MAGA Becomes Comfortable With the HARD R

In the year 2024, the GOP no longer needs dog whistles as a substitute for the N word. Apparently, they can just say it openly on TV without any pushback or penalty.

I’ve always wondered what MAGA would give the majority in order to be able to say the N word openly again.

Would they be open to free healthcare? Funding Social Security and Medicare? Taxing the rich? Gun control? Banning Assault rifles?

This is just one of my many dark thought experiments for a country plagued by a portion of the electorate desperately trying to hijack us back to the 19th century when people didn’t have to wear hoods or use dog whistles.

It’s very clear that not being able to say the derogatory term used to dehumanize Black people in America really bothers some influential right-wing “thinkers.” Why can’t everyone else just say it in jest with friends or when reciting hip hop lyrics while driving their pick up truck to the polling booth to vote for Trump?

Oh, the injustice!

Well, in 2024 the hoods are off and the dog whistles have been replaced by a return to the “Hard R.” Case and point: National Review Editor- In-Chief Rich Lowry casually dropping the N word on Megyn Kelly’s show to describe innocent Haitian immigrants who are the latest target of Trump and MAGA’s stochastic terrorism. 

A committed GOP warrior, Lowry did his best to downplay the escalating threats. He said, and I quote, “They only found 2 Springfield residents calling to complain about Haitian N****R - migrants - taking geese from ponds.”

Lowry alleges that he misspoke when trying to say “migrants.”

Well, you all decide for yourselves. Go ahead and watch the clip. Sounds like the Hard “R” to me.

Megyn Kelly, who took a break from defending white Santa Claus, did not call Lowry out or ask him to apologize. So far, Lowry’s one token Black friend has not been trotted out to defend him and tell the rest of us that he has no racist bone in his body. I asked my wife, a doctor, if indeed there is a racist bone and she said such a bone has not been identified. I also have not been able to contact God to ask him what is in Lowry’s heart or his intentions, so I only have to go off his own words and actions. (If God responds, I will update this essay.)

Unfortunately, the damage and harm towards Haitian Americans is escalating. There’s tragically too many terror threats to list. Earlier today, Gary Pierre-Pierre of The Haitian Times tweeted, “This past week has been intense for us at The Haitian Times. Threats, a canceled gathering, and our editor being swatted—yet we’re standing strong. Grateful for the support from journalists and leaders. We’ll continue covering Springfield and shining a light on anti-Haitian hate.”

Even after being informed of these threats, Donald Trump and J.D. Vance have decided to double down on the conspiracy theories and disinformation that has emerged from the swamps of neo-Nazis. Even when given multiple opportunities to correct the lie, they have gone all-in as evidenced by Vance’s appearance on CNN over the weekend.

Racism is the hardened spine of the modern GOP.  This is who they are and have been for decades, but our institutions and establishment media continue playing Taboo instead of accurately diagnosing the behavior and the disease. It’s not “economic anxiety.” It’s not a “racial trip.” It’s not even a “racial flare up".” It’s their permanent condition. It’s their herpes. They’ve had it for life. (No offense to herpes.) Sure, not every conservative voter is a racist, but they have absolutely no problem voting for a racist, promoting racist conspiracy theories, and subsidizing racist content-creators. 

Dare I be accused of being hysterical and divisive, let me just share some receipts. 

This year alone Trump has gone all-in with the racist anti-Haitian conspiracy as a means of drumming up support from his base, which includes racist militias, such as the Proud Boys, who have descended upon Springfield, Ohio. He accused Kamala Harris of “turning Black” at the National Association of Black Journalists. He keeps talking about “Black jobs,” which will soon include “female President” in two months. He has done rallies in “sundown” towns, which were places in which Black people risked lynching if they were caught in public during the evening. He has kept targeting predominantly Black cities as being violent urban centers of chaos while ignoring white cities with higher crime rates and gun violence. This is the same man who promoted the “birther conspiracy” during Obama’s presidency and fueled his campaign on a Muslim Ban and referred to Mexican immigrants as rapists and criminals.

GOP strategist Lee Atwater should have stayed alive to relish MAGA’s open embrace of racism and white supremacy. In 1981, he described the Republican Southern Strategy of using coded language to replace the N word as a means of winning over white voters.

You start out in 1954 by saying, “N*****, n*****, n*****.” By 1968 you can’t say “n*****”—that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff, and you’re getting so abstract. Now, you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites.… “We want to cut this,” is much more abstract than even the busing thing, uh, and a hell of a lot more abstract than “N*****, n*****.”

In 2024, you can just come outright and say it on TV and still be seen as a respective conservative voice and editor of a magazine.

Even though it’s Fall, springtime came early for racists and those who love saying the Hard R.