This Week in American History: The Most Sweeping Plot Against American Leaders Ever Undertaken

This week in American history the most extensive plot to kill senior US government officials and prominent Americans in history took place. It targeted two former presidents, their families, a former Vice President, a former Secretary of State, a former Attorney General, a former head of the CIA, senior members of Congress, a leading media organization, one of America\’s most distinguished philanthropists and a well-known actor and spokesperson for liberal causes.

This attack involved the coordinated distribution of deadly explosive devices across the country and was only foiled through the intervention of America\’s top law enforcement agencies.

Nothing on this scale or level had ever been attempted before. The motive was apparently political with the objective apparently being the assassination of the leading spokespeople for the views of the Democratic Party.

If you read about such an attack in a history book, you would assume it was a major turning point in the life of the nation. But it happened Wednesday.  And the reaction of the president was essentially to pay it lip service.  He offered a few words condemning violence but as he spoke them his words fell lifeless from his lips, it was clear he meant not a one of them.  He did not, as any other president would have done in the face of such an extraordinary and potentially destabilizing plot cancel a political rally he had scheduled for the same day.

Indeed, at that rally, the hostile, unhinged chants of the far right were coaxed again from the crowd by a Republican political leader.  At the rally, the president sought to congratulate himself for not continuing his personal and vicious attacks on Democrats at the event, offering essentially a wink and a nod saying that if he could he would.

Hours after that rally, the president sought to place the blame for the attacks on one of its intended victims, on one of the targets of his own most vile and unrelenting attacks.  He wrote: “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!”

He did not reflect on how his own violent rhetoric might have contributed to the atmosphere that produced yesterday’s failed but sweeping plot.  He did not think back to his celebration days before of a Republican candidate who beat up a reporter, his own staff manhandling members of the press, his own words echoing one of the world’s most brutal dictators, Josef Stalin, calling them “enemies of the people.”  He did not think of the consequences of rallying crowds with chants of “lock her up” or suggesting that Hillary Clinton’s Secret Service protection should be taken away or his own dehumanizing and relentless vilification of each and every one of those targeted Thursday.

He did not because he does not believe what he and others have done is wrong.  He is just like other demagogues of the past, others who have worn the labels he has placed upon himself like “nationalist.”  He will do anything to gain power.  He seeks to destroy and discredit any in his path.

As for the attacks, he wants them behind him. He wants them forgotten.  He wants to go back to stoking the flames of division and discord that are tearing apart our country.

But these attacks—their scope still unfolding even as I write this–should not be shrugged off or consigned to a single news cycle. Wednesday was a very bad day in our history and we need to devote the time and energy not just to brining the people behind it to justice but to understanding what is happening to us and why.

The stakes are very high.  Not just because not all plots such as the one this week will fail and there will be human tragedies.  It is because attacks like yesterday’s delivered via the mail as well as those delivered daily in the words of the president and other leaders in his party, take a giant toll on our society and have a chilling effect on our system of government.  Whether the bombs explode or not, whether the words produce violence today or violence to come, grievous damage is done to us all.