The Assassination Attempt Changes Nothing

In the recent movie Civil War, the president of the United States is clearly based on Donald Trump. He is an authoritarian who, among his other crimes, abolishes the FBI. At the end, he is executed as he begs for his life in front of contemptuous journalists.

Commentary at Morgoth’s Review called the film a cowardly attempt to indulge in violent fantasies against villains coded as right-wing without having the courage to commit to a coherent story or justification. Progressives always pretend they are rebels, even when they control everything.

Mainstream politics follows the same pattern. Before the 2022 midterm elections, Joe Biden gave a bizarre speech with black-and-red lighting in which he called Republicans a threat to equality and democracy. It worked, and the “red wave” piddled out. He mocks American gun owners and brags that they will need fighter jets to take on the federal government. Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) alluded to using nuclear weapons against Americans who resist gun control. Governments throughout the West try to control speech and behavior, and claim they are defending “democracy.”

Credit Image: © Kyle Mazza/TheNEWS2 via ZUMA Press Wire

There is a lot we don’t know about the Trump assassination attempt. We still know almost nothing about the shooter’s motive. He may simply have been insane.

Ideally, it shouldn’t matter. Speech is not action. Calling an opponent a threat does not make you morally culpable for violence. However, America is well past that point. Congressional Democrats issued a resolution saying that “Great Replacement Theory”  is “used to falsely justify racially motivated, violent acts of terrorism.” Dylann Roof quoting mainstream news articles posted on the Council of Conservative Citizens’ website was enough to kill the organization. From the destruction of monuments, to deplatforming, to federal surveillance of right-wingers and banning travel, the spurious link between “hate speech” and violence justifies repression. To point out who actually commits violence is itself “hate” and thus somehow worse and more dangerous than crime itself.

Thus, a serious Right should hold progressives accountable for their rhetoric about President Trump and his supporters. It arguably is incitement. If someone is opposed to the Great Replacement, it does not follow that you should go around shooting people. You just need to change policy. However, if you really believe that Donald Trump is Hitler and a unique, existential threat that may not be stopped at the ballot box, the logical conclusion is . . . .

Nothing will change, however. Slate is right. The dynamics of the election and American society are the same. A homosexual writing for Newsweek caught the liberal mood: Conservatives are so consumed with spurious fears of leftists and leftists by genuine fears of conservatives that the assassination attempt “barely registered.”

It is tiresome to play “what if the situation were reversed,” but it is necessary. If President Joe Biden or Vice President Kamala Harris were shot at, American Renaissance and other organizations might suffer consequences. Look at the clampdown that followed Charlottesville. When there is an attack on whites or the Right, the problem is guns or American society. When there is an attack on a progressive, the problem is the Right’s mere existence, which is why it must be crushed rather than debated.

President Trump has an importance that surpasses his policy platforms. To many millions, he is a true American hero. In a country where image is reality, his image is now mythic. Yet President Donald Trump is not the existential threat his enemies (and some of his supporters) imagine. He was already president once, and the Left suffered no permanent reverses.

The underlying power structure has not fallen, nor the “anti-fascist” mythology that underpins it. If he is reelected, leftist sites will not be shuttered, violent leftist groups will not be raided, and there will be no “Red Scare” equivalent to the “Brown Scare” we have been experiencing since 2017.

The complacency taking root in the American Right is dangerous. We are in a desperate situation, and though there are signs of progress, time is running out. And the Left will not back down.

It may be tempting to believe its fears are justified. This makes us feel powerful, but that would be wrong. We are essentially powerless. Progressives will not be held accountable unless a real right takes power and holds them to account. There is no other path forward aside from wishful thinking. It will be a long fight against ferocious opposition.

On the repulsive nature of a guy like Destiny who would mock a dead hero and why the media is grooming the next shooter pic.twitter.com/XbBYuyRm03

— Auron MacIntyre (@AuronMacintyre) July 16, 2024