Trump assassination attempt was not a surprise

Former President Trump was back at his summer home in Bedminster, New Jersey, Sunday before leaving later for the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee.

He arrived there only hours after taking a bullet to the side of his head from an assassin's rifle at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania.

It’s obvious to everyone that the country has become more divided than ever in the last few years. Our country is no stranger to political violence as abhorrent and tragic as it may be.

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I remember as a small child being let out of school after President Kennedy was shot. Also, I can recall as a child living through the Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy assassinations.

Many of us remember the assassination attempt on Presidents Reagan and Gerald Ford. Thankfully, both of those men survived. And there are other instances of members of Congress being shot or killed and more recent times.

What's different about this assassination attempt on former President Trump is that you could see it coming. When you have mainstream voices in the media and politics comparing the man to Adolf Hitler and repeatedly calling him a Nazi or fascist, you could sense that maybe something bad would happen. Of course, there was no one to blame for this horrible act other than the shooter.

But here is a person who is identified by mainstream voices as a Nazi, a Hitler figure, a threat to democracy, and someone who would put people in internment camps if he were reelected. So why wouldn’t many people think they would be doing society and the world justice by removing that threat?

Rhetoric has been heated on both sides for sure. But while one side is mocking, ridiculing, and questioning the mental capability and the policies of our current president, many on the other side have painted Donald Trump as pure evil.

Let me say emphatically for the umpteenth time, I’ve never liked Donald Trump‘s personality, from his early appearances in the media, some 40 years ago, to his campaign style and rhetoric in recent years. He seems egotistical, narcissistic, and unnecessarily brash at times.

But as many people who feel the same way have concluded, that doesn’t take away from his ideas and policies as President. Many of us who have voted for Donald Trump have wished many times that he could become more conciliatory to his opposition and more measured in his speech. However, many love, his brash bold style, and his aggressive rhetoric.

Let’s hope that both sides can be more conciliatory and open-minded as we wind down this campaign to elect a president.

Many people on the right have observed people who hate Donald Trump so much and have identified them as having "Trump derangement syndrome". I’ve seen it. It’s real. And some of us feared that would manifest itself in this way. Sadly, it has. Fortunately, it didn’t meet its desired end.

Tragically a man lost his life as a result of this act and two people were critically injured. If you can’t have any sympathy or empathy for Donald Trump, hopefully, you can feel for the families of those who were also shot.

And that’s part of the problem. We tend to view people on the other side of our political point of view as evil or lesser than us. Trust me, neither is true for either side. Let’s hope we can come away from this with a little more humanity and understanding. The hope is there, but the prognosis isn’t good. God bless America and please be kind to each other moving forward.