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Hatred Draws Blood
Posted at: Jul/18/2024 : Posted by: Mel
Related Category: Politics & Gov, Watching America,
A few days ago, an apparent lone gunman from a rooftop near a political rally in Butler Pennsylvania fired a handful of rifle shots. One spectator was killed, two were severely injured and the Republican candidate for President suffered a “flesh wound”. The critical shot missed his head by mere millimeters. As I write, the information in the public domain regarding the perpetrator is still sparse. The shooter, 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, was killed shortly after firing his lethal shots. The public is therefore left to speculate about his motives. However, what we do not need to speculate about is the climate of hatred created and cultivated by Trump’s political enemies. America is polarized, toxic, and politically close to a breaking point in part because the country’s liberal political, cultural, and media elites never accepted Trump’s legitimacy as the country’s president from 2016 to 2020. There is no value in waxing philosophically about some bygone era, the nature of democracy is that people argue and they debate. America, except during a few limited times in its history has always been divided. But, during most of our history, we could also respect the other person's right to their opinion. We seem to have entered into an era of “extremism” where it is simply “I’m Right and You’re Wrong.” The Biden administration and other political leaders have conveyed their condemnation of the shooting and issued statements of well wishes to Trump and his family. That may be a first sign of self-awareness and a step in the right direction, but it sounds hollow and disingenuous. Politicians and their staff are renowned for their sense of timing. There is obvious value in publicly showing compassion in the short term. The very same leaders of the Democratic Party, along with a cohort of the Republican Party who labeled themselves “Never Trumpers”, and a swath of what was once the mainstream media, crossed the line of political and public decency by framing Donald Trump as a monster and his supporters (roughly half the nation) as monster-worshipping deplorables ready to hand our democratic republic to a dictator. All this seems strange because Donald Trump has already been President once and he did not suspend the Constitution or disband Congress. As fragile as democracy may be, it is doubtful the military would roll down Pennsylvania Avenue and support this. If you believe that could happen, you have very little faith in our core institutions. For years, they have proclaimed Trump to be a danger to democracy and demonized his voters as witting or unwitting fascists. The May 16 edition of New Republic depicted Trump as Hitler on its front cover. "We chose the cover image, based on a well-known 1932 Hitler campaign poster," wrote editor Michael Tomasky. Tomasky continued, "for a precise reason: that anyone transported back to 1932 Germany could very, very easily have explained away Herr Hitler’s excesses and been persuaded that his critics were going overboard." The argument that Trump posed a Hitler-level threat to American democracy can be traced back to the first outbreak of Trump Derangement Syndrome (TDS) among left-leaning journalists in 2016. What made the argument so malignant was that it justified using all means possible to disrupt Trump’s presidency and to prevent his re-election. Are these journalists really trying to protect democracy, or just sensationalizing their content more than the next talking head to attract viewers? One thing that Roone Arledge taught us with the crashing ski-jumper at the start of Wide World of Sports is that sensationalism sells. (“The agony of defeat”, Vinko Bogataj, 1970) As a teen, I once asked my father how to make money. He suggested writing a book about some gloom-and-doom event in our future tied together by a handful of unrelated facts and rumors. He explained that we have some primal weakness for wanting to believe these stories. He assured me I could sell 100,000 copies regardless of how ridiculous my premise was. Begrudgingly, I found myself too ethical to take that path. This is why we seem so fascinated with the doom and gloom of others and why conspiracy stories get a life of their own. These media types and their social media counterparts know this and play to this weakness. Hillary Clinton conceded her loss to Trump in 2016, but the Democratic Party inwardly denied the legitimacy of his victory. What followed that concession speech was a sustained campaign of scheming to undermine the 45th President. There were calls to change the electoral system because Clinton had won more of the actual votes cast; the pseudo-feminist Women’s March; the invention of the "collusion with Russia" hoax; the invocation of the 25th Amendment; the spurious claim that Trump attempted a coup on January 6, 2021; and, most recently, the carefully orchestrated abuse of the civil and criminal justice systems to wage "Lawfare" against his candidacy. Following the 2016 election, the Democratic Party failed to do what a losing party in a major democracy is supposed to do after a loss, conduct an autopsy and reinvent themselves. That is supposed to be the main point of the years in opposition. Instead, they focused on thwarting Trump's bid for 2020 with the narrowest margin of success without paying attention to the current challenges of American society. The Democratic Party for most of its history has been focused on the “little guy”, jobs, unions, housing, food, etc.. This time around the agenda has been TDS and the voices of the extreme fringe left. The TDS has been the voice of hate and the legal jihad, more commonly called “Lawfare.” The two cases won in New York, rather than leaving Donald Trump deflated and defeated, delegitimized the legal system and cast Trump as a martyr to many. The fringe left has been about gas stoves, green economy, climate change and LGBT+ access. All this agenda unfolded while ignoring crime, the cost of food and staples, energy, and an open border. Gas stoves, the green economy, climate change and LGBT+ are all noble causes, but pale in the face of month-over-month inflation and the basic issues that regular people deal with. Trump and his team have focused on these same basic issues under the banner of “Make America Great Again.” It is difficult to understand why that slogan is considered bad. Does that mean if I go to a football game and cheer for the home team, I am a misguided soul? I know that the truth is they are focused on a “World Order” in lieu of American security and prosperity. With less than four months to go until the election, the Democrats are in the grip of an internal power struggle of their own making. Now the attempted assassination of Trump almost certainly dooms them to defeat, whether they nominate Biden, Harris, or some other candidate. After President Ronald Reagan narrowly avoided assassination in March 1981, his approval rating surged from 60 to 70%. It would be remarkable if Trump did not reap a comparable political reward for his evident courage and defiance in the moments after his brush with death. A great many people who wished Donald Trump ill over the past eight years also dodged a metaphorical bullet on Saturday night. Had Trump been killed, his death would have been on the consciences of everyone who ever called him Hitler (assuming they have consciences). I shudder to imagine the political aftermath of such a nightmarish event. Even after the shots had been fired, it was clear that the DEI hires of the Secret Service were simply not tall enough to adequately shield Trump while ushering him away. The advice I would give the Democratic Party as they prepare for their party’s likely defeat on November 5 is simple: This time, do the right thing after you lose. Instead of demonizing the guy who beat you, take a long hard look in the mirror and ask yourselves this simple question: Was this result what we deserved for four years of failed policies on immigration, inflation, and national security – and for eight years of smearing Donald Trump as a Nazi?
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