Extremist Trump Appointee is Revising Presidio History

An aerial view of the Golden Gate Bridge and the Presidio. A beautiful blue sky with a hint of low fog.

Mother Jones has a fascinating and deeply insightful article concerning the appointment of a truly incompetent fool to a position of responsibility by Trump.

Published Thur Apr 8, 2021 and titled “Trump Put a Right-Wing Radio Host in Charge of a National Park. Emails Show the Chaos That Ensued.” the author Dave Gilson tells the sorry saga of what happened when Trump appointed radio shock jock Michael Savage to the board of directors of the Presidio Trust. This is the federal corporation that runs the nearly 1,200-acre urban park at the foot of San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge.

Who?

Permit me to quote mine a few juicy gems so that you get a feel for what this Trump sycophant is really all about …

…a right-wing shock jock whose 27-year career has left a trail of racist, xenophobic, and homophobic comments … the pseudonymous talker (real name: Michael A. Weiner) …

…Savage’s first months as a Presidio Trust board member were marked by prickly outbursts, culminating in a sudden push to inject his toxic politics into park business…

… he warned as the 2020 election approached, “we know Trump is the only thing standing between us and absolute chaos in this nation.”…

Least you wonder, yes indeed, the above only scratches the surface. You can add inflated ego along with anti-science, and xenophobia to the list of his “attributes” and “qualifications” …

…he’s claimed that COVID surges are caused by Mexicans trying to “flood the gringo hospitals” and has vowed to “join an armed militia”⁠ before getting vaccinated, he’s boasted of being “a trained epidemiologist.”

Let’s not forget the issue of our age, climate change. Where does he stand on that?

Oh come now, opinions like these are generally a package deal, you can most probably guess that it would be this …

…he detests the “Environmental Propaganda Agency” and thinks climate change is a “scam” based on “Stalinist science,”

What is his Beef regarding the Park?

The Presidio has a very dark past. One chapter of history concerns the former base’s inarguable connection to the forced removal and detention of Japanese Americans during World War II. It was an abuse of power that was set in motion by a 1942 executive order signed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. That was then carried out through more than 100 military exclusion orders issued from the Presidio.

The museum at the Presidio has an execution that tells the story of this very dark chapter.

Savage has decided that this is “unchecked liberal sensitivity” and so embarked upon a campaign of historical revisionism to obliterate all mention of this and instead redirect it to be a museum that presents the greatness of the US Army at the Presidio …

“I am so sick and tired of the vermin on the left debasing the military in my country that I could just scream about it!”

Some Thoughts

The article itself is well-researched and well-referenced. It is a long detailed read, and so I’ll simply recommend that if the topic is of interest, then go read it. It is a truly fascinating insight into the appointment of an incompetent idiot.

There are two specific observations I’d like to add.

The first is this. Appointing wholly unqualified, inept and utterly incompetent fanatics to positions of responsibility has consequences. Take almost any position, immigration, race, gay rights, climate change and you find that Michael A. Weiner is on the wrong side of the argument. He is wrong in so many ways, wrong on basic ethics, bereft of basic human empathy, and wrong regarding basic facts. It perhaps acts as a microcosm that illustrates everything wrong about the Trump administration.

Individuals that were prepared to basically lick Trump’s arse were rewarded, and Mr Weiner’s tongue is ever so orange. That, and that alone, is why he got appointed to the board.

My second point is this. History is not simply a story we tell concerning what happened to entertain, nor should it ever be revised to narrate what we would like it to be. Facts are facts, and so we should lay it all out, even when what is revealed is uncomfortable, dark, and does not align with what we might wish it to be. The truth of what happened is a lesson for us all to grasp and learn from so that we can then strive learn from such mistakes and do far better.

Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on retentiveness. When change is absolute there remains no being to improve and no direction is set for possible improvement: and when experience is not retained, as among savages, infancy is perpetual. Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

George Santayana, philosopher, essayist, poet and novelist. – Vol. I, Reason in Common Sense

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