How far has America really progressed?

It was Donald Trump’s moment of truth and the questions didn’t even come from his competitors but from an ordinary person at a town hall meeting at a local high school in New Hampshire.

The question to Trump, the front-runner in the 2016 Republican campaign and a billionaire property mogul, was combined with a statement: “We have a problem in this country. It’s called Muslims. We know our current president is one,” the man said of Barack Obama. “You know he’s not even an American?”

“We have training camps growing where they want to kill us. That’s my question,” the man in the audience continued, “When can we get rid of it?”

At that very moment, Trump had a decision to make. Should he answer the question to the best of his ability or should he rebuke the questioner who had not only insulted Muslims but was wrong about Obama’s faith and nationality.

Trump mumbled on, as vaguely as possible, about how bad things are out there but essentially said:  “We’re going to be looking at that and plenty of other things.”

The questioner was speaking into a microphone, and his remarks was heard by several journalists sitting near the back of the gymnasium, according to press reports.  

But no matter how hard his campaign people said he didn’t hear the entire question, the damage has been done.  

Trump’s refusal to rebut the question suggest that he is a man who is unable to think on his feet. Although no American presidents ever make major decisions without consulting top advisers and strategists, the ability to think on one’s feet is also important, especially during the campaigning when candidates on a campaign trail never know what kind of question is going to be thrown at them.

It may not be a fair thing to do but people do actually judge the candidate from how he or she reacted and their response to such questions while on their feet.  

“He knew, or he should have known, that what that man was asking was not only way out of bounds, it was untrue,” said Democratic front-runner Hillary Rodham Clinton who was quick to condemn Trump’s response in New Hampshire.

“He should have from the beginning repudiated that kind of rhetoric, that level of hatefulness.”

Condemnation from the Clinton camp could be expected. But what’s sad about this whole thing is that his fellow Republicans are keeping mum, refusing to denounce Trump’s cynical strategy probably for fear of losing votes. What about self respect?

The incident at New Hampshire was not the only the bigotry Americans face. There are plenty of other examples and incidents. The challenge is what one is to do about it.  

The recent incident involving the arrest of a young Muslim schoolboy in Texas over a clock his teacher thought was a bomb.  

The young man was trying to impress his teacher with the electronic clock that he had assembled. What a nerd, one might say. But the fact that he was a Muslim, and that he was carrying a gadget that beeped, was enough to handcuffed him and put him through an interrogation.

The fact that America has elected a black president is also a testimony of how things have changed. In fact, it was only a few decades ago – and within the lifetime of many of these US presidential candidates – that many American public figures commonly referred to blacks as “niggers” on television or public events knowing how offensive that was.   

And although America’s treatment of the blacks left a deep ugly scar in its history, the country and its society has shown the world that it can come to terms with the past by admitting its mistakes, acknowledge the contribution of its minorities, named parks, cities and roads after the people they locked up in reservations and praised those who helped push through the Civil Rights movement. For that America deserved to be praised.  

Unfortunately, it’s people like Ahmed, the boy with the clock, who are becoming the latest outcasts.  

What’s disturbing is that people like Trump and other public figures see no need to speak about such bigotry or how their unwillingness to talk about such things reflects poorly on American political culture and institutions.

But the fact that Trump can get away with what he says about Muslims, women, ethnic minorities suggests that America has not come very far, in terms of mindset, from the days when American public figures openly used the N-word.