Redefining Grifting as Patriotism
By Michelle Bryant
Michelle Bryant
If you ask any brotha in the streets right now about Donald Trump’s political moves, most would say, “This is some gangsta (expletive)! In the background, you could hear the 1995 Grammy Award-winning rap song Gangsta’s Paradise by Coolio. With a haunting beat and sinister bass, the accompanying lyrics said it all.
I’m a educated fool with money on my mind
Got my ten in my hand and a gleam in my eye
I’m a loc’d out gangsta, set trippin’ banger
And my homies is down, so don’t arouse my anger
By now, you’re likely wondering, where is she going with this? Indulge me.
In the America of Donald Trump, the old virtues of honesty, hard work, and fair play have been swept aside for a new creed: if you can cheat and get away with it, why not? Trump has not only made cheating a personal trademark but has elevated it to a philosophy of governance, offering a disturbing new definition of Americanism—one where being a cheater and a thief is not just tolerated but celebrated.
I’m a educated fool with money on my mind. Let’s start with Trump’s well-documented personal conduct. His record with taxes is damning, using every loophole, questionable deduction, and legal gray area to avoid paying his fair share. Bragging that not paying taxes “makes me smart” (educated fool), he acts as if cheating the system is a badge of honor, not a betrayal of civic duty.
Then there’s Trump University—a “school” that fleeced hard-working Americans out of their savings with empty promises of real estate riches. The courts ultimately forced him to pay $25 million to settle fraud claims. He’s said to have cheated in golf, on his wives, or during the infamous “Sharpie-gate” incident, in which Trump altered a weather map with a marker to retroactively justify a false statement about Hurricane Dorian’s path.
Got my ten in my hand and a gleam in my eye. Whether significant or trivial, Trump’s behavior is emblematic of a larger pattern: when faced with inconvenient facts, Trump simply changes them. Truth becomes whatever he says it is—and if all else fails, then cheating appears to be the next best option. Trump’s use of D.C.’s National Guard (my ten) and the effort to take over control of the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) is a prime example. Even though data says the city is experiencing a 30-year low in crime, Trump declares that the situation is out of control. He has had the democratically controlled D.C. in his crosshairs for a while (gleam in my eye).
I’m a loc’d out gangsta, set trippin’ banger. And my homies is down, so don’t arouse my anger. What’s especially dangerous (loc’d out) now is how Trump’s ethos of cheating has infected the Republican Party (my homies). In Texas, Republicans are pushing through redistricting maps designed to dilute the power of minority voters and entrench their dominance—cheating millions of Americans out of a fair vote. This is not democracy; it’s gerrymandering as political theft. Grifting, at every level, is being sold as patriotism.
Trump has made it clear that for him, everything is transactional—a quid pro quo, whether it’s foreign or domestic policy, or the sacred right to vote. The American ideal of a government of, by, and for the people is being replaced by one that’s for the cheaters, by the cheaters. America – a cheater’s paradise.