RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.thefp.com/p/yuval-levin-assassination-attempt-america-choice

At first glance, Saturday’s terrifying assassination attempt on Donald Trump seems like an obvious extension of our depressing political drift. 

We have grown more divided in this century, we use more militant rhetoric, and political violence has escalated. In the last 15 years, there have been shootings of members of Congress of both parties, a foiled assassination attempt of a Supreme Court justice and his family, a mob storming the Capitol to disrupt the certification of a presidential election, and rising levels of threats against public officials of all sorts. A near assassination of a once and perhaps future president might seem like all too natural a next step. 

And yet, this moment feels like a sharp break. Maybe because it was by far the highest profile act of domestic political violence in this century, directed at the highest profile figure in our politics, in front of television cameras, that it struck even our cynical culture as a shock. It gave us a terrible glimpse into what it would feel like to live beyond the bounds of our constitutional republic.

We have tested those bounds pretty aggressively in the last few years. Our leading politicians have called each other fascists and enemies of the people, deployed or threatened to deploy the justice system against their opponents, declared that election results were illegitimate, and insisted that our society’s very existence would be imperiled if the other party were in power. Donald Trump himself has been the worst offender on this front, but his opponents and critics have frequently come close. Both sides have seemed incapable of criticizing one another’s violations of essential norms without engaging in their own. All of this has shown contempt for the character of our republic. 

But what Trump’s would-be assassin did on Saturday was different—and not only by degree. 

https://www.racket.news/p/the-surrender

The decision was announced at a White House briefing Monday morning. “In light of this weekend’s events, the president has directed me to work with the Secret Service to provide protection to Robert Kennedy Jr.,” was the quote from Homeland Security Director Alejandro Mayorkas.

It’s difficult to read the line “in light of this weekend’s events” and not see an admission on the part of the White House that Secret Service protection was previously being denied to Kennedy, Jr. for political reasons, or out of spite, if those are even two different things in this era. Whatever the original prerogative was for pushing the envelope with that denial, it seems to have been removed by series of paradigm-shattering news events, leading to a flurry of real and symbolic surrenders.

MSNBC likewise made an extraordinary decision Sunday night to pull Morning Joe, with CNN saying the network wanted to “to avoid a scenario in which one of the show’s stable of two dozen-plus guests might make an inappropriate comment on live television.” As with the Secret Service decision, MSNBC was making a major admission, essentially telling audiences its lead morning news show is either not really a news show, or that its format only holds up under something less than maximum scrutiny. I can’t recall a similar act of self-sabotage in media.

https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/america/2024/07/joe-biden-on-the-back-foot/

Within minutes of the attempt on Donald Trump’s life, Joe Biden’s handlers suspended all campaign advertising. They had no choice. As demonstrated in the weeks leading up to the shooting, the Democrats’ ads had assailed him as a threat to everything that is good and decent about America. Incendiary rhetoric, as the President intoned on Sunday night in his address to the nation, must be condemned.

Below, excerpts of that Oval Office (in italic) message and, below each, some links and background to what might well be the biggest example of hypocrisy since Captain Renault evinced shock at finding a roulette wheel in Rick’s gin joint.

My fellow Americans, I want to speak to you tonight about the need for us to lower the temperature in our politics and to remember, while we may disagree, we are not enemies.  We’re neighbors.  We’re friends, coworkers, citizens.  And, most importantly, we are fellow Americans.  And we must stand together. 

Translation: We must stand together, especially those amongst my fellow Democrats who have been calling on me to stand down. 

Yesterday’s shooting at Donald Trump’s rally in Pennsylvania calls on all of us to take a step back, take stock of where we are, how we go forward from here. 

How indeed! The day before Thomas Matthew Crooks’ bullet took the tip off Donald Trump’s right ear, the man demanding “a step back” from fighting words variously described Trump as “a rapist”*, “a convicted criminal”, “a business fraud”, “a threat to this nation” who is “unhinged” and, inevitably, an enemy of “our democracy” who would force the public servants he doesn’t sack to pledge their loyalty to him personally.

https://www.city-journal.org/article/a-compromised-secret-service

It was a shot heard around the world. 

On Saturday, a gunman whom the FBI has identified as Thomas Matthew Crooks fired a burst of rifle shots at former president Donald Trump, grazing his ear and nearly killing him. The attempted assassination is an historic, and perilous, moment. We’ll get commentaries and investigations, and the government will announce reforms.

But amid all the chaos weaves the thread of another story, one that reveals a mounting problem in our political life. A surprising number of the Secret Service agents protecting the former president were women. And, according to video recordings of the scene, many did not acquit themselves favorably.

Scene one: after President Trump ducks, a group of agents leaps to him and protects him with their bodies. A female agent who rushes to the stage acts bravely, without a doubt, but the point of the “huddle” is to protect the president. The agent was much shorter than President Trump, leaving his head and neck exposed after he stood up.

Scene two: as Trump enters the escape vehicle, a female Secret Service agent fumbles her gun and cannot find her holster; another female agent appears confused and, in the moment of crisis, decides to use both of her hands to put on her sunglasses; a third looks frightened and uncertain.

These agents wear the typical Secret Service outfits—Kevlar vests pressing against white shirts; black blazers with gold pins; dark sunglasses—but to an impartial observer, they do not appear to have the same poise, confidence, and strength as the male agents around them.

The obvious question: Why so many female agents? The answer, unfortunately, is the same as in many other institutions: DEI. The Secret Service has highlighted “diversity” as a key priority and its director, Kimberly Cheatle, named to the position in 2022, has pledged to increase dramatically the number of women in the ranks.

This is official policy. The Secret Service openly boasts that it “prioritizes recruiting women candidates” and has formulated an “affirmative action” plan to increase the number of women, LGBT, Native Americans, and other identity groups.

https://www.city-journal.org/article/political-rhetoric-and-the-trump-assassination-attempt

By December 2023, the Biden campaign’s frequent equation of Donald Trump with Adolf Hitler had caught the attention even of some in the mainstream media. “In most situations, comparing a political opponent to Adolf Hitler might seem like an extraordinary step,” wrote Politico. “For Joe Biden’s campaign, it has become part of the routine of running against Donald Trump.” CNN predicted that the Trump-is-Hitler “attack line” would likely be “central” to the president’s efforts to win reelection. Other outlets contributed their own Trump-Hitler comparisons. The New Republic’s June 2024 issue, a special report on “American Fascism,” showed a blended image of Trump and the Führer on its cover.

It was not even necessary to make an explicit Hitler comparison; the similarities were too obvious. Robert Kagan told the Washington Post’s Jonathan Capehart that Trump was a “natural dictator.” If you “give him unchecked power in the United States, I think any sensible person would find that a frightening proposition.” Americans are whistling past the graveyard, Kagan warned. All checks on presidential power will be impotent against Trump’s attacks on the Founder’s constitutional order, he declared.

“Existential threats” can seem to demand a different set of rules from those governing ordinary political life. Had the July 20, 1944, assassination plot against Hitler been successful, the plotters would have been greeted across the world as heroes.

Thomas Matthew Crooks, who missed blowing out Donald Trump’s brain by a few inches and who murdered a Trump supporter instead, may have thought of himself as just such a hero-in-waiting.

So now we gaze into the abyss. Every act of political violence opens up the prospect of the collapse of civil order. When political disagreement becomes lethal and political leaders risk their lives to run for or occupy political office, we trade the civil peace bequeathed to us by centuries of Western civilization for Third World anarchy.