18 July 2024 12:00 am Views - 1280
Right now, Trump is riding a wave of sympathy; even his fiercest critics in the US admire the way he handled this crisis
So said J. D. Vance, Republican senator of Ohio and a strong candidate for the position of Vice President if Donald Trump is re-elected as President of the United States.
Republicans are making capital out of the botched assassination attempt on Trump. Their anger is levelled at the Democratic Party, and it’s all too easy to talk of a plot to kill Trump as he seems to be set for a second term.
But the Democrats don’t need to shoot Trump. With Joe Biden as President and Kamala Harris as Vice President, they have shot themselves enough both in the foot and the mouth to be crippled. The Democratic Party is in total disarray and everyone from Bill Clinton to senators we have never heard of are scratching their heads, thinking of a substitute for Biden as presidential candidate. The party has people who can turn things around and challenge Trump, but they won’t get a chance unless Biden steps down, which looks unlikely.
Right now, Trump is riding a wave of sympathy. Even his fiercest critics in the US admire the way he handled this crisis. His right wing supporters have found a new Messiah and an icon. That iconic photograph of Trump with blood on his face defiantly shaking his fist refuels their abiding faith in him.
Biden, on the other hand, is looking more and more ridiculous. His face got bloodied recently for the wrong reasons – falling down the stairs and falling off a bicycle. He gets his words mixed up – last week, he called Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy ‘President Putin’ during a gathering of European Union leaders.
Among standing Democratic presidents, only Jimmy Carter and Richard Nixon have been so vilified at re-election time; Carter because his increasingly spartan domestic policies did not appeal to the upper middle class and the rich, as well as the disastrous mission to rescue American embassy hostages in Tehran, and Nixon because of Watergate. But both men were far more competent and far sighted as presidents – it was Nixon who made the historic diplomatic breakthrough with Mao Tsetung’s China.
As for the attempt on Trump’s life, there is no shortage of conspiracy theories. Some point fingers at the FBI. The word is that they were either grossly incompetent or complicit. There is no doubt as to the first theory. But the second theory is more complicated.
The lone gunman, 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, is a white male high school graduate. He was good at science and math, and a teacher says he was always very nice and helpful. Looking at his photograph, you see a good poster image for American youth, looking bright and cheerful. He could be an up and coming country and western singer, not an assassin. Two of his schoolmates say he was a loner, but many bright and intelligent youth like to be that way to protect themselves from the chaos around them.
He had a fascination with guns, but this is hardly a surprise – all too many Americans have a fascination with guns. The powerful AR15 semi-automatic rifle he used was bought by Crooks’ father (you need to be over 21 to buy one). Crooks’ social media profile shows nothing dark and troubling. The most intriguing thing is that he was a registered Republican, not a far left anarchist.
If the FBI could recruit a young Republican with no psychopathic tendencies or a history of violence to undertake a suicide mission (Crooks would have known his chances of a getaway would have been nil), that would be a major feat, because suicide bombers etc. are an Asian and Middle Eastern phenomenon. The US has no such history.
Given what we know of Crooks so far, this makes the case all the more bizarre. He practised target shooting at a club with 2,000 members, training to hit targets 170 metres away. But he missed Trump at a range of 150 metres.
The AR15 is not a sniper weapon and has no telescopic gunsight. But Crooks was very close to Trump – on top of a building 150 metres away. Crooks had a clear target and it seems incredible that he missed Trump at that short range. Actually, he didn’t miss – one of the eight rounds he fired grazed Trump’s right ear. Another centimetre closer, and Trump would have been dead or critically injured.
The AR-15 doesn’t fire automatic bursts. It fires one bullet at a time. Crooks had the time to fire eight rounds before an FBI sniper killed him. Other bizarre facts have emerged. Visitors can’t bring tennis balls or hard water bottles to the convention centre where Trump was speaking, but they can bring guns.
Crooks was seen climbing to the roof of that building opposite Trump’s stage. He was in military fatigues and it was assumed he was part of Trump’s security. It’s hard to imagine presidential security assuming such a thing. From the ground, people could see Crooks with his rifle.
Up to that point, the complicity theory can be supported. But the rest of it defies logic – how did the FBI recruit someone like Crooks for a suicide mission? Whoever was behind it would have hired a professional sniper. Botched attempts are more dangerous to the plotters than to the victim.
“AR-15s are the most commonly used rifles in marksmanship competitions, training, and home defence,” according to the US National Rifle Association. The Washington Post found that in 2023, about 1 in 20 U.S. adults owned an AR-15. The Post found that the weapon was used in at least 10 of the 17 deadliest mass shootings in America.
I find it strange that few analysts are pointing fingers at another culprit – the lax gun control laws in the US. It’s the Republicans who are mostly for it – but the Democrats haven’t done anything substantial to put civilian weapons under control.
The US is a country created with the gun – driving out indigenous Indian tribes from their lands until the surviving remnants were pathetically confined to settlements. This is a strong legacy and many Americans believe in their right to own guns. But the problem is that military-capability weapons too, can be purchased by ordinary citizens and used in mass murder.
Ironically, the Defense Procurement Manufacturing Services (DPMS), now owned by the parent of South Carolina-based Palmetto State Armory, which makes AR-15s, was visited by Trump himself during a campaign stop in 2023 where he took photos with the owner and admired a Glock handgun with his face engraved in the grip.
This is not an expensive weapon. New AR-15 rifles can be bought for $400 to $2,000 and nearly every major gun manufacturer produces one. Ammunition is inexpensive and can be bought in bulk online, and magazines are interchangeable between manufacturers. The AR-15 has been called “America’s rifle” by the NRA with well over 15 million sold by 2019.
That’s how easy it is. While it’s a good thing to find out if there was indeed a plot to kill Donald Trump (they are still trying to unravel the mysteries behind the killing of John F. Kennedy), it’d be a good thing to take a good hard look at America’s gun laws. Trump should make that a priority if he walks into the White House again.