It was a desecration really.
President Trump, the P.T. Barnum of presidents, is ever the showman seeking applause from his audience. Unfortunately, his audience primarily consists of his base of assorted white supremacists, corporate oligarchs, and misguided evangelicals who ignore his putrid patina of evil to save the lives of unborn children whom they promptly cease to care about once they exit their mother’s womb.
So Trump’s latest stunt comes as no surprise in the midst of a nuclear culture war. After addressing a forum of small business owners, the president grabbed a flag hanging from a stand and hugged it as he walked off stage.
The cheap theatrics of the move meant to demonstrate how much he loves the country he is in the process of destroying will surely play well to his base, despite the fact that nearly everything that he does stands in direct opposition to the values that the flag represents.
His straining for authoritarian powers undermines the very basis of our constitutional government. His separation and mistreatment of children from their asylum-seeking families mocks the inscription on the Statue of Liberty. His attacks on the judicial system and the federal law enforcement agencies spits in the face of our system of laws and justice.
Trump may try to wrap himself in the flag like a cartoon hero, but while he continues to mount his attacks on the “Truth, Justice, and the American Way” that Superman defended on the 1950s era TV series, the era that Trump seems to want to return the nation to culturally, no intelligent person will buy his charade.
So, Trump — the carnival barker — can make all the photo ops he wants, there are enough Americans who still remember the substance of what the flag represents to point and laugh at his hypocritical gesture and work as hard as they can to make sure his tenure is short and that he’s held responsible for all of the damage that he has done.
You can watch a video of Trump’s flag molesting in the clip below from CNN.
On his way out of the small business owners event, President Trump stopped to hug the flag. pic.twitter.com/CXwNDM7Ht3
— Meg Wagner (@megwagner) June 19, 2018
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