Trump/NFL political theater: who's winning?
By Jon Rappoport
Who's protesting what?
Players are standing up with arms locked, they're sitting,
they're kneeling, they're staying in the locker room during the National
Anthem, a few owners have come out of their high offices to join with
the players on the field, the networks are suddenly airing the pre-game
Anthem because TV viewers want to see the protests and it's all about
ratings and ad revenues; viewership for the games is down, one
quarterback who stayed with his team in the locker room confessed he
wanted to be out on the field and didn't want to be known for protesting
the Anthem, Trump praised fans in the stands for booing the players,
it's a party, a circus, it's theater, so who's winning?
According to counts and a survey, 70% of NFL players are black, and 83% of NFL fans are white.
One biracial player, Colin Kaepernick, started the whole
business by kneeling during the National Anthem, to protest police
brutality against black people.
Colin Kaepernick's original message, whatever you may think
of it, has exploded into pieces all over the landscape. Now people are
talking about the flag, the Anthem, patriotism, the veterans, ungrateful
millionaire athletes, "unity," the League, the Commissioner, racism in
general, and Trump as a slavemaster according to Jesse Jackson.
But don't worry. We're assured these football protests are part of engaging in a "national dialogue on race."
How many times have we heard that one before?
What dialogue? The whole country is going to assemble in the
geographical center of America and begin talking earnestly to one
another?
Yes, Trump is "energizing his base," as they say. But he's
also gleefully attacking the NFL team owners, some of whom were/are his
pals. He likes that kind of theater. He's sticking the owners with the
nasty job of defending the players. If the owners remain silent and go
away and hide, they'll be seen as racists. That's not a good look. So a
few of them appeared on football fields Sunday, "standing in solidarity"
with their teams. Now they can run away and hide.
"Jeeves, tell my pilot to gas up the jet. I've done my duty.
We're heading to the Cape. Let the staff know they'll have to open up
the summer house again..."
Trump also wants his enemies everywhere to understand he's
willing to attack anyone, even the rich owners of NFL franchises.
Fallout, no fallout, he doesn't care.
So today, a Pittsburgh Steeler offensive tackle few people
have ever heard of, a decorated ex-Army Ranger, Alejandro Villanueva, is
the most popular player in the League, because he didn't stay in the
locker room with the rest of his team during the playing of the National
Anthem. He came outside and made himself visible on the field.
Suddenly, his jersey has shot up to number one on the best seller list
of NFL merchandise.
That 80% of white fans are buying it.
This is supposed to be part of the "national dialogue," too?
(Update: Villanueva has now apologized for standing alone and
"throwing his teammates under the bus." What's the policy on returning
NFL merchandise?)
The strategic winner in this big NFL story, so far, is Trump.
His America-first rhetoric is making a bigger impact than all the NFL
protests.
Joe Scarborough, MSNBC: "This may be unpopular but it is a
political reality. Every NFL player refusing to stand for the national
anthem helps Trump politically."
Oops.
Of course, the rest of the politically Left media echo
chamber refuses to acknowledge that. The echo-chamber denizens always
try to convince themselves they're creating and owning and controlling
the narrative.
"If we say the NFL player protestors are smacking Trump down, the American people will believe us."
Yes, just as people believed the echo chamber when they elected Trump over Hillary "nothing is my fault" Clinton.
Of course, the echo chamber has to drown out a few voices.
For example, a player many think is the greatest NFL athlete of all
time, hall of famer Jim Brown: "I'm going to give you the real deal: I'm
an American. I don't desecrate my flag and my national anthem. I'm not
gonna do anything against the flag and national anthem. I'm going to
work within those situations. But this is my country, and I'll work out
the problems, but I'll do it in an intelligent manner."
Hmm. That doesn't work for the preferred narrative, so put it on the back page.
Where is the wild NFL-Trump-media theater piece heading? It's
obvious, isn't it? More supporters for Trump. More voters on his side.
And who wants that?
The Russians! Yes. Now we see the light. Vladimir Putin is
behind all these NFL player protests because, as a chess player, he
understands the end game: Trump wins.
Putin somehow manipulated Colin Kaepernick into staging his original kneel during the National Anthem. That's the op.
Is WikiLeaks going to play a role? We don't know yet. Stay tuned.
I'm sure James Comey will fit right in. He can return and testify before Congress:
"Well, we know Ivanka Trump met with Putin eighteen months
ago. At the time, he expressed an interest in buying the Dallas Cowboys,
with gold bars he found in a Venusian UFO that crashed in Siberia. But
then the conversation turned to the possibility of triggering player
protests, as a way of garnering support for Donald Trump..."
Putin is also behind Black Lives Matter, Antifa, incidents of
violence, riots, cops being shot, because all that, too, will swing
support over to Trump.
Note to John McCain: Get moving, John. Put together the
Committee hearings on the Hill. We've got our man. Putin. We've got the
tiger by the tail...
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