As Republicans gather, Democrats cannot dither

Broad Street, Milford, PA

Last night, President Joe Biden had exactly the right reaction to the attempt on Donald Trump’s life on Saturday evening.  “We stand for an America not of extremism and fury, but of decency and grace," Biden said in a six-minute address from the Oval Office.  “In America, we resolve our differences at the ballot box, not with bullets.  Disagreement is inevitable in American democracy.  While we may disagree, we are not enemies. We’re neighbors, we’re friends, co-workers, citizens, and most importantly, we are fellow Americans. We must stand together.”

Donald Trump escaped being killed by a shot fired by a disturbed 20-year-old who fit all the characteristics we have found in mass shooters over the years – he was a loner who was bullied in school; he lived at home with his parents; he had few friends and social contacts with others.

We have become sadly inured to the mass killings which happen all too frequently in this country.  The attempt on Trump’s life was another one; one man was killed, and two others were seriously wounded.  If it hadn’t happened at a political rally, and if Trump had not been grazed by a bullet, the incident would not have made the news outside the area where it happened. 

President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris each called Trump and asked if he was all right and if there was anything they could do.  Biden has ordered an investigation of how the protection of Trump by the Secret Service could have failed so badly.  He made brief remarks to the nation in the hours after the shooting and again last night.  All these actions were the right things to do.

The wrong thing to do was exemplified by Senator J.D. Vance, whom Trump chose as his vice-presidential running mate today.  Vance blamed the attempt on Trump’s life on “rhetoric” used by the Biden campaign.  This is par for the course.  We’ll see more finger-pointing and false charges by right-wing Trump followers as the presidential campaign goes forward.

Republicans are said to be scrambling to use the attempted assassination of their candidate at their convention which began today in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.  The convention was scheduled to have the theme of “defiance,” and there is speculation that they will use Trump’s raised fist and calls to his crowd to “fight, fight, fight” as he was carried off the stage by Secret Service agents as a symbol of that theme.  It is questionable how successful they will be in targeting Democrats as the guilty party in the attempt on Trump’s life, but they will try their best. 

If you were like me and my wife Tracy after the shooting on Saturday, you were probably at least a little stunned and shaken.  We went to bed later than usual and had trouble sleeping. 

But yesterday morning, the world had moved on.  No major sporting events were canceled.  Major League Baseball games were played.  The NASCAR race, held in Pocono, Pennsylvania, the same state where the shooting took place, went on as usual.

Tourists walked around our small town in Northeast Pennsylvania, taking in the sights.  The main road through town was crowded with RV’s and campers and trailers headed into the nearby Pocono Mountains lake region. Tracy and I went to a jazz brunch here in Milford, and then we made our way over to a fundraiser for the Pike Opera, which has commissioned a well-known composer to write an opera that will celebrate Milford’s historical role in the birth of the American conservation movement. 

I don’t know who the people were seated around us at the Hotel Fauchere during brunch, and although we knew some of the people at the fundraiser in the backyard of our town’s mayor, we didn’t talk about politics or about the attempted assassination of the former president. Even Trump went out and played golf at his course in Bedminster, New Jersey, yesterday morning. 

Whatever the public reaction turns out to be, the Republican Party will try to use the attempt on Trump’s life to turn him into a martyr and a hero.  It’s kind of a hollow mission, since that was the image of himself Trump has been pushing ever since he lost the election in 2020, but Republicans will do it anyway.  They will use their convention to drill down on that image and theme relentlessly over the next three days.

What should Democrats do in the meantime?  Number one, they should not dither around.  President Biden should hit the campaign trail and hold at least a rally every other day, if not a rally daily, while Republicans crown their king in Milwaukee.  Biden should talk about the issues Democrats are good on – jobs, infrastructure, the return of manufacturing, supporting Ukraine and opposing Vladimir Putin.  Don’t make a big deal about guns.  Biden will only be accused of using the Trump shooting as a political bludgeon.  There will be plenty of time to talk about AR-15’s and the Supreme Court’s terrible decisions on guns and bump stocks later.

Move on.  Everybody else has.  We would still be feeling aftershocks if they hadn’t.  There is a campaign to be run and an election to be won.  The Republicans will spend the week working on exactly that.  So should Democrats.  There isn’t any time for dithering and second-guessing ourselves.  Beating Donald Trump isn’t going to be easy, but it can be done, if we get out there and campaign and push our candidates and do the hard work necessary to win.