Last night, in chapter #81 of the Trump Time Capsule series, I argued that Donald Trump’s recent “outreach” to black voters amounted to talking about African Americans as a problem group, rather than to them as part of the “us” of America.
Reader Jamie Douglas, who is black, writes in to disagree. I am leaving in some of the complimentary things he says about non-Trump articles I’ve written, because they provide context for what he doesn’t like in my recent political coverage. After his message I’ll summarize why I see things differently.
Over to Jamie Douglas:
I’ve read many of the articles you published about the new China. I lived in Sichuan and Guizhou for several years (from about 2000-2005) and your articles, I felt, focused on things that Americans really needed to understand about where China was and is headed. Other journalists spent way too much time in Beijing writing about the machinations of the Communist party, and in doing so, they missed the real story.
I’m not writing today about anything related to China. Rather, what concerns me is your coverage of Donald Trump. I’m a black American from New York. My parents immigrated to Brooklyn from Grenada in the 1960s. And I wholeheartedly support the Trump campaign.
You’ve made it clear that you think Trump would be a disaster and that he has to be stopped. Trump inspires strong feelings, and from what I knew of you, I would have been shocked had you not been strongly opposed to his campaign.
I’m surprised, though, by how willing you are to do the easy thing and focus on Trump’s many gaffes, his off-putting braggadocio, and his very nontraditional tactics. There is a bigger story here and I’m still waiting for a journalist of your stature to address it. I believe that someone capable of writing something as honest and introspective as, “What Did You Do In the Class War, Daddy?” is very much able to produce a similar piece honestly analyzing Trump’s appeal and the visceral dislike that you and your colleagues in the media feel for him.
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