The Seat of Humiliation
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/22/opinion/south-africa-white-afrikaner-trump.html
("A South African Grift Lands in the Oval Office")
It is the seat of humiliation. The one next to Mr. Trump. The one where he lures you in with fingers crossed promises to make nice and then unleashes the furies upon you while you sit there in stunned disbelief. Scolded for transgressions he informs you that you have committed. While the world watches.
After having performed this act of cruelty on the President of a country three years into a war for its very survival, Mr. Trump now turns his focus on a nation steeped in a history of oppression against blacks. South Africa now acting as substitute for Mr. Trump's obsession with making white Americans appear as the ones subjugated, vulnerable and subject to unspeakable atrocities. A white America misunderstood and under attack.
We are invited in to see how far America has descended, leaving our fate in the hands of a person with such contempt for those he believes he has the power to manipulate and control. A man with a persecution complex, combined with boundless ego and hubris. A man with no understanding of history and an unquenchable desire to recreate the universe as he perceives it. A man with no perspective and little discernible intelligence. A dangerous man, in all its worst meaning and application.
It was not the President of South Africa who occupied the seat of humiliation yesterday. It was America itself.