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Trump Assassination Attempt: A Round-Up

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By Lambert Strether of Corrente.

The iconic image (from AP’s Evan Vucci), helpfully annotated to show how composition makes for an iconic image:

And speaking of iconic images, if your first thought is “Trump (nearly) died for us”:

(Notice, in Vucci’s image, a woman also supporting Trump in his agony.)

Or if your first thought is “Trump (nearly) died for our country” (AP’s Joe Rosenthal):

(The stars and stripes doing its work, although I suppose Secret Service agents in sunglasses will have to stand in for the Marines. But that’s where we are, isn’t it?)

Icons propagate. Already, T-shirts printed with Vucci’s image are on sale at a New Jersey boardwalk:

“Shooting makes me stronger.”[1]

Having begun, as it were, in medias res, let’s circle back to the beginning, and proceed in an orderly manner. I will aggregate the material I have read on the shooter, the venue, the shooting, and cui bono. I’ll conclude with some of the more humane reactions. Starting with the shooter–

The Shooter

We know very little about the shooter, although one of the first things we know about is his partisan affiliation (or proxies therefor). From the New York Post, “Thomas Matthew Crooks ID’d as gunman who shot Trump during Pa. rally”

According to state voter status records, Crooks was a registered Republican.

The shooter made one singular $15 donation to the liberal ActBlue political action committee on January 20, 2021 — Biden’s Inauguration Day, the Intercept reportedp[2].

(Smith was not carrying ID; he was identified through the gun and DNA analysis[3].)However, from the Inquirer:

[ex-Bethel Park student Max Ryan] Smith recalled participating in a mock debate with Crooks in an American history course in which the teacher had students stand on opposite sides of the classroom to signal their support or opposition.

“The majority of the class were on the liberal side, but Tom, no matter what, always stood his ground on the conservative side,” Smith said. “That’s still the picture I have of him. Just standing alone on one side while the rest of the class was on the other … It makes me wonder why he would carry out an assassination attempt on the conservative candidate.”

Crooks graduated from high school two years ago. From the Post:

Crooks was a member of the 2022 graduating class at Bethel Park High School, the school district confirmed Sunday morning.

Video shows him walking across a stage to accept his diploma. He also received a $500 National Math and Science Initative Star Award during his graduating year, TribLive reported.

His high school experience was unhappy. NBC:

A high school classmate, Jason Kohler, 21, said Crooks was a “loner” who was “bullied so much in high school.”

Crooks would regularly wear hunting outfits and was made fun of for the way he dressed. He often sat alone at lunch, Kohler added.

His post-high school experience seems not to have been happy, or at leat not STEM-oriented. BBC:

Crooks worked in a local nursing home kitchen just a short drive away from his home, the BBC understands.

Then there’s the family. CNN:

When reached by CNN late Saturday night, Crooks’ father, Matthew Crooks, said he was trying to figure out “what the hell is going on” but would “wait until I talk to law enforcement” before speaking about his son. He could not be reached again on Sunday.

We have no motive. BBC:

Having established Crooks’s identity, police and agencies are investigating his motive.

“We do not currently have an identified motive,” said Kevin Rojek, FBI Pittsburgh special agent in charge, at a briefing on Saturday night.

It would be disconcerting if a diary documenting Crooks’s motives were found; a lone gunman, acting alone, but leaving behind a diary is a movie we’ve all seen before. And the sequels, too.

The Venue

From the New York Post:

Crooks, of Bethel Park, Pa., squeezed off at least five to seven shots — one of which grazed Trump in the ear — at an outdoor rally in Butler, just outside Pittsburgh, according to law enforcement sources.

Sources said Crooks crawled on the roof of a manufacturing plant more than 130 yards away from the stage at Butler Farm Show grounds.

Here is a map from the New York Times that shows the rally site and the manufacturing plant:

Security at the manufacturing plant (likely to be American Glass Research) was lax[4]:

And:

I recall reading, but cannot find again, that the cops talked to people at the plant, but only to tell them they’d be using the parking lot. Here is a report of “a guy” sighted moving between the buildings of the manufacturing plant:

The question arises how Crooks picked this building, how he knew to get access, etc.

The Shooting

Here is an extraordinary interview from the BBC with an eyewitness to the shooting:

The prose version, “Witness says he saw gunman on roof near Trump rally“:

Mr Smith was listening from outside the rally and said he saw the gunman around five minutes into Trump’s speech.

“We noticed the guy bear-crawling up the roof of the building beside us, 50ft away,” he said. “He had a rifle, we could clearly see a rifle.

“We’re pointing at him, the police are down there running around on the ground, we’re like ‘Hey man, there’s a guy on the roof with a rifle’… and the police did not know what was going on.”

Mr Smith said he tried to alert the authorities for three to four minutes, but thought they probably could not see the gunman because of the slope of the roof.

“Why is there not Secret Service on all of these roofs here?” he asked. “This is not a big place. “[It’s a] security failure, 100% security failure.”

He said he later saw the agents shoot the gunman: “They crawled up on the roof, they had their guns pointed at him, made sure he was dead. He was dead, and that was it – it was over.”

Here is what someone very near the stage itself experienced. From the Free Press:

I was four feet from the stage, in a causeway with about five other journalists. My daughter, a photographer, was next to me. Her husband was next to her.

Trump was back on his feet within seconds, although his red hat was knocked off his head. He was calm.

I heard him shout to one of his staffers, “Get my shoes!”

He lifted his arm in the air. I think he shouted, “Fight!”

Then he definitely shouted, “USA!” The crowd chanted it back in unison.

Here is a photo of the bullet whizzing toward Trump’s head[5]:

And here is a video of Trump shouting “Fight! Fight!”:

Taleb comments:

Note that there were more victims: “A former fire chief attending the rally with family was killed, as was the gunman. Two other people were also critically wounded.”

Cui Bono

Now let us ask who benefits. Curiously enough, both Trump and Biden may. I say “may” rather than “do” because of this salutary reminder from Stoller:

But let’s not be nihilists. First, Trump:

The first and simplest reaction comes from the New York Post (and I confess that it was mine, as well):

The moment probably also won him the election.

The same reaction from The Hill:

“President Trump survives this attack — he just won the election,” Rep. Derrick Van Orden (R-Wis.) told POLITICO in a brief interview shortly after the shooting.

Prediction markets agree:

But then I remembered [checks campaign timer] that 114 days is a long time in politics.

Axios draws attention to the effect on apartisan voters:

The biggest electoral impact from Saturday’s stunning events could come courtesy of low-information and politically disengaged Americans, who are expected to make up a decisive voting bloc.

The attempted assassination was so shocking that it immediately cut through a wide range of cultural and digital bubbles, drawing mostly sympathetic reactions from influencers, athletes and CEOs.

Elon Musk, for example, immediately endorsed Trump in a post that racked up more than 80 million views on X.

YouTuber Jake Paul, who has legions of young followers, tweeted: “If it isn’t apparent enough who God wants to win. When you try and kill God’s angels and saviors of the world it just makes them bigger.”

Axios, however, equates “electoral impact” with popular sentiment; however, the salient point is the effect on low information voters in the swing states where the election will be won or lost. However, Pennsylvania is a key swing state (which is why I keep drawing a red box around it on the RealClearPolitics poll averages chart), and while I hesitate to say that Crooks just sewed up Pennsylvania for Trump, he certainly did Trump no harm. I would speculate that turnout in the non-Philly, non-Pittsburgh counties will be, well, fervent.

The Telegraph argues that the assassination attempt reinforces Trump’s messaging:

Trump has built his campaign on the idea that everyone is out to get him. Federal prosecutors, judges, election officials, rival politicians and journalists have all been accused of trying to bring down his campaign and prevent his return to the White House.

Many of those claims have rightly been contested. But after the incident in Pennsylvania, even Trump’s worst enemies cannot deny that there are some who would rather see him dead than re-elected.

Trump supporters urge that the attempt reinforces Trump’s ethos:

And people say, why do people like Trump so much? Why are his supporters, why are they so loyal to Trump? You know why? Because of what we saw today. Because he got up after getting hit by a bullet or something, and he said, I’m here basically fighting for you, and fight on. And we don’t have enough people like that in this country in politics.

But Biden may also benefit. First, his staff can wrap him up in tissue paper again. Axios:

For President Biden, it was an easy decision to reach out to former President Trump, pull down his political ads and return to the White House.Biden advisers were unanimous that he needs to take his fight directly to Trump.

That’s a difficult case to make against a man who came within several millimeters of losing his life.

There’s now a broad recognition that Biden is facing a delicate balancing act in the coming weeks: He must continue to warn that Trump is a threat to democracy, while acknowledging the recent threat to Trump’s life.

Second, out of deference and respect to Trump in this difficult time, the Biden campaign can save some money:

The Democratic National Committee told Fox News that it is in the process of pulling down ads that it went up with on Monday on 57 municipal buses in Milwaukee.

Third and most importantly, I speculate that the Republican National Convention plus Trump’s cannily postponed selection of a vice-present, would already have sucked all the oxygen out of the room. The Trump assassination attempt will “blot out the sun” (I somehow did not preserve the link to the Democratic strategist who used that phrase). The campaign to unelect Biden has depended critically on constant, incestuous dogpiling in the press. That coverage will be much, much harder to get, and so indeed Biden may run out the clock. (Alert reader antidlc helpfully points out that the DNC may set a date for its virtual roll call before the end of the month.)

Conclusion

I really wanted to have a section about how the blame cannons are being deployed, but time presses, and so I must leave them on the cutting room floor. To conclude, I’ve aggregated some of reactions to Trump’s assassination that are more kind or humane, rather than less; tending to reject the Schmittian view that the essential dichotomy of politics is the friend/enemy distinction:

First, Russell Brand:

Second, Robert F. Kennedy, Junior:

Third, Melania Trump:

(I actually found Melania Trump’s letter touching. Odd, but touching. Note that all these reactions, in their different ways, appeal to the “better angels of our nature” instead of vacuous notions of civility.)

Lincoln, in his First Inaugural, got it wrong:

We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.

In fact, slaveholders and abolitionists were enemies. But can anyone truly say that the country faces such a “polarizing” issue today? (Perhaps it should — climate, for example; or, well, capitalism — but does it?) Perhaps this time we can get it right, or more right than wrong. Of course, this would take an extraordinary turnaround from “defiance” to generosity of spirit but what are we “fighting” for?

NOTES

[1] On Trump’s fist pump and whether the Secret Service should have permitted it, The American Conservative:

An assassin can kill a president, but cowardice is what kills a movement. President Donald Trump didn’t give his would-be murderer what the gunman wanted. Trump survived the shots, then he did something profound—he waved back the Secret Service agents shielding him, freeing his bloodied face up from the scrum, and, with a look of defiance, raised his fist and said, “Fight!”

He shouldn’t have done it, according to the rules of presidential security. And the Secret Service were obviously torn between the urgency of covering the former president and getting him to safety, and allowing him to do what he was determined to do. They parted just far enough for Trump to show his face and pump his fist. His life and theirs were at risk.

But the risk had to be taken. The United States can’t be led by a coward or by someone who looks like one under fire. Trump knew in a split second what a leader had to do in that situation. He had to show courage. Morale is a nation’s blood. Trump refused to let the assassin shed it, even as his own wounds bled.

Despite the garish prose, I think Trump was right to do what he did. We can’t have the stagehands directing the stars, after all. NOTE Re Kayfabe: Could Trump possibly have converted himself from a Heel to a Face?!

[2] The PAC was the Progressive Turnout Project:

Progressive Turnout Project’s email consultant was the cartoonishly evil Mothership Strategies. Mothership Strategies was not on my Bingo card!

[3] Crooks is said not to have had a criminal record, so where did the DNA come from?

[4] I’m not entirely happy with this account; the writer has done work for Bellingcat.

[5] There is a theory running round that the blood on Trump’s face comes from the shattered glass of a TelePrompter, but so what?

APPENDIX: The Cassandras

Here are some of the people who called it.

(August 30, 2023) Tucker Carlson, “Tucker Carlson stokes conspiracies, claims U.S. is ‘speeding towards’ assassination of Trump“, NBC: “If you begin with criticism, then you go to protest, then you go to impeachment, now you go to indictment and none of them work. What’s next? Graph it out, man. We’re speeding towards assassination, obviously. … They have decided — permanent Washington, both parties have decided — that there’s something about Trump that’s so threatening to them, they just can’t have him.”

(August 31, 2023) Yves Smith, “The Other Option for Containing Trump“: “It’s not as if this is the first time Tucker has brought up the possibility that Trump could be assassinated by members of the power structure.”

Steve Bannon (June 2024), the Guardian: “In a Guardian interview in June, Steve Bannon – a Trump adviser and former White House chief strategist – spoke of his concerns that the Republican nominee would be assassinated before the election in November. ‘It’s my number one fear,’ Bannon said, speaking before he began a four-month prison sentence for defying a congressional subpoena. ‘Assassination has to be at the top of the list and I believe that the woman that’s running the Secret Service part is not doing her job.'” (I can’t find the original when I search on these quotes, and I tried several search engines. Readers?)

* * *

Sadly, this tweet supposedly from wint is a fake:

But:

APPENDIX: The Lighter Side

Via:

This situation reminds me of this [Your Favorite Ethnicity Here (YFEH)] joke:

Two YFEHs are hiding on the side of the road waiting to try and kill Hitler. They wait and wait but after many hours Hitler still hasn’t come down the road where they expect him. After a long time of waiting, one man turns to the other man and says “Geez! Where is this guy?” And the other man turns to him and replies “I don’t know… I hope nothing happened to him.”

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About Lambert Strether

Readers, I have had a correspondent characterize my views as realistic cynical. Let me briefly explain them. I believe in universal programs that provide concrete material benefits, especially to the working class. Medicare for All is the prime example, but tuition-free college and a Post Office Bank also fall under this heading. So do a Jobs Guarantee and a Debt Jubilee. Clearly, neither liberal Democrats nor conservative Republicans can deliver on such programs, because the two are different flavors of neoliberalism (“Because markets”). I don’t much care about the “ism” that delivers the benefits, although whichever one does have to put common humanity first, as opposed to markets. Could be a second FDR saving capitalism, democratic socialism leashing and collaring it, or communism razing it. I don’t much care, as long as the benefits are delivered. To me, the key issue — and this is why Medicare for All is always first with me — is the tens of thousands of excess “deaths from despair,” as described by the Case-Deaton study, and other recent studies. That enormous body count makes Medicare for All, at the very least, a moral and strategic imperative. And that level of suffering and organic damage makes the concerns of identity politics — even the worthy fight to help the refugees Bush, Obama, and Clinton’s wars created — bright shiny objects by comparison. Hence my frustration with the news flow — currently in my view the swirling intersection of two, separate Shock Doctrine campaigns, one by the Administration, and the other by out-of-power liberals and their allies in the State and in the press — a news flow that constantly forces me to focus on matters that I regard as of secondary importance to the excess deaths. What kind of political economy is it that halts or even reverses the increases in life expectancy that civilized societies have achieved? I am also very hopeful that the continuing destruction of both party establishments will open the space for voices supporting programs similar to those I have listed; let’s call such voices “the left.” Volatility creates opportunity, especially if the Democrat establishment, which puts markets first and opposes all such programs, isn’t allowed to get back into the saddle. Eyes on the prize! I love the tactical level, and secretly love even the horse race, since I’ve been blogging about it daily for fourteen years, but everything I write has this perspective at the back of it.

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236 comments

  1. steppenwolf fetchit

    I was listening to BBC last night and heard the first few hours of reports. I heard some statements from the people who saw the “guy with a rifle” bear crawling up the building roof. They described how they kept waving ( though they didn’t necessarily say they were shouting at) police and secret service and pointing at the roof where the bear-crawler was. As I heard them talking, it sounded like the police and secret service maybe heard and certainly saw them very well, and studiedly ignored their repeated pointing efforts. And at the time I started wondering what was determining the police and secret service non-response to the waving pointers? And other people will wonder too. And fill in the blank with various theories which are not necessarily helpful at this time.

    1. Jamie

      It is ridiculous to believe a SS team would not notice a roof top sniper.

      But. Interviews of that finger pointing, red haired guy (and his finger pointing friends) never mentioned pointing their phones at the would be sniper. Finger pointing guy never mentioned taking pics/vid. No one asked him why. Hard to take him seriously.

      If someone Zapruder ‘d the sniper crawling up the building (etc.), that would be a bombshell . .

        2. albrt

          This is consistent with my comment below. It very much looks like they waited until the sniper got a shot off. I could see the command being reluctant to shoot somebody, but they failed to send any officers over to investigate.

          1. gestophiles

            SS snipers on nearby roof had a clear view of neighboring roof
            at same level. A single walkie-talkie message could have alerted
            them. It’s Uvalde all over again.

          2. Dave Hansell

            One reasonable observation in this piece….

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n3_RUWLuA4E

            …….makes the valid point that the number of different security and law enforcement agencies operating in the area means [by inference] that communications between a plethora of different agencies needs to be 100% for a 100% of the time.

            The two-man counter sniper team on the roof who eliminated the alleged shooter after the shots were fired would have to verify the status of anyone on the opposite roof with a rifle, as no one wants to be responsible for killing someone from another law enforcement agency.

            In this context, whilst it is certainly valid to raise serious questions about communications processes between the various agencies it is equally pertinent to question the efficacy of a model which contains so many disparate, disintegrated, and atomised parts each operating within its own stove pipe mentality.

            The point being that this paradigm is not unique to law enforcement and security. It is an integral systemic ‘organising’ principle across the whole of Western society from services to industry, health to transport/logistics, education to defence.

            As explained here:

            https://www.harrowell.org.uk/blog/2018/01/31/in-the-eternal-inferno-fiends-torment-ronald-coase-with-the-fate-of-his-ideas/

        3. Jamie

          Would be really bad if that’s someone impersonating Willis on 4chan. Could cost him his life. As in, dead man walking.

          2. Paul Art

            After reading several tomes like “Last Word” – Mark Lane and also Rush to Judgement, I have come to the conclusion that agencies like the SS, the FBI and the CIA even to the very top ranks are clueless about the things they do. They are manipulated and they follow orders perforce. In the Kennedy case, several of the SS agents were pulled off the detail before Dallas and others substituted in. This is a documented fact uncovered by Lane. Since that time the 0.1% who orchestrate things have become extremely sophisticated at what they do. Consider all the cretins who occupied the top post(s) in the foreign service, Brzezinski, Kissinger, Alan Dulles, Foster Dulles, Vicky Nuland etc. Apart from some thin tendrils of their connections many times removed from billionaire sponsors, we really don’t know why they do what they do. We conclude that they are useful idiots and true believers. Are they really? I am not in the least bit surprised by the egg the SS laid in this case. The theory that they did not sweep the surrounding roof tops (Trump country) does now wash. Security agencies like the SS follow routine and do not run probability exercises on what to check and not to check. I am 200% sure that the omission was deliberate. Someone asked them not to do it just as someone pulled those agents off the Dallas Motorcade and someone asked the agents not to sweep the Book Depository and so on and so on. Stitch these together and immediately you will be called a Conspiracy Theorist just as Mark Lane was besmirched. We are truly in the evening of our nation.

    2. ilsm

      Biden is shouting hatred and fear! Last night it caused a shooting! His democracy is in trouble!!!

      The SS/LEO on site were so unlucky/unprepared to suggest they were in on the plot!

      Tomorrow, House committees need to have the cabinets officers from DoJ and DHS is front of committee cameras answering harsh questions!

  2. lyman alpha blob

    “He must continue to warn that Trump is a threat to democracy…”

    Or, just spitballing here, he could provide some concrete material benefits to those without houses in the Hamptons. Had the Democrat party done that at some point during the last 40 years or so, a mountebank like Trump never would have had a chance in politics.

    Pretty sick of all the recent claims, many made while trying to give SlowJoe the hook, about Biden’s great achievements, rivalling those of FDR. Those claims are always extremely unspecific. The Democrat party has no policy other than “not Trump” which only leads to more divisiveness.

    If they want to get rid of the chaos, have a stable society, and “save our democracy”, then try doing something for the majority of voters for once, even if it hurts the corporate elite, rather than making excuses for why USians can’t have nice things.

    Then they wouldn’t need to depend on assassins to win elections.

    1. Lambert Strether Post author

      > Biden’s great achievements, rivalling those of FDR

      Yes, it’s ridiculous. Lina Khan is pretty great! OTOH, Biden slaughtered hundreds of thousands of people, and infected most of the population with SARS-CoV-2, in addition to making the United States a source and sink for global infection, both biologically and in policy terms. That’s a body count bigger than Gaza or Ukraine, though I grant pandemics don’t edge us toward the nuclear precipice. Biden is not a good or decent man.

      1. Pat

        Throwing the railroad workers under the train in regards to safety issuesEast Palestine. The elimination of child tax credits.
        It isn’t just the focus on foreign proxy wars and genocide, it is the continued disregard for safety and the basics necessary for workers and children.

      2. Jason Boxman

        My favorite tweet, from some influencer or politico, today. Didn’t care who, presented again the list of Trump’s sins, including allegedly rape with Epstein now, and we need to vote Biden to “heal”. Just mind blowing stupid.

      3. Michael Fiorillo

        Fifteen million people losing Medicaid eligibility on the day the Stormy Daniels indictment dropped; for me, the symmetry of that, combining self-delusion with nastiness, was the signal that the Democrats are irredeemable.

    2. flora

      Well, ya know, I’m thinking of the earlier Eu, what was it, the Belgian’s or Netherlander’s aristocracy , can’t remember, who wore a star of david whenst the bad guys came in and overran the place. I might just buy a red baseball cap. Who knows.

      Some local stuff. The local church attendance seemed larger than usual this morning based on church parking lot fill. And local attendance by young parishioners seemed larger than usual, to my assessment. And this is in a true blue uni town. What was it that Admiral Yamamoto said about awakening a sleeping giant? Not sure.
      This afternoon’s traffic on the major streets in my totally blue town seems very quiet.

        1. flora

          and adding a bit of thing-a-me : if my comments make you or your’s uncomfortable, well then, there ya go.

      2. fjallstrom

        The story is about the King of Denmark. It’s a nice story that makes the effective and important bureaucratic struggles that the Danish state engaged in to protect its citizens – including its Jewish citizens – into a personalised symbolic story. It’s not true though in any literal sense, Jews were not forced to wear the star of David in Denmark, and the king never wore one.

  3. juno mas

    So a 20 year old, self-described Republican, comes within inches of assassinating Trump and now his election is a wrap? For all the brave talk, and fighting for America, my guess is he, and Biden, will fight for America with Ukrainian men until the end of America.

    The dizziness of American culture is beyond the horizon.

    1. Bugs

      Trump displayed some behavior that is beyond the ability of most men of any age, less his own advanced age. It was courageous, even heroic. People are not going to let that go unrewarded, no matter how big a schmuck he is.

      1. Amfortas the Hippie

        im not a trump fan, by any means…i see him as an Honorious, at best, along our long sawtooth decline into a ditch…
        but yeah…that was heroic.
        credit where due.

        1. Jake

          You’re referring to Cadet Bone Spur, there? And “heroic”? For seizing the photo ap? And, of course, putting the agents, who are probably thinking about they’re doing, unlike some, in danger.

          Other less worshipful adjectives do come to mind….

          1. Amfortas the Hippie

            simply put yerself in those shoes…i dont hafta love the guy to recognise a bit of heroism if i see it.
            jeez, this aint hard.
            have you ever been almost killed?
            beaten up?
            let alone buried alive?
            well, i have.
            crawled up out of the ground like an insect…twice.
            once by rednecks, once by cops.
            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ltc6wIgiTLs

          3. ian

            And even if you see it as simply recognizing it as a photo op, think of it as a cognitive test.

          5. bertl

            I think you may be overlooking a significant difference between being heroic and being stupid, Jake, given that, in the context of the times with the body bags beginning to mount up, having the courage to admit to a medically certified condition of bone spurs was an an acutely intelligent act which bodes well for his Second Coming.

        2. Jeremy Grimm

          Trump’s response to the shooting may be ‘heroic’. However, I am not sure such ‘heroism’ is good trait in a National Leader. I would prefer a less ‘heroic’ and what I regard as a more reasonable and practical response of keeping low until the threat is eliminated. Similarly I very strongly prefer reasonable and practical responses to foreign affairs. ‘Heroic’ responses to foreign affairs too readily ignore the value of measured and well-considered responses.

          1. John Merryman

            You mean like Putin, the quiet little bureaucrat the oligarchs thought would be a seat warmer?

          2. Ashburn

            The man has been vilified, demonized, delegitimized, indicted, convicted, impeached (twice), had his home raided by the FBI, and now nearly assassinated. I think his reaction is what just about anyone who has been so targeted for so long and so relentlessly would wish they could do under such circumstances. I know I would wish that for myself.

            Cue Elton John’s “I’m Still Standing.”

        3. Bill

          Even though I have a hard time thinking of Trump as heroic, I’ll give it to him. But, let’s say he’d stayed down and gotten off the stage ASAP, not knowing if there were one or more other shooters. No one would’ve called him a coward for that, and he still could’ve used the assassination attempt in his campaign. His heroism could’ve resulted in his death or incapacitation, though, and then where would his campaign be? If I were a Trump supporter, I would want my candidate to be safe and not taking risks like that. I might question his judgement.

      2. ilsm

        Tomorrow I am changing my party affiliation to republican.

        I can no longer be associated with Biden’s insane agenda.

        “Biden’s bulls eye”!

        Trump is flawed but infinitely less evil.

      4. no one

        To be totally tasteless, I, a Canadian, was reminded of this 2014 incident involving our former Conservative prime minister:

        “As Ottawa shooting broke out, PM was kept hidden in a closet…”

        The day began as most Wednesdays do when Parliament is sitting. Conservative and NDP MPs filed into their rooms on opposite sides of the Hall of Honour around 9:30 a.m …

        A half-hour later, they heard a loud bang outside. Of the many MPs who spoke to The Canadian Press, all agreed that they thought nothing of that first loud sound — some thought it was food trays falling on the marble floor or the seemingly perpetual construction work outside.

        [Prime Minister] Harper continued with his remarks to his caucus.

        But then the rat-a-tat-tat of more gunfire boomed through the building …

        Harper hunkered down into what has been described as a closet or a closet-like space, according to multiple Conservatives. MPs and senators lay on the ground or stood pressed against the walls.

        https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/as-ottawa-shooting-broke-out-stephen-harper-hid-in-a-closet-unknown-to-his-own-caucus-in-the-same-room

        Trump truly seized his moment. The world, which has seen a doddering old man in charge of the US, cannot but contrast him with his rival.

      5. Daniil Adamov

        Courageous, yes. Damn skillful, too, recovering as quickly as he did. I don’t doubt that he improvised his response, but he did it perfectly.

        Why heroic, though? Because he reassured his followers?

        1. mrsyk

          I did not see improvisation. I saw “F**k you mother******!” written all over his face. That was raw emotion. Make of it what you will.

        2. ajc

          Contrast his behavior with Congress on Jan. 6th, all of whom scurried away in absolute fear from the hoi polloi, coupled with post riot histrionics from the likes of AOC who sought to capitalize and dramatize their scurrying as flight from likely violence toward their persons. How different would have Jan. 6th been if a few or many in Congress stared down the ravening mob, to actually be the fearless leaders and fighters, the heroes they claim to be (implicitly) in their campaign ads and venues of self-promotion?

          Alas, we are led by a mob of lying cowards, and most people know this.

          1. Pat

            Since most of those followers would have just yelled at them…

            But please you don’t actually point out my favorite part of AOC’s confession of fear of her own mortality. She was cowering in a corner in a whole different building. She didn’t make that clear, others had to, so even she got that she was ridiculous but sought to use it anyway to condemn all those scary folk. You know the ones that actually exited the Capital quietly at the end of the day.

          2. bertl

            They have the courage of a bowl of cold custard, which is why they had to call an unplanned, symbolic, minor intrusion by an unarmed incohesive crowd of ordinary folk an insurrection.

    2. Rip Van Winkle

      One would have to ‘register’ as a Republican to vote for Nikki Haley, for example. It’s only about which party’s primary ballot you get. There’s a different municipal ballot to skip the parties and vote for which day you want your garbage picked up, non-partisan.

      1. Dermot O Connor

        The Bush shoe thing was another SS cockup. Bad enough that he had to duck one shoe, but a second? And after us all being forced to take our shoes off in airports in case we had bombs in them, when TWO of these potential Death Devices got lobbed at him, it’s “What me Worry?”
        All very strange. Now we find out that the new shooter was kicked out of his gun club because he was a lousy shot, AND he was in a Blackrock commercial, which is all perfectly normal and not suspicious.

  4. Carla

    When I saw the iconic picture, my first thought was “Did Trump’s campaign set this up?” Cause that pic sure looks like it.

    1. Lambert Strether Post author

      FWIW, I don’t think so. I think it’s just a great photographer doing what a great photographer should do. (It would take strong evidence of the photographer’s political affiliations to convince me otherwise.)

      1. rowlf

        Driving around 5pm today WRAS 88.5 NPR station had a telephone interview with photographer Doug Mills and Mills explained what he saw and how/why he was taking his pictures. Mills also related that he had been good friends with the photographer that took the pictures during Reagan’s assassination attempt.

        A side note from a clever wag in a firearms forum: One thing’s for certain: Allen Dulles didn’t have anything to do with this one. He’s got a iron-clad alibi.

        1. JBird4049

          Some of it is likely just luck although a good photographer creates luck his own luck. Reminds me of Abraham Zapruder’s video and how he managed to capture JFK’s assassination.

          1. gestophiles

            LOL. I took a photography course featuring a Pulitzer winning photog
            back in the day. Someone in the audience asked what it took to
            be a great photographer. He laughed and said, “Be there.”

            1. johnnyme

              He left off the f/8 part:

              “f/8 and be there” is an expression popularly used by photographers to indicate the importance of taking the opportunity for a picture rather than being too concerned about using the best technique. Often attributed to the noir-style New York City photographer Weegee, it has come to represent a philosophy in which, on occasion, action is more important than reflection.

              f/8 is considered in photography to be a general-purpose aperture (“that never fails”, commented the magazine editor Richard Stolley in 2009). With the aperture set to f/8 (allowing sufficient light to enter for exposure but not so much as to bleach the picture) and the lens set to the hyperfocal distance—which results in a sharply-focussed depth of field whether taking pictures up close or at great distances. f/8 allows sufficient depth of field and lens speed for good, clear exposure in most daylight situations.

      2. Amfortas the Hippie

        anybody who has ever shot a rifle…at a deer or merely a target…should know that this was not a staged event by the trump people.
        there were real bullets flying.
        and a dead guy behind himself, and 2 others wounded, critically.
        nobody can make that kind of shot…:”hit my ear not my brain…”
        lol.
        its just silly.
        from what ive seen, today, lotsa folk over at Kos are gonna get banned for having some experience with rifles,lol.
        because that is the narrative their hive has settled on.
        that it was staged.
        silly.

        1. rowlf

          Well said. A really good competition Service Rifle or High Power rifle shooter under perfect conditions on a range would still be gambling to keep a shot inside 1.75 inches at the range this supposedly happened, and they are at the National Matches this month.

          Only TFMs would attempt a staged shot like this in real life, as the F-up Faerie would definitely be nearby.

        2. John D.

          Have any of the Democrats (or their usual media propagandists) actually suggested that Trump pulled a “Bob Roberts?”

          (For those who don’t know the reference, it’s a film directed by the actor Tim Robbins, in which the title character [played by Robbins], a right wing demagogue running for the presidency, fakes an assassination attempt against himself to improve his chances of being elected.)

          I’ll admit I briefly pondered this myself i.e. “It couldn’t be…could it?” But several people are dead, which really puts paid to the idea of this being fake.

        3. Xihuitl

          “and a dead guy behind himself” – So been wondering about the trajectory of the bullet that nipped Trump’s ear. The stands behind him were packed.

      3. bob

        They put the press in a pen at those events. Very tightly controlled press pool in hostile territory. There have been lots of stories about the staging of these events. Its not hard to compose a picture if you know where the camera is going to be.

        It looked scripted from here. Providing cover to every angle except where all the cameras are….

      4. MFB

        You try to shoot someone at a US campaign rally and fail to kill them, there’s going to be an American flag in the background when the cameras click. Can’t be avoided.

        My wife immediately said “Must have been a set-up” when she heard the news; like Lynette Fromme trying to shoot Ford. But in my opinion, the Republicans wouldn’t set up an assassination attempt against Trump, because it would be too dangerous; there really are a lot of people who want him dead and it wouldn’t have been difficult for someone to replace the blanks in the rifle with real rounds (for example). I’d say either a lone gunman influenced by Democratic Party propaganda (my national radio had an interview with an American retired academic Democratic hack, John Stremlau, who basically said it was a pity the gunman missed by reciting all the party talking-points about how awful Trump is and how he must be stopped by any means necessary) or a “deep state” hit organised by the Bidenites. The signature of the Bidenites is that they stuff up everything they try to do, so no surprise if they even failed to kill Trump . . .

        1. Zanshin

          “it was a pity the gunman missed by reciting all the party talking-points about how awful Trump is and how he must be stopped by any means necessary”

          This made me laugh.

          A hitman has to be silent, emotionally and mentally, and with an even, slow heart beat to minimalize the chance that small body movements will make him miss the shot.

          And there he was on the roof aiming his shot at Trump while reciting to himself all the party talking-points. Trump is awful; a danger to democracy. He must be stopped by any means necessary.

        2. Oh

          One of my neighbors who said he was gonna vote for Drumph in 2020 recently told me that he was gonna vote against him this time. Asked why, he said that there would be a dictatorship if Drumph were elected. I told him we already have a dictatorship right now. Methinks that the neighbor watches too much CNN, MSDNC, NBC News and CBS News.

    2. Acacia

      Another thing that strikes me about the composition of “the iconic picture”, is how much it resonates with one of the Donald’s recurring populist themes. I.e., that he is on the side of the nation — his fist with the flag —, trying to do what is right for the people, but mostly he is struggling against the state.

      Of course, here the SS agents are trying to protect him from harm — from a possible second shooter —, but the immediate, visceral effect of the image, the tangible conflict between the bodies, as it were, is between the SS agents, crouching down, pulling Trump down, while he is rising up, raising a fist defiantly in the blue sky. And it’s actually a photogenic shot for the Donald, low angle, almost feeling a little too perfect.

      Watching the video, Trump doesn’t look nearly as defiant, but that’s not the image people are going to remember. Trump, the consummate showman, truly seized the moment, and the photographer was there to capture and create his own moment, as well.

      It somehow recalled the end of Oliver Stone’s Salvador (1986), in which the two photojourno protagonists, searching far-flung war zones for “the perfect shot”, they finally capture it — nodding, knowing, that it is “the shot” they have been seeking for their entire careers —, but this at a terrible price, as the John Cassady character (a stand in for John Hoagland), dying on the street, passes the exposed film roll to his comrade.

      To risk and sacrifice everything… for that “perfect” image.

      1. Amfortas the Hippie

        wow.
        thanks for that connection/
        should be a couple of pulitzers, or whatever, in this, at least.
        iconic images.
        (i hung out with a gang of lesbian photography students at sam houston state…wish i was still in contact, now,lol…we argued incessantly about such iconic shots)

      2. ilsm

        Strength! Courage! Resolve! Unbowed!

        Also protest of SS ineptitude! Trump should have been flattened and covered up with SS bodies until all clear was established!

        His head was out in the open, perfect position to get it blown off.

        Courage yes, as much SS ineptitude!

        When does bad luck and ineptitude become supporting the plot?

    3. Cas

      We can assume thousands of pictures were taken, especially after the shots were fired. There were a ton of professional photographers there from the news networks and papers. It is a great shot, but it would be more unlikely if out of all of those pictures not one great shot was produced. We don’t see all the photos that were taken and were sh*t.

      1. ISL

        Unfair. That is how it always has been.

        How many photos did Ansel Adams take and NOT sell? Bet it was thousands. How many photos of your children, family, friends, pets, etc. do you have where you share the really good ones and should you not be given kudos?

        1. ISL

          For context, I have hundreds and hundreds of my doggie, Perla, a beautiful young border collie. I only share a few (who other than me wants to see them all)?

        2. Robert S

          I think the point being made is that a great photo is not evidence of staging, because in the circumstances it would be more surprising if at least one of the many photos taken by many people did not look great.

  5. Maxwell Johnston

    First Fico, then Raisi, now Trump; all three of them not on board with Project Ukraine. Call me a conspiracy theorist, but: once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, thrice is enemy action.

    This was a comically bad security failure. Heads should roll at the Secret Service. And how could the shooter miss from 130 yards? Yours truly was a lousy shot with an M16 during my army days, but even I (with eyeglasses and nervous hands and no previous firearms experience) had no trouble hitting stationary pop-up targets on the rifle range out to 150 meters. The ones at 200/250/300 meters were trickier, but 50/100/150: no sweat. Only one bullet allowed, no telescopic sight. This guy shot multiple times.

    A question for the commentariat: the official story is that the shooter did not carry ID, so the authorities ran his DNA through the system and quickly ascertained who he was. Is this a reality? Does the USA government have the ability to take any random person’s DNA and quickly make a positive ID? That would be dystopian on the level of Dick or Huxley or Kafka…..

    1. Ranger Rick

      Now you’re starting to get how broad the surveillance net is. If it has been digitized, the government has access to it, whether by warrant, data request, DHS demand, or a data broker via third-party doctrine. Many states preserve a blood sample from infants after they’re born…

    2. juno mas

      The “authorities” identified the shooter from the rifle registration. Then confirmed thru DNA. The rifle as purchased bu the shooters father. So no AI needed searching the DNA database.

      1. Maxwell Johnston

        OK, that makes sense, thanks. Good to know that the DNA surveillance grid isn’t fully in place. Yet.

        1. Amfortas the Hippie

          last time i was arrested for public intoxication, some 20+ years ago…they took a cheek swab…and this is decidedly a backwater county in far off rural texas.
          of note, perhaps, is that the city of austin, 10 years before, did NOT take a cheek swab when they arrested me for “theft”…that last $19 check i missed taking care of when my last paycheck from huntsville bounced and sent us immediately into homelessness…
          so between like 93 and 2003? something changed with all that.

        2. Polar Socialist

          Even with the huge leaps in technology, it still takes time and money to sequence the most of the DNA of a person, so identity kits – like paternity tests – focus on a set of markers (fragments of DNA) that vary the most in a given sub-population. And since the combination of biology, chemistry and the reading device is a complicated one, we’re talking about probabilities: there’s a 99% probability that the DNA came from the same person, or 98% probability that the man is the father.

          Thus, if you take a sample from the dead perpetrator and, say, organic samples found in the room of the suspect, and they have a 99.5% match, you have identified you perpetrator. With decent CSI team, a prefabricated marker kits and an accredited lab can be done in less than 12 hours.

    3. JBird4049

      First Fico, then Raisi, now Trump; all three of them not on board with Project Ukraine. Call me a conspiracy theorist, but: once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, thrice is enemy action.

      We know that the CIA is very capable and ruthless enough to do multiple assassinations, but sometimes it is not state action or even very coordinated. Police from American municipal and state agencies have also been used for assassinations in the past as well, but unless we start seeing a pattern similar to the 1960s or to the leaders of the Ferguson protests, I am going to hold off on speculating. For the home country or even for other countries doing multiple assassinations for such as Ukraine seems requires an emotional readiness that I do not think we are there yet. Close, yes, but we don’t have the shootings, riots, and bombings of the 1960s to push people over the line to act.

      What I worry about are the overreactions of the fearful and incompetent authorities who have do have actual and realistic training for mass protests, which often involve peaceful negotiations and not crowd suppression, or either the experience and wisdom to deal with the violent political protests that was routine during the Twentieth Century Even if the George Floyd protests are included, the past thirty-two since the Loss Angeles Rodney King have been comparatively peaceful.

    4. redleg

      Perhaps the assassin got a case of nerves? I think anyone would agree that something like this wasn’t target practice at the range.

      1. YetAnotherChris

        This was my first thought. Absent a big dose of beta blockers, this guy must have been shaking with the gravity of the moment. I wonder about his heart rate as he raised the gun.

    5. dcrane

      There are reports that a police officer climbed the ladder and disturbed the shooter who pointed the gun at the cop who backed down. Maybe that forced him to rush the crucial first shots. If so then law enforcement in one way did help save Trump’s life.

  6. jo6pac

    I was wondering how many copycats shotting we’ll have now? I wish they hadn’t killed the shooter.

    1. ambrit

      I’m wondering how quickly after the first shots did the counter snipers “neutralize” the “Man on the Roof?”
      If it happened quickly, then I can believe that the counter snipers were “in the heat of the moment” and reacted to eliminate further shooting at the stage. If they took their time, then we enter “Conspiracy Theory Land.”
      America has a rich and varied history of political assassinations and attempted assassinations.

      1. albrt

        The videos I have seen are strange. The counter snipers appeared to have the assassin in their sights all along, but only began shooting back after he got his shots off.

        2. michael99

          Yes, that was my perception as well from a link posted by LawnDart earlier today (here). The counter snipers appear to be taking aim at the shooter with Trump continuing to make his speech in the foreground.

          The question this prompted in my mind is if the Secret Service knows there’s a guy with a gun out there, why wouldn’t the agents on the platform immediately surround Trump and get him down on the ground or escort him to safety? The SS agents didn’t react until after the shots were fired.

        3. YetAnotherChris

          My theory is that the Secret Service were well aware of the gunman on the roof but were confused about his identity. Security was a hodgepodge of Federal and local efforts. “Is this guy local law enforcement?” That would explain why they didn’t do a peremptory takeout. Once the bullets began to fly, they indeed took him out.

        4. dcrane

          The only vid of the rootop countersnipers I have seen shows them appear to be startled by the first gunshot sounds (one looks up and his gun angle drops), then the camera leaves them so we cannot see whether or where they eventually shoot. (I suspect the first shot sound reaches them before it reaches the videographer.) Before that they were aiming roughly north, so perhaps toward the shooter but they could have been scanning farther away instead. It looked to me like they were surprised, as if they had not spotted him yet.

          A WSJ video remarkably claims that they were either setting up, or perhaps repositioning, a mere 92 seconds before the shots. Trump was already speaking then, so this is something to ask about. Were they distracted by some command right when the shooter was moving up on the rooftop?
          https://www.wsj.com/politics/elections/trump-taken-off-stage-after-apparent-shots-fired-at-rally-9d6680da

          The main Trump speech video has three or so gunshots that happen as Trump stops talking, then a flurry of additional ones starting about four seconds after the first one, then one more sharp crack 16 seconds after the first shot. Did the shooter die from the flurry at four seconds, or was the 16 second sound a single shot killing him? Haven’t seen anything to resolve these questions.

          1. Yves Smith

            A new video by Larry Johnson, with a colleague who is a career sniper, says it is impossible for the snipers to have identified the threat and shot at it as quickly as happened (in about 4 seconds). His best explanation (and he says he would probably have done the same) is that the Secret Service snipers had sighted him but held off from shooting because they were trying to confirm whether he was some LEO they had not been told about, like local or county cops.

            So they could have been trying to figure out if anyone had posted someone to that roof, then reacted to the shots.

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cA3ueMsAcTM

        5. Arkady Bogdanov

          They knew he was on the roof, but he was on the backside of the roof out of their line of site. They were sighted in on the roof ridge, but had to wait for him to appear above the roof ridge before they could see him. Also realize- that is a big building with a big roof. I am a pretty good shooter, and I train regularly. I would have taken several seconds to get the optic onto that guy once he appeared, then steady the gun, even if on a rest, then a second or two to steady my body before pulling the trigger. This is going to be 10-15 seconds, I would say. Keep in mind that the counter sniper team was also reacting to the incoming fire- this is instinctive. Now the shooter knew EXACTLY where his target would be, and was able to pop up and fire on his target faster. I reject the claims that he was untrained- this kid was into guntube. He may not have had hard-core expertise, but he was probably good with a rifle, and was probably intimately familiar with his rifle. People do not understand that from the first reports of people seeing this kid, to the shot that killed him, was probably only around 5 minutes at that. Was security lax? You betcha. However I do not believe that security just sat there and watched this guy climb that roof and fire his shots. As someone who knows a bit about tactics, security, and shooting from a military/security standpoint. I don’t see anything that happened that is totally out of line (other than the lack of air-cover and security on that building in the first place) That counter sniper team was on that guy very fast from what I saw.

  7. GDmofo

    As a Pennsylvania resident, it was so nice having a Sunday with no political ads, I even watched some Nascar! Seriously, there is at least 2 every commercial break during sports, going back to the spring. I dont watch much TV, just some sports, and even for me, it’s been unbearable.

    If only all political ads were banned, no more lowest common denominator baiting garbage trying to brainwash idiots.

    A guy can dream

    1. Steve H.

      Appropriate, political ads are divisively binary, while today’s race was at a tri-oval. Political theory about marginals at the center are based on a normal curve, but the center of gravity is getting tossed around by the extrematies, the center cannot hold. And it never gets old when a driver gets tired of being bullied and wrecks a Kyle.

      2. ilsm

        From the ineptitude, boarding on complicity, of SS/LEO everyone should have an AR 15.

        A bunch of red necks with deer rifles would keep Trump safe everywhere, every time.

        We have been listening to progressive thugs; using criminals and nuts to try and take our protections for decades.

        It does not work outside of Biden’s infamous scam aka “our democracy”!

      3. Rip Van Winkle

        Tomorrow at 8 an when the Chicago Heyjack@ss blog posts the routine totals for killed and shot this weekend there will not be a peep from Mayor Johnson or Governor Pritzker. For some reason the guns aren’t self-animated in most of the rest of the state, where there are actually more guns.

      4. bob

        No guns allowed. Not allowed to carry.

        It does make me wonder what would have happened if they did allow the crowd…..

    3. ashley

      most common gun in america. might as well say that a driver got into an accident with a ford f150…

  9. Mo

    Is the bullet leaving Trump’s head in the photo, not whizzing toward it? That seems so from the stage diagram and shooter’s location.

    1. eudora welty

      I try to remain quiet and only add something unique to the commentary, but – YES! – I wondered this, too.

  10. Wukchumni

    Huey Long was gonna be a major thorn in FDR’s side in the 1936 election, but ran against Alf Landon instead when Long wasn’t long for the world all of the sudden.

    The Donkey Show pulled out all the questionable legal stops in stopping Trump from his appointed rounds as the next Grover Cleveland (on the $1000 FRN, btw) and it looks to have been all for naught.

    Security was a joke yesterday, almost similar to the hi-jinx displayed by law enforcement on January 6th in Humordor, hmmmmmm…

    1. Steve H.

      In both cases, the tactic seems negligence, a lowering of resistance. Tho the Shamen being guided to the Chamber certainly had agency.

  11. nickj

    trump tried to overthrow a democratically elected president. the republic should have shot him as a traitor there and then, surely?

    4. The Rev Kev

      What is this “democracy” that you talk about? That is a system of government where the will of the people rule. Well the studies are in and they show consistently that only the will of the elites rule and the only time the will of the people is taken into account is when they align with the elites. Hell, even former President Jimmy Carter calls America an oligarchy. We now live in an era of Game of Thrones – but without the boobs and dragons.

      1. jake

        Spoken like an American who’s never missed a meal.

        This “democracy” (as you call it) is presenting you with a very stark choice.

        If that difference is not meaningful to you, perhaps you’re largely immune from public policy or are too despairing to any longer participate?

        1. Steve H.

          Well, he’s immune from American public policy, since he lives in Oz.

          That ‘like an’ spares it from an ad-hom by an ears width. Could we try refuting the Princeton Oligarchy Study instead of shanking each other?

          O sir, we quarrel in print, by the book, as
          you have books for good manners. I will name you the
          degrees. The first, the Retort Courteous; the second,
          the Quip Modest; the third, the Reply Churlish; the
          fourth, the Reproof Valiant; the fifth, the Countercheck
          Quarrelsome; the sixth, the Lie with Circumstance;
          the seventh, the Lie Direct. All these you may
          avoid but the Lie Direct; and you may avoid that too,
          with an ‘ If.’ I knew when seven justices could not take
          up a quarrel, but when the parties were met themselves,
          one of them thought but of an ‘ If ’: as, ‘ If you said so,
          then I said so;’ and they shook hands and swore
          brothers. Your ‘ If ’ is the only peace-maker; much
          virtue in ‘ If.’

        2. Yves Smith

          One more like this and you will be blacklisted for violations of our written site Policies. As Steve H. said, ad hom and attacks on commenters generally are not on.

    6. ilsm

      All Trump was saying and we all saw it who were not democrat party stooges: the “swing districts are still today July 14 2024 suspect and the VP should not have allowed those electors to be certified”!

      The gaslighting about Jan 6 is still too bright!

      If that is treason so be it!

    7. Lee

      If, as you say, “Trump tried to overthrow a democratically elected president”, he didn’t try very hard. Where were the tanks and planes? Without mobilization of a significant portion of the military and security forces, what you get at most are riots. There was no material threat of a coup by force of arms. The greater threat, if you see it as such, are the institutional gains by conservative authoritarians. Too bad the Democrats keep fundraising on “fighting for” instead of institutionally securing gains for the majority of our citizens.

    8. Mark Gisleson

      I like your thinking, looking forward to seeing Biden shot for bungling Afghanistan, HRC shot for Russiagate, Obama shot for bailing out Wall Street, Bush shot for Iraq, Clinton shot repeatedly, Bush dug up and shot repeatedly, etc.

      There’d be a lot more interest in Presidents Day if every year we dug one up to be horsewhipped as an example to the others.

    10. Yves Smith

      I don’t know how this got through but you can go to hell. How dare you use this site for dog vomit like this. Any punishment for this alleged action is the courts, not vigilantism.

      And you seem to forget that sainted Hillary and the intel state tried the same thing with Trump in 2016. There were op-eds saying that someone not approved of by the military should not be President. Hillary talked up trying to get electors to defect but gave up.

    12. gestophiles

      I’m curious what is the officially prescribed penalty for treason? The closest we
      (never) had in modern times was Petraeus’ transmission of state secrets to his mistress.
      Which resulted in…. nothing, not even a pinky slap on the wrist.

  12. playon

    All I know is I had a gig in Butler PA way back in the late 70s and I can’t recommend the town. We had a day off there so were able to do our laundry but the place was depressing, and no doubt is worse now (like most other things in the USA).

    I enjoyed Russell Brand’s video, he made some good points. The atmosphere is poisonous here in America.

  13. Z

    What if the shooter was not politically motivated? It was an attempt at notoriety and a ‘shot’ of opportunity because simply Trump (someone famous) was going to be there?

    1. Acacia

      Certainly possible, though from his perch atop that building, Crooks undoubtedly saw all the law enforcement and snipers.

      To me, at least, it seems clearly a suicide mission — and who chooses that?

      I wonder if we’ll ever get a plausible motive.

      1. MFB

        Most plausible motive: “Must shoot Hitler and prevent the Holocaust”. Cf. Geoffrey Household’s Rogue Male.

    1. Sardonia

      When events are breaking fast, I sometimes click on Yahoo since they update news stories quickly. There was a touching article on Comperatore and his family. Then I clicked the comments….

      LOTS of them along the lines of “cool, one less Drumpf voter”, or “maybe a nice guy but a moron who won’t be missed”, etc. etc. What was especially sad was that the dozens of “thumbs up and thumbs down” were evenly split.

      If people are split on THAT…we’ve crossed a Rubicon.

      1. albrt

        To be fair, I saw a tweet by somebody with the same name responding to a story from Piers Morgan about the devastation in Palestine.

        The alleged Comperatore account responded “They’ll get over it. The Japanese did.”

        It’s everywhere, and don’t let anybody shame you for saying both sides do it.

  15. willow

    A very profound moment in history that will have very deep & lasting consequences on US politics. As much from Trump’s response and already simmering anger over the use to lawfare to nobble him than the assassin’s attempt of itself.

  16. hamstak

    Perhaps it is worth considering the possibility that this was less a political than a celebrity assassination attempt.

    A young, disaffected man, with no known strong political affinities, seeing few prospects in life (who knows, maybe he was recently spurned by a love interest) seizes the opportunity to conveniently try to take out the arguably foremost celebrity of our age, thereby obtaining his 15 minutes of fame in what was otherwise looking to be an utterly mundane existence.

    Perhaps he even saw the possibility of provoking a civil war or at least significant, violent unrest, and sought revenge against “the world”. Apres moi…

    If it had been a Biden rally or a Taylor Swift concert he might have gone for one of them (ignoring the security aspect of the convenience factor — the other being proximity).

    1. Bazarov

      I just posted almost the same reaction as you (I nearly mentioned Taylor Swift, as well)! NC minds sometimes think eerily alike…

    3. Amfortas the Hippie

      aye.
      we’ll likely never know…scrubbers are prolly working right now.
      but its trump…
      so the hat falls on the side of the bed that says “political”.

    4. rob

      as long as we are guessing what could have happened….. maybe,,,
      he was all those things. A disillusioned kid. bright enough….to know things are bad. naïve enough to think this “ends” , somehow. competent and capable enough to get himself in place and take a “good” shot.
      maybe he saw trump as ushering in the complete collapse of personal liberty, because he could tell that is already true. So it is no stretch to think that Trump will take the baton and run with it. And he heard in the past, the old question, “If you could go back in time and kill Hitler. Would you?
      And maybe he figured , he would.

    5. hk

      That was how the Reagan assassination attempt came about, if you recall (there were some references here yesterday.). That doesn’t mean that this is an extremely dangerous situation, possibly the most dangerous since 1860 or even 1775. ( exaggerated for emphasis, but maybe not that much.)

    6. ebolapoxclassic

      Well we, for example, have footage of the shooter some time before the assassination attempt screaming “slash his [Trump’s?] throat”, “slash Republican throats”, “slash fascists’ throats” at Trump campaign workers. I don’t think the theory that he might just as well have shot at Biden or Taylor Swift holds water.

    7. willow

      Considering recent actual (Abe) & attempted (Fico) political assassinations, it has me wondering about whether these individuals have been ‘crafted’ online into a state of conviction and intent. You could plausibly see darker forces deploying AI to engage these individuals continuously to lead them down the path of a particular type of action. Abe, Fico & now Trump would seem to be odd individuals usually lacking courage to do something like this irrespective of their underlying anger. I felt this particularly with Abe’s assassination.

      1. WJ

        MK Ultra was a real thing and it is very naive to think that it just stopped. Hard to know what processes would be used today but I guarantee using AI, curated social media feeds, plus live access to a perp’s phone (as the CIA obviously has) would let you know on the basis of his search history, location history, etc. with 90% accuracy whether he was being influenced and in what direction.

  17. Bazarov

    I find, contra the “compassionate reactions” included in this round-up, it rather premature to blame the nation’s political division and vitriol for the assassination attempt on Trump.

    From what we know about the assassin, he sounds a lot like the various mass-shooters that’ve been terrorizing our schools since Columbine. Many of them have been, at least in part, motivated by the chance to be famous and important, to have their name recorded, to be finally acknowledged.

    There’s a cult of people out there who worship Klebold and Harris, just as there are for most serial killers of repute and, no doubt, for assassins. I imagine John Hinckley Jr., recently released from the insane asylum, has not few admirers out there. Many comment on his youtube videos. The chance to become a kind of internet saint must be, to those already suicidal and nihilistic, rather attractive.

    The “red vs. blue” stuff might be beside the point. The shooter so far strongly resembles the sad, bullied, lonely, neglected, young, male soldiers in the country’s rather pathetic revolt of the alienated. Trump just happened to come to him. Could’ve been anyone suitably famous enough and willing to visit his little town. A target of opportunity, for all we know.

    1. juno mas

      I agree. And I’m glad he failed. Imagine he didn’t in this volatile, angry nation. I’m terrorized by ‘road ragers’; wild gun owners seeking revenge could endanger almost anyone.

      1. redleg

        I fear that the effect will be the same, and the proudboy types will now do what they have always wanted to do: “shoot liberals”. Buckle up and stay safe everyone.

      2. Retired Carpenter

        re: “wild gun owners seeking revenge”
        In my experience, the great majority of folks properly trained in handling firearms-combat veterans and/or hunters- are not wild, would not seek gratuitous revenge, and try to stop violence if they are able to. So far it has not been the “liberals” who are being shot: Trump, Scalise, Reagan…
        IMO, youngsters who have been weaned on violent video games are far more likely to commit such acts.

      3. MFB

        If Trump was assassinated, there would certainly be a swing towards the Republicans. However, they’d probably put up a candidate who was less popular than Trump and possibly even more odious, so they might have lost and Biden win, However, they would probably take the House and Senate. In which case a senile, unpopular President would be in the weakest possible political position, more or less guaranteeing gridlock for as long as he could stave off constitutional removal.

        No, not only Trump dodged a bullet yesterday.

    2. Amfortas the Hippie

      “…sad, bullied, lonely, neglected, young, male soldiers in the country’s rather pathetic revolt of the alienated. …”
      thats exactly what my jr high and into high scholl years were like,
      40 years ago.
      but as Bonn Scott sez, ” i never shot nobody…”
      whats different since…say..columbine?
      shrink parents?
      fewer and fewer opportunities?
      a general malaise?
      easy answer is too much porn, and not enough nookie.
      but thats my sitrep, today…and i feel zero need to shoot anyone, unless its in defense of my place.

      1. Chris in OK

        The difference is SSRIs. Homicidal behavior is one of the side effects. Plus, they were never tested on young people. They should be banned for anyone under 25.

        1. Philo67

          Yes, this. Only banned for anyone period.
          They’re very dangerous in high dosages. 200mg a day turned me into a fearless maniac within a month.
          I thank God I was arrested without serious incident.

    3. Lefty Godot

      Doesn’t the shooter have a long history on social media for would-be Sherlock Holmes/Sigmund Freud types to pore over? I mean, I thought everybody (but me) was on Twitter and Facebook. Or everybody that is anybody, at least.

      1. Acacia

        CBS news:

        Crooks did have a social media presence, the FBI officials said. Agents are combing through his posts and emails but have found nothing so far that reveals a motive or anything threatening.

        …which is somehow what I’d expect.

        SSRIs? “Nope, couldn’t have been that!”. Whatever Crooks’ motive, I wonder if it will even be shared with the public.

        In the US, there seems to be a large investment is filing these events under “another lone nut — ’tis a mystery”.

        1. Louis Fyne

          I second that..I really wish someone (transparently and in good faith) fully researched SSRI chronic medication and violence for any causal link.

          1. David in Friday Harbor

            My own very sweet child was turned into a monster by SSRI’s recklessly prescribed with spouse’s approval over my objections. Said child had also been the victim of bullying.

            I hope this was not the case here. We don’t know.

            Shooter was reported to have been a fan of wearing “hunting garb.” Photo above shows his corpse to be so attired, including quasi-military flag insignia. SS snipers were probably trying to figure out if he was local LE before he opened fire. Uvalde taught us that having all these little armed agencies running around lacking unified command is a recipe for chaos.

            A culture that heaps bullying narcissistic borderline personalities like both DJT and JRB with praise is incompatible with the Second Amendment. My heart aches for those who were harmed and for those who love them.

  18. Amfortas the Hippie

    man!
    i just went to do the sheeps for the evening…and Don’s cousin and hubs are up for a month or so, because of Beryl tearing up their north houston neighborhood.
    so cousin insists i come in and hang out,lol.
    but the news is on, and i say something about that iconic photo, fist raised, etc…”he’s already won”.
    and mom, who thinks im a trumper and a putin puppet and fond of alex jones(lol)…launches into a 30minute argument with me.
    i ended by saying, go to cspan and look up 40 years of joe bidens speeches…theyre all there,lol.
    she insists she has, but she still thinks hes Joe From Scranton, and a Union Man, etc.
    what can one do, but withdraw?
    mad mention during all this thats shes worried about who im reading…and i say…the same people ive been reading for almost 30 years, who have a track record, etc…as well as the horse’s mouth when it comes to the great enemies…russia, china and iran.
    useless arguing about it with people like that…they will never concede…especially if covert narcissism is involved.
    but thats why shes my proxy for the PMC….because they seem to suffer from various forms of narcissism, as well, en masse.

    ill be in the doghouse for weeks, now,lol.
    and im gone to lubbock for 3 days with youngest this week…and have a gay guy being me, out here, 7am and 7pm…which will just piss her off more,lol….and then she’ll ensure that he never ever wants to work for that woman…ha!
    to punish me for not just laying down and saying thank you, m’am, may i have another.

    i reckon she’s a pretty good specimen for study.
    that right there is how they are.

    1. ilsm

      When I want an evening of peace and quiet from “she who must be obeyed”, I enter into converse about Trump….

      “You don’t think that!!!” Then a few minutes of hot tongue, then cold shoulder, with quiet the rest if the night then I can listen to my bagpipes and she don’t go to bed then……

      Being over 70 yoa, I come to enjoy the better elements of the “dog house”.

  19. Carolinian

    Thanks Lambert. Re the future of Biden: perhaps he will indeed hang around if November is looking even more of a no hoper for the Dems. Why fruitlessly generate even more turmoil?

    Then we only have to wait for Trump to destroy democracy. I won’t be holding my breath. The fact that Axios still clings to this crap doesn’t say much about Axios. The people at that rally look to be about as unthreatening a bunch as you could imagine.Trump may be their paper mache idol but they are not evil for wanting one. And I’d say they aren’t stupid either. They just want to still be part of something that–PMC division–no longer wants them. The working and small business class may be on the ropes but the prob for the Dems is that they can still vote. And here’s suggesting there will be no more suspiciously available roofs at Trump rallies.

    1. Louis Fyne

      The demographic standing behind Trump at the rally was ***the base*** of the Democratic Party even 30 years ago, and built careers for Dems. like Dick Gephardt.

      Amazing how the parties have drifted past each other in demographics.

      1. gestophiles

        It was George Bush Sr who brought in the John Birch society into the Republican
        fold.

    2. hk

      Indeed, destroying “their democracy (and not ours)” doesn’t seem like such a bad thing to large swaths of Americans, as far as I’m aware….

  20. Dr. John Carpenter

    Good point about the benefit to Biden. They’ve been looking for an excuse to campaign from the basement again. Well, here they have it.

    One thing I’m really curious about, and you touch on it here, is how do they start the campaign again? And I include the Dem friendly media in the “they” I’m talking about here. Thus far, the campaign has been “vote for Biden because Trump is an existential threat to Our Democracy ™.” Many people have gone further calling him a fascist and Hitler, etc. You all know the song and dance.

    So, if that’s what they truly believe, how do they dial it back now? How can they condemn this assassination attempt if Trump is literally planning on canceling further elections? What else do they have?

    The part I think is really ironic is I’ve been hearing for years how it was just a matter of time before some MAGA deplorable takes out a Dem politician. Yes, I know this shooter was registered as a Republican, but I don’t think that necessary means he could have been immune to the “Trump is literally Hitler” thing. We may never know a why, but the fact is Trump was shot at, not Biden.

    (TLDR: your lighter side joke absolutely nails the current Dem dilemma.)

    1. OliverN

      I think you’re on the money here, I think these are two things the Dems will struggle with over the next few months.

      Suppose for example they use this as an excuse to cancel any Biden rallies and have him sit inside and do video conferences instead. Pros – avoid gaffes, avoid any embarrassing senile moments. Cons – what if Trump keeps doing public rallies? Biden wasn’t shot, and hides. Trump was shot, and continues to stand up in public. What kind of image is that?

      Now about how Trump was such a unique danger to democracy. Some very clever Repubs could tangle Dems in knots over the question “if he’s so bad a threat to democracy, is it better to assassinate him then it is for him to win an election”? Inevitably Dems will have to dial the rhetoric back, or admit that “actually democracy will be fine”, and when they do that’s another win for Trumps side.

      That said… I think we’re at the point where there are no undecided voters, this won’t move the needle. It will probably encourage more Repubs to get out and vote though

      1. Amfortas the Hippie

        thats a fine thing, Olivern.
        and a likely conundrum that the donkeys will find themselves in.

        except for the shamelessness, maybe.
        gotta account for the hypersinfuerguenza, and all.
        these are not rational people.

  21. CA

    Lambert:

    Thank you so much for pointing to and briefly describing the impact of the photographic composition we experienced.

  22. Samuel Conner

    DJT’s defiant expression in The Photo reminds me a bit of the moment when, after returning from Walter Reed Hospital in 2020 after his bout with COVID, he turned to face the cameras and removed his procedure mask.

    I don’t know how much credit to give the man for bravery and how much to shake my head at folly.

  23. Al Havermann

    The Secret Services was so incompetent that it must have been part of a Secret Service operation to assassinate. Remember, secret service personnel being called off John F Kennedy’s car as he left the Dallas airport?

    1. gestophiles

      MMMM…. They shoulda put the top up on Kennedy’s car…. the crowds seemed so friendly.

    1. Duke of Prunes

      I’m skeptical. I mean it obviously could be true, but it could also be damage control about how that roof was left so wide open… it wasn’t wide open, see… we had a bumbling township sheriff up there who crapped his pants and fell down the moment danger presented itself.

      I’m still trying to figure how this supposed exchange went down. Did the gun man turn and point the gun at the cop from his bear crawl? While lying down? And turn quickly turn himself back to laying down and firing some pretty accurate shots in just a few seconds? Maybe it’s not that far fetched, but I’d like to see a reenactment

      1. britzklieg

        Agree that it is murky at best. But the report apparently came from the AP so I thought it should be mentioned.

      2. ajc

        After Uvalde, this should be the expectation of anyone when police encounter a gunman. Copaganda paints the police in movies, TV, and news stories as “heros” risking their lives everyday against criminal forces of chaos and evil, but reality is that most cops are cowards, which is why we have tons of videos and reported incidents of cops mag dumping their handguns into innocent, unarmed people.

        Of all the tidbits of info that have come out of this moment, this is one I have no problem believing is true, based on the overwhelming evidence that this SOP for cops.

        1. Duke of Prunes

          It is true that the bumbling cop part makes it a bit more believable. Cops rarely throw each other under the bus, but spooks and feds probably live by different rules.

        2. Lee

          From Findlaw:

          Questions of Police Duty
          The motto, “To Protect and Serve,” first coined by the Los Angeles Police Department in the 1950s, has been widely copied by police departments everywhere. But what, exactly, is a police officer’s legal obligation to protect people? Must they risk their lives in dangerous situations like the one in Uvalde?

          The answer is no.

          In the 1981 case Warren v. District of Columbia, the D.C. Court of Appeals held that police have a general “public duty,” but that “no specific legal duty exists” unless there is a special relationship between an officer and an individual, such as a person in custody.

          The U.S. Supreme Court has also ruled that police have no specific obligation to protect. In its 1989 decision in DeShaney v. Winnebago County Department of Social Services, the justices ruled that a social services department had no duty to protect a young boy from his abusive father. In 2005’sCastle Rock v. Gonzales, a woman sued the police for failing to protect her from her husband after he violated a restraining order and abducted and killed their three children. Justices said the police had no such duty.

          Most recently, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit upheld a lower court ruling that police could not be held liable for failing to protect students in the 2018 shooting that claimed 17 lives at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.

        3. MFB

          I got to know an ex-cop who was in my anti-apartheid organisation in the 1980s (back then you could choose to serve in the police rather than in the army, which was how they got him). Under apartheid the police were represented to us whites as being ten feet tall, of course.

          He said he was frightened most of the time (especially when, for instance, he had to enter a house after a suspected intruder) but had to pretend to look tough for fear of getting in trouble.

          I wouldn’t care to be a cop myself.

    2. Screwball

      How did he get on the roof? I read about a ladder. Was it a permanent ladder? If not, how did it get there?

      1. sarmaT

        I saw a ladder on one of the aerial videos, on the side of one of the passageways between buildings. I would say, a permanent ladder intended for maintenance related activities.

    3. Amfortas the Hippie

      so…the Barney Fife Defense?
      well awright…if they really wanna go there,lol…
      (my dad was a part time cop in san augustine, tx when he was in college…early 60’s. he said they literally gave him one bullet…idk…he seemed sincere about it…wondered why everybody laughed)

  25. Windrip

    “Bob Roberts takes place in Pennsylvania in 1990. It depicts a fictitious senatorial race between a conservative Republican folk singer, Bob Roberts, and the incumbent Democrat, Brickley Paiste. The film is shot through the perspective of Terry Manchester, a British documentary filmmaker who is following the Roberts campaign. Through Manchester’s lens we see Roberts travel across the state and sing about drug users, lazy people and the triumph of traditional family values and laissez-faire capitalism over the rebelliousness and social justice causes of the 1960s. Even though the Roberts campaign team officially avoids manifestations of open bigotry, their songs, speech and mannerisms are rife with snobbish dog whistles and racist and sexist innuendos, and Manchester’s footage reveals casual use of homophobic slurs. ”

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Roberts

  26. Northeaster

    Never voted for Trump (Golden Retriever was better than both candidates in 2016/2020). Now I am.

    Not that he a great candidate, but it’s a protest vote in how much a banana republic this country has turned into. Will he fix it? Probably not. But since we’re approaching Civil war 2.0, it doesn’t matter anymore.

    1. Merf56

      Northeaster – Have you considered instead a protest vote for one of the other two decent humans trying to turn this mess around – Jill Stein or Claudia de la Cruz?
      A heavy third party (write in vote if not on the ballot) vote would certainly cause more concern amongst the D party especially, than just another Maga vote they can totally discount.
      Just a thought. Cheers.

  27. Clwydshire

    Being knocked down and getting right back up and shaking his fist is not just an attractive political meme, I suspect that the event reinforces a core element of Trump’s psychological image of himself. I can say without irony that I hope this event does not lead him to be too full of himself. His enemies would deny it, but Trump can be vulnerable and frank, and that’s been part of his charm. But really, this event leaves me trying to imagine the kind of schemes and conspiracies that will be born in the back rooms of a Democratic Party convention where they will probably be absolutely dead certain that their own candidate will lose.

    1. Bill Malcolm

      Brilliant screen name. Drove through there several times while it was an active county. Lived further west in Llanbedr in ’48/’49 as an RAF brat. But few would guess an observer on US politics might reside there. Here in a remote part of rural north Acadie, I think the locals would agree with you, adding that Americans are crazy, not that they’ve ever met any answering to that description as visiting tourists these past seventy years. It’s just a general feeling about collective America.

      My thoughts upon reading these several hundred comments, with screen names I recognize from several years of following NC, is that compared to normal, a lot leap to conclusions their arguments don’t support. It’s most strangely abnormal to experience, so I attribute it to shock at the event. We’ll see in the days ahead if that changes for the better or whether it is me who cannot understand the logic. Quite unbalancing at the moment for this old head.

  28. Louis Fyne

    “competency crisis” irony….

    look, I don’t know if the “competence crisis hypothesis” is real or not…but this crossed my mind…

    I vaguely recall during fhe Reagan shooting, Reagan (not a petite man) being man-handled into the limo by the posse of Sec. Service agents.

    Post-volley, Trump said, “wait” as he shoes came off, then gave the spontaneous fistbump-“fight” rally cry.

    I was under the impression that what the “protectee” wantsis irrelevant—as for all you know, there are multiple shooters. So 1st priority for the agents is get to a secure, enclosed location–no time for fistbumps, even if a president gives a direct, contravening order.

    So ironically….Biden admin. DHS incompetence unintentionally handed an iconic moment worth >$100 million of TV adverts???

  29. none

    Someone on Reddit said the $15 to Act Blue wasn’t a donation, it was a purchase of some sort of merch, a coffee mug or something. Idk how to verify or whether it matters.

  30. JerryDenim

    Absolutely killer political instincts, the Donald, genius level even. The way he turned the whole thing into what seemed like a choreographed spectacle, amazing and surreal. He was leading the crowd in chants of “U-S-A!”during the middle of his own assassination attempt while some of his less fortunate admirers in attendance were literally bleeding out?! And the adoring crowd hung around for it all ! Wild.

    Unsurprisingly he’s being heralded for “bravery” but I just saw an incredibly narcissistic and reckless asshole endangering his secret service human shields by refusing to leave the stage. He was brave like a guy that naked-eye stares at eclipses. If he was a surfer, Trump would have been universally assailed for “over-claiming”. It was pure luck and the reaction of his security that saved his life. That and poor marksmanship. Not sure what he was so proud about? Just GTF off the stage like a dignified professional and save the ham for later. Certainly the most bizarre assassination attempt I have witnessed.

    1. Daniil Adamov

      That’s the thing though, he’s not a “dignified professional”. He’s a genius of improvised political theatre.

    2. Lambert Strether Post author

      > save the ham

      If you believe that re-electing Trump is important for the country, as many do, then it wasn’t “ham.” See here for a similar story about DeGaulle:

      1. JerryDenim

        Thanks for the great story and quote Lambert. Ha! Tough lady Yvonne De Gaulle, wisdom and steel in her words, but getting your head blown off on camera to replayed over and over again is a bad look for a politician too. Trump’s post-assassination end-zone dance was undeniable political gold for his fan base, and incredible showmanship, but still an over-claim in my book. He looked absolutely deranged to me and selfish as usual.

  31. none

    Re spotting guy on roof: surprised no nonstop surveillance drones overhead. They are cheap and quiet (electric) these days.

    1. rowlf

      How many drones are used at a President Biden rally? Are there reports from observers? I say this as a comment in a firearms forum (Veterans, LEO, nutters) mentioned hearing many drones in the sky at a Biden rally.

    2. Screwball

      Biden was in Michigan last week. I know someone who lives close to where his rally was. He said there were drones all over the place. I would be curious the size of the two, and if that makes a difference.

      I wonder if there is any difference between SS detail around the current president and a former?

      Another thing, I read here they identified the guy via the gun registration. I also watched a clip of a presser with no SS people by the way. The guy in the presser said they can’t confirm what the weapon was. That should be easy – the guy’s dead with the gun right beside him. Of course I could have missed something.

      So many questions, so few answers.

  32. ChrisPacific

    There is a lot of fog of war stuff around the shooter at present. The ‘bullied loner’ archetype is definitely finding some support, but there’s also a story from a classmate and co-worker that paints him as a quiet but apparently well-adjusted and happy guy, with a friend group and not much evidence of bullying. The classmate also said he was a compassionate and caring worker at the nursing home (and was very confused as to why he would do something like this). So I’d be careful of explanations that hew too closely to the stereotype.

    1. Lambert Strether Post author

      > well-adjusted and happy guy,

      He was well-adjusted enough to get a STEM award, which also implies good relations with at least some authority figures. Beyond the first day, I’m really concerned that the teenagers interviews are regurgitating the narratives they know.

  33. AG

    May be I should see a shrink since I just cannot get myself to be interested in this Trump shooting.

    p.s. It´s funny as a freshman I did an entire analysis on Rosenthal´s Iwo Jima image, the iconogaphy of which originated with some steelworker picture fom the 1920s or so I think, with the workers lifting a huge piece of metal post…I needed weeks for the research back then. In today´s online world it´d been done in a few minutes or hours I assume.

    p.p.s. Clint Eastwood had an interesting take on the photograph´s history in “Flags of Our Fathers” (2006)

    1. hk

      If I remember right, the famous picture was a do-over/staged. The original flag raising was not so nearly photogenic, although, personally, it was impressive in its own way. (You can still find it on the web). Nothing too problematic with that, though–most famous photos were at least quasi staged.

      The impressive thing about this photo is that it was “genuine.” Maybe like the girl whose clothes got burnt off running from napalm (was it in Vietnam or Cambodia?)

      1. AG

        Yes certainly staged one way or the other. That´s how art is done essentially.
        (You have certain forms of street photography e.g. which attempts a different approach as an agenda in itself however.)

        But even the Spanish “Falling Soldier” by Capa 1936 or so was not “genuine”.

        “was it in Vietnam or Cambodia?” – as a former art student I should know, gee. So long ago. They even got a film sequence discussing the origin of that burnt clothes aspect in some documentary I think.

        I find it extremely puzzling that the more society is engulfed in media, the more immersed individuals are in creating images, the more professional they become in presenting themselves in front of a camera/reporter (compare that to the 1960s when passers-by had to speak in presence of a camera) – the less savvy people are with understanding the nature of art as a produced form of reality. Produced by one person, often a huge group, mostly with financial incentives.

        Which is why so-called hidden-camera approaches are bullshit. Since the object – the humans photographed – are always part of the process and the result.

        Yet, mass society today seems to take anything at face value. Whatever you throw at them must be true because it looks true. Wow. What level of insanity.

  34. Louis Fyne

    The photojournaliat who took the “iconic photo” was also recording with a GoPro helmet cam.

    I can’t recall the link, but the video is out there. at the WashPost webaite I think

    Most recorded unscripted political event in history? with ironically the media stuck in the reporters’ penalty box during the rally.

    1. rowlf

      I have to admit I love all the recorded data/observations escaping into the wild before a narrative cage can be completed.

      Kinda flips that smart phones are so the government can track you to smart phones (plus raw reporting) tracking the government.

    2. Greg Taylor

      Lots of angry birds flying as Trump was escorted away. I’ve wondered who they were aimed at. Appeared to be toward the back center of the audience in front of the speaker. Was that the media penalty box? Strangely under-reported crowd reaction.

      1. Jamie

        >Strangely under-reported crowd reaction.

        I noticed a guy in the stand behind Trump to the left, in a bucket style hat.

        Had his nose in his phone during the entire hail of bullets. Never ducked, or looked up. (I would have dived under the bleachers).

        After Trump raised his fist, he re-animated.

  36. MaryLand

    “Staged” was trending on twitter a few minutes ago, but now I don’t see it listed.

    Many were saying that it was staged because, among other reasons, the secret service would not ordinarily allow him to stop for a photo op.

    1. Acacia

      There are still a lot of questions about this incident and we have to remain open-minded to new evidence.

      But still… “staged”? Are we to believe the SS detail assigned to Trump, as well as with law enforcement were in cahoots, and somebody set up Crooks as a patsy who would be killed, that some innocent bystander was intentionally killed and several people critically injured, and that the doctors and staff at Butler Memorial Hospital who examined Trump were in cahoots — all for a photo op —, or that the victims were also “fake”, and that we “know” Trump juiced himself because somebody posted an unsourced photo on the Intertubes showing a ketchup package laying on some concrete, etc. etc.?

      As a friend joked: “Soros should have sent in Yamagami”

  38. antidlc

    Why in the world did they have that woman who is much shorter than Trump trying to protect him? I have nothing against women in the SS, but it seems to me that if you are standing in the line of fire, you need to be at least as tall as the person you are protecting.

    1. dave -- just dave

      On the basis of what I have seen so far, I find “lone wolf” the most plausible theory. In the absence of evidence of the shooter having political preoccupations and strong views, I don’t think he was motivated by the thought he would save America from Trump.

      Washington Post refers to “BlueAnon” conspiracy theories – anti-Trumpers advocating ridiculous notions of how this event was staged.

      As Yogi Berra might have said, you never know when something surprising might happen – and it’s still almost four months until election day.

    2. begob

      She whipped her shades off during Trump’s scrum-move, and popped them back on once he’d been safely door-clunked into the big black hearse.

    3. Polar Socialist

      At first I was thinking the same, but from the video it turns out she’s pretty much the same height as Trump but when he stops them from removing him from the podium, the lady is leaning forward – whether to pull him along or because he got her under his left arm – exposing Trump’s face.

      All the other agents seem to be taller than Trump, though.

  39. zach

    while I hesitate to say that Crooks just sewed up Pennsylvania for Trump, he certainly did Trump no harm.

    Interesting choice of words.

    The Simple T did an emergency update on the Trump shooting, linked a bunch of screenshots of various media outlets’ creative phrasing employed to whitewash the attempt on the DT’s immaculate coif, your point about the weight of this event surviving until election day may prove despressingly prescient.

    1. Lambert Strether Post author

      The “troubled loner” narrative seems to be taking hold, as it does. I’m no sure about the bomb-making “materials.” Not a lot of good detail or sourcing on that one, at least as far as I have seen; nothing, for example, about timers or electronics.

      1. Mikel

        Somebody (his father allegedly) got the gun for him but he got everything else by himself? And was going to put it all together by his “lonesome”?

  42. St Jacques

    While everybody is putting forward their pet theory, here’s my wild hypothesis:

    We now learn from classmates that he was a loner but was good at mathematics, who stood steadfastly for conservative values where his classes were overwhelmingly liberal, and suffered from bullying (and probably a lot of mockery for his conservatism and social awkwardness).

    And here’s my wild hypothesis : Maybe he saw Trump as a demagogue and therefore a traitor to conservative values as he understood them. In other words, Trump was a super bully that had to be eliminated for the safety of the nation – and here was his great chance to avenge his years of solitary suffering with a historic act.

    1. dingusansich

      A Brutus out to take the life of a would-be tyrant to save the republic (such as it is)? Interesting thesis.

  43. vidimi

    My take:

    the assassination attempt was genuine, and the SS knew about it, as most of the evidence supports willful ignorance of the shooter. Maybe the spooks even trained him? Regardless, this was signed off by the uniparty deep state. One body guard allegedly wrote that the head of the security detail ordered them to stand down. If so, arresting the SS head may be a good thread to pull.

    It failed, Trump will now almost certainly win as it will convince a large number of apathetic voters that the deep state really does see him as a threat and getting him in office again will be a way to stick it to them. If this is some Eleventy-dimensional chess then I don’t see the point. It might sheepdog some people back into the republican party similar to what Bernie and the squad did with the dems, but for how long? I guess it’s a way to get a deluge of donations from people who would have shut their wallets otherwise.

    It will further hurt Biden and the Dems as they are mostly refusing to call it an assassination attempt. Also, whoever runs Biden’s twitter account repeatedly tweeted that Trump was an important threat and needed to be “put in the crosshairs”. Someone just did that literally and Trump was dragged through the courts for less for fomenting an insurrection.

    The most important question, why?
    The Democratic Party needs to replace Biden. Whoever it will be would lose in an absolute landslide to Trump and the Dems would get wiped from both the House and Senate. For reasons I don’t understand, they really don’t want this to happen (main flaw in my theory). The only way to stave off disaster was therefore for the GOP to also nominate an unknown, unpopular candidate so that the presidency remains in safer hands. The RNC is in a few days.

    This suggests that the Presidency still has nominal power but that most choose not to use it and go with the flow.

  45. sarmaT

    This situation reminds me of this [Your Favorite Ethnicity Here (YFEH)] joke:

    Two YFEHs are hiding on the side of the road waiting to try and kill Hitler. They wait and wait but after many hours Hitler still hasn’t come down the road where they expect him. After a long time of waiting, one man turns to the other man and says “Geez! Where is this guy?” And the other man turns to him and replies “I don’t know… I hope nothing happened to him.”

    I’ve heard this joke very long time ago. It was about partizans (i.e. Eastern European guerrilla) making an ambush for regular Nazis/Germans (no Hitler or “YFEHs” involved). I guess this version counts as a Hollywood remake.

  47. Daniil Adamov

    Excellent (and entertaining) round-up.

    I admit I am surprised it took this long for someone to try and kill Trump. I remember people expecting it back in 2016 (and one person I spoke about it with online, a nice, open-minded centre-left American lady, predicted that it would be a Republican – that or someone from the military). The demonisation was already in full swing then, so if it’s because he’s Hitler, why would it only happen now? Despair because of his growing reelection chances?

    So I think it might be something more peculiar and personal than being caught up in anti-Trump messaging. But that’s just a dim suspicion.

    One thing I am sure about is that it wasn’t staged. Too much risk, and the odds of winning the election were already in Trump’s favour. I could maybe just about entertain the version of a false flag assassination attempt to save a failing candidacy, but not to endanger a successful one, months away from the election.

    It probably does benefit him, though. One way might be by forcing the Democrats and others on their side to put the brakes on their anti-Trump messaging of the past nine years. That has got to wrongfoot them, having to actually think about precisely how much they should bash him. They can’t actually back away from it completely either, though, so I expect some bungling and confusion.

  48. dingusansich

    I actually found Melania Trump’s letter touching.

    Amusing if true, especially given Lambert’s kill-it-with-fire refrain: Was Melania Trump’s Statement About Donald Written by AI?

    Touching—hmm …—but odd, definitely. Take this sentence:

    Our personal, structural, and life commitment – until death – is at serious risk.

    Structural? That’s Melania writing? A staffer with a cultural studies Ph.D.? Or … an AI. Perhaps her favorite designer was unavailable for an appropriate garment, so “she” longer-form ad-libbed I really care. Do u?

    Whatever the source, I’m with Harry Frankfurt here.

  49. NotThePilot

    I’ve been taking a commentary break, and though I’m no fan of Trump, I always disliked the people around him more than the man himself. He’s not the devil, he’s just a corrupt showman and a narcissist (consequently, he will not save America from itself when he’s elected).

    But the way a section of the Democratic party and allies saw him as the Prince of Darkness has always been nuts. When a black-bloc anarchist says shocking things about a political figure, that’s one thing. They usually have a point about whether some lives are really “more important” than others. But it’s really unbecoming to hear from lame apparatchiks on twitter that just hate the other side’s team captain.

    On the attempt itself, info is still just trickling out and I try to stick to Occam’s Razor, so I will abide in conscious uncertainty for now. But… I must say I’m a little scared by the way so many people seem to have let the “hot media” narrative wash over them, even here at NC. Surely I’m not the only one that thinks a lot of this just doesn’t add up?

    The rally & shooting itself, the way he just phoned-in the debate, the timing with shifts by donors and media, apparently the Feds just decided to drop the documents case against him this morning? Even Trump has started sounding more like a typical neocon/neolib (e.g. I like the idea of giving foreign students instant visas on graduation, purely out of hospitality, but that is so not the sort of thing that Trump’s base asks for).

    I don’t really do conspiracy theories. Even in the small chance they’re true, that doesn’t change the actual effects in our lives. I can’t shake the feeling though that Trump is being moved into position somehow, and even if the attempt itself was just a spontaneous attack, it’s now being used to prep the runway for him.

    1. Bill Malcolm

      It’s taken me over three hours and an all-nighter to read every comment — the article itself was exhausting in length before that.

      I nominate your comment as the one closest to the way I feel about it all. Wonderful — at times I questioned my logical abilities trying to make sense of some of the leaps I saw in logic in the comments. So you’ve restored my faith in myself. Thank you, particularly for the second-to-last paragraph, with which I heartily agree — Trump’s been turned I believe, at least a bit, but that message hasn’t got out there among the masses.

  50. Tom Stone

    It will be instructive to see how this affects contributions to the Biden Campaign, Donors matter.
    Absent Trump being caught in bed with a live boy or the next assassination attempt being successful his election seems assured.
    And yes, I do expect further serious attempts on his life.

  51. Michigan Farmer

    Trump supporters fear assassination.
    Here’s Steve Bannon performing his evergreen duty as seer and prophet. The Guardian Sat 13 Jul 2024 23.07 EDT

    In a Guardian interview in June, Steve Bannon – a Trump adviser and former White House chief strategist – spoke of his concerns that the Republican nominee would be assassinated before the election in November.

    “It’s my number one fear,” Bannon said, speaking before he began a four-month prison sentence for defying a congressional subpoena. “Assassination has to be at the top of the list and I believe that the woman that’s running the Secret Service part is not doing her job.”

    Referring to the Republican national convention, due to start Monday, he added: “I’m not comfortable with what’s happening in Milwaukee.” But he added: “His detachment is fantastic.”

    Bannon argued that Trump had been portrayed as a new Julius Caesar everywhere from a New York theatre production to an essay by leading scholar Robert Kagan, paving the way for a would-be assassin to feel justified in emulating Brutus. He said president Abraham Lincoln received similar treatment after the civil war before his assassination at the hands of John Wilkes Booth.

    “Remember John Wilkes Booth,” Bannon said. “In the southern press, and in particular the Richmond papers, Caesar-ism, Lincoln is Caesar, Lincoln is taking your liberties. You fought this war but, even in losing the war, he’s going to take all your liberties and enslave you.”

  52. Rob

    but what are we “fighting” for?

    “ordinary Americans” are fighting for some deceny, calmness, take a step back and stop with all the rhetoric and bs on all sides imho. But the corporateers are always optimizing responses and efforts to seek advantage, monetize, gain influence on every cast of the die. A pox on them all.

  54. John k

    Biden’s bad performance did not move the polls, maybe trump assassination won’t either.
    Polls tell you preference, us is so divided, and fervently so, it’s hard to move the needle.
    It doesn’t take much effort to tell the pollster the same thing you said last week. But leaving the couch to go vote takes an effort. Even voting absentee takes some time and effort. My spec is that Biden’s performance is depressing and discourages positive effort such as voting, whereas the trump incident positively boosts a person’s interest in participating.
    Actually tho, it seems to me lambert’s swing state polls have moved trump’s way, ispecially Pa.

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