We’ve been in jail for four hundred years.” I have nothing to lose by standing up for my beliefs.

But I either have to obey the laws of the land or the laws of Allah. If I thought the war was going to bring freedom and equality to twenty-two million of my people, they wouldn’t have to draft me. Or, as he put it, “Why should they ask me to put on a uniform and go ten thousand miles from home and drop bombs and bullets on brown people in Vietnam while so-called Negro people in Louisville are treated like dogs?. Ali was not prepared to give his life, or kill Vietnamese, on behalf of a society that barely valued his life or that of his fellow-black men and women. When Cassius Clay changed his name to Muhammad Ali, and when he later refused the call of the military during the war in Vietnam, he was not universally cheered. And he believes that the numbers are with him.Īnd so it’s a good moment to recall the events of a half century ago. He envisions his base, on couches and stadium bleachers, booing the likes of Steph Curry, Colin Kaepernick, and LeBron James. Hatred, pitting one group against the other, is his political instrument. This perceived self-interest is almost certainly the reason for his ugly outbursts in recent days directed at African-American athletes. Or possibly it meant the opposite-that Trump knows precisely what he is doing, that he is willing to say absolutely anything that will, in the moment, work in his perceived interest, and to hell with all else.

Perhaps this was meant to stand as evidence that Trump is in possession of a mind unblessed by coherence or knowledge. What sport is he talking about, and who? Is Obama profiling?” He will be missed by all!” Alert readers recalled that, just six months earlier, Trump had tweeted this: “Obama said in his speech that Muslims are our sports heroes. When Muhammad Ali died, in June, 2016, Donald Trump tweeted, “A truly great champion and a wonderful guy.

David remnick muhammad ali