Richard M.Nixon in 1968. Credit: Bettmann/CORBIS/Bettmann Archive
On April 3, 1968 Martin Luther King gave a speech at the Mason Temple in Memphis. He spoke for 40 minutes without notes, pressing his case for non-violence in the fight for racial justice but also preaching how the greatness of America lay in the freedoms of the press and right to protest. Famously, he ended with prophetic words that there were “difficult days ahead” and his people would get to the Promised Land, even if he might not be there alongside them. These were his last words in public. The next evening, the civil rights leader was shot dead on his motel balcony.
As furious crowds flooded on to streets across the country, Robert Kennedy landed in Indiana on the stump to win the Democrat’s presidential nomination. He was, of course, a man who had suffered personal loss in another terrible political murder. Police advised him to cancel his event but instead he spoke from the heart for a few minutes. “What we need in the United States is not division,” he said. “What we need in the United States is not hatred. What we need in the United States is not violence and lawlessness; but love and wisdom and compassion toward one another. And a feeling of justice towards those who still suffer within our country whether they be white or they be black.”
Some listeners cried. Others stood still in shock. But elsewhere rioting broke out and cities burned. It was start of the country’s worst unrest since the Civil War, with dozens killed, hundreds of shops destroyed, thousands of citizens injured and tens of thousands arrested. Two months later, Kennedy himself was shot on the campaign trail in California. It felt as though American society were falling apart as cultural, political, social and racial fissures beneath the surface of the nation erupted. African-Americans, anti-war protesters, hippies and women were fighting for profound change. Yet that summer of fire and fury ended with election of Richard Nixon as president.
Now look across the Atlantic. Once again, the US is horribly divided, its cities burn with rage and the curse of racism continues to corrode the world’s richest nation in an election year. Nixon, the former vice-president who had slunk away in 1962 after defeat in his previous presidential campaign, won through overt appeal to white anxiety as he promised to restore order and played into fears of his ‘silent majority’. Today we see Donald Trump pursuing the same strategy but in far less subtle style. “When the looting starts, the shooting starts,” he tweeted, reviving a phrase popularised by the segregationist George Wallace in 1968 as he sent troops on the streets.
History never repeats itself exactly, even when it ricochets through time. Now there is rioting over the murder of another black man taking place against backdrop of a public health battle rather than bloody conflict in Asia. Yet there is one clear political continuum that links these two turbulent years half a century apart. For 1968 was the year in which the Right took firm control of the Republican Party, driving away the liberals in a strategy that has reached its dark apotheosis in Trump.
Nixon won as a populist, using the language of law and order to lure fearful white Southern, suburban and working class northern voters into the Republican fold to create his conservative majority. This was nasty party politics: brutal, divisive but effective. He repudiated a liberal consensus that had held sway for four decades, speaking directly to some citizens’ anxieties on crime, economic status and racial integration. The success of this strategy, four years after the crushing defeat of conservative champion Barry Goldwater, confounded many analysts.
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SubscribeNonsense. It is the left that will destroy destroy democracy. That is what they do whenever they can and wherever they can. Had Corbyn come to power the likelihood is that democracy would have ended in the UK.
10 unarmed black people were killed by police last year in the US, down from 38 in 2015. In the vast majority of those cases, the police were being violently attacked. Meanwhile, 48 cops were killed by black people last year in the US.
Approximately 7,000 black people were killed by other people – almost all black and mainly in Democrat dystopias such as Chicago, Baltimore and New York. These are facts that the media never tells you.
‘Nixon’s coalition was solidified by Ronald Reagan as he seduced Southern Democrats with sunny optimism and cemented by the Bush dynasty, then the politics of fear revived by Trump to win narrowly in 2016.’
Trump did not win through the ‘politics of fear’ He won because we was the first presidential nominee for decades to offer some hope in terms of jobs, an end to the wars, and at least a modicum of control over immigration. Well, I suppose Obama offered hope – but he delivered no change and was just a shill for Wall St and China.
One sided polemics like this, which entirely exculpate the Democrats of any role in bringing about the polarisation of American political life, are the reason no one trusts the media today.
Lol, this piece reads like a liberal fantasist’s take on events.
In reality, during this descent into “the cesspit of his hate-fuelled populism”, polls have consistently shown that Trump’s approval rating among black and Hispanic voters has been increasing.
The writer of this article embodies all the reasons why we have given up on the MSM. He tells a tale that is egregiously twisted to suit his narrative while ignoring all manner of pertinent facts. One fact is that the US and the UK are, by all historical standards, perhaps the least racist societies the world has ever seen.
Another fact never acknowledged by any of these people is that everyone gets 11 or 12 years of free education, even in the US. Then problem is, of course, that this education is controlled by left-wing teaching unions and delivered by left wing teachers with no useful knowledge to impart.
The result is that every year, millions leave school (or even college/university) unable to function within an economy that demands cognitive skills and at least a modicum of mathematical and written facility. This left wing determination to deliver an education devoid of all reason, rigour or discipline only serves to broaden the gap between the two looting classes – those in the streets and those on Wall St, in the media/academia, large corporations, government etc.
The U.K. yes, the US? Don’t make me laugh.
Just over a month ago Mr Burrell I thought you had enjoyed a Damascene conversion, when you correctly castigated the CCP for it’s culpability in the atrocious C-19 scandal. Sadly, I see now, that I am mistaken.
This is yet another in a plethora of anti Trump rants, and as such unworthy of UnHerd. It may read well in the hovels of Islington and Hampstead, but you are just playing to the gallery. Come, come, you can do better.
The world seems to split into two camps over Trump, which can probably best be explained by the etymological origin of the word Trump.
Some, myself included, believe its origin goes back to Ancient Greece and the cult of Dionysius and thence to Ancient Rome and that moment of supreme glory, the Roman Triumph.
Others, yourself included I would postulate, would prefer a German, onomatopoeic origin where it means “to break wind loudly” (fart).
This dichotomy is unlikely to be solved by such inflammatory essays as yours. You have set yourself a low standard, and yet failed to achieve it. As said before you can, and must do better.
The blatantly false reference to advocating the injection of disinfectant leads me to question what other lies are contained in this piece.
I would say that pretty much every word of this piece is a lie.
Agreed – widely debunked. Fact checking is not a competency the leafy lane liberals excel at.
The one about the teargas for a start. The “protesters” were hurling rocks and abuse near where President Trumps was giving his address. They put up smoke bombs not teargas.
I follow UnHerd precisely because it usually avoids rants such as this. As other commenters have pointed out a poorly written article, and ending with an encomium to David Frum, sufferer of a particularly virulent cases of TDS tells you all you need to know about the author.
Take a look at the dishonesty and ignorance written by Christopher Rhodes just yesterday.
If this is UnHerd’s new standard of excellence (sic), count me unsubscribed.
TDS?
Apologies if this comment is repeated – my last seemed to disappear into the ether whilst on review.
How very mainstream, echoed from other liberal correct thinking media-spheres. A white-noise of outrage to drown out any countervailing argument. How easy it is to concentrate all the woes of America into a single individual. What I am not seeing in the article is any liberal self reflection in their part in ensuring the racial fault lines are perpetuated for political gain. The article is loaded with cyclopean vision and straight out of the Al Sharpton victimhood manual.
Re- your first paragraph, I posted something three times yesterday for that same reason. I used Chrome, and “refresh” removed almost all of everyone’s comments. When I open the column in Edge, all the comments appear. I don’t know what browser you use, but there seems to be an issue with UnHerd and Chrome.
” In 1968, the Right drove out the liberals. Now they’re undermining democracy itself.”
Firstly, why should the right want liberals in their midst? Liberalism is the root problem, and too much of Conservative Inc. and the establishment pseudo-right too often want to make common cause with liberals.
The latter part is utterly inane, but typical. Whenever leftists lose a democratic election or referendum (USA 2016, Brexit, etc.) it’s always claimed to be because The other side is actually undermining “democracy.” Not that I really care about “democracy” either (perhaps the greatest shibboleth of modernism). What we really have is a degenerate hybrid system of plutocracy, oligarchy, and ochlocracy anyway, not democracy (which is itself a degenerate form of government – except in small, ethno-culturally homogenous city-states).
Unherd is utterly pathetic. I know I should have realised that, the moment I saw the name of Tim Chavers here, but you have published an extremely bad article by somebody called Ian Birrell and you won’t permit me to respond. I don’t make libellous comments, or use profane language. On the other hand, I do use facts and logic, concepts a little alien to the Unherd mentality.
If you can’t allow comments with which you disagree, why have a comments section at all?
Their site seems to have a problem, IMO, with Chrome. That’s where I see comments disappear. Right now I have this column open in both Chrome and Edge. In Chrome there are just 3 comments (even though when I first opened the column in Chrome, there were quite a few). Here in Edge I see 18 comments. In Chrome, my original comment doesn’t appear; but it’s here in Edge. Just FYI.
If you don’t log in you’ll only see 3 replies; I use Firefox and it’s exactly the same.
Lol at these comments. Just as blinkered and partisan as they claim the author to be. I’m not sure that any serious person can still deny that the GOP has been persistently trying to undermine the rules of the democratic game for some time, from systematic gerrymandering (most recently noted in Wisconsin), through McConnell undermining the ability of congress to function as it should. It’s not a game that will end well for anyone.
Great point. Half the country is on the side of the aisle opposite yours…but no “serious person can still deny” yada yada yada. Oh, and yeah, only the GOP engages in systematic gerrymandering. And right, McConnell (but not Schumer or Pelosi or Schiff or earlier, Harry Reid) is the only one undermining the ability of congress to function as it should, and of course, only you get to define how it “should” function.
But it’s the Right that’s blinkered and partisan. Not you. Riiiiiiight.
Well, you’re not blinkered; you’re blind, and willfully so.
What gerrymandering?
Ballot harvesting? That’s the Democrats.
Mail-in ballots for everyone, which is open to fraud (see ballot harvesting) – that’s the Democrats.
Opposing voter identification to stop illegal voting. Again, Democrats.
So basically you don’t like Donald Trump but don’t have a coherent argument so have to jump on the current race bandwagon
Look, UnHerd. You published a garbage essay – full of lies and fabrications – yesterday, by Christopher Rhodes. Today, you publish another dog’s breakfast of an essay, this one by Ian Birrell.
I attributed yesterday to being an anomaly. But then this one, today?
Do you not have editors capable of reading lies and deceit and recognizing them? Or do you just publish whatever gets sent your way? How is it that this kind of garbage finds its way into your daily emails?
Whatever the answer, you’ve got two strikes on you now, in my book.
One more essay as useless and as dishonest and as historically ignorant as this one and as Rhodes’ essay from yesterday, and I’m through with you. If you provide this kind of claptrap one more time, you are useless to me as a source of legitimate debate and discussion pieces, and I will unsubscribe.
Nobody can match a Brit when it comes to speaking so arrogantly and authoritatively about a culture that they have absolutely no understanding of. And its curious that an article deploring racism (which is simply a fear or dismissive opinion towards someone due to the color of their skin) is so replete with exactly the same kind of negative stereotyping toward an American public simply because it is culturally different from the Brits with regard to individual rights acknowledged by the Bill or Rights, regardless as to whether Birrell likes it or not.
So, some corrections to the above blather. The political “right” in the US believes that individual rights are more important than state control. The political “left” in the US favors state control in order to brush aside individual rights that the left doesn’t agree with. Racism is simply racism. Some on the left are racist, some on the right are. That has nothing to do with right or left.
There are no “classic liberals” on the left. That’s the domain of the right, because individual liberties are at the very core of classic liberalism.
What we’re really seeing with Trump is a political revolution, where the citizens have risen up against Beltway Insiders – from both parties, to fight back against creeping and suffocating state control. Revolutions are messy and ugly, necessarily led by someone willing to get down in the dirt and fight against overwhelming odds. Like it or not, that’s Trump. No other Republican could fight the press, the political left, and fellow Republicans who were mired in the corrupt swamp of the Beltway.
Apparently Birrell doesn’t like that because he subscribes to the political left, state control and hates the ideas that individuals have individual rights – including the right to bear arms and protect themselves.
It is undeniable that one of the segments of American society that has benefited most, maybe THE most, are black Americans. And calling for order when rioters are burning and looting is not in the least racist. So spare me the pseudo-intellectual analysis of American politics through a skewed British prism.
Has Ian Birrell been trapped in some American airport these last months, disconnected from the real world and relying for his last trace of contact by lip-reading those television screens, doomed eternally to play CNN, with the sound switched off?
His piece is utter garbage. A man was wrongfully killed in Minneapolis by a policeman. George Floyd was black. The now ex-policeman is white. There is evidence that Chauvin was always bad at his job, but not that he was racist. Yet the permanently aggrieved class in the United States immediately took to the streets, not just in Minneapolis, but in New York, Richmond, Rochester, St Louis and places as far apart as Miami and Los Angeles – each of the last two, I’d guess, getting on for two thousand miles from Minneapolis.
While the initial protests were sincere in feeling, it’s a bit hard to see what they were protesting. Chauvin was dismissed immediately and was quickly charged. His colleagues on the spot have also been fired and may well face charges.
Heartfelt but meaningless protests were very quickly hijacked by terrorists. If you dispute that, how else do you explain attacks on churches, synagogues and courthouses? The American and British Left will blame Jews for everything, but rational people struggle to see a link between a death in Minnesota and a Jewish place of worship in Brooklyn.
To synthesize outrage, activists, Democrat politicians and the media have spouted nonsense about four hundred years of suffering, a reference to the “1619” campaign in the “New York Times” (it won a Pulitzer! – congratulations, so did Duranty, for the same rag). Nobody has suffered slavery in the United States since 1865 and the outrages of the Jim Crow era would have been stamped out, if the Republicans’ efforts had not been stymied by the Democrats, until fully a century after the end of the Civil War.
Let’s remember that every one of these burning cities – every one – is controlled by the Democrats and, with only the occasional exception, such as NY, has been for decades. If there is something wrong in the Minneapolis PD (and there probably is), how is that the fault of President Trump, or Republicans in general?
Where was Ian Birrell, when rioters were tearing apart American cities five years ago? Was Trump President then? Speak up, Ian, you pompous pipsqueak. I can’t hear you.
Does Mr Birrell seriously believe what he rights. If so he is a very deluded individual.
John McCain was not widely respected by the left nor was George Bush. Both were viciously and falsely attacked as racist, extremists etc by the left when in office or running for president. The only different know is the left with the aid of activist like Mr Birrell, have created a new imaginary bogieman.
What’s the point of an obviously biased article?, who is going to take it on board let alone read it to the end?.
It is always fascinating to read articles written from the past and see just how wrong the writers were. This one is only 2 years old and couldn’t be further from the truth. Thanks for republishing this imbecilic rant.
Has Ian Birrell been trapped in some American airport these last months, disconnected from the real world and relying for his last trace of contact by lip-reading those television screens, doomed eternally to play CNN, with the sound switched off?
His piece is utter garbage. A man was wrongfully killed in Minneapolis by a policeman. George Floyd was black. The now ex-policeman is white. There is evidence that Chauvin was always bad at his job, but not that he was racist. Yet the permanently aggrieved class in the United States immediately took to the streets, not just in Minneapolis, but in New York, Richmond, Rochester, St Louis and places as far apart as Miami and Los Angeles – each of the last two, I’d guess, getting on for two thousand miles from Minneapolis.
While the initial protests were sincere in feeling, it’s a bit hard to see what they were protesting. Chauvin was dismissed immediately and was quickly charged. His colleagues on the spot have also been fired and may well face charges.
Heartfelt but meaningless protests were very quickly hijacked by terrorists. If you dispute that, how else do you explain attacks on churches, synagogues and courthouses? The American and British Left will blame Jews for everything, but rational people struggle to see a link between a death in Minnesota and a Jewish place of worship in Brooklyn.
To synthesize outrage, activists, Democrat politicians and the media have spouted nonsense about four hundred years of suffering, a reference to the “1619” campaign in the “New York Times” (it won a Pulitzer! – congratulations, so did Duranty, for the same rag). Nobody has suffered slavery in the United States since 1865 and the outrages of the Jim Crow era would have been stamped out, if the Republicans’ efforts had not been stymied by the Democrats, until fully a century after the end of the Civil War.
Let’s remember that every one of these burning cities – every one – is controlled by the Democrats and, with only the occasional exception, such as NY, has been for decades. If there is something wrong in the Minneapolis PD (and there probably is), how is that the fault of President Trump, or Republicans in general?
Where was Ian Birrell, when rioters were tearing apart American cities five years ago? Was Trump President then? Speak up, Ian, you pompous pipsqueak. I can’t hear you.
I couldn’t be bothered to read all of this I got as far as some fantasy about the republican party being a continuum since Nixon. Since George Bush senior the Liberal consensus has reigned until Trump which is why Trump Derangement Syndrome which this bloke and his mate Damon is obviously part of.
Interesting and even more interesting comments. It would seem you need to get the dictionary out and look up the definition of populism with the Latin root populus (people).
Clearly this essay is an attempt to collapse the distinction between populism and conservatism and then high brow the moral excellence of liberalism without providing any definitions of the three.
What this ‘liberal’ analysis fails to understand is that democratic freedoms are a free pass for sociopaths/ideologues/demagogues. The Liberal camp it seems is positioning itself for Race Ideologues and the Conservative camp too if Trump is now the representative of Conservatism.
The way in which this works is through Liberalism.
First we have equality and the moral yearning for tolerance which is then bolstered by the rhetoric of diversity followed by another boost of tolerance. All of a sudden we have sociopaths in our midst who under the veil of equality, diversity and inclusion take advantage of the fact that we have no real means of differentiating between sociopaths and nonsociopaths until it is too late.
This is the fundamental flaw of Liberalism, in it idealisation of human good it provides no checks against human bad. This is perfectly exploited by the manipulative sociopath.
Therefore, all that you tell is the history of sociopaths coming to power and nonsociopaths murdered because they get in the way.
What is the solution. Clearly ‘equality, diversity and inclusion’ is part of the problem here since it is unable to differentiate between good and bad people. Similarly, part of the problem is not understanding that equality as a mental framework tool is also accompanied by inequality as a mental framework tool. When used in conjunction with one another, we have equity or common sense, in that equality is the tool we use to provide a meta level of dignity but inequality is used to discriminate/discern/differentiate between good and bad.
Liberals ostensibly reject the tool of inequality when it comes to meta policy making because they cannot comprehend that some people are just plain bad and instead idealise perfection in everyone. However Political (il)Liberals overuse it to provide a doorway for sociopaths to transmit their Race Ideology and Trans Ideology and as a means to castigate nonadherents.
Conservatives on the other hand are generally more comfortable and realistic about applying the tools of equality and inequality because they appreciate that all people are not good and most certainly not perfect. In this respect, Populists have more in common with Conservatives than they do with Liberals.
Therefore to claim that Liberalism and Conservatism are pretty much the same is in reality nonsense. Liberals have no real comprehension of inequality except as an aberration from equality whereas Conservatives perfectly understand that both equality and inequality are different mental tools to weigh up the pros and cons of a situation and then assess equity. Liberals don’t really do equity except as a derivative of equality. Conservatives on the other hand understand equity as a balance between equality and inequality.
Which brings me to Trump, the supposed arch enemy of Liberal equality. Yes he probably is a sociopath in disguise like most hard nosed businessmen, but he does at least try to measure a person by their deeds rather than by idealistic notions of perfect equality which cannot exist except in the fanciful imaginations of universalistic Liberals. Hence he does see population growth within a constrained economy as a problem. He does see the lack of national resilience as a problem, especially in terms of the extent to which American industry has been offshored to Asia. And yes he does see the imperfectability of the Liberal Establishment that purposely deploys media manipulation as a substitute for rational debate and policy making.
The fact of the matter is, Conservative governments the world over are under attack by the Liberal Establishment and this reduces overall social productivity because a government under siege is a government that needs to use much of its resources to defend against this Liberal Establishment attack.
This is why the UK’s and the US’s death toll are so high. Both countries are under siege by the Liberal Establishment which means national intelligence and national productivity are collectively wasted due to the need to divert mental and emotional capacity into political defence or political attack.
This essay is a pertinent reflection of that.
It seems to me that the ‘descent into darkness’ is that of Democrat supporters and others on the left. They seem to love nothing more than rioting and causing trouble. They prize their special interest groups because they are a way of causing division which often leads to trouble and violence.
In 1968 the left committed electoral suicide. As it did in 2016 when it decided to nominate a strident harridan of a kleptocrat.
I can’t seem to find the accompanying article ‘The Democrat Party’s descent into madness?’ Am I looking in the right place?