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The Lovely Doreen and I were at dinner with friends when we learned the news. In between the salad course and the meat course, one of our party of four received the alert on her phone: there was an assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump. The news was reported by Newsmax.

“Well, regardless of my opinion of Newsmax, I would guess they wouldn’t report something like that if it wasn’t true…” I started to say. Our friends quickly said how much they trusted Newsmax, even as I tried without success to pull up the New York Times app on my phone. No bars, no internet, no more information. And a gulf between our trusted news sources.

Where was Trump? Was he in Milwaukee in advance of the convention? Was he in Florida? Was he announcing his running mate when it happened? Eventually one of us got enough of a signal to learn that Trump was at a rally in Pennsylvania. We also learned that another person attending the rally was killed, as well as the gunman.

Speculation began about the motives of the shooter, and I reminded the table that we don’t know anything, and likely will not learn anything, until we learn the identity of the shooter. I also read aloud what Nick Gillespie, the editor of Reason Magazine, posted on Twitter (X).

“If past is prologue, there is a good chance that everything that gets reported over the next 24 hours will be false, incomplete, barely accurate, totally mistaken, etc.”

This is advice that I’ve also offered after other shocking events, including after a mass casualty event at the Waukesha Christmas Parade.

It’s natural for our minds to try to fill in the blanks. It’s also to give in to our tribal instincts to identify an “us” and “them” – as we have so often in our political age. But as we have often learned, madmen have their own reasons. President Ronald Reagan was shot because of one man’s fixation on a Hollywood starlet. President Gerald Ford was shot at by supporters of Charles Manson. John Lennon was killed by a “fan” of The Catcher in the Rye. 

When President John F. Kennedy was killed, speculation centered on the hostile right-wing political atmosphere of Dallas. Only afterwards did we learn that it was, in the words of Kennedy’s widow, “some silly little Communist.” Such was the enormity of the crime that we’re still dealing with speculation and conspiracy theories later from those who cannot grasp that great events can be caused by the flutter of a moth’s wings.

These were the thoughts I had as our dinner conversation turned to the other victims. Think about the people attending such a rally. They have an assumption that the Secret Service and the large police presence would protect them despite any fears we might have a mass shooting at large public events. They wait for hours to get in, then more hours for the show to start. A few lucky fans will find seats in the bleachers. Event volunteers and local Republican officials are given coveted seats behind the candidate so they can hold signs and represent America in images broadcast on television and the internet.

Earlier this year, an article in Politico explained why Trump supporters were willing to put with so much to attend a Trump rally.

For Trump’s dedicated supporters — who, at this point, make up the overwhelming majority of the rallies’ crowds — the payoff is clear enough: a chance to bask in the Trumpian aura, snap a few pictures and a participate in a collective venting session. At a rally on Friday in Concord, I spoke to MAGA die-hard Edward X. Young, who has attended close to 70 Trump rallies since 2016. “They give me hope,” he said, when I asked him what kept him coming back. “Politics aside, Trump rallies are the greatest show on earth.”

The “Greatest Show on Earth” on Saturday night went from a rollicking circus to a nightmare within minutes as the would-be assassin, 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks from Bethel Park, Pa, fired several shots from a nearby rooftop, injuring the former president’s ear. I doubt that Corey Comperatore, a former fire chief, had any premonition that he would die that day while protecting his family from gunfire. I doubt that the other two victims imagined that they would be seriously wounded while attending such a secure event.

We don’t know much about the shooter. According to various media reports, Crooks had the materials for explosive devices in his car and his home, leading investigators to believe that Crooks intended to escape alive after the attempt, possibly to commit more violent acts. An interview with someone who claimed to attend high school with Crooks claimed he was bullied for being a loner and for the camouflage clothing he wore. The rifle used, the subject of much reporting and finger-pointing, was allegedly purchased by the shooter’s father.

There is an apparent dearth of social media presence by the young man, unusual for someone his age. No political “manifesto” has been found, according to reports on the investigation. Crooks was a registered Republican who once gave $15 to a politically left cause. He was employed.

In other words, we may never know the actual motive for the shooting. It may not have been political at all. It’s possible that Crooks would’ve attempted some other public, violent act if the opportunity to shoot the president didn’t present itself a little over 50 miles away.

Despite the lack of information, it hasn’t stopped us from dividing and blaming each other, some sincerely and some just seizing the opportunity. Senator J.D. Vance (R-OH), no shortage of ambition and seeking to be Trump’s running mate, knew who to blame.

“Today is not just some isolated incident,” Vance posted on Twitter (X). “The central premise of the Biden campaign is that President Donald Trump is an authoritarian fascist who must be stopped at all costs.That rhetoric led directly to President Trump’s attempted assassination.”

This is Vance 2.0, the Trumpist model. A previous version of Vance placed himself on the other side of the divide.

“I go back and forth between thinking Trump might be a cynical asshole like Nixon who wouldn’t be that bad (and might even prove useful) or that he might be America’s Hitler,” Vance wrote to a friend, allegedly. “How’s that for discouraging?”

Sean Davis, a founder of the political website the Federalist, took a break from calling the FBI “a domestic terror organization” long enough to  accuse President Joe Biden’s administration of being directly involved in the execution of the assassination attempt. He also accused the “Democrat-media industrial complex” of being “demonic psychopaths.”

The local rightwing partisan web outlet, Wisconsin Right Now (not to be confused with RightWisconsin or One Wisconsin Now) posted on Twitter (X) their spin to try to make January 6 go away as an issue, “Will Democrats be held accountable for their dangerously demonizing and inciting rhetoric?” They asked.”After all, the media held Trump accountable for telling rallygoers to go to the Capitol peacefully.”

Not quite. Trump also told them to fight like hell or they won’t have a country anymore, attempted to go to the violent insurrection himself, said his Vice President deserved to have his life threatened, told former Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy that his supporters attacking the Capitol cared more about overturning the election than McCarthy did, and inspired the mob with his efforts behind the scenes to overturn the presidential election using fake electors. Ironically, Trump was reportedly upset with the Secret Service because they were screening for weapons, preventing many of his supporters from attending the January 6 rally.

Still, according to Wisconsin Right Now, criticizing Trump for his actions that day is “dangerously demonizing and inciting rhetoric”. But who in this instance was incited to violence?

“Washington Post is reporting the Trump shooter is a registered Republican,” Wisconsin Right Now posted. “Not sure what to make of that.”

I bet.

In the days to come, there will be practical questions that need to be answered. Why was the rooftop overlooking the rally left unguarded? We should be pleased that the desire to find the source of this security failure is bipartisan. We should also be pleased that Biden has ordered an independent investigation of the failure of the Secret Service to protect the former president.

The president has also ordered a complete review of the security for the Republican National Convention, and for the presidential candidates and the members of Congress.

Unfortunately, there will also be more attempts to use the assassination attempt for political purposes as early as the Republican convention this week. Partisans from both sides will point at the rhetoric used by their political “enemies” as proof that “they” – the other tribe – are the ones encouraging violence. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson has already brought up Biden’s use of the word “bullseye,” perhaps forgetting the controversy of Sarah Palin’s website using bullseyes on targeted Democratic lawmakers, including former Rep. Gabby Giffords of Arizona.

And, despite calls from both sides to tone down the political rhetoric, expect it to only get worse. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) will be speaking at the Republican National Convention. After the assassination attempt, she posted on Twitter (X): “We are in a battle between GOOD and EVIL The Democrats are the party of pedophiles, murdering the innocent unborn, violence, and bloody, meaningless, endless wars. They want to lock up their political opponents, and terrorize innocent Americans who would tell the truth about it. The Democrat party is flat out evil, and yesterday they tried to murder President Trump.”

It will also be just a matter of time until some Democratic politician loses it in front of a microphone and wishes the former president was dead.

We can blame our elected officials but the fault is ours. We elect them and they hear us. A poll last month found that ten percent of Americans supported using force to prevent Trump from becoming president. The same poll found that seven percent of Americans supported using force to make Trump president again. In March, another poll found that 20% of Americans believed that force was necessary to “get the country back on track.” In that poll, That belief was held by 28% of Republicans and 12% of Democrats.

We’re the ones who talk about a national divorce or a civil war. We donate to politicians, buy the newsletters, listen to the podcasts, and believe the worst about our neighbors who just happen to disagree with us. As long as we believe the worst about each other, we enable our leaders to use those beliefs for profit and power. They in turn continue to stoke our anger and tribalism, knowing that the greater our outrage the greater their power.

We cannot let this act of political violence silence our criticism of Trump. The former president, to his credit, is not letting the attempted assassination alter his campaign schedule. It must not alter our resolve to see him defeated.

Trump remains a threat to the constitutional order. He is still the president who organized an attempted coup de tat. He is still a convicted felon who has also been found in a civil case to be guilty of rape. He has endorsed political violence in the past, including at his rallies. His rhetoric towards his political enemies is unmatched in vileness and implied violence. His contempt for the American people, including those who have served this country, is boundless in its depths. He would corrupt every institution he touched in the pursuit of power and to protect himself from justice.

But none of that is a justification for calls to violence. We can win at the ballot box. And if we lose, we can still resist the excesses of a Trump second term lawfully, and work to undo the damage he will wreak after he is gone.

In the meantime, we can demand better from ourselves in what we say and in our conduct. We can set higher standards for our leaders, demanding that they stand for the truth rather than devote themselves to the pursuit of power. And we can reject those in all of our public institutions that would willingly lie and divide us just to pursue selfish ends.

Because if we don’t, we’ll continue to see the worst of each other. This weekend’s assassination attempt was a warning. Let’s not let it become our normal condition.

 

 

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