It is the presidential election that never happened but has come to define an era of US politics.
asserted
that → happen → politics
Obama is back on the campaign trail for the midterms, still electrifying crowds, earning shouts of “We love you!” and skewering his successor.
asserted
We → electrify → successor
“What’s up with the gold?” he asked a crowd in Detroit.
asserted
he → ’ → Detroit
“I mean, he’s got the White House looking like Saddam Hussein opened a Cheesecake Factory.”
asserted
Hussein → mean → Factory
This has, predictably, set off a mini culture war involving questions of elitism and the tastefulness of chain restaurants.
asserted
This → set → restaurants
Trump’s election to the White House 10 years ago next month owed much to a racist backlash against America’s first Black president as white Christians shifted from majority to minority.
asserted
Christians → owe → minority
He had pushed conspiracy theories about Obama’s birthplace and promised to build a border wall to keep out criminals and rapists.
asserted
He → push → criminals
Indeed, election campaigns are a furnace in which pretence burns away and essential character is exposed.
asserted
character → burn → which
They certainly bring out the worst in Trump.
asserted
They → bring → Trump
This year’s midterms effort, in which he is averaging about a rally a day and fighting bad polls like a cornered animal, is a case in point.
asserted
he → average → point
Has any president’s closing message ever been so Islamophobic, misogynistic and racist, not to mention downright deranged and bizarre?
asserted
message → mention → ?
It is like watching a man vomit up bigotry that has been poisoning his soul for decades.
asserted
that → watch → decades
Just when you think Trump has hit rock bottom, he produces a jackhammer and starts tunnelling to a new nadir of nastiness.
asserted
he → think → nastiness
He still relishes calling Obama by his full name, Barack Hussein Obama, with an emphases on Hussein.
asserted
He → relish → Hussein
Now he has Democratic candidate Abdul El-Sayed, who would become the first Muslim senator if elected, in his sights.
asserted
who → have → sights
In Port Huron, Michigan, on Sunday, he called El-Sayed a “jihadist” who is “on the side of the terrorists” and would “have to go through a metal detector before he’s allowed to go into the Senate”.
asserted
he → call → Senate
Trump repeatedly invoked the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks, drawing a comparison between stopping El-Sayed from entering the Senate chamber and the passengers who fought back against the hijackers onboard United flight 93.
asserted
who → invoke → flight
He has repeatedly attacked Ilhan Omar, the Somali-born congresswoman of Minnesota, while his justice department banged on her door at 6am to investigate alleged fraud in her family’s immigration paperwork.
asserted
department → attack → paperwork
Omar has said she is “confident in the fact that I didn’t do anything wrong”.
asserted
I → say → anything
One of Trump’s standard punchlines now is the racist and false assertion that 98% of people from Somalia in the US don’t work for a living.
asserted
% → work → living
“They don’t really have to work because they steal so much,” he told one rally.
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he → have → rally
“They all have a Mercedes-Benz.”
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They → have → Benz
He told his overwhelmingly white fanbase: “Can you believe, low IQ, and they live better than you do?
asserted
you → tell → fanbase
I don’t know what’s going on.
asserted
what → know → ?
Maybe they’re not as low as we think.”
asserted
we → ’re → ?
He said of the Ohio senator Jon Husted: “I looked at his ass, and then I looked at his legs.
asserted
I → say → legs
I said, ‘His ass, shit, it’s like, it’s like a pile of muscle.’”
asserted
it → say → muscle
He also claimed to have “fallen in love” with Tim Scott, the South Carolina senator.
asserted
He → claim → Scott
The objectification is not limited to men.
asserted
objectification → limit → men
Back in Michigan, Trump turned his attention to the posterior of the rapper Nicki Minaj.
asserted
Trump → turn → rapper
“I looked at one hell of a beautiful ass before: Nicki Minaj,” he said.
asserted
he → look → ass
“That’s hard to miss.
asserted
That → ’ → ?
That’s hard to miss.”
asserted
That → ’ → ?
How is all of this resonating with Trump’s supporters?
asserted
all → resonate → supporters
I called Sharon Anderson, who has been to 81 Trump rallies and was entirely untroubled by his comment.
asserted
who → call → comment
She said: “If a woman puts her ass out there for attention and somebody pays attention to it – Trump didn’t try to rape her – what’s the big deal?”
asserted
what → say → her
Anderson, 70, who is from Etowah, Tennessee, and went to her first Trump rally in 2015, dismisses the notion that he is getting worse.
asserted
he → go → notion
“I’ve been doing this for 11 years.
asserted
I → do → years
He’s not changed a bit in my opinion.
asserted
He → change → opinion
Now, a lot of what he says is reported and a lot of what he says isn’t reported.
asserted
he → say → what
…and 12 more, not listed.
The Aporia
