Trump regards violence as a legitimate political tactic

WASHINGTON - So, Donald Trump thought he’d have a little fun with the idea of Hillary Clinton being assassinated.

The Republican presidential nominee suggested that, because Clinton favors restrictions on guns, her security detail should be disarmed. “Take their guns away,” he proposed. “Let’s see what happens to her.”

There was a time when fantasizing aloud about the murder of your opponent would have been beyond the pale — but not anymore. “Absolutely nonsense,” Trump’s running mate, Mike Pence, told ABC News when asked if such a message could incite violence.

If Trump’s “let’s see what happens to her” suggestion were a one-off, there might be an argument for giving him the benefit of the doubt. The tendency to regard each Trump outrage in isolation is what allows him to become normalized. But look at the comprehensive output of Trump and there’s no escaping the conclusion that he winks, and sometimes smiles, at political violence.

Did Pence think it poppycock to doubt Trump’s intent when he suggested last month that gun owners could murder either Clinton or her judicial appointees? “If she gets to pick her judges, nothing you can do, folks,” he said. “Although, the Second Amendment people, maybe there is.”

But before long all this baloney and drivel reaches critical mass, and you realize that Trump regards violence as a legitimate political tool.

After Trump proposed Friday evening that Clinton be denied armed protection, New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd told CNN the next day that she had told Trump “it was wrong that there was violence being incited at his rallies.”

Trump, in Dowd’s telling, “disagreed and said he thought the violence added a frisson of excitement.”

Trump, in response, fired off tweets calling Dowd a “neurotic dope.” At least he didn’t propose Second Amendment remedies.

Follow Dana Milbank on Twitter, @Milbank.