By Karen Rubin, News-Photos-Features.com, editor@news-photos-features.com
It is such an advantage for Trump that a first reaction to the assassination attempt before learning that a man was tragically killed and two others critically injured, was that it was set up.
Trump and the Republicans are already milking this event in disgusting, despicable ways, actually blaming “liberals,” “Democrats”, and even President Biden for accurately warning that the twice impeached, four times indicted, convicted felon, accused insurrectionist and national security threat Trump, whose campaign is based on weaponizing the Justice Department and military to seek retribution against his political enemies (“vermin”) and who regularly advocates, incites and foments political violence and whose Project 2025 would install a dictatorship, poses an existential threat to democracy, American values, and the American way of life. Trump has even co-opted Biden’s warning of the existential threat to urge his supporters to load up on ammo (he called for a Second Amendment solution for Hillary Clinton in his 2016 campaign and says there will be a “bloodbath” if he is not elected in 2024).
The tactic is aimed at guilting Democrats to pull back on their accurate depictions of who Trump is and what he intends. Will Biden and the Democrats fall for it? (The Republicans will also use this as an excuse to violently crack down on protesters.)
The other initial reaction was that Trump experienced what America experiences every day: a mass shooting. The day of this attack on Trump, four people were killed and nine others injured in a mass shooting in Alabama “but you might not have heard about it because it’s the sort of thing that happens every single day in America,” writes former US attorney and Muller Report prosecutor Andrew Weissmann. “It’s long past time we did something about that.”
In point of fact, the incident points up all that is wrong with America’s obsession with guns that give guns more rights than a woman’s womb and elevates the severe consequence of the surge in political violence that has threatened judges, prosecutors, elected and election officials, journalists, even school board members. It is a form of terrorism to extort certain decisions by officials or to discourage people from seeking offices, altogether.
“Our nation’s ease of access to firearms is a threat to our democracy,” writes David Hogg on his threads.net site. “Not only as threats to those running for office but to our democratic norms that would be violated in retaliatory violence between political parties. We have to do more to end gun violence... There’s no conspiracy. The fact of the matter is it’s way too easy to access firearms in the United States and no one is safe. Not kids. Not teachers. Not parents. Not even a former President.”
The expression that comes to mind is “Chickens come home to roost.” and “He made his bed, now lie in it.” Recall, Trump revoked Obama’s gun safety measures for people with mental illness which Obama put into place after the Sandy Hook school massacre and cozies up to the NRA. But of course, Trump and the Republicans will blame anything but the ubiquity of guns and the machismo American society attaches to guns (the only thing that is truly American Exceptionalism) and have the gall to complain about “rising crime.”
Instead of using this incident to guilt Biden and Democrats to “tone down” their accurate warnings that the 2024 election is in fact the most consequential of our lifetime (while the Republicans only scale up their fear-and-hate-mongering, scapegoating, vilifying), this should be a call to renew the ban on assault weapons and high-capacity ammo, and implement the other commonsense gun violence prevention proposals including safe gun storage, liability for parents/guardians who do not (the shooter’s father bought the AR-15 and had a dozen other guns in the house; a six year old just murdered a three year old;), SMART ID so that only the registered, licensed, certified/trained gun-owner can use it and Red Flag laws. Instead, states like Pennsylvania advocate permitless open-carry so this 20-year old white male registered Republican had the ability to bring his AR-15 close enough to kill the candidate.
Instead, Trump will again use this incident to make the case for his persecution, his victimhood, elevate himself as the saved-and-selected-by-God savior, and engender sympathy enough to sway those double-haters, on-the-fencers and not-really-independent voters.
Trump now has a replacement image for the mug shot which he thinks engenders support of young Black men who feel abused by the unJustice System, of his fist in the air as he pronounces, “fight, fight, fight” – a strong, heroic figure to contrast to the “feeble, weak, old” Joe Biden. Trump is being hailed for his “valor” for doing nothing but drop down and get hustled out by Secret Service - a “hero” for not getting dead.
When Trump says the incident has made him “rethink (?)” and call for “uniting the country” he means uniting around him. By “unifying”, he means ending the prosecutions into his unprecedented criminal attempts to overthrow the government. What he doesn’t mean is for stopping his attacks on his political enemies he calls “vermin,” deserving of violent retribution against his enemies.
Indeed, the Republicans are stoking anger and retaliation against Biden and Democrats who they charge are responsible – actually ignoring the explosion in political violence the MAGAs have instigated. Indeed, as he walked into the RNC, both triumphant and the pitiable victim, the delegates chanted “fight, fight, fight” – a survivor, touched by god, proudly sporting his bandaged ear, taking the slow walk as Lee Greenwood sang “God Bless the USA” with commentary hailing the hero, the champion, the white knight and “next president of the United States”.
Once again, Trump has managed to overtake the headlines – nothing about Biden leading the world at the NATO summit or Biden’s agenda for a second term (ban assault weapons; lead the world on clean energy; restore Roe v. Wade; sign John Lewis Voting Rights Act; expand Social Security and Medicare; end medical debt; raise the minimum wage; pass the PRO Act for workers; make child tax credit permanent; $35 insulin cap for all; build more housing; invest in child care and elder care) or focus on the threat Trump’s Project 2025 poses (which the cowardly Trump actually pretends to “know nothing about, have no idea who’s behind it”.
“Luckiest defendant in the world” as one legal expert put it -on cue, faux-Judge Aileen Cannon dismissed the Mar-a-Lago stolen classified documents case, while his Imperial Supremes immunized him against criminal prosecution, so he can reiterate his claims of “hoax,” “witchhunt”, “lawfare” (which he uses to justify his intention to weaponize his DoJ) - not the BS Trump levels against “Crooked” Hillary Clinton (“EMAILS”), and “Crooked” Joe Biden (Ukraine! Hunter Biden Laptop!). It makes your head explode.
Not even George Orwell’s 1984 or Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 have depicted the dystopia that is unfolding in America.
You know the expression “there are those who were born on third base and think they hit a triple?” Throughout his life, Trump was born with three runs on the board and the umpires’ rulebook banning them from calling him out, ever.
That Trump is the luckiest defendant ever, Biden is the unluckiest candidate with everything going against him.
For Biden, the apt expression is “with friends like these, who needs enemies.” Democrats continue to shoot themselves in their own circular firing squad, not only bloodying Biden but any candidate who would take the top spot, ESPECIALLY Vice President Kamala Harris. (Trump is already demeaning her as “Laffin’ Kamala”).
Democrats should not fall for it. They should keep the focus on where it should be: Donald Trump is a lawless wannabe dictator, Putin’s useful idiot, who has no regard for the Constitution, the Rule of Law or democracy, who would enact the Project 2025 laundry list of undemocratic, racist, misogynist, actions that would send the USA back to the Dark Ages of kings and witches, who is only running for personal profit and to stay out of prison, and would happily let others establish their theocracy, their kleptocracy, their oligarchy.
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