Monday, July 22, 2024

Thoughts on the Trump shooting


Now that some time has passed, I have additional thoughts I'm willing to express about the assassination attempt on Trump

I'm against it.

Beyond that...

In extraordinary circumstances, assassination is both ethical and necessary. We are not there. Not with any politician currently on the radar. Not Trump, Biden, or even Hillary Clinton (although she's dangerously close).

It's literally part of the reason the Second Amendment exists-- to enable the people to have the upper hand-- the final word-- against government and politicians. It's why it protects literal weapons of war from government rules. It's why the arguments about government having all the nukes and fighter jets are silly and miss the point. Even a flintlock in the right hands can beat all their nukes, but modern weapons would be better for the task. 

In the end, politicians rely on the people tolerating them.

It's also a human right to defend yourself from those archating against you. Or making a credible threat to do so. That is what politicians and candidates are doing by their very existence.

It's still not usually smart, and may not be ethical, to try to assassinate anyone unless you have an actual Hitler-level threat in front of you, which I've never considered Trump to be. He's not unusually dangerous; he's the same as any other politician who may become president again. Which is bad enough.

But... shooting him could actually make him more dangerous by raising him to martyr status, Or removing him so that his supporters rally behind someone else and help that person become what TDS sufferers believed Trump was. That would be really stupid.

I also admit that my religious past made me instantly think of Revelations 13:3. I kept that to myself, until now.

Anyway... It's possible that the nearly successful attempt was just normal governmental incompetence, but it sure looks like something more was at work. Is it just a DEI problem? I doubt it. It looks like someone in government either helped plan the attack or was careful to not prevent it. That may be confirmation bias on my part.

The shooter (or shooters) bears full responsibility. But the media encouraged him to do it. If you doubt that, where have you been for the past 9 or so years. The media has been calling Trump "literally Hitler" and claiming he's an existential threat to America (and "our democracy") this whole time. Mentally unstable, or evil, people don't require much encouragement to act. He got more than he needed.

You or I will never know the whole truth about what happened. Even if the truth slips out, it will be a needle in a haystack of misinformation, and there will be false needles mixed in that are too big and shiny to ignore.

-
Thank you for reading.