Best Not Miss
Trump Assassination Tango
Jim Kavanagh
The first and
worst thing to say about the attempted assassination of Trump is that it is
going to divert attention from the much more important and horrific mass
slaughter of Palestinians that is taking place daily in Gaza and the West Bank,
as well as the constant Israeli attacks on Lebanon and Syria. Nothing that did
happen, or could have happened, to Donald Trump or any American politician supporting
that atrocity is worth an ounce of concern that should be going to the killed
and amputated children of Gaza. In that context, it’s particularly sickening to
witness the spectacle of politicians across the US political spectrum proclaiming
the unacceptability of “political violence”—meaning violence against
establishment politicians—while they vie to manage the country MLK correctly
called “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world.”
N. Pelosi: political violence is unacceptable
— Zachary Foster (@_ZachFoster) July 14, 2024
J. Fetterman: political violence is unacceptable
L. Austin: political violence is unacceptable
A. Blinken: political violence is unacceptable
J. Biden: political violence is unacceptable
Gaza’s 2M people: u bigoted hypocrites
Sat morning: Israeli massacre, Western politicians in full support
— Tiberius (@ecomarxi) July 14, 2024
Sat afternoon: Israeli massacre, Western politicians in full support
Sat night: Trump’s ear shot, Western politicians denounce all violence
Sun morning: Israeli massacre, Western politicians in full support
Nonetheless,
I’ll succumb to discussing what is, however ultimately diversionary, an unavoidable
event that’s symptomatic of the present, tense, American political paradigm and
of the peculiar, fascinating history of such events in American history. It’s impossible
to ignore, and kind of fun
to discuss, presidential-level political assassination.
So what are we dealing with here? What we seem to know now is that shots were fired at Donald Trump—a volley of three evenly spaced shots followed by another volley of five more quickly spaced shots; Trump was injured, either directly by a bullet or indirectly by the glass of a shattered teleprompter that was hit by a bullet; a spectator was killed and two others critically wounded; a man, identified as 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, was seen climbing onto a roof with a rifle by witnesses who pointed him out to police and Secret Service personnel, and was shot and killed by a Secret Service sniper after shots were fired at Trump.
We know, from Butler County Sheriff Michael Slupe, as interviewed by Pittsburgh CBS affiliate KDKA-TV, that an armed police officer “had both hands up on the roof to get up on the roof, never made it because the shooter had turned toward the officer, and—rightfully and smartfully—the officer let go.”