First of all, while Iâm no fan of Trump, at all, the assassination attempt must be condemned. It is appalling.
Second, if any member of the public attempts an assassination, they are clearly not well, mentally, whether they are a registered Republican, or happened to donate to a liberal cause. Itâs crazy to suggest Biden ordered the hit. Itâs also crazy to suggest Trump staged it all. Just nick my ear, from 150 yds away⌠really?
Having thought about all this overnight, Iâm sad this has happened, but not surprised in the least. The ingredients are all there. 400 million guns swashing around in society? Check. An absence of any meaningful gun controls? Check.
A politician who is more divisive than any I have seen? Check.
Who is bold in calling for violence? Check.
From early days Trump has been quite free in his rhetoric in calling for his followers to smash opponents on the head, that sort of thing. It started out by sounding like low level violence - rough them up, whether it was an unfriendly journalist at a rally, or political opponents. He had an old school sort of way of casually saying just knock them in the head and teach them a lesson.
That sort of rhetoric helped to spawn much worse acts - I could be here all day, but I will just highlight a few from memory:
A racist drove their car into a crowd to kill someone at Charlottesville.
A teenage Republican traveled across state lines, from his home in Illinois to Kenosha in Wisconsin, and shot three men, two fatally. Appallingly he is lauded by the right.
The violent rhetoric got worse again when Trump incited an insurrection and hundreds of people stormed the Capitol Building - they were looking for politicians, and a gallows was assembled to execute Mike Pence.
From Googling it, 174 police officers were injured (party of law and order?), 5 people died within 36 hours and a further 4 police officers who responded that day ended up committing suicide within 7 months.
This is the world we live in, and while there is plenty of wrong to go around on all sides, Donald Trump has done far more than most to create the current environment.
There is no hope for things to get better while he remains a prominent politician. In fact, I fully expect it to get worse, with tit-for-tat hits, and maybe even scaling up to wider conflict.
Trump will, of course, look to maximize the âbenefitâ from the assassination attempt, to change the narrative from felon/sexual assault/election denier/vote rigger/government documents stealer/seller? - to something that will galvanize his base even more.
He would much prefer to be seen as an almost-martyr who is fighting for his people. He is of course no such thing, but thatâs what millions will buy into.
With the Supreme Court in his pocket, and going against all precedent to make the President untouchable and unaccountable - more so than any king America tried to throw off in its Revolutionary war, things will get worse.
Add to that Biden refusing to step down, possibly fueled by his wifeâs dislike for Kamala Harris, and I fear the dark days we are living in are going to get worse before they get better. Ugh.
