On Saturday's PoliticsNation show, MSNBC host Al 'Tawana Brawley' Sharpton griped about President Donald Trump and former President Richard Nixon promising "law and order" in their presidential campaigns as the MSNBC host alluded to the liberal trope that it is racist to promise to fight crime.
Sharpton accused both Trump and Nixon of wronging "peaceful" protesters by accusing them of violence even though there has, in fact, been an increase in violent crime since last year just as there was in the 1960s when Nixon was campaigning.
Beginning his regular "Memo to Trump" commentary, Sharpton referred to the President's recent use of the "law and order" slogan, and then complained: "You're following the lead of your party's most infamous former President, Richard Nixon, who successfully ran on 'law and order' as a slogan in 1968."
He soon suggested that Nixon was in part campaigning against the civil rights movement as he recalled that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was initially unpopular with the public:
In the years leading up to 1968's election, Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. was one of the most visible faces in the Civil Rights Movement, leading and inspiring nonviolent protests and demonstrations. And Americans were overwhelmingly against him -- 63 percent of Americans disapproved of Dr. King at that time while only 33 percent approved. Richard Nixon played on public opinion to portray peaceful protesters as violent agitators, and it propelled him to the White House.
But, even though Dr. King was opposed to violence and spoke out against it, there was, in fact, a documented increase in violent crime in the 1960s which caused legitimate concerns to the public. And, not mentioned by Sharpton, Democratic nominee Hubert Humphrey also used the "law and order" expression as he condemned crime.
Then, in spite of reports that there has been a recent increase in violent crime, Sharpton hinted that this is not the case as he portrayed the recent protests by left-wingers as being nonviolent:
But things look very different half a century later. Hundreds of thousands of Americans took up the cause of nonviolent resistance in the aftermath of George Floyd's killing .This time, two-thirds of Americans actually approve of their marches and demonstrations. So your bluster about law and order isn't going to resonate because most potential voters don't see the protesters as out of order at all, but rather a needed movement in the ongoing fight for racial justice in this country.
He soon incorrectly claimed that President Trump has sent "federal troops" into cities (they re actually federal agents) and blamed them for creating a "war zone' of violence:
Mr. President, you're the incumbent to the extent that anyone will believe things are out of control. It is you who is responsible -- you botched a pandemic response, tanked a once-booming economy, and sent federal troops into American cities, escalating peaceful protests into war zones.
He concluded by wishing to see the President defeated and then face "consequences" in the "American justice system."
The episode of PoliticsNation was sponsored by Humira and Oscar Mayer. Their contact information is linked.
Below is a transcript of the relevant portion of the Saturday, August 1, PoliticsNation on MSNBC:
PoliticsNation
8/1/2020
5:26 p.m. Eastern
For this week's "Memo to Trump," I want to talk about "law and order." Given its ubiquity on the airwaves and your propensity to sit around watching television, Mr. President, at first I thought that your repeated tweeting of the phrase "law and order" was just your way of letting us know you were catching up on reruns of the famous crime drama. But, no, you're following the lead of your party's most infamous former President, Richard Nixon, who successfully ran on "law and order" as a slogan in 1968.
(…)
But let's back up to 1968 so I can explain to you why the "law and order" gambit worked for Richard Nixon and why it's never going to work for you. In the years leading up to 1968's election, Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. was one of the most visible faces in the Civil Rights Movement, leading and inspiring nonviolent protests and demonstrations. And Americans were overwhelmingly against him -- 63 percent of Americans disapproved of Dr. King at that time while only 33 percent approved. Richard Nixon played on public opinion to portray peaceful protesters as violent agitators, and it propelled him to the White House.
But things look very different half a century later. Hundreds of thousands of Americans took up the cause of nonviolent resistance in the aftermath of George Floyd's killing .This time, two-thirds of Americans actually approve of their marches and demonstrations. So your bluster about law and order isn't going to resonate because most potential voters don't see the protesters as out of order at all, but rather a needed movement in the ongoing fight for racial justice in this country.
But, perhaps most importantly, in 1968 Richard Nixon ran as an outsider against the sitting Vice President, Hubert Humphrey, when he promised to restore "law and order," it was an implicit accusation that his opponent was the one who had allowed things to spiral out of control. But here in 2020, Mr. President, you're the incumbent to the extent that anyone will believe things are out of control. It is you who is responsible -- you botched a pandemic response, tanked a once-booming economy, and sent federal troops into American cities, escalating peaceful protests into war zones.
That's all still happening on your watch. You cannot run on a platform of restoring law and order when you are the one who allowed this country to slide into chaos. And with your recent commutation of Richard Nixon's fan who and who is now convicted, Roger Stone, you have shown that the only law and order you believe in is the kind used arbitrarily by you to reward your friends and cronies and to punish black and brown Americans you see as political enemies.
But you know what, Mr. President? I, too, am a great believer in law and order. The American people will hold you accountable for your crimes on November 3, and, come January 20, when you return to civilian life and can't use the office of the presidency to shield yourself from the consequences of your misdeeds, I look forward to seeing you get a taste of the American justice system.
