The Saddest Part About the Trump Assassination Attempt

While speaking at a rally in Pennsylvania, Donald Trump was injured in an assassination attempt that left one dead and two others hurt.

Over the weekend, a friend commented on a post I made on social media before an assassination attempt at a Donald Trump rally in Pennsylvania. I shared the post from an account I don’t follow. But I agreed with the sentiment.

Here’s what it stated:

How sad it must be — believing that scientists, scholars, historians, economists, and journalists have devoted their entire lives to deceiving you, while a reality TV star with six decades of fraud and exhaustively documented lying is your only beacon of truth and honesty.

The post originated in a group of fans of astrophysicist and TV host Neil deGrasse Tyson. I do not know the person who created it. I do not know if that person originated the quote.

But I posted it to demonstrate a growing truth about American politics. Those who consider themselves ultra-partisan —on either side — will seemingly accept without question whatever their side’s leader tells them. They will sometimes ignore documented facts and dismiss as fiction or conspiracy anything that contradicts said leader.

I consider myself neither Republican nor Democrat. I agree with certain things both sides suggest. However, I vehemently disagree with others. Neither side fully represents everything I believe.

So you’ll just have to pardon me if I fall into the category of people who have a hard time fathoming this blind devotion toward Trump or toward Joe Biden.

A friend posted a comment after the assassination attempt

Later on Saturday, gunfire erupted at a Pennsylvania Trump rally shortly after he began speaking. Trump himself was wounded, although it wasn’t immediately clear whether he was hit by a bullet or by glass, possibly from a broken teleprompter screen. Trump later said a bullet grazed his ear.

The shooting attempt killed a man who attended the rally and injured two others. The suspect fired 6-8 rounds using an AR-15 style weapon, approximately 400 feet from the podium, investigators said. 

The Secret Service quickly surrounded Trump and got him out of there. They “neutralized” the shooter, who authorities later identified as a 20-year-old Pennsylvania man. He was apparently a registered Republican in Pennsylvania but donated to a liberal Political Action Committee in 2021.

A friend of mine — a former colleague who’s known me for more than 20 years — left this comment on my post:

I take it from this post, You’re sad that he was not assassinated yesterday. Am I right?

Before answering, I asked if he was serious in asking me that question. To his credit, he apologized. He saying that he’d seen posts from others who seemed to indicate they were sorry the gunman wasn’t more “precise” and apparently reacted to mine after assuming I had the same point of view.

I appreciated his apology and I accepted it. But then I answered his question.

I’m going to answer it in more detail here

For the record, I’m definitely not sad that he wasn’t assassinated. I wouldn’t have cheered if he had been. This kind of violence is unacceptable in America. 

Completely unacceptable. Period. Full stop.

But some things do make me sad. Very sad, in fact.

I’m much more sad that this country has become so divided and politics have become so bitter, so toxic, so bullying and so belittling — thanks, in no small part, to Trump’s own hate-filled rhetoric — that people would actually hope for his death or express sadness that a would-be assassin was unsuccessful. 

Our politics have become divisive at a level we’ve not seen before. It should be no surprise to anyone who has been paying even slight attention over the last decade that political scientists picked Trump as the most divisive president.

Our nation’s leaders are quickly forgetting — or have completely lost — the art of uniting people. Even worse, they seem to be proud of the polarization they cause because it might get them another vote. 

It seems like it is happening more and more often when it’s time to elect a president: Instead of two good candidates who each bring a smorgasbord of good ideas and plans meant to help all Americans, we’re left with two less-than-ideal choices. The choices leave us wondering why the parties can’t find someone who might bring people together rather than polarize. We wonder why we can’t help more than just one side. And we wonder why what we like to think of as the greatest country in the nation can’t solve our own problems better than this.

There was a time when improving the country, making life better for our citizens, proving America was the greatest country on Earth to the extent that people would want to come here (and be welcome to do so) were the goals. 

Now, it’s apparently only about vote counts. That makes me sad.

What we should have learned about hate by now

When you use hate — in your speech, in your actions, in your motivation to persuade — what do you think you’re accomplishing?

Dr. Martin Luther King said it quite well:

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Hate multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction.

The Bible also addresses hate, which certain members of the Religious Right conveniently forget:

Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.

Ephesians 4:31-32

Our society seems to thrive on hate these days. It’s as if every political debate has to feel more like an episode of The Jerry Springer Show than anything resembling civil discourse.

The more outrageous we get with our political rhetoric, namecalling and finger-pointing, the less surprised we should be when such horrible actions take place.

That’s the saddest part of all.