On April 25, one Cole Allen allegedly charged a security checkpoint outside the Washington Hilton ballroom where many of the nation’s most prominent politicians, journalists, and entertainers were gathered for the White House Correspondents’ Dinner, bearing both arms and ill will toward some or all of those inside — almost certainly including US president Donald Trump.

I’ve been in that ballroom. I’ve also been outside the exit, mere feet away, where there’s a historical plaque commemorating the attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan, by John Hinckley, in 1981.  I was there even as Donald Trump was too, campaigning for the support of several thousand anti-government extremists at the 2024 Libertarian National Convention. At which event, it’s worth noting, no one tried to kill him (that I know of, anyway).

Allen was quickly taken down after shooting a  Secret Service agent (whose bulletproof vest fortunately stopped the bullet). It seems unlikely that he’ll get much enjoyment out of his future lifestyle. And whatever the reasons for his resort to attempted political assassination, the attempt almost certainly didn’t serve his desired ends … and wouldn’t have even if he’d been successful.

This is not the part where I clutch my pearls about the evils of “political violence.” There’s no creature on Earth more violent than a politician, albeit usually at arm’s length and behind a wall of security to insulate him or her from negative consequences.

Politics IS violence, and I don’t see how shooting a politician is inherently any more immoral than, say, ordering the murder of an eight-year-old American girl (Nawar Anwar al-Awlaki) or the bombing of a school in Iran, both of which Trump himself bears responsibility for.

But it’s probably no LESS immoral, either.

I’m no pacifist. I fully support violence in immediate self-defense of one’s own life or the lives of innocent others, and you won’t find me shedding any tears for those who, having overseen and ordered non-defensive violence, eventually pay the ultimate price for their misdeeds.

BUT!

When considering an attempt to kill someone, even if the target arguably deserves to die, the likely consequences of one’s own actions are worth considering.

If Donald Trump — or any other president — dies at the hands of an assassin, two such consequences follow as night follows day.

First, that president becomes a martyr. His party and/or movement become stronger, not weaker. Some of the things he or she was trying to accomplish become far more likely to happen through a process of lionization and memorialization. The assassination of John F. Kennedy arguably resulted in (to name two big things) passage of the Civil Rights Act and the moon landing. Both things might have happened anyway, but his death put them on rails.

Second, the regime that president led opportunistically uses the assassination to expand its police and surveillance powers, and clamp down on dissent. Especially the varieties of dissent associated with the assassin’s persona.

If you happen to be “anti-Trump,” the LAST thing you should want is for him to die violently in office.

Or, for that matter, even non-violently. If he has a perfectly ordinary fatal coronary tomorrow, he’ll still get the “martyr effect” (and a certain sub-set of his supporters will forever suspect foul play regardless of the evidence).

Absent  revolution, which seems unlikely in this country and at this time, taking out figurehead politicians empowers rather than enervates their supporters, cronies, and hangers-on.

Don’t like Trump, personally or politically? Your best bet is to persuade others to agree with you and start building sentiment and  infrastructure for better times …  then wait him out. His time will come without your violent assistance.

Thomas L. Knapp (X: @thomaslknapp | Bluesky: @knappster.bsky.social | Mastodon: @knappster) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY

On April 21, a majority of Virginia voters said “yes” to a ballot measure allowing the state’s US House districts to be redrawn for the benefit of the Democratic Party.

The next day, a judge banned certification of the election results, calling the ballot language “flagrantly misleading” and asserting that state legislators didn’t follow relevant rules in putting the measure on the ballot.

Virginia is the latest battleground in a centuries-long war to “gerrymander” legislative districts such that the party in power at the moment retains an advantage in future elections by drawing those districts to minimize the number of seats its opposing party can plausibly win.

This year, the war escalated from decades of World War 1 style “dig in, the line moves a few yards this way or that every decade” to dual blitzkriegs. Texas Republicans decided to re-gerrymander their House delegation, California Democrats followed suit, and we’ve seen a nationwide domino effect as the two “major” American political parties duel for advantage in the upcoming midterms.

Normally, redistricting occur every ten years, in years ending in “1,” for the perfectly good reason that seats are apportioned to states by the US Census, which is taken every ten years, in years ending in “0.” But there’s nothing in the US Constitution or federal law to prevent additional re-gerrymandering in between. Republicans thought they saw opportunity, and Democrats reacted in kind.

But just as the Constitution doesn’t forbid mid-decade redistricting, it also doesn’t require “districts” at all, and in the early republic different states did things different ways.  Mandatory districts are a product of various, arguably unconstitutional, federal laws, the latest being the Uniform Congressional District Act of 1967.

The absolute BEST way to end the gerrymander wars would be to abolish Congress (and the rest of the US government). I’m all for it, but I sense I’m in the minority on that suggestion.

There’s an easier — or at least simpler — way to get it done, while still catering to the fantasy that it’s possible for a politician to “represent” the rights and interests of the diverse populations who elect him or her. It’s a two-step process:

First, Congress repeals the Uniform Congressional District Act.

Second, each state goes from “single-member district” elections to “at-large statewide” elections with Ranked Choice Voting.

For example, Florida has 28 seats in the House. At the moment, the districts are gerrymandered such that 20 (71.4%) of those seats are held by Republicans and 8 (29.6%) by Democrats, despite the fact that Republicans constitute only 41.3% of registered voters to 30.2% for Democrats (the rest of the electorate claims “no party affiliation” or “minor” party affiliation).

Electing all 28 seats “at large” would end the ability to gerrymander a 70-30 representation split on a 4-3 party differential simply by virtue of happening to hold power when the gerrymandering occurs.

One problem, of course, is that without Ranked Choice Voting, one party could plausibly end up with all 28 seats because of minor advantages in voter affiliation.

Ranked Choice Voting would reduce that likelihood by using voters’ second choices to eliminate the candidates with the fewest votes. It still probably wouldn’t produce outcomes that fully align with declared party preference percentages, but it WOULD elect the specific candidates liked the most by the most voters.

Heck, we might even see some “minor party” candidates — Libertarian, Reform, Forward, etc. — win seats with high “second choice” ratings.

Another supposed problem is that candidates would have to conduct statewide campaigns. They’d have to reach, and successfully appeal to, voters further from where they live. I don’t consider that a problem. This isn’t 1789. It doesn’t take two weeks to cross a state physically. In fact, via broadcast and digital media, campaign communications are instant.

Those outcomes, though, aren’t really the point. The point is to remove one costly and contentious element —  constant redistricting fights — from the equation, producing “more democratic” outcomes.

Since I couldn’t care less whether the Republican or Democratic faction of the single state-approved party wins elections, what’s in it for me? Reduced annoyance and increased clarity. I prefer to see the “best version” of democracy given its chance so that when it fails too, others might finally give up on that fairy tale and start looking seriously at alternatives to political government.

Thomas L. Knapp (X: @thomaslknapp | Bluesky: @knappster.bsky.social | Mastodon: @knappster) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY

“The longest government shutdown in US history!”

Apart from perfunctory stories about failed congressional votes to end it, that’s really all you’re hearing right now from mainstream media lately about the partial “shutdown” of the US Department of Homeland Security.

Wow! More than two months! Headed for three! It’s starting to sound like auctioneer patter: “Two, three, can I getta four, four, who’s bidding four, I’m looking for four …”

OK, so it’s dragging on. And on. And on.

But is there really anything else to notice about it? Anything that rises to the level of “news?”

Yes and no.

That is, yes, there’s something else newsworthy about it, which is that there’s really not much to notice about it.

For a little while, politicians managed to hype the negative effects of the “shutdown” by annoying air travelers.

Airport “security” gropers and oglers were “forced” to work without pay (scare quotes because they were always free to quit and go find productive jobs in the private sector), instead of getting sent home, permanently, so that airports and airlines could provide cheaper, more effective, and less annoying private-sector “security screening.”

After politicians figured out that taxpayers were even MORE annoyed  by having to wait in line longer to get felt up and hear orders barked at them, US president Donald Trump invented a workaround and the paychecks started arriving again.

Better for air travelers, worse for the claim that the “shutdown” portends apocalypse.

What we HAVEN’T seen is any noticeable uptick in  threats to the “security” of the “homeland.”

No hijackings.

No bombings.

No “national security” related hostage situations.

Just life, as usual, minus paying out big bucks for a useless bureaucracy that we got along just fine without from 1789 through 2002 … and can clearly get along just fine without now.

Even starting a war with Iran wasn’t enough to give DHS anything visibly productive to do. Political and media hysteria over supposed “Iranian sleeper cells” quickly dissipated after it turned out that those cells either don’t exist or didn’t set their alarm clocks.

Any sane policy discussion, at this point, should center around how quickly DHS can be defunded permanently and abolished entirely.

My more politically astute friends tell me that “there just aren’t enough votes in Congress to pass that kind of bill.”

But there aren’t enough votes in Congress to fund DHS either.

I guess that will have to be good enough.

Thomas L. Knapp (X: @thomaslknapp | Bluesky: @knappster.bsky.social | Mastodon: @knappster) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

PUBLICATION/CITATION HISTORY