Media Flubs Chance To Avert Trump Shooting – OpEd

Were there signals of a possible assassination attempt that were missed?

My research suggests there were. These signals were not out in the open, staring us in the face. Identifying them would have required putting together a series of clues and observing the constellation that they form: that of conditions ripe for something like an assassination.

Who missed the signals? Who's to blame for the ensuing tragedy? Isn't this level of lawlessness a real threat to the functioning of our democracy?

As I delved into this matter, it occurred to me that fundamentally it's our news media that dropped the ball and missed the chance to avert a tragedy. I'm talking about neglecting their important role in investigative reporting.

Think about the historic role played by investigative reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein in the Watergate case. They learned of a break-in at political offices in the DC Watergate building and didn't leave it at that. They doggedly dug into the circumstances leading up to it and saw that they formed a constellation. It was a picture of abuse of presidential power and obstruction of justice. President Nixon himself turned out to be the culprit.

So as I dug into the current assassination case, searching for causal factors, I found a culprit there too.

I started my search for clues in the Twitter (X) feed of President Biden. This is what I found:

--"This race is about our freedom. It's about our democracy. It's about the very soul of America."

--"Save Democracy. Stop Trump."

--"Trump's assault on democracy isn't just part of his past -- it's what he is promising for the future."

--"Donald Trump's campaign is obsessed with the past, not the future. He's willing to sacrifice our democracy to put himself in power."

--"I'll be damned if in the year 2024 -- just two years before the 250th anniversary of our Declaration of Independence -- Donald Trump takes that away."

--"Justice Sotomayor warned us in her dissent that, based on the majority decision, Trump could take out his opponents, take bribes, and lead a coup while president -- and be immune to being held accountable. He really could become the dictator that he promised to be on day one."

--"Donald Trump is a threat to our democracy, and we cannot let him win."

--"Donald Trump vows to be a dictator on Day One. We must stop him."

--"The choice in this election is simple: Donald Trump will destroy our democracy. I will defend it."

--"Donald Trump is a genuine threat to this nation. He's a threat to our freedom. He's a threat to our democracy. He's literally a threat to everything America stands for."

--"In this election, your freedom, your democracy, and America itself is at stake."

(Note, in compiling the list of Biden tweets, I left out those that in addition to denigrating Trump also dealt with policy issues. I left them out because they embodied specific policy issues over which there is wide disagreement within the country. In some, Biden's points had merit. Others were based on lies and distortions. The tweets I cited here deal with fear mongering and demonization of Trump.)

Then I saw a July 8 CNN report of a video call to top donors. Biden said: "We can't go another day, another day, without explaining what he [Trump] is doing -- and we have to go after him."

Post debate reports had Biden rapidly losing significant public support, and some political allies were abandoning him. The dream of beating Trump was perhaps privately being seen as unattainable, at least by some. The only sure route to success would be if Trump were to somehow go away. Earlier efforts to put him in jail failed. The attempt to gain traction for Biden at the debate also failed. What's left?

Per CNN, Biden offered, "We're done talking about the debate; it's time to put Trump in a bullseye."

That's exactly what the would-be assassin did on Saturday, July 13. His bullet hit Trump on the side of the head, and missed killing him by only a half inch. The shooting did kill one bystander and it seriously injured two others.

Is there any reason to believe Biden hadn't created an incubator for inciting lethal political violence?

Retrospectively, Biden has quibbled that when he said bullseye he didn't mean bullseye. But we're not mind readers. He said what he said and it contributed to the result.

Trump was guilty too of making a poor word choice recently. He said that as president, on day one, he was going to be a dictator and close the border and "drill baby drill" regarding the pursuit of domestic energy extraction. That "dictator" term was used by opponents to really frighten many people. That all could have been avoided if instead he had just said, "On day one I'll take the bull by the horns, close the border and 'drill baby drill.'" People in such positions of influence like Trump and Biden need to be more responsible in their word choices.

So now here's the story that was never put together by journalists: Biden literally stated that if Trump won, it would be the end of life in the United States as we know it -- no more democracy, no more freedom, but instead just life under a dictator. Few Americans could accept that. Biden painted Trump as an existential threat, one that must be eliminated. How many other deluded individuals are still out there and are yet to act?

The Watergate case is not something that was put together by government law enforcement or investigative agencies. It took the work of smart, dedicated investigative journalists to assemble the bits and pieces together and see the constellation: an unsavory picture that ultimately unseated the president of the United States.

In times gone by, the media were given the title of The Fourth Estate, a necessary component of our democracy. They were to be our watch dogs, working to expose government malfeasance and corruption.

Today, however, our mainstream media seem to be mired in petty political bickering and engaging in partisan advocacies.

They're largely not watch dogs on behalf of the people, but are too often mouthpieces of self-serving political parties and their members. That leads me to wonder, where have all the investigative journalists gone? It seems to me that in their absence the media clearly have flubbed their opportunity to avert the Trump shooting. Where does that leave our future?