One
Speaking of immigrants, speaking of immigrants from African countries, speaking of immigrants from what Donald Trump is pleased to call “shitholes” – news outlets today are talking about Emmanuel Mensah, who came to New York from Ghana.
The Times did a story on him on December 29th.
Emmanuel Mensah was a handsome, strongly built young man in his late 20s who immigrated to the Bronx from Ghana five years ago. He joined the Army National Guard but returned to his apartment on Prospect Avenue in December, after graduating from boot camp with the rank of private first class.
And on Thursday night, he lost his life trying to save people from his furiously burning apartment building, one of 12 people to die in the blaze.
“He brought four people out,” said his uncle, Twum Bredu, who lives next door. “When he went to bring a fifth person out, the fire caught up with him.”
He was living in the apartment of a couple with four children.
Private Mensah, a decorated soldier who had been awarded a medal for marksmanship and was planning to join the military police, got that family to safety, then pulled out four more people, his uncle said, before returning to the building.
He never emerged; the authorities said he died of smoke inhalation.
Just a back-of-the-envelope estimation: when the US was on its way up in the world, it had presidents like Washington, Jefferson and Lincoln.
Now it’s got Trump, who got in on the slogan “make America great again.” But he has been strangely silent on that of late. So we must draw our own conclusions as to whether or not the Trumpian US is perhaps itself headed to becoming a shithole.
The emblem of the United States is a bald eagle, depicted on various seals holding all manner of goodies in either talon. Perhaps Trump’s presidential seal should show it holding a banana, symbolising the sort of republic the US is set to become by the time Trump is through his second term
On the face of it, Trump would not be fit to polish Mensah’s boots.
Omar, maybe Trump’s seal should be Ganesh, only with Trump’s head and with each hand stuffed with cash – except for the one that’s grabbing a pussy.
Acolyte:
Very good. But surely a banana can still be worked in somewhere. After all, we are talking big symbolism here.
;-)
Omar, I’m seeing a banana, but it’s wedged somewhere other than his hands!