After President Trump came out with his second Charlottesville statement on Monday, this one denouncing racism and the Ku Klux Klan, some listeners were ready to say it’s OK if he took 48 hours to get it right, or at least better. Sometimes presidents grow in office, said MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell, citing JFK. Then on Tuesday Trump took it back, reverting to his original equivalency stance, that all sides are to blame. He may need to try a few more times to make a cogent, helpful statement that he believes. It’s hard to get race right. But he, too, could grow in office, and if he did, he could bring a lot of others along with him. –Fletcher Farrar, editor and publisher
This article appears in Aug 17-23, 2017.
