Fostering Hatred

Ten percent of Americans and some journalists were in favor of violence against Trump.

Funny how lone wolves abound. In Japan, a retired military man shot dead the former prime minister, unconventional Shinzo Abe. Another “madman with no sense of direction” fired five shots at Slovakia’s strongman, Robert Fico, who was known for his dissident profile. Now it is Donald Trump’s turn, attributed to an outcast boy who managed to climb — armed with a semiautomatic rifle — a building 430 feet from the former U.S. president’s rally, within view of the inactive Secret Service.

Another steppe wolf, Lee Harvey Oswald, killed John F. Kennedy in 1963. In a recent poll, 70% of Americans believe that Oswald did not act alone. In fact, only the very naïve, those who believe everything, swallow the official version about JFK without further ado. Of the four American presidents assassinated, the only Democrat was Kennedy. All of them fell at the hands of loose cannons, just as in the cases of the assassination attempts against Republicans Ronald Reagan and Teddy Roosevelt.

It is striking that, except for the detail about lone wolves, on most occasions the assassinations are perpetrated against “unconventional” leaders, those who have their own ideas, often opposed to those of political lobbies. The day before Kennedy’s assassination, Dallas woke up flooded with billboards with the legend “JFK: Wanted for Treason.” Treason against whom? To the powerful arms industry, for resolving the missile crisis on his own terms. To secret societies, for declaring them illegal. To the financial emporium, for withdrawing the Federal Reserve’s ability to issue dollars for the benefit of the Treasury. Curiously, the latter also happened to the equally assassinated Abraham Lincoln, James A. Garfield and William McKinley, each one at different times but with the same underlying conflict: first, with the First Bank of the United States, and later, with the Second Bank of the United States, both precursors of the Fed.

Mere coincidences, such as the fact that the young man in his 20s who, rifle in hand, climbed up to the roof of a building in front of Trump went unnoticed by the Secret Service. Trump had asked for increased protection; he was denied. Police were supposed to be on that rooftop, but the shooter was left free. Several witnesses saw the sniper climb the building with a gun and then crawl away. Not so the Secret Service, the same group that denied the existence of Hunter Biden’s computer. “Extreme incompetence or something deliberate,” Elon Musk has written on X. Also on X, Jonathan Willis posted: ” [I]n the famous photo of the two snipers on the roof at Trump’s rally. I came here to inform the public that I had the assassin in my sights for at least 3 minutes, but the head of the secret service refused to give the order to take out the perp. 100% the top brass prevented me from killing the assassin before he took the shots at president Trump.”

It must be sheer incompetence. Because it is difficult to believe that they could have acted deliberately.

During his campaign, Trump has been constant in saying that his enemy is not Biden but “the swamp,” that is, the “deep-state,” which he blames for the succession of “ridiculous” accusations in the courts, and for the hate campaign unleashed against him in the media. Some alleged “journalists” have gone so far as to call for his removal. And 10% of Americans have justified the violence against the Republican leader. It may or may not be a Trumpist fantasy, but the attack in Pennsylvania could have been avoided.

Of course, everyone feels reassured: Biden has announced an investigation.