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Dear Loudmouth2,

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You wrote :

« Some photos here - obviously faked - of the vast crowds at Trumpf's rally in Tulsa. It looked a lot more crowded during the TV coverage on the ABC. So which is fake, which is real ? »
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From where I was sitting in my living room here in Paris, watching it live on CNN, waiting to see what Trump had to say, there were about 100 people wandering around in front of the Bank of Oklahoma Center when Airforce 1 flew over with Trump waving his hand to the crowd.

Trump was supposed to kick off the show by giving a speech to the crowd outside the Center where he expected an overflow of about 40,000 supporters, the maximum capacity of the Center being 19,000. But an hour or so later there was nobody left outside the Center as there was more than enough room for everybody inside – even then the Center was only about 90% full.

Time dragged on as Trump waited and waited, hoping that more people would come, but they didn’t. Another hour later, trucks came and they started to dismantle the stands that had been erected for Trump to give his speech to the 40,000 expected overflow outside the Center – but which proved to be a pipe dream that went up in smoke !

In the meantime, CNN reported that according to Trump’s team (six of whom had been tested positive for Covid 19 virus), the media had frightened off thousands of Trump’s supporters (with threats of Covid infection) and a group of Democrat activists had blocked many others and prevented them from reaching the Center – which, of course, was completely false.

Yet another hour later, Trump made an appearance inside the Center and wandered about like Cassius Clay saluting his supporters before a world-championship boxing match.

That went on and on until I decided I had had enough and closed the TV.

By this time, it was three o’clock on Sunday morning here in Paris so I went to bed.

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Banjo,

Yeah, but what if CNN had photo-shopped Trumpf walking around like you claim ? What if, in reality, there were tens of thousands outside a packed gathering ?

OR what if the handful of BLM protesters outside scared off the tens, perhaps hundreds, of thousands who were trying to get in ? We didn't see scenes of violent protesters intimidating peaceful Trumpf supporters on CNN.

OR it happened as you viewed it. There was a pissy little crowd inside and bugger-all people outside. Not even all that many protesters. And Trumpf struggled to keep his mind on why he was there at all - after all, as a fair-weather politician, he's not used to anything like poor crowds (his employees are supposed to rent bigger crowds than this one) or adversity of any sort.

Is this a sort of tipping-point moment ?

Joe

Hi Joe,

"In Australia, droughts have been the limiting factor in relation to Indigenous population."

Are you saying disease, war and disposition played no part? Drought in Australia is a European aberration, pre colonisation, periods of low rainfall were well managed by Indigenous people with minimal impact on population.

One of the most devastating impacts of British colonisation was the introduction of diseases such as influenza, venereal disease, typhoid, tuberculosis, pneumonia, measles and whooping cough into the indigenous population. Many of the Eora people who lived on the foreshores of Sydney Harbour died from smallpox in the first few years of colonisation. European diseases spread rapidly throughout the Indigenous population following settlement.

Frontier conflict between European settlers and Indigenous tribes was a feature of the Australian landscape from 1790 to 1930's. In the course of frontier wars, it is estimated that about 2000 British colonisers and over 20,000 Indigenous Australians died violently, with large numbers of aboriginals perishing due to land disposition, particularly the young, women and older people. Disease, armed conflict and tribal land disposition were critical factors in the decline of the Indigenous population of Australia for over 140 years. Where drought fits in, I'm not sure, but it works well for those who want to minimise the impact on the Aboriginal population of European colonisation.

Hi BP,

I hate to correct you; "Trump made an appearance inside the Center and wandered about like Cassius Clay saluting his supporters before a world-championship boxing match." I'll have you know Mr Trump would not like to see himself associated with Cassius Clay, for obvious reason, bkack draft dodger, please substitute the name Maximillian Adolph Otto Siegfried "Max" Schmeling instead.

Paul,

No.

And no, I don't think that droughts were/are a post-invasion phenomenon, there is plenty of evidence that they occurred frequently, perhaps just as frequently, before 1788.

And no, I don't think that Aboriginal people had any more ability to withstand droughts than anybody else. Sure, they may have known where to find scarce water resources, but how long can you live on water alone ? Two or three weeks ? And by then, the animals, with more bloody sense, have shot through to greener pastures, to coin a phrase. And I'm sure that the elders would have always been fully aware of that and joined them.

After all, that was a major part of the careful marrying-off of daughters to men from outside groups in better country, to where families and clans who had inter-married with neighbours could move expeditiously. With a long drought, say ten or fifteen years, incoming groups may have lost many of their elders, but not replaced them with many new births.

And re-population may have taken generations, and subject to more intermittent droughts.

During their stay, they may have passed over all of their most precious songs and dances to the host groups in return for their hospitality, who would also 'join' them in re-colonising their old country. Some groups might be very small by then, and decide to stay and be incorporated into the host groups. Vice versa, the host group may have been quite small in numbers, and willingly incorporated incomers. This may have happened amongst the Ngarrindjeri south of Lake Alexandrina as groups moved in from the dry, limestone-country Tatiara to the east where droughts would have been particularly severe.

Yes, yes, I know that Aboriginal people could live on a drop of water and one grass seed for a month, but I don't think they would have liked it.

Joe

Joe, we have had this argument many times in the past. I contend that "drought" as applied to Australia is a European concept. In the Aboriginal world it is a period of low rainfall, quite manageable. Simply put Europeans farmed in a European style with European crops and European livestock, they tried to live a European lifestyle. Great in the high rainfall English climate, but disastrous in the often excessively dry and arid regions of Australia. With the disasters "drought" brought upon the European settler, and still does today 230 years later, its no wonder some will argue that low rainfall periods must have severely impacted the Aboriginal population just as it did the European. I say with 40,000 to 60,000 years of adaptation Indigenous people in 1788 far more acclimatised to the conditions. Although low rainfall periods would have had some impact on Aboriginals, nothing in the order that would bring about a 75% plus decline in population. In fact if it had, Australia would have truly been "terra nullius" by 1788 with not a soul to be seen, they would have died out many millennia before Phillip arrived. What Aboriginal people had not acclimatised to was disease, murder and dispossession! Now, that would explain a sharp 75% decline in population.

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Dear Paul1405,

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You wrote :

« Mr Trump would not like to see himself associated with Cassius Clay, for obvious reason, bkack draft dodger, please substitute the name Maximillian Adolph Otto Siegfried "Max" Schmeling instead. »
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Yes, Paul1405, Max was a great boxer and a national hero In Germany, but he was before my time. I never knew him nor saw him boxing.

Your objections about Cassius Clay are perfectly valid but, though, as you say, Trump would probably not like to see himself associated with Cassius Clay, a couple of similarities, nevertheless, come to mind.

Trump never did military service and managed to avoid being drafted to serve in the Vietnam war – though not for the same reasons as Cassius Clay. He didn’t have to go to jail for his personal political and humanitarian convictions as Clay did. Trump was declared physically unfit.

Cassius Clay was the first young challenger for the world heavyweight boxing championship title I ever saw, to declare before the match that he was “the greatest”. Like many others, I suppose, at the time, that struck me as being extraordinarily pretentious and I was persuaded he would lose. He didn’t. He won. Trump’s leitmotif “make America great again” echoes with that.

But you’re right. That’s where the similarities stop. The only time I saw Trump in a boxing stadium he was close to the ring but not inside it. He bulldozed some objector beside him he was quarrying with and wrestled him to the floor. That was not boxing, and it was most unfitting for a candidate for the presidency of the United States.

As you say, Cassius Clay was an Afro-American. He converted to Islam and changed his name to Muhammad Ali. He was a man of principles, with the courage to uphold them at great personal cost.

Sometimes I wonder if something similar couldn’t be said about Donald Trump – for the opposite reasons, of course.

I saw an interview of Muhammad Ali on French TV and was impressed by his exceptionally calm disposition, his wisdom and intelligence.


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