Last week, a 20-year-old troubled man thought it was his life’s goal to kill President Biden or former president Trump.  He chose Trump because of his close proximity (40 miles) to where the rally took place.

No matter one’s political leanings, it is a terrible day in America when a citizen targets a former president.  At a time when few events unite all Americans, Saturday was a time for calm reactions.  However, in today’s America, a majority of the people no longer agree on facts.

Look at the immediate reaction from Ohio Senator J.D. Vance, now the Republican Party’s Vice President nominee who said this.

“The central premise of the Biden campaign is that President Donald Trump is an authoritarian fascist who must be stopped at all costs. That rhetoric led directly to President Trump’s attempted assassination.”

In other words, President Biden was behind it.  That’s not true.  The shooter was tracking both politicians.  He was mentally disturbed and the investigation into his troubled life has revealed that he wasn’t political, just insane.

President Biden spoke to reporters after the event about how the rhetoric on both sides needs to be toned down.  But that unifying message has to be accepted by both sides; like a game, everyone must abide by the rules.

As an American who doesn’t belong to any political party, I was heartened to hear that Biden placed a call to the former president to check in on him.   Even Trump acknowledged that kind gesture, not publicly, but in a private conversation with another presidential candidate, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. 

Trump released a statement that “it was God alone who prevented the unthinkable from happening.”  But was it also “God alone” who took away the life of Corey Comperatore, the volunteer firefighter who attended the rally with his wife and daughter?

If hate speech were on the ballot, Trump would win in a landslide.  Since he ran for president in 2015, he has not followed normal protocols as a national political figure.   He says things that no other president has ever said, yet that is part of his appeal for a good portion of Americans.   His focus is divisiveness, not unity.

Unfortunately for the Democrats, Biden’s health has declined, most notably on display in the debate a few weeks ago.  Ever since then, there has been another type of assassination brewing, non-violent but still lethal.  Joe must go.  Each day there is another headline of an even more powerful Democrat who jumps on the bandwagon.  If this were Shakespeare’s play Julius Caesar, the senators would call a meeting with the president concealing daggers, distracting Biden until each senator took turns stabbing their leader, with Vice President Harris, the loyal Brutus figure, providing the final blow as Biden cries out, “Et tu, Kamala?”

For Trump supporters, the past few weeks have been a combination of Mardi Gras and the Fourth of July rolled into one big MAGA celebration.  The Republicans are so confident in the election that when Trump spoke at the convention, they didn’t wait for his inauguration in January.  He stood in front of an IMAX-sized image of the White House, as if to show he’s already returned.

Unlike, the attempt on Trump’s life (a bullet grazed the top of his ear), the “killing” of Biden will be successful.

What it comes down to is this.  Even though Trump is the only president in history who has been impeached twice and found guilty of a felonious crime, the things that should disqualify him are, one, not accepting the results of the 2020 election, two, inciting people to storm the Capitol on Jan. 6 and not putting a stop to it for over three hours, and three, the only president not to attend the inauguration of his successor, a sacred symbol of democracy’s smooth transition.

For those of us who believe in the law, thank goodness Mike Pence also shared that belief by validating the results of the presidential election.   Would possible future vice president Vance do the same thing if he ran for president in 2028 and had to certify the results of an election he lost?

A few days after the shooting, President Biden put in a call to Comperatore’s widow to offer his condolences; however, she refused the call “because of her husband’s political views.”  Imagine refusing to accept a call from the President of the United States?  That’s how bad it’s gotten in this country.