Seldom is there such a confluence of examples, in one day, of one of my ongoing premises.
CNN, John Blake, today: Some Americans don’t believe all people are created equal. Their movement is going mainstream, this author says
My premise is simply that an original base human nature, one that is tribal, racist, and selfish, resides within all of us; some of us have inherited a gradually evolving enlightened human nature, that has grown along with the growth of a global society; and modern life is a sort of see-sawing back and forth between which of these perspectives prevail. The OT represents the former; parts of the NT (some of what Jesus said; nothing of what Paul said) and the US Constitution and many other documents represent the latter. MAGA represents the former, even as they claim to worship Jesus and the Constitution. They seem completely un-self-aware, or maybe are just dumb.
The article:
They hold this truth to be self-evident: Only a fool believes that all men are created equal.
Look around you, they say. Most Americans are takers, not makers. Rich people work harder. Poor people make bad choices. Some racial groups are born with more intelligence than others. That may sound harsh to some, but remember, they say, “empathy is a weakness.”
These observations come from some of the most prominent people in the country. They seemingly reject the foundational American belief — enshrined in the Declaration of Independence — that “all men are created equal.” Instead, these people belong to a “shadow tradition” of anti-egalitarians who have fought against America’s founding ideas — and their movement is going mainstream, one historian says in a new book.
The article is on the occasion of a new book; I’m not so much interested in that book as making the general point, which is increasingly obvious.
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Not one or two or three, but four items from today’s NY Times (print edition) illustrate the regressive, selfish, tribalistic nature of Trump, MAGA, and the current administration. (A couple of these I’ve already noted, when they first appeared online.)
- NYT, posted 21 Aug 2026: Trump Threatens Suit Over Report He Doesn’t Like, Aiming to Intimidate a Critic [gift link]
- Subtitled “It was the latest example of President Trump’s bid to use the legal system against those who voice unflattering facts and opinions generally protected by the First Amendment.”
- Shoot the messenger.
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- NYT, Dave Philipps and Eric Schaff, posted 20/21 Aug 2026: Under Trump, Protected Wild Horses Are Going to Slaughter
- Subtitled: “A legal loophole allows the government to sell mustangs on the cheap, stripping them of protections and clearing their path to destruction.”
- Why kill innocent wildlife? Because they can. And because they get $25 a head!
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- NYT, posted yesterday: Trump Administration Has a Different Way to Drain Harvard Funding
- Subtitled: “The federal government has slowed Harvard’s funding, despite the university’s legal victories. The conflict is forcing hard choices on campus.”
- Trump and MAGA: Education is bad. Take it down.
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- NYT, Maxine Joselow, posted 20 Aug 2026: How Trump Is Trying to Crush California’s Environmental Policies
- Subtitled “At least a half-dozen federal agencies have taken action against the state that has led the nation in environmental protections.”
- Because to conservatives, as with the ancient hunter-gatherers whose human nature is part of us to this day, there are no long-term consequences; no long-term planning is necessary; the tribe lives from day to day. Grab what you can now. Kill the beast. Make money while you can. If it means burning up the planet, you don’t care, you won’t notice.
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Robert Reich on an item above.
Robert Reich, yesterday: He Really IS Stark-Raving Mad: subtitled “This proves it”
Trump is threatening the Center for American Progress, a prominent liberal think tank, with a $5 billion defamation lawsuit over a report concluding that his deployment of the National Guard to cities across the country has had little effect on reducing violent crime.
This is nuts, for several reasons.
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And from yesterday.
Robert Reich, yesterday: Trump’s View of Everything in the World, subtitled “Vassals, Mooches, and Thugs (oh my)”
Friends,
Trump says he directed Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to “substantially reduce” military drills with South Korea, citing his “very good relationship with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un” — whom he calls “unthreatening and respectful.”
Kim Jong Un is unthreatening and respectful? Hello?
Trump also says he’s miffed at South Korea for refusing to help the United States in its conflict against Iran — a conflict that was initiated entirely by Trump alone and is over 4,000 miles away from South Korea.
Wha?
