Amidst the widespread cancellation of in-person events including graduation ceremonies, former President Barack Obama has delivered a string of special video messages for graduates, including a message that aired on ESPN recently honoring 2020 graduates from Historically Black Colleges and Universities, otherwise known as HBCUs. On Twitter this weekend, the widely liked former president added to the message, encouraging graduates to forge ahead no matter the current social turmoil — and clearly demonstrating the huge gap between the current White House occupant and the leadership that the United States could have.
Imagine what private-citizen Trump, along with every Republican official and talking head, would have said if President Obama went to his own luxury golf club—which he was profiting from in office—to play a round while the tally of dead from a still unresolved pandemic hit 100k
— Robert Maguire (@RobertMaguire_) May 23, 2020
Obama posted on Twitter:
‘The Class of 2020 is full of the leaders we need to bend the arc of history toward a better future—and our HBCU grads have the talent, skills, and vision to lead that change. I couldn’t be prouder of all of you.’
In the original video broadcast, the former president had said, in part:
‘You chose to become leaders, and this happens to be a time when that’s what we need most. If the world is going to get better, it’s going to be up to you.’
The Class of 2020 is full of the leaders we need to bend the arc of history toward a better future—and our HBCU grads have the talent, skills, and vision to lead that change. I couldn't be prouder of all of you. https://t.co/Qlr5ivBvpJ
— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) May 23, 2020
Imagining the current president, Donald Trump, saying anything along those lines, let alone sounding like he means it, is tough, at best. This weekend, as Coronavirus cases and deaths continued to climb in the United States and the devastating effects of the economic and social fallout continued to set in, Trump went golfing. On Friday, he’d marked his day with spectacles like a Bikers for Trump-style event at the White House in which bikers who were, at least on paper, there for a Memorial Day observance fired up their engines and rode in apparent circles around the White House driveways.
It's like a deleted scene from Idiocracy https://t.co/aF0pgBfAoo
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) May 22, 2020
Voters, for their part, seem to be sick of it. In poll after poll on both the national level and that of swing states around the country, presumptive Democratic presidential nominee (and Obama’s former second-in-command) Joe Biden leads by substantial margins. He even leads in numerous swing states that Trump won in 2016 and were crucial to his winning margin in the electoral college.
We've reached the point where a Republican governor is begging his constituents to practice health decisions based on scientific and medical consensus rather than deciding based on one's political ideology. https://t.co/aH3ES5SKyE
— Nathan McDermott (@natemcdermott) May 22, 2020
Check out Twitter’s response to Obama below. There are some trolls.
