THE ICON VS. THE I-CON

 

Over the weekend, President-elect Donald Trump tweeted out the following across two tweets

Congressman John Lewis should spend more time on fixing and helping his district, which is in horrible shape and falling apart (not to mention crime infested) rather than falsely complaining about the election results. All talk, talk, talk - no action or results. Sad!

Trump chose the weekend to attack Civil Rights Icon and Congressman John Lewis (GA-5, D) for being all talk as well as this third tweet about that “Lewis should focus on the burning and crime infested inner-cities.”

Citizens living in the congressman’s Atlanta based district shared their pictures of what it is like living there as well as this response by the front page of the Atlanta Journal Constitution.

This is how we feel about @repjohnlewis down here in the GA 5th, a district Donald Trump thinks the congressman is failing #Defendthe5th pic.twitter.com/qZUgrGBBtc

— Jeb Boone (@JebBoone) January 14, 2017

Did I mention that this weekend was the Martin Luther King Jr Holiday?

It is quite possible that Trump doesn’t know who John Lewis is.

A brief history lesson

Lewis was one of several persons involved with the Civil Rights Movement during the late 1950s and 1960s. In March 1965, Lewis was part of the march across Alabama that culminated in a confrontation at Selma. On 7 March 1965, Lewis and many others were assaulted by Alabama State Troopers in their efforts to try to reach the state capitol of Montgomery to protest the various forms of discrimination – voting, economic, and social – that were pillars of southern society for nearly a century after the Civil War.

The events at Selma prompted then-President Lyndon Johnson to push and eventually sign the Voting Rights Act. Many of those provisions were later gutted by the 2013 Supreme Court decision Shelby County v. Holder.

Trump’s real estate company was sued by the Nixon justice department in 1973 over housing discrimination.

If Trump is further interested in learning more about this, he can read some of the books that Lewis authored though there might be a wait list due to his books are selling out and Trump doesn’t seem to be the type that reads anything that will enlighten him.

Perhaps the March Trilogy would be up his alley. It has a lot of pictures.

I will be happy to give him my copy of the books.