As a freshman student at OU in 1963 I’ll never forget the events of the day when President John Kennedy was murdered in Dallas. Then five years later I can remember exactly where I was when both Martin Luther King Jr. and subsequently Bobby Kennedy met death at the hands of a deranged, angry individual.
Donald Trump is lucky to be alive at this moment. A bullet only creased his right ear while other projectiles sent his way injured or killed three rally-goers seated behind the former President. The shooter, a 20-year-old from Pennsylvania, died instantly when terminated by a sharpshooter who either spotted the assassin too late before he fired his own long gun three times or immediately after those rounds took their toll. Recordings indicate perhaps as many as five deadly shots took down the rooftop-perched murderer and, most disturbingly, a number of witnesses have alleged they verbally and visually warned security officials of a man with a rifle on a roof before any shots were fired.
As is always the case in a national crisis, you can bet Congress will commence an investigation of what occurred; how a madman could locate and occupy a spot almost directly in line with a speaking president. It was only luck that precluded him from successfully completing his deranged mission.
Our country was badly divided in the 1960s and it cost the lives of major figures who dominated public policy at that time. Today those fault lines have reappeared; name-calling has accelerated; death threats multiplied; allegations of fake media intensified; and overall it is as though we didn’t learn any lessons from the savagery of two generations ago which leads to a question this nation and all political parties must face.
How much longer can the world’s greatest democracy continue to exist when bullets preempt and interrupt debate; when threats of violence accelerate, have become normalized and expected; and when neighbors no longer are neighborly but view the family next door as expendable, as ignorant, as not worthy of respect?
Politics ain’t beanbag, whatever that famous phrase means, but for sure it was never intended to be a reason for violence by one American against another.
Our two major political parties commence their conventions beginning with the Republicans in Milwaukee Sunday followed by the Democrats in Chicago on Aug. 19. What wonderful opportunities for healing, respect and reconciliation instead of accusations, threats and intolerance.
After all, words have meaning and the sooner our leaders understand and appreciate that the sooner this nation will have a chance, and maybe the last chance, to be “indivisible with liberty and freedom for all.”
What a concept.
