Smithsonian Institution

The Wiping Out Of History By Donald Trump: Museums And The White House! :(

Ronald Leave a comment

President Donald Trump has declared war on History, attacking various museums and their exhibits, and destroying the East Wing of the White House without any input, consultation, or authorization by any agency or organization.

For someone like this historian and scholar, this is a very depressing situation!

Interference with museum exhibits at the National African American Museum and National Museum of the American Indian in Washington, DC, along with the National Museum of American History, National Gallery of Art, and all other Smithsonian Museums is an attempt to wipe out truth, and distort the reality of the American past.

The same situation affects all National Parks and Monuments, with “sanitizing” of the reality of these sites.

Additionally, interference with the Library Of Congress, and cultural institutions, such as the Kennedy Center For The Perfoming Arts, is infuriating!

Declaring war on “DEI”, Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, is trying to repeal the 20th Century Civil Rights Movement, and reforms moving forward on race and gender, and instead working to impose white male dominance of all cultural institutions!

Trump Interference With Smithsonian Museums An Attack On Historical Truth!

Ronald 36 Comments

This author, scholar, and blogger has been communicating to students and adults for more than a half century “the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth” about the American historical experience, along with discussion of world events and foreign policy.

To have Donald Trump and his followers set out to declare war on the truth and the facts of the American past is a challenge that cannot be allowed to be lost!

For Trump to interfere with exhibits at the various Smithsonian Institution Museums is totally beyond the pale, and must be vehemently opposed with every fiber of the being of scholars and authors!

The truth of Civil Rights Museums cannot be allowed to disappear!

The challenge to teachers and professors is to refuse to teach and spread lies and mistruths.

That is very difficult for teachers and librarians who depend on state and local governments for their livelihoods.

But the reality of the American past must not be compromised, and lawsuits and action by decent people, parents and those who care about proper education, must lead to resistance.

The American Historical Association, the Organization of American Historians, the American Political Science Association, and reputable news media and scholars in the nation and around the world must unite to guarantee that “the truth shall set us free!”

Ten Days Away, Coming Back To New Controversies Surrounding Donald Trump! :(

Ronald 19 Comments

This author and blogger took a vacation, visiting my old “haunts” in New York City, where he lived until 1989.

While it was great getting back to “my origins”, for only the third time in the past 36 years, new controversies erupted around Donald Trump and his administration while I was away.

At least ten areas of crisis grew while this author and blogger was away on vacation.

The earlier decision of CBS to cancel Stephen Colbert, occurring days before this author and blogger took a break, just to gain the ability to merge with new ownership accepted by Donald Trump, was just the beginning. And Trump celebrating Colbert’s show ending next May was a moment of total disgust!

Trump fired the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics because she revealed a report of weak employment growth in July, and massive revision downward of May and June figures, numbers she had no control over adjusting.

Trump’s tariffs, which will raise the cost of living dramatically in future months, are due to take place on August 7, with some nations being “punished” more than others, including Canada and Brazil, and all Americans paying the price for this insanity, as tariffs cause economic collapses historically!

Ghislane Maxwell, in prison for 20 years for sexual abuse of young girls, connected with the Jeffrey Epstein Scandal, was moved to a minimum security prison, after being interviewed by Trump’s Deputy Attorney General. This is seen as an attempt to move to pardon her, and avoid revelations of whether Donald Trump was involved in the sexual abuse, another sign of a coverup to protect Trump.

Texas is attempting to use the abuses of gerrymandering to insure possibly five more House seats to go to the Republican Party, an effort to insure Republican control of the House of Representatives, with the support of Donald Trump. Democrats have left the state, to try to avoid such abuses from occurring.

The National Museum of American History, connected with the Smithsonian Institution, temporarly removed an exhibit showing Trump’s two impeachments, although it now claims it will be restored in the future.

The number of ICE arrests is multiplying, including at immigration hearings, when people show up at their required appointments, gain a new court date, but then are grabbed by multiple ICE agents wearing masks, acting like the Nazi Gestapo!

The number of government workers are being decimated, which makes a future set of shortcomings that will affect Americans in many areas of government involvement, most notably the National Weather Serivce and the upcoming hurricane season, as well as air traffic control, which delayed this author and blogger’s flight to New York City by a TEN hour delay! 🙁

Trump has moved nuclear submarines closer to Russia, as relations between Trump and Vladimir Putin worsen, and as the Russian war against Ukraine continues unabated.

The mass starvation of Gaza residents by Israel continues, and Trump’s inability or lack of concern about what is seen by many as a growing Holocaust.

So trying to “escape” from the news really is not truly possible, as the nightmare of Donald Trump continues! 🙁

The Attempted “Whitewashing” Of American History Will NOT Survive In The Future!

Ronald 26 Comments

As a veteran of the college and university classroom, and having just retired after 53 years of teaching American history, government, and politics, I want to make clear that the attempted “white washing” of American history by the Trump Administration, will NOT succeed in the long run!

The truth and facts and reality of American history–the good, the bad, and the ugly–cannot be eliminated just because the present national government sets out to destroy the Library of Congress, the Smithsonian Institution and its multitude of museums, and the many other historical sites and memorials.

Short term, we are seeing the attempt to reverse reality of the past, and it is a long hard struggle that will be waged over the years in the future, but the truth will win out in the long run!

We are not going to go back to a purely white Christian version of American history, as we will keep the faith on the truth of African American history; Latino American history; American Women’s history; Asian American history; Native American history; Gay and Lesbian American history; and Jewish American history!

All areas of American history will continue to be spoken about, taught to students, and scholarly works published!

“Red” state governors and legislatures, most notably in Florida and Texas, will continue to attempt to wipe out the reality of the historical record, and short term, they may be triumphing, but the battle to retain and preserve the past in an accurate manner, will return in the future.

And “Blue” state governors and their legislatures, and city mayors and city councils around urban America, will fight the good fight to keep alive the historical record as it is, explaining to future generations the positives and negatives of American history, and hold the federal, state, and local governments accountable for their actions!

Anything worth preserving requires dedication and commitment, and all scholars of American history, including this author and blogger, will NEVER give up the fight for the truth and reality!

Trump Attack On The Smithsonian Institution, Library Of Congress, Copyright Office, Kennedy Center: An Attack On Truth And Facts Of American History And Culture!

Ronald 10 Comments

Donald Trump has unleashed an attack on the Smithsonian Institution and its various museums, including the National African American Museum, the National Museum of the American Indian, the proposed National Women’s History Museum, and the proposed National Latino Museum in particular; on the Library of Congress, on the US Copyright Office; and on the Kennedy Center For Performing Arts.

This is endangering the quest for facts and truth regarding the American historical past, and on American culture at large.

It is also interfering with the separation of powers, with agencies that the Executive Branch should have no power over, and should not be able to fire their leadership, but Trump has gone ahead and done so, anyway! This is Executive Branch overreach to the extreme!

The nation is in a crisis over so many issues, but interference with these institutions is something that Congress MUST stop in its tracks, for the safety and survival of these crucial organizations!

Donald Trump, The Disruptor In Chief!

Ronald 59 Comments

Donald Trump is the Disruptor in Chief.

He has declared the Gulf of Mexico is the Gulf of America.

He wants Veterans Day (November 11) and V E Day (May 8) to be renamed.

He wants Alcatraz, an infamous prison off of San Francisco, closed six decades ago and a much visited national park since then, to be renovated and reopened for the “worst of the worst” criminals.

He has no shame, and portrays himself as a potential Pope before the Catholic Church conclave to select the successor to Pope Francis.

He also shares the image of Darth Vader on “Star Wars Day”, May 4, as a muscular image of himself.

He wants to put tariffs on foreign produced films.

He wants to purge the Smithsonian Institution and its various museums of any references to race and gender.

He has mounted an attack on higher education at the top Ivy League universities.

He wonders if he must obey the Consitution that he swore the oath to enforce both in 2017 and 2025.

He wants anyone opposed to him and his actions in the past and present to be prosecuted by a Justice Department that is his personal fiefdom.

He has taken action against corporations, law firms, and media organizations to force them into compliance or face the consequences.

He refuses to make sure the laws are faithfully executed, even from federal courts, and doubts about the veracity of “due process”.

He lies incessantly without a sense of shame or guilt, and no one can trust anything he says.

There has never been a President anything like him, not even Richard Nixon at his worst!

Donald Trump’s Promotion Of Return Of Racial Segregation!

Ronald 13 Comments

It is unfathomable how Donald Trump, 70 years after the unanimous Brown V Board of Education Supreme Court decision (1954) outlawed racial segregation, which promoted the Civil Rights Movement and transformed the nation, is working earnestly to reverse all of that progress, and promote the return of segregation.

In the 1960s, Alabama Governor George Wallace became a threat as a third party nominee with the same aim as Donald Trump, but he could not win the Presidency, thank goodness.

But now Trump is going full scale ahead to wipe out all of the racial progress, advocating discrimination returning as official policy, thrilling white supremacists, Ku Klux Klan and American Nazi Party supporters.

Trump is going beyond just race, but also gender, wishing to set back the vast progress of women in American life since the 1960s.

Trump has, by an extensive number of executive orders, promoted all end of DEI initiatives at all levels, including higher education institutions, corporations, federal government agencies, and cultural institutions, including the Smithsonian Institution museums in Washington DC and across the nation.

Trump is working to destroy all civil rights litigation, and causing growing fear that police and law enforcement will return to the era of abuse toward racial and ethnic minorities.

All references to notable African Americans, Latinos, native Americans, women, and gay, lesbian and transgender people are being scrubbed from government websites.

And Trump is trying to totally close down the Department of Education created under President Jimmy Carter in 1979, to promote equal educational opportunity and funding for low income and marginalized students.

His aim is to promote White Male Supremacy and dominance, what people who would agree with him would consider “The Good Old Days” before the 1950s and since!

All decent, fairminded people must work to resist and overcome this clearcut racism, nativism, and misogyny of Donald Trump!

Time For Action By Congress On H. R. 19, Authorizing National Women’s History Museum On National Mall!

Ronald Leave a comment

The Congress has accomplished nearly nothing under Republican leadership in 2017, but one action they should unite on is the passage of H.R. 19, authorizing the construction of a National Women’s History Museum on the National Mall.

Democratic Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney of New York introduced the legislation authorizing the building of the museum on March 30, 2017. It was referred to a Subcommittee On Federal Lands on April 7, 2007, and no further action has yet been taken. There were 127 cosponsors with Maloney, and now an additional 100, for a total of 227, have been added to that list.

Maloney has tried to lobby personally with President Donald Trump, his wife Melania, his daughter Ivanka, Vice President Mike Pence’s wife Karen Pence, and Kelly Anne Conway. to join in support of the museum project, but one wonders what the odds of endorsement are from a President who is a known misogynist.

Despite earlier moves to get this legislation accomplished under President Barack Obama, it failed to be dealt with before he left office. In 2014, the Congress voted to create a commission to study the creation of a national museum, and now the time for action has arrived in this 115th Congress.

Republican Senator Susan Collins of Maine introduced the Maloney bill in the Senate with 11 co-sponsors, but there is little enthusiasm evident to make such a museum part of the Smithsonian Institution, due to other priorities, and the issue of private funding being a long haul.

We are coming up to the centennial of women’s right to vote (19th Amendment) in 2020, and it would be appropriate that we were well on the way to the creation of such a building to honor the role of women, half of our population, which has been mostly ignored until now.

Ironically, though, the Republican Party has become so anti women’s rights, that they are likely to refuse to take action on this, as they work to undermine a woman’s right to an abortion; the right to equal pay; the right to be protected from sexual harassment; and the right to be treated as equals to men in all aspects of life.

Too often, the religious Right has worked against women’s equality, and the Republican Party, the party that many early women’s rights advocates supported in the 19th and 20th centuries, now has taken steps backward in their advocacy of equality.

Smithsonian National Museum Of African American History And Culture Opens: A Treasure For The Nation!

Ronald 2 Comments

The day has finally arrived when America can celebrate the history and culture of African Americans, with the opening of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture on the National Mall near the Washington Monument in Washington, DC.

This event comes at a time of increased racial tensions and open racism in America, despite the election and two term Presidency of the first African American President, Barack Obama.

The museum exposes the true history of slavery, Jim Crow segregation. lynching, the civil rights movement, and the massive contributions of African Americans in all areas of public life over the past 397 years since slavery first came to America at Jamestown, Virginia.

This author thinks back to when he was young, and the discussion of African American history was ignored in high school, and how far we have come in understanding and dealing with the history, all of it both good and much of it evil, which had been covered up for so long.

So despite the problems we face today, this is truly a development to celebrate, and this author looks forward to visiting this new museum next summer, and for many times in the future, as the exhibits will constantly be evolving, as they are at any museum, and particularly one associated with the Smithsonian Museum, our national group of fantastic and tax supported museums that are a blessing to American culture and history!

Smithsonian Institution Anniversary: A Great Cultural Icon For America!

Ronald Leave a comment

Today marks the 169th birthday of the founding of the Smithsonian Institution, created with a grant by an Englishman, James Smithson, whose body is interred in a tomb in the original building of the institution, the Smithsonian Castle, which was dedicated by Congressman and former President John Quincy Adams in 1846, after legislation was signed into law by President James K. Polk.

Smithson was a chemist and mineralogist, who became the donor of the founding of an institution named in his honor, although Smithson never visited the United States, but he made it clear in his will of his great admiration for the United States, and desire to give a bequest for the promotion of learning and knowledge.

The institution named in Smithson”s honor has become the largest museum-educational complex in the world including 19 museums, 9 research centers, and a zoo, including among them the following:

National Air and Space Museum
National Museum of American History
National Museum of Natural History
National Portrait Gallery
National Museum of the American Indian
Smithsonian American Art Museum
National Museum of African American History and Culture
National Zoo

This pursuit of knowledge in the arts, sciences, culture, and history is a national treasure, and a “must see” for tourists in Washington, DC!