No. Just…no. I mean, I know MAGA will anyway, having no sense of irony or hypocrisy, but Trump does not get to suggest that Kamala saying Trump is a threat to Democracy incites violence after years, literally years, of defending Trump saying things like “Knock the hell out of him,” “Fight, fight, fight,” and “you’re not going to take your country back with weakness” as NOT inciting violence. We all still remember January 6th. We know who, exactly, inflamed and incited those people. Oh, AND we reject your attempted rewrite. We still remember the actual January 6th.

Especially since both sides have been calling their opponent a threat to democracy. Kamala thinks Trump is a threat to democracy. (I agree with her.) Trump pretends Kamala is a Marxist and wants to turn America Communist – AND Fascist at the same time. In fact, he just seems to string together words that easily frighten MAGA. He says we’ll live under anarchy AND tyranny in a “full blown banana republic.” He’s always sparse on detail, so I’m not sure how he sees anarchy and tyranny operating at the same time, hand in hand…

The difference? Well, for one, I’m not sure Trump could accurately define ANY of those political movements he’s citing to scare his base. He just knows these are “bad” things so he insists that’s what the left wants to do. He is just making things up as he goes along. (Although he may have seen it on TV…) He has no actual basis for saying any of those things.

On the other hand, Trump has a 900+ page agenda for exactly how he plans to destroy our republic and replace it with an authoritarian dictatorship. To my mind, it’s MUCH harder to deny one’s intent to dismantle democracy when one has a 900+ page plan all written out for anyone to read. Trump, as always, is a liar and his lies might well incite violence. Kamala is simply telling the truth – Trump IS a threat to democracy.

And do I really need to point out that neither of the accused have been hardcore Democrats? If anything, their political leanings tend to be nebulous. The guy who actually shot seems to have been trying to get into the history books. The second guy – the one who never even glimpsed Trump? – that guy voted for Trump in 2016. He was angry at Trump over Trump’s inadequate response on helping Ukraine. We all know Trump will help Putin.

But that’s hardly a radical Democrat trying to kill their precious. If anything, these seem to be disillusioned MAGA, having recovered from MAGA. I suspect more MAGA will react in similar fashion over time as they discover they’ve been betrayed by Trump. But only time will tell…

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It’s a fair question. If the golf round was a last minute decision, how did the potential shooter know to be there? But that’s the word. Trump didn’t have anything scheduled for the day, already stupid in a race he’s losing. So, without warning, he decided to golf. And, somehow, there was a shooter there, waiting for him? Again, no.

The idea that one might find Trump, at any given moment, out on a golf course isn’t that crazy. But knowing which course and what time seems the trick. Are we supposed to believe this guy just set up randomly, waiting until Trump played a round?

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I don’t feel good about Israel’s latest violence, using pagers with explosives in them. Israel expected these pagers to be carried by Hezbollah, an opposition group to Israeli encroachment. Israel didn’t know, or care, that someone else – like the civilians killed – might end up with them as well.

It was a surreptitious attack that killed randomly. I continue to have very low regard for the way Israel is prosecuting this war.

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Trump went to a rally in New York and asked the crowd to vote for him because “what the hell do you have to lose?” People were ready with answers. So far, the list includes years of progress on climate, the return of high tech manufacturing, our standing around the globe, the Affordable Care Act, Medicare and Social Security, our democracy, bodily autonomy, voting rights, representative government, and pretty much anything rational Americans hold dear. That, right there, is some BAD campaigning…