[I started working on this yesterday but didn’t finish it so that it could be published. Since then authorities have arrested a suspect in the mailed pipe bombs so some of my original thoughts are being updated before I publish today. And with the news changing so fast, this may be out of date when I do publish]
When Donald Trump visited the airport in Mosinee Wisconsin for a hangar rally to support Governor Walker’s re-election campaign and State Senator Leah Vukmir’s US Senate run, he read a prepared text from the teleprompter. It made him appear more President Trump instead of Rally Trump but it didn’t totally prevent him from being inappropriate at times.
But he talked about the pipe bombs that were being discovered…those sent to his opponents…people that he has castigated and denigrated…prominent Democrats, media organizations, and people critical of the administration. People who he has ridiculed and called out on the campaign trail, in his speeches, at his rallies and in his constant tweeting.
Here’s where it gets interesting because here’s the President Trump stuff. He basically asked for unity in the face of this threat to American Democracy. He said political violence has no place in America. I have to give him credit here for doing the right thing…and promising that the FBI and other federal agencies will give this priority and they will quickly bring the perpetrator to justice.
And then he went a little off script and tore the sleeve off of his suit while patting himself on the back for being nice.
But then a few hours later, the president tweeted that the fake news mass media are to blame. They need to stop publishing all of that incendiary stuff. Are there no mirrors in the residence at the White House? The only way the media can stop publishing incendiary information against the Dems and the media and his opponents would be to stop covering the president’s rallies, press conferences, and tweets!
I used the word assassination in my title. Is that too strong a word? Well when I started writing this, no it wasn’t. We didn’t know if the bombs were capable of exploding or not. It looks now, that they were all missing key components needed to detonate them. But initially it looked like someone was intent in harming if not killing people. Now that we know that the bombs couldn’t go off, we have to wait until the suspect decides to tell us if the bombs were inert intentionally or as the result of his lack of expertise in bomb making. Or was his actual intent to just threaten and intimidate Democrats and opponents of the president? Either way this is domestic terrorism…a term that I haven’t seen in the media…yet. I was heartened today to see that at one point the president apparently called mailing the bombs as ‘terrorizing acts’. So we’ve cleared one hurtle so far in the West Wing.
Unfortunately Sen. Vukmir didn’t get the message on unity before she took the stage to present her stump speech. When she mentioned Hillary Clinton, the audience broke into the anticipated “lock her up” chant…and Sen. Vukmir just stood there and smirked. No indication she knew or cared how inappropriate that was considering Ms. Clinton was one of the first recipients of a pipe bomb. Sen. Vukmir remains as tone deaf as ever and the consistent unthinking mouthpiece of the Trump wing of the GOP.
And now, it appears, that the president is saying that the bombs are hurting the chances of the GOP in the mid-term elections on November 6th. I hope he is right this time!!
You know what they say in political boiler rooms everywhere: “bomb stuff happens!”
And thanks to the FBI, Postal Inspectors, Secret Service, and those law enforcement agencies involved in investigating these mail bombs.
Recent Comments