Confused

I’m confused. Newt Gingrich said recently that Barack Obama was influenced by “Kenyan anti-colonial behavior.” Now correct me if I’ve got this wrong. Gingrich apparently doesn’t approve of either the president or “anti-colonial behavior.” If he’s anti-anti colonial behavior that means he favors it, two negatives being a positive. So Gingrich is apparently in favor of colonialism, something to which less forthright people might be reluctant to admit.  

Another prominent Republican, Mike Huckabee, went after you know which half the president’s ancestry by saying “he probably grew up thinking that the British were a bunch of imperialists.” This may be an implied rhetorical criticism of imperialism. But selecting what was once an empire on which “the sun never sets” confuses his argument to where it could be taken as a not too subtle endorsement.

Imperialism and colonialism, close to synonymous, seem to be making a comeback in right wing circles. These are just two examples. This shouldn’t be a surprise. It’s hard to cultivate national Islamophobia when Muslims, along with other people of color, are historically known as victims rather than conquerors in this sort of activity.

Rewriting history can only be done in the short run, a job at which today’s Republicans have demonstrated an aptitude. To help them I suggest using a subliminal approach by promoting a revival of vintage movies from the same winery as “lives of a Bengal Lancer.” In this particular film the protagonists are British imperialist/colonialists Gary Cooper and Franchot Tone. (has Gary ever played a bad guy) The main antagonist is Douglas Dumbrille, recognizable as the heavy in several Marx Brothers films, wearing dark makeup to look Indian. It doesn’t matter that the enemy losers, who happen to be particularly inept at hand to hand combat against our heroes, are Hindus rather than Muslims. They have dark skin like our president and clearly are not “us.”

This kind of chauvinism knows no international boundaries. It can happen here. In “Geronimo” the “good guys,” whose ancestors had been victims of British colonialism a century earlier, were doing the same to Native Americans out west. I just Googled the famous chief and found out that he operated in what is now New Mexico. This is a pity because I had the perfect ending if his battles had been fought in Arizona.

Now I’m really confused!