Shots Fired
Trump dodged a bullet, and American politics may never be the same
“The river of history flows as it will,” said Bismarck. “If I put my hand into it, I do so because it is my duty, not because I think I can alter its course.”
I thought that today I’d be publishing an article on what might happen if President Biden stepped down as his party’s 2024 standard bearer. That, I thought, would make history. Then some other history happened. Here‘s what I’ve made of it all, so far.
How Could It Have Happened?
While the Secret Service agents who shielded Trump with their bodies displayed notable courage, and while the Secret Service Counter-Sniper Team quickly neutralized the threat by killing the shooter, the attempted assassination of the former president was the result of an intolerable lapse in security procedures.
The would-be assassin should never have made it to the roof from which he fired, should never have been able to get off a single shot. How could the Secret Service have failed to secure a building from whose roof there was a clear line of sight at a range of less than two hundred yards to the podium at which Trump was standing? Either the advance team tasked to assess the security situation at the event venue simply failed to do its job properly, or there was a breakdown in coordination of the various law enforcement agencies on the scene. Whatever the explanation, there’s no excuse for what happened.
There’s also the troubling history of Secret Service misconduct and incompetence, which stretches as far back as the George W. Bush Administration. Why has nothing been done about that?
A lot of people have a lot of explaining to do.
Blood on Their Hands?
At this early stage of the investigation, we have very little information about the would-be assassin, Thomas Matthew Crooks. His motives are unknown and it’s possible that they never will be known. But some Trump supporters have jumped to the conclusion that he was egged on by the vitriolic rhetoric of the broad Left, which has excoriated the former president as a fascist monster of evil, the American Hitler, an existential threat to “our democracy” who must be stopped at all costs. This charge of incitement, though not provable, embodies a certain plausibility.
The events of the summer of 2020, and since October 7, 2023, have demonstrated with crystal clarity that certain factions on the broad Left have no problem at all with using violence and the threat of violence to further their various causes. Just ask American Jews about that. Even so, to say that the Left has “blood on its hands” today is a bit of a stretch, maybe even unfair. Most people on that side of our political divide are not violent extremists, though they might be tolerant of those who are.
But nobody on the Left has standing to complain now that the “blood on their hands” charge is being leveled at them. The comrades have been prodigal in their use of it, after all, heedless of the fact that what goes around comes around. So as far as I’m concerned, they can just pipe down—a good strong dose of unfair denunciation is exactly what they deserve.
Iconic Images
The image of Donald J. Trump, bloody but defiant, fist raised, shrugging off his bodyguards to show the crowd that he was still in the game, was electrifying—and I say that as someone who’s no great admirer of the former president. In a flash, the qualities that made him a great politician and populist leader stood revealed. Those qualities may be summarized in one sentence: He can take a punch, shake it off, and drive on.
Among Trump’s supporters, many are saying that what happened yesterday makes it certain that he’ll win in November. Perhaps, but I’m not so sure. There may be many more dramatic moments in store before we get to Election Day—some of them not necessarily favorable to the former president. But as I contemplate his progress toward restoration, I’m reminded of one of Napoleon’s bon mots. Asked what kind of general he preferred for his army, the Emperor replied: “A lucky general.”
Whatever else Donald Trump may be, he’s one lucky politician.
Political Prognostications
Not many people are speaking of it so far, but everybody’s thinking about it: How might the attempted assassination of the presumptive, soon to be official, GOP candidate for president shake up American politics?
As if the Democrats didn’t have problems enough, they now have to figure out how to recalibrate their basic electoral strategy, which boils down to: Orange Man Bad. So far, they’ve been relying on the ridiculous charge that Trump’s a fascist who must be defeated—at all costs. Just the other day, President Biden declared that now is the time to put Trump ““in the bullseye.” Did Thomas Matthew Crooks take his cue from that remark? Probably not—but going forward it’s the kind of rhetoric that the Biden campaign and the party should probably avoid.
This puts the Dems in a tough spot, because they’re desperate to shift the spotlight from their own decrepit candidate to the Ogre Trump, Destroyer of Democracy. But now they have to watch what they say. And that’s sure to infuriate the most rabid anti-Trumpers of the Left, for whom hatred of Trump seems to have become an end in itself.
Trump and the GOP have a similar problem, which to put it bluntly is how to maximize the political advantages of having dodged an assassin’s bullet with aplomb without going overboard. It might be thought that Trump, Mr. Wretched Excess, will indulge himself with intemperate denunciations of his enemies and threats of retribution. But this election cycle’s Trump is subtly different than the populist demagogue of yore. Maybe it’s because he’s older now, maybe it’s because he has a crackerjack campaign team whose advice he heeds. I just get the impression that the Dems shouldn’t expect that Trump will do them any favors by blowing himself up.
Unknown Unknowns
Just before the assassin squeezed off his first shot, the 2024 race for the presidency was tight. Though Trump had a lead in the average of national polls, it wasn’t a big one. In the battleground states, however, things were looking dire for Biden. And finally, both men had approval ratings in the thirties, indicating that the American people are not particularly thrilled about the choice before them.
It’s possible that the attempt to assassinate Trump will trigger the campaign’s breakaway moment, propelling him into a clear lead with good prospects of decisive victory on Election Day. It’s also possible that the story will flame out after a few days, with the race remaining tight.
Then there’s the possibility that President Biden will have another public meltdown, which coming on top of the assassination attempt will sink him. Or the President might master the revolt that’s brewing against him inside the Democratic Party and somehow muddle through to Election Day. Or Trump might have a meltdown moment. Or something else might happen—In Ukraine, in the Middle East, in the Western Pacific, here at home in Chicago or New York or some small town in Middle America that no one’s ever heard of.
During a press briefing at the beginning of the Iraq War, then Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld delivered a sharp little lecture on the knowns and the unknowns. It seems particularly relevant at this moment in time.
It’s July 14th today, it’s also the day after the assassination attempt and, throughout the French-speaking world, it’s Bastille Day.
On July 14, 1789, somewhere around a thousand French peasants who were mad as hell made the decision not to take it anymore. They stormed the prison where Louis XVI housed his political prisoners and thus began the French Revolution.
The elite that the French peasantry revolted against was the Royal Family, its courtiers, the Catholic hierarchy and the aristocracy.
In the United States today our elite is
the over-educated intellectual set; the credentialed clerisy. The vanguard of our contemporary rulers is the mainstream media who are reacting with justified panic as they watch their power, influence and earning power collapse around them. They will say anything and do anything to maintain their control over the public discourse but they are failing and they know it.
Trump is the leader of the current revolt and the deplorables that he champions are metaphorically storming the American Bastille. That’s why the rhetoric employed against Trump is so overheated. Whether that rhetoric motivated the now dead assassin doesn’t really matter. What matters is that our current elites are as venal as the French elites in 1789 and they are just as frightened and desperate. They will continue to say anything and do anything in their attempt to hang on.
It’s not just Trump who they worry about. They’ve recently decided that Biden is no longer an asset they can depend on. If Biden won’t resign his candidacy I can’t help but wonder what measures they might take out of their desperation.
I believe the use of violence as a political strategy is taught in our institutions of higher learning. A Colorado professor in the late 1960s recommended reading Frantz Fanon's "The Wretched of the Earth" to me and a group of trainees for Prez Kennedy's "Volunteers in Service to America'.
Recently I saw a copy of it on TV. In HBO's (award winning) "The White Lotus" a young woman is relaxing by the pool reading "The Wretched of the Earth". Later on she's reading Aime Cesaire's "Discourse on Colonialism". It's no proof of anything, except that these formerly obscure tracts are leaking out into the culture...from somewhere.