America now has more than one mass shooting each day, with tens of thousands needlessly losing their lives in these and other shootings. It still hasn’t addressed its diseased obsession with weapons. Nor has it faced up to the fact that political violence is not an aberration, when in fact it is who we are as Americans. .
Even before U.S. President Joe Biden dropped out of the race on Sunday, November’s presidential election had become a dizzying roller-coaster ride.
In the run-up to this election, the Democratic Party failed to consider the impact a weakened Biden would have on the electorate, and it assumed that fear of former president Donald Trump would be enough to win.
In just the past few weeks, however, two new factors emerged, wreaking additional havoc on the foundation of these two assumptions: the horrifying mass shooting at a Trump rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, and the growing chorus of prominent Democrats urging Biden to step down as their party’s presidential nominee.
Even before U.S. President Joe Biden dropped out of the race on Sunday, November’s presidential election had become a dizzying roller-coaster ride.
In the run-up to this election, the Democratic Party failed to consider the impact a weakened Biden would have on the electorate, and it assumed that fear of former president Donald Trump would be enough to win.
In just the past few weeks, however, two new factors emerged, wreaking additional havoc on the foundation of these two assumptions: the horrifying mass shooting at a Trump rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, and the growing chorus of prominent Democrats urging Biden to step down as their party’s presidential nominee.
Trump will continue to project his frightening dystopian vision of American life, targeting his favorite line-up of evildoers—federal law enforcement, media elites, immigrants. His use of ridicule and hostile language will continue to inflame passions and incite violence.
Democrats, meanwhile, will continue to call for greater economic, social, and political equity. Biden had previously called out the widening income gap between the richest Americans and those struggling to make ends meet. Democrats will call for a fairer tax system, a raised minimum wage, and protection of unions and labor rights.
Despite their crackdown to stop the flow of illegal immigrants, they’ll call for a humane approach to those fleeing persecution. They will call for expanded healthcare, lower drug prices, support of women’s rights to make their own healthcare decisions, and continued progress towards racial justice.
And finally, Democrats will continue to focus this election on the need to protect democracy and the rule of law, warning about the threat posed by Trump supporters’ plans to reject the outcome of this election by using administrative tactics and even violence as they did in 2020 to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power.
One additional factor that will remain the same is the threat posed by gun violence and the failure of the GOP to support even modest gun control reforms—despite the attempt on Trump’s life.
America now has more than one mass shooting each day, with tens of thousands needlessly losing their lives in these and other shootings. It still hasn’t addressed its diseased obsession with weapons. Nor has it faced up to the fact that political violence is not an aberration, when in fact it is who we are as Americans.
When The New York Times writes as editorial titled “The Attack on Trump is Antithetical to America,” or when Biden asserts that political violence isn’t who we are or that it’s an aberration, they are ignoring the reality that political violence is “as American as cherry pie.”
Living in denial is not only ignoring the dozens of attempted assassinations that have defined American history, but also means that the country isn’t ready to learn lessons and take much needed remedial steps to end this plague.