Trump’s assault on the Smithsonian is intellectual violence

In his landmark essay “The Souls of White Folk” published in 1910, W.E.B. Du Bois eerily previewed President Donald Trump’s appeal and rise to power. “This assumption that of all the hues of God whiteness alone is inherently and obviously better than brownness or tan leads to curious acts,” he wrote. “How easy, then, by emphasis and omission to make children believe that every great soul the world ever saw was a white man’s soul; that every great thought the world ever knew was a white man’s thought; that every great deed the world ever did was a white man’s deed; that every great dream the world ever sang was a white man’s dream.”

Forty-six of our 47 presidents have been white. But it’s becoming increasingly clear that Trump is America’s first White president. His power in that role is g