Politics is falling further into logic of the vendetta
Whether the packages delivered to leading Democrats and liberals turn out to be functioning bombs or dummy devices intended to send a message, the effect is largely the same: American politics is descending further into the logic of the vendetta.
If you read about famous feuds or intergenerational rivalries — Hatfields vs. McCoys, Israelis vs. Palestinians, etc. — one simple truth makes everything much more complicated: Everybody has a valid point. The Hatfields shout, “Your family shot my uncle!” The McCoys reply, “Well, you folks hanged my father!”
And they’re both right. And they’re both wrong.
They’re right that the other side did something bad, but they’re wrong that the first bad act justifies the second.
We’re not a failed state where competing coalitions visit bloody reprisals on each other. But we’re getting closer. And you can tell by the way we’re talking.
In response to this still-unfolding crime, the overwhelming response from Democrats and most of the mainstream media is that this is all Donald Trump’s fault.
“Time and time again, the president has condoned physical violence and divided Americans with his words and his actions,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said in a joint statement Wednesday. “Expressing support for the Congressman who body-slammed a reporter, the neo-Nazis who killed a young woman in Charlottesville, his supporters at rallies who get violent with protestors, dictators around the world who murder their own citizens, and referring to the free press as the enemy of the people.”
Trump’s call for unity in response to mail-terror attacks “ring hollow,” they added. And they’re right.
Indeed, Trump seemed to demonstrate the hollowness the following morning in a tweet: “A very big part of the Anger we see today in our society is caused by the purposely false and inaccurate reporting of the Mainstream Media that I refer to as Fake News. It has gotten so bad and hateful that it is beyond description. Mainstream Media must clean up its act, FAST!”
But Trump has a point, too. His “enemy of the people” rhetoric is irresponsibly hyperbolic, but it resonates with millions of people who have good reason to believe that much of the media has gone off the rails in their animosity toward Trump and toward Republicans generally.
More relevant, Trump’s most loyal defenders leapt to make the case that Schumer, Pelosi and all of the Democrats and pundits blaming Trump for fomenting a climate of violence are hypocrites. Fox News host Sean Hannity had a furious monologue recounting all of the uncivil things Trump’s liberal critics have said, from Waters encouraging mobs to harass Republicans in public to Hillary Clinton saying civility isn’t an option for Democrats.
Hannity has a point. Ricin was sent to Trump. GOP Rep. Steve Scalise was shot at a practice for a charity baseball game by a man motivated by liberal rhetoric.
Everybody is using the real or perceived hypocrisy of the “other side” to justify their refusal to look squarely at their own side’s irresponsible words and deeds.
The reactions to Trump are often irresponsible, too. And saying “Trump is worse” doesn’t change that.
Yes, everybody is right. But that doesn’t mean everybody isn’t wrong, too.