The mask of political moderation is now officially off George Will. His shameless column’s recitation this week of extreme far right Republican fringe drivel exposed his truly devious agenda. Joining the conspiracy theory fanatics, Will, without any evidence, claimed that the 1619 Project “may already be embedded in school curricula near you,” is a bald-faced effort to shake up the rabble deeper into their abject fear of “progressives” in the public education system. “Near you” is the personalization of the fear mongering.
Will says that the 1619 Project’s claim of systemic racism in America is a “racial obsession”. Somehow, his eagle eye for protecting America’s institutions glazes over and he misses the Proud Boys web sites, the Charlottesville neo-nazi marches openly shouting anti-semitic slogans and the authoritarian urgings of former President Trump. Somehow this paragon of conservative patriotic propriety has totally whiffed (in his ersatz baseball parlance) on these overt efforts to overthrow our government.
He whiffed on failing to condemn not only Trump, but all of Trump’s cowering, beholden Republican congressmen and senators who remain too fearful to uphold their oaths to uphold the US Constitution as they voted not to vote to accept the electoral results of the election. Crickets from Mr. Will, too cowardly to criticize his party’s ugly racist, white supremacist agenda. This cowardice allows the intellectual Will blissfully to ignore the systemic racism that has plagued this country since it’s totally white male-controlled beginnings proceeded to clear native americans of their land and murder any whose organized resistance was offered.
It is apparent that Will is part and parcel of the radical “1776” project, founded by Trump through an executive order during his presidency. This self-proclaimed “patriot” group, whose website is called “Flag and Cross” with renditions of the US flag and Jesus Christ’s Cross, sells T-shirts, flags, pins, mugs and glassware, much of which includes the “Let’s Go Brandon” theme, which refers specifically to an obscene chant, “F*** Joe Biden”.
Of course, our Founding Fathers made no room at the table for native americans, non-whites or women, including white women, either. Somehow, Mr. Will seems completely unwilling to acknowledge systemic racism exists today and that the Republican Party’s survival relies upon preventing massive numbers of non-whites from voting – making minimal pretense for hiding that monstrous truth. He needs to write a column announcing for self-identified constitutional “originalists” like Amy Coney Barrett to snap out of her ultraconservative coma. Under the original US Constitution, not only would she not have a place on SCOTUS (or any other court), she wouldn’t even have been able to vote.
As an alleged constitutionalist and historian, Will ought to be howling in the streets, not only over the Republican effort to overthrow the 2020 election, but the Republican-controlled governors’ and state legislatures’ efforts to overturn the results of 2020 and upcoming elections via arbitrary election fraud claims. He should be howling every day about his Republican cronies’ deep involvement in the brownshirt-style plot to steal the election. He should be adamantly demanding to see any evidence that conservative Republican officials have to claim the election was stolen. If they can’t produce it, Will should be demanding they resign in deference to our sacred American rule of law.
And speaking of resignations, Will’s second article this week called for SCOTUS to reign in police lawlessness citing two cases where federal police officers obviously abused their authority yet remain protected from prosecution under federal law. Yet Will completely whiffed again by utterly ignoring the often heinous abuse of power by state and local police, especially in abusing minorities. In fact, Will missed the clear responsibility of state and local police authorities to dismiss officers and administrators who are members of white supremacist radical organizations and/or openly espouse such ideology to their peers. Racism and white supremacist ideas are not illegal in our country, but when imposed on minorities by people in authority, they cannot be allowed to enforce the law on behalf of all citizens.
We won’t see that kind of candid commentary from men like George Will. Will is the nearly complete personification of what his former fellow Republican Spiro T. Agnew once called an “effete intellectual snob”.
Mickey Terrone
Oxford
Chip Heartfield says
I am wondering where Mr. Terrone is getting the “information” that has caused him to write to the Editor? Mr. Will does indeed provide evidence, at least in the online version I read; he links to the Pulitzer website and its description of the 1619 Project’s use in classrooms. And you can go to the NYT website to see more detailed info on the curriculum as well as teaching aids. And as has been widely reported, the founder of the project explicitly intended it to be used in classrooms. As for the 1776 project, Mr. Terrone has confused the “1776 Commission,” launched by President Trump and then terminated by President Biden, with “1776 Unites” – a project launched by Robert Woodson and whose website is http://www.1776Unites.com, not Flag and Cross, which is owned by an unrelated conservative media company founded in 1999. I hope this helps to clarify.
Stephen Schaare says
Hi Chip, Mr. Terrone has his own facts and fantasies. He is clearly unaware we are in the 21st century. Mickey is confusing the George Will of some twenty years ago with the present day “never Trumper” George Will. He may be thinking of the late Andrew Breitbart.
Always the white supremacy. Who, where are these klansmen? Are these white devils committing the black genocide in our cities? Are these monsters burning down cities and killing police officers? I think not.
Someone said “we are entitled to our own opinions, but not our own facts”
Thank you Chip. I feel less alone. Steve
Reed Fawell says
Wow!
Mickey Terrone says
Messrs. Heartfield and Schaare: Please articulate where and how George Will “links to the Pulitzer website and its description of the 1619 Project’s use in classrooms”. What classrooms? Where? I didn’t see any such references on the Pulitzer web site. Will makes no specific reference to jurisdictions anywhere in the US where the 1619 Project theory is being taught to children.
It certainly is not taught in the state of Maryland. Yet hysterical local citizens have claimed publicly that “Critical Race Theory” is being taught to our children now and citizens need to put a stop to it. They were roundly applauded at the Firehouse meeting when they added that our school teachers and administrators hate us and our children, and are part of the Marxist takeover. Our StarDem even editorialized on it recenntly as a major issue in the 2022 elections. Will menacingly wrote that “The 1619 Project, which might already be embedded in school curricula near you…”. Of course, WIll failed to mention anything specific. If he could have, he would have. “MIGHT ALREADY be IMBEDDED”? Let’s see your documentation.
If that’s what you consider a factual link, it isn’t surprising. Its likely that you consider it factual that Trump won the 2020 election despite the absence of any evidence. It may be that you consider it a fact that the January 6th Riot was just a harmless, peaceful protest. It appears a substantial percentage of Republicans are living in a deluded state, unthinkingly believing anything from Trump’s mouth and waiting for the next update from “Qanon”. Did you believe Sean Spicer when he told Americans that Trump had the largest inaugural crowd in history? Did you believe Kellyanne Conway when she came out an told us that Spicer was simply offering “alternative facts”? Are you inured to the practice of believing obvious lies and just going along with them expecting others to blindly go along, too? Doesn’t it require delusion to believe Trump’s lies?
It seems to me that white supremacists would be upset about teaching children about the value of diversity in society and the harm that racism has caused our society in the past 300 years. Locally, for example, most white adults were raised to believe the Talbot Boys were innocent of any racist or white supremacist vices and were fighting for freedom from an oppressive US Government presided over by Abe Lincoln. The bronze rendition of the Confederate flag is likely considered by many whites locally as a symbol of that government’s effort to assert the rights of individual freedom. These are more delusions.
Diversity could not make heroes of of those who fought for the Confederacy, as it would appear some local white residents wrongly believe. We should be teaching our children to respect everyone, not just white people. How this resembles or differs from Critical Race Theory is not very relevant. It is not a part of our curriculum anywhere in Maryland – or any other state of which I am aware.
I am aware of Will’s past critical comments of Trump. I am also aware of Senators like Lindsey Graham and Ted Cruz’ former criticisms of Trump. And look at them now. It appears Will is now groveling as well.
Its good that we have this conversation. Thanks for responding. Lets continue.
Stephen Schaare says
Mr. Terrone, White Supremacy and former President Trump are living in your head and dictating your every thought. I am not smart enough to understand how this happens.
As expected, you will not address the questions posed in my comment. Your zealotry prevents this. Do you not see the rich irony in your very first sentence?
“The mask of political moderation”
You are describing our current President Joseph Robinette Biden Jr.. Percieved as a moderate for so many, many years. Oath of office, hand on Bible, Poof! Karl Marx.
Can you, in fact, cite one positive contribution by a white man in the history of America?
John Fischer says
My goodness, Mr. Terrone. Take a breath. Take a breath.
Chip Heartfield says
Again, the info on the 1619 project as a classroom activity is easy enough to find at the Pulitzer Center site that Mr. Will’s column linked to (https://pulitzercenter.org/lesson-plan-grouping/1619-project-curriculum), directly at the NYT site (https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/22/magazine/teaching-the-1619-project-event.html) or in hundreds if not thousands of articles and interviews with the project’s creator, Ms. Hannah-Jones; ten minutes tops on the internet at reputable websites left, right or in between.
As for the rest of Mr. Terrone’s response, there sure is a lot of leaping to conclusions going on there! I happen to think the 1619 Project is a useful addition to the discussion of how and why our country was founded. Historical writings always change over time as new facts are uncovered, as revisionist authors publish, and as that revisionism is debated and found either sound or wanting. We shall see if the 1619 Project holds up as more and more professional historians weigh in. In the meantime, let’s make sure we get the facts we do have right and, as important, avoid blanket condemnations and wild suppositions.
Mickey Terrone says
Mssrs Schaare and Heartfield: First, let’s evaluate your thinking processes. To claim that a centrist Democrat like Joe Biden can take the oath of office and “Poof”, become Karl Marx is absurd and without any basis in fact. The Pulitzer web site makes no mention whatsoever of any of this country’s public schools (among the total of nearly 245,000 schools) where Critical Race Theory is actually being taught. It is a theory. You are obsessed with baseless presumptions. George Will has joined the fringe and is hollering “fire” in the movie theater. Where is that curriculum actually being taught? Which state(s) have adopted the curriculum?
Go ahead and explain how Joe Biden becomes Karl Marx by taking the oath of office as POTUS. Go ahead. Besides, your abject fright over anything that appears to suggest to white children that any white people were guilty of abuse of minorities is appallingly dishonest. If anything, the horrors of slavery have been glossed over in schools. Very few Americans today are aware of the horrendous physical, mental, emotional, sexual and spiritual cruelties perpetrated upon millions of black men, women and children every single day for 200 years! Of course, when some of us have been characterizing our confederate ancestors as patriotic Christian heroes, there needs to be some explanation. This is what brainwashed white Republican Trump supporters can’t seem to accept. Many claim that we need to teach the “good, the bad and the ugly” about our history, yet we mustn’t allow our children to learn the realities of our actual history.
Now local Republicans are enraged about a “Marxist takeover” of our schools with at least two of the announced Republican County Council candidates espousing this utter nonsense in lieu of facts.
Trump has weaponized white supremacy to drive fear into the minds of fearful whites and as a tool to divide Americans against each other. His support of the white supremacists in Charlottesville was a clarion signal that radical fringe groups will be protected and given full support by the Republican Party, to include limiting minority voting and to ensure the ability of some states to overturn elections that Democrats win by state legislative actions. Trump’s awful racism has been rife for decades, starting with him and his KKK father being sued for discrimination in housing against minorities and his gross, public call for the death penalty for the black teenagers falsely accused in a Central Park (NYC) attack on a white woman. Of course, the list is very extensive, so I’ll just offer you a window into his sordid Aryan white supremacist history: https://www.vox.com/2016/7/25/12270880/donald-trump-racist-racism-history. Maybe now, Mr. Schaare can become smart enough to understand and acknowledge how Trump and white supremacy are synonymous.
In reality, George Will has also sold out to the conspiracy theorists with his blind fear mongering of the 1619 Project. If Will could have provided specifics on which state(s) added the CRT to their curriculum, he would have. The utterly extremist tone of radical Republicans with Marxist references and locally, the claim that our public school teachers and administrators “hate you, hate your children” are almost obscenely false. This is a manufactured, false issue designed to incite those who are fearful of equal rights for all Americans. The protests seek to prevent any discussion of systemic racism. The absurdities of claiming that whites didn’t practice slavery and Jim Crow racism are grossly false and nearly paranoid. Equally dumb is the idea that if white children learn about the ugly realities of their ancestors, that they would somehow be emotionally injured. In reality, white children are injured by racist parents whose prejudices rub off on their children even before they get to school. The teachers and administrators who have to deal with racism among students of all ages. Of course, when some of us have been characterizing our confederate ancestors as patriotic Christian heroes, there needs to be some explanation. This is what brainwashed white Republican Trump supporters can’t seem to accept. Many of them claim that we need to teach the “good, the bad and the ugly” about our history, yet they deny the obvious realities of our actual history. Public schools promote equal rights and diversity. They don’t teach guilt to white children. Both of you, George Will and millions of Republicans know this but are desperate for a campaign issue.
The 1776 Project, a frantic web site that makes it appear that Critical Race Theory has taken over our lives and that this is our “Goal-line stand” against Marxism, is an utter sham of lies and exaggeration. It is a reflection of the far right fringe in this country that is creating hysteria to divide Americans against each other and weaponize racism, this time, using the 1776 theme to call upon deluded “patriots” to defend the Bill of Rights and Constitution, even as Republicans are undermining both in their effort to overturn the election and install a demagogue in the White House after he got thrashed in the 2020 election. Y’all need to understand local school boards are not empowered to adopt new “Theories” in their curricula. The Maryland state board can do that under the aegis of the governor and legislature. But what do facts matter to fearful, misinformed fringe group elements?
In response to Mr. Parket’s thoughtful letter, the way to minimize, if not eradicate racism, is to address it in schools, where it can be done over years and openly among diverse groups of younger children, teenagers and young adults. However, when the issue becomes subsumed by radical fearmongering political campaigns attempting to divide Americans, the challenges become more complex.
Bob Parket says
It seems to me that those participating in this conversation are all approaching the question of racism in the America as a binary condition, i.e., either it exists in all interactions or it is absent in all. Maybe this stems from an overly simplistic definition (or understanding) or the phrase “systemic racism”. While there are likely individuals who believe every interaction or transaction in our society is defined or tainted by racism, I do not believe this is an accurate characterization of most who support elements in the 1619 project. As there is no denying that most Americans are not racists, there is also no denying that there are white supremist racists in America,and that many institutions in America have not been as effective of moving such individuals and their un-American illegal practices out of our social and commercial lives. The issue, and conversation, should not be “does racism exist in America” (it does), but rather how do we eliminate it, in whatever form, no matter how common or prevalent. To do this, we must admit it does exist and then decide how we can best educate us all.