on Wednesday — many companies surely sense that staying mum on gay-rights issues would not only hit their bottom lines, but would put them on the wrong side of history.

"Corporate support is no longer a coastal phenomenon," she says. "We're seeing heartland and manufacturing companies making the case for business equality" far more often than they did five years ago.

In Indiana, for instance, Eli Lilly and Cummins made donations of $100,000 each to a campaign supporting the constitutionality of same-sex unions. In an interview with Bloomberg last month, Eli Lilly's senior director of corporate responsibility, Robert Smith, said "it was important for us to lead. If we didn’t do it, who would?”

That question, ultimately, is the right one. Corporate leaders may have self-interested reasons for promoting gay rights. But as we saw in Arizona, they are also in a unique position to create bridges between political parties and to be voices not only for the rights of their own employees and customers, but for everyone.

While not noted in the article, it is also likely that corporate leaders are coming to see the far right's "family values" organizations for what they always have been: religious extremists and white supremacists who are anti-gay, anti-black, anti-Hispanic and anti-social progress.  These "godly Christians" are not nice folks and they belong outside of the political and social mainstream.