I bet you anything this was faked by his handlers. Trump has been no more coherent than Biden at a couple of recent public appearances. He wasn’t hurt, but now he has a perfect excuse to cancel events and escape scrutiny.
Don’t say things in the heat of the moment that might embarrass you later. There seems to be an attendee who suffered serious harm. Now is the time to pray everybody is alive and not badly wounded.
It’s impossible to be an American and not have a strong response to the images of a bloodied former president still pumping his fist defiantly as the Secret Service tries to drag him away.
…and if the sharp-eyed photoclippers aren’t using photoshop, it looks like two of those shots hit Trump, but he was apparently wearing a bulletproof vest? So maybe just the one casualty, thank God. One’s bad enough.
I’m weirdly proud of my redneck peeps there– whole group of them along the back row and elsewhere never did duck and cover, they were looking for the shooter.
I visited Fatima today, and had a wonderful day. Then, my husband texted me the news. By the way, today was 107th anniversary of the 3rd apparition of Our Lady in Fatima, which happened on July 13, 2017. This is the apparition where the children received the secrets and a call to penance. You can read about it here: https://www.fatima.pt/en/pages/narrative-of-the-apparitions- Make of this coincidence what you will.
Thank you! It really was a special experience. I was in Portugal for work, not super-close to Fatima (too far for taxi/uber or public transport), but I was able to arrange a private tour to get me there. It turned out the driver who took me to Fatima goes there often (both privately with his family and with tourists), which was helpful and he kindly extended the time I was supposed to be there by about three hours. I visited the houses of the children, met a niece of the two of them (Jacinta and Francisco) whose family still owns the house where they used to live, went to the site of the apparition of the angel and of course, went to where the Virgin apparition site is with the two Basilicas. I was able to go to confession, attend the mass there, pray the rosary, and participate in the procession. I was able to see more and do more than I expected in a single afternoon. It was a very special gift (God is a generous Father), and I am very grateful for it.
Everybody on Israeli and Russian-speaking blogs I follow says Trump won this election.
A correct take, imo:
If he really wanted to stop Trump, he would have been better off shooting Biden. A normal Democratic candidate would solve the problem.
Another reaction:
Also, great NRA commercial. More guns available for crazy people, what can go wrong! Jeez…
I love how conservative commentators immediately started blaming democrats for “fearmongering” that Trump will be the end of democracy. Apparently fearmongering and hate speech could have violent consequences. Who would have thought! All these years of Trump’s hate speech and journalists begging him to stop because he put their lives in danger, but he only laughed.
Anyway, none of this matters now. He just won a lottery ticket on all accounts.
Trump was winning before the shooting, too. He was leading in 7 out of 7 swing states.
Regarding fear mongering. You are not in the US, so you don’t have a way to know. It’s wall-to-wall hate-mongering for almost a decade. He’s a Hitler! He’ll genocide everybody! If he’s really a Hitler, doesn’t it make sense to stop him before he murders millions? It was inevitable that some psycho would be taken in by the rhetoric.
I’m not sure. My sibling just moved to central NY. Says there are Trump signs everywhere, but not a single Biden sign in sight, even in the nearby college town. Obviously the population dynamics there are such that NYC outweighs everybody else in the state. But it’s not culturally homogenous and quite a lot of people have some negative feelings about their newly imported neighbors. Even in the cities.
Is it enough to make a dent in the state numbers? Probably not. Total fantasy? Maybe, maybe not?
#BREAKING: Pennsylvania voter registration records show Thomas Matthew Crooks, 20, is a registered Republican. Crooks has been identified by law enforcement sources as the shooter who attempted to assassinate former President Trump at a rally on Saturday. pic.twitter.com/PFdnLgiLyY
The people who have been pushing this must be held to account. Fired. Blackballed. Ostracized. Stripped of their titles. Pushed into bankruptcy. They should never work in this business again. pic.twitter.com/y4SjfPojW2
— Christopher F. Rufo ⚔️ (@realchrisrufo) July 14, 2024
Yes, this kind of thing. From every device, every publication, for years. If the shooter is 20, he must have heard this for half his life. Is it strange that it finally made an impression?
What’s really disturbing is that photos of two completely innocent people are being spread around the world as an image of the shooter. Completely irresponsible and stupid.
Mr Smith was listening from outside the rally and said he saw the gunman around five minutes into Trump’s speech.
“We noticed the guy bear-crawling up the roof of the building beside us, 50ft away,” he said. “He had a rifle, we could clearly see a rifle.
“We’re pointing at him, the police are down there running around on the ground, we’re like ‘Hey man, there’s a guy on the roof with a rifle’… and the police did not know what was going on.”
Mr Smith said he tried to alert the authorities for three to four minutes, but thought they probably could not see the gunman because of the slope of the roof.
“Why is there not Secret Service on all of these roofs here?” he asked. “This is not a big place. “[It’s a] security failure, 100% security failure.”
There’s other spectator video out there now, where you can hear multiple people shouting “he’s got a gun!” before any shots were even fired. Several bystanders spotted him, but not security.
Secret Service agent (meant to protect the POTUS) is so panicked she can't holster her own gun.
Meanwhile Trump is posing after taking an attempted assassin's shot to his head. pic.twitter.com/osqcoW9UMy
— Blockchain Supply Issues (@HalfAcreBTCFarm) July 13, 2024
Donald Trump is 6'2"
That he would be assigned not one, but TWO female Secret Service agents is a travesty. The agents should all be the same height or taller as the principal they need to protect https://t.co/lkYrhrAdIB
Sorry, do not know about numbers in previous eras, but such high status positions would always have had many enforcement applicants. Current Social Security Director Kimberly Cheatle was sworn in by Biden in 2022 and publicly has set a goal of achieving 30% female recruits by 2030. At least one of the observed female agents not only knew her job but had the guts to attempt to shield Trump with her own body, the others???
Like everybody else on the internet has wondered by now: how did they leave an unsecured rooftop that close? He’s clearly got security people on the nearest rooftop. Rifle-shooting distance isn’t a big mystery. How’d they miss that?
Diagram of the assassination attempt on President Trump in Pennsylvania on July 13, 2024. The Sniper, Thomas Matthew Crooks, was located on an unguarded building 130 yards away from the president with a clear line of sight. pic.twitter.com/8YPuCk0ZTT
I’ve seen an extraordinary number of people on social media claim that the assassination attempt was staged because none of the people standing behind Trump suffered. Even though it was known within moments that there were civilian casualties.
People just can’t step into reality from their imaginings.
Oi. They’re just puzzled because so many of them didn’t duck. Because they’re not cowards. They can’t imagine themselves behaving in such a way, in a real shooting situation. Does not compute: must be fake, right?
Wouldn’t be at all surprised to find that there was considerable malign negligence on the security side, with some higher-ups at least casually toying with the idea that if they short the guard detail and leave it mostly up to local rural cops with no training, somebody’d be bound to to take a shot at him eventually. All while maintaining plausible deniability because “budgets”, “staffing”, etc.
A blogger I follow started quoting interesting excerpts from his book “The End of the World Is Just the Beginning: Mapping the Collapse of Globalization: The Collapse of Globalization and Its Aftermath” (2022).
Interesting speaker and the type with a thousand data points in his head at all times…. but there are some weaknesses. He’s a rational westerner and always tries to find rational western motivations. At least he realizes the Ukraine invasion is not about NATO but he underplays the role of imperial ideology. He claims that the strategic goal isn’t Ukraine at all but the Bessarabian and Polish gaps which happen to lie on the opposite side of Ukraine (along with the Baltic coast and some places in the Caucasus and Central Asia that the USSR controlled but russia doesn’t).
He also claims China is on the verge of societal demographic collapse (decades of the one child policy coming home to roost) and thinks Israel is in long term trouble as well since the fastest growing demographic are the conservative orthodox who don’t contribute much economically or defensively to the country.
Cliff, do you disagree with his take on China and Israel?
Don’t know about China.
Still have hope the numbers of conservative orthodox serving in IDF and working will grow. Of course, this welcome change wouldn’t prevent Israel from becoming more religious, even more Right wing and , well, less like me in other ways.
“do you disagree with his take on China and Israel?”
I don’t know enough about either to say much intelligent. I have had close contact with a group of Chinese students (50/50 male/female) and none of them seem interested in marriage or family and the big trend among their age peers is apparently ‘breaking the relation’ (cutting off contact with family members who ask prying questions and who aren’t satisfied with vague diplomatic answers….).
Nothing I’m hearing about the Chinese economy is good and the country is being run by the worst leader since Mao… (saying something) who’s undone decades of slow economic and social progress and only promises more.
I know a lot less about Israel but IINM there are other problems (many stemming from Neanyahu’s death grip on power)
I think the EU expansion is much more important than the NATO expansion. Russia’s former colonies, most notably Poland, have benefitted enormously economically by ditching Russia and joining the EU. They are clearly losing what’s left of their empire. Personally, I would say what’s best for Russia is if they were to join the EU.
“what’s best for Russia is if they were to join the EU”
Not remotely possible at present…. and even if the government and public were remotely at the levels they need to be the public would hate the EU.
Humiliation plays a large role in the collective national psyche… many thought of the former russian relationship with the West of making massive amounts of money through sell gas and oil as deeply humiliating…. they are world conquerors, not burgeois shopkeepers! Their present economic hardships and massive loss of life are small prices to pay for a sense that they’re an imperial great power…. it’s not something modern minds are very able to understand but…. that’s what it is.
Maybe they aren’t familiar with the right empires. The British and Dutch empires were largely built by their respective East India companies, and the US flag has a suspicious resemblance to the British East India Company flag.
Selling natural resources is a standard third world economy. It’s not surprising that Russians would consider it humiliating that that is all they have to offer to the world.
So … ever stayed in a hotel where the US President chose to have a lively afternoon press gathering?
Back during the Bush I regime, I made the mistake of doing just that.
Among the restrictions: couldn’t leave by vehicle, couldn’t go to the roof, could not dine at the restaurant except by room service, could not go to adjacent office buildings (as they were on lockdown), could not wander about in general, and your only way out was into an attached shopping mall whereupon entering you couldn’t get back in the hotel until Shrub the Elder fucked off back down the road.
And then you were trapped in the mall rather than the hotel, of course.
All of this security was put in place by the US Secret Service in conjunction with the State Police with a level of thoroughness that was clearly planned to the most minute detail.
The idea that some shooter could get within less than 200 metres of Donald Trump speaks volumes as to the severe punishments that are thoroughly deserved by that Secret Service detail, their supervisors, and so far up the command chain that the command chain has to salute itself.
I read today on some American blog that there is a huge difference between the level of security provided to the US President vs. the protection of presidential candidates.
So what you describe and Trump’s shooting can both be seen as unsurprising.
The front steps of my office building were used in 2020 for Ovama stumping for Biden. My coworkers who went to the rally filmed snipers on the roofs of the surrounding buildings. That the shooter, and not the security detail, was on a roof goes against what I’ve seen for a former president’s security detail.
So…. this stage of US degeneration to third world status is kind of irritating and depressing… can we just fast forward to the stage where politicians fist fight each other during debates that are moderated by big-boobed women in miniskirts while dwarves dressed as bees run around engaging in zany antics and spraying seltzer at the crowd?
I bet you anything this was faked by his handlers. Trump has been no more coherent than Biden at a couple of recent public appearances. He wasn’t hurt, but now he has a perfect excuse to cancel events and escape scrutiny.
LikeLike
Don’t say things in the heat of the moment that might embarrass you later. There seems to be an attendee who suffered serious harm. Now is the time to pray everybody is alive and not badly wounded.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Don
LikeLike
Don’t be yourself a conspiracist
LikeLike
Well dang, I go to evening vespers and miss all the news!
LikeLiked by 2 people
https://x.com/SeanDKennedy/status/1812264767547199516?t=AvAC1999gRWn-LGobQQTRg&s=19
LikeLiked by 1 person
It’s impossible to be an American and not have a strong response to the images of a bloodied former president still pumping his fist defiantly as the Secret Service tries to drag him away.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Dude couldn’t’ve bought better publicity.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Trump has always understood that a leader needs to project strength. Never been clearer than this moment.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Extraordinary political instincts.
And serious balls.
LikeLike
How long ago was all this? How many people were hit? All I’m seeing so far is 1 dead other than the shooter.
LikeLiked by 1 person
…and I counted at least five shots before it sounded like return fire, with a dense crowd 😦
LikeLike
nope, three. there’s an echo.
LikeLike
…and if the sharp-eyed photoclippers aren’t using photoshop, it looks like two of those shots hit Trump, but he was apparently wearing a bulletproof vest? So maybe just the one casualty, thank God. One’s bad enough.
I’m weirdly proud of my redneck peeps there– whole group of them along the back row and elsewhere never did duck and cover, they were looking for the shooter.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I think one dead and one seriously injured.
Will we be told who the shooter was? I heard the FBI took over, which isn’t making me hopeful.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Already rumors flying about a Chinese national. But who knows?
LikeLiked by 1 person
I heard the Chinese are already selling souvenir T-shirts.
https://newsable.asianetnews.com/world/trump-lives-cant-be-killed-more-t-shirts-go-on-sale-just-hours-after-assassination-bid-see-pics-vkp-sglx2e
LikeLike
https://thebeltwayreport.com/2024/07/breaking-assassination-attempt-on-president-trump-trump-bleeding-from-head-video/
From that article:
“The shooter, identified as a Chinese national, was reportedly in a sniper position hundreds of yards away from Trump’s podium. ”
(doesn’t say *who* identified him as a Chinese national though)
And this dude:
https://x.com/Mrgunsngear/status/1812273738823745712
claims to be an eyewitness from beside the building.
LikeLike
It’s sad that Trump’s reaction is faster and more appropriate than that of the Secret Service. Extraordinary unprofessionalism on their part.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I visited Fatima today, and had a wonderful day. Then, my husband texted me the news. By the way, today was 107th anniversary of the 3rd apparition of Our Lady in Fatima, which happened on July 13, 2017. This is the apparition where the children received the secrets and a call to penance. You can read about it here: https://www.fatima.pt/en/pages/narrative-of-the-apparitions- Make of this coincidence what you will.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’ve been to Fatima! It’s an incredible experience. I’m so happy you could go.
My visit to Fatima was in 2001 (23 years ago), and I still drive with their rosary on my rearview mirror.
LikeLike
Thank you! It really was a special experience. I was in Portugal for work, not super-close to Fatima (too far for taxi/uber or public transport), but I was able to arrange a private tour to get me there. It turned out the driver who took me to Fatima goes there often (both privately with his family and with tourists), which was helpful and he kindly extended the time I was supposed to be there by about three hours. I visited the houses of the children, met a niece of the two of them (Jacinta and Francisco) whose family still owns the house where they used to live, went to the site of the apparition of the angel and of course, went to where the Virgin apparition site is with the two Basilicas. I was able to go to confession, attend the mass there, pray the rosary, and participate in the procession. I was able to see more and do more than I expected in a single afternoon. It was a very special gift (God is a generous Father), and I am very grateful for it.
LikeLiked by 1 person
The reply was from me… to avoid confusion with all the anons.
LikeLike
Everybody on Israeli and Russian-speaking blogs I follow says Trump won this election.
A correct take, imo:
Another reaction:
LikeLiked by 1 person
Trump was winning before the shooting, too. He was leading in 7 out of 7 swing states.
Regarding fear mongering. You are not in the US, so you don’t have a way to know. It’s wall-to-wall hate-mongering for almost a decade. He’s a Hitler! He’ll genocide everybody! If he’s really a Hitler, doesn’t it make sense to stop him before he murders millions? It was inevitable that some psycho would be taken in by the rhetoric.
LikeLike
Apparently NY had just become a swing state…
LikeLike
I strongly believe it’s a fantasy. NY and CA are deep deep blue. Especially now that they’ve been inundated with migrants. But even without them.
LikeLike
I’m not sure. My sibling just moved to central NY. Says there are Trump signs everywhere, but not a single Biden sign in sight, even in the nearby college town. Obviously the population dynamics there are such that NYC outweighs everybody else in the state. But it’s not culturally homogenous and quite a lot of people have some negative feelings about their newly imported neighbors. Even in the cities.
Is it enough to make a dent in the state numbers? Probably not. Total fantasy? Maybe, maybe not?
LikeLike
LikeLike
This video made me so emotional.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I watched many times. It’s humanly impossible not to admire this moment.
LikeLiked by 2 people
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yes, this kind of thing. From every device, every publication, for years. If the shooter is 20, he must have heard this for half his life. Is it strange that it finally made an impression?
LikeLike
Depicting Trump in words and images as a fascist or a revenant Hitler is vile and pusillanimous.
LikeLiked by 1 person
What’s really disturbing is that photos of two completely innocent people are being spread around the world as an image of the shooter. Completely irresponsible and stupid.
LikeLike
Via:
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cn4v7v2g5l1o
LikeLiked by 2 people
There’s other spectator video out there now, where you can hear multiple people shouting “he’s got a gun!” before any shots were even fired. Several bystanders spotted him, but not security.
LikeLiked by 1 person
DEI or something more nefarious?
LikeLiked by 2 people
There is at least four female secret service agents visible there, not surprising because the Directer herself is a DEI.
LikeLiked by 1 person
It would be interesting to know when they were hired because there was no pause on such hirings during the Trump administration that I know of.
Would love to be proven wrong.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Sorry, do not know about numbers in previous eras, but such high status positions would always have had many enforcement applicants. Current Social Security Director Kimberly Cheatle was sworn in by Biden in 2022 and publicly has set a goal of achieving 30% female recruits by 2030. At least one of the observed female agents not only knew her job but had the guts to attempt to shield Trump with her own body, the others???
LikeLiked by 1 person
Two FEMALE Secret Service agents: go figure…
LikeLike
Like everybody else on the internet has wondered by now: how did they leave an unsecured rooftop that close? He’s clearly got security people on the nearest rooftop. Rifle-shooting distance isn’t a big mystery. How’d they miss that?
LikeLiked by 2 people
LikeLiked by 2 people
I’ve seen an extraordinary number of people on social media claim that the assassination attempt was staged because none of the people standing behind Trump suffered. Even though it was known within moments that there were civilian casualties.
People just can’t step into reality from their imaginings.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Oi. They’re just puzzled because so many of them didn’t duck. Because they’re not cowards. They can’t imagine themselves behaving in such a way, in a real shooting situation. Does not compute: must be fake, right?
Wouldn’t be at all surprised to find that there was considerable malign negligence on the security side, with some higher-ups at least casually toying with the idea that if they short the guard detail and leave it mostly up to local rural cops with no training, somebody’d be bound to to take a shot at him eventually. All while maintaining plausible deniability because “budgets”, “staffing”, etc.
LikeLiked by 1 person
That about sums it up.
LikeLike
Have you heard of Питер Зейхан Peter Zeihan ?
A blogger I follow started quoting interesting excerpts from his book “The End of the World Is Just the Beginning: Mapping the Collapse of Globalization: The Collapse of Globalization and Its Aftermath” (2022).
For instance, почему в Венгрии утвердился автократический режим.
Or как будет выглядеть многополярный и деглобализированный мир.
LikeLike
“Peter Zeihan”
Interesting speaker and the type with a thousand data points in his head at all times…. but there are some weaknesses. He’s a rational westerner and always tries to find rational western motivations. At least he realizes the Ukraine invasion is not about NATO but he underplays the role of imperial ideology. He claims that the strategic goal isn’t Ukraine at all but the Bessarabian and Polish gaps which happen to lie on the opposite side of Ukraine (along with the Baltic coast and some places in the Caucasus and Central Asia that the USSR controlled but russia doesn’t).
He also claims China is on the verge of societal demographic collapse (decades of the one child policy coming home to roost) and thinks Israel is in long term trouble as well since the fastest growing demographic are the conservative orthodox who don’t contribute much economically or defensively to the country.
His twitter feed is worth following:
https://x.com/PeterZeihan
LikeLiked by 1 person
Cliff, do you disagree with his take on China and Israel?
Don’t know about China.
Still have hope the numbers of conservative orthodox serving in IDF and working will grow. Of course, this welcome change wouldn’t prevent Israel from becoming more religious, even more Right wing and , well, less like me in other ways.
LikeLike
“do you disagree with his take on China and Israel?”
I don’t know enough about either to say much intelligent. I have had close contact with a group of Chinese students (50/50 male/female) and none of them seem interested in marriage or family and the big trend among their age peers is apparently ‘breaking the relation’ (cutting off contact with family members who ask prying questions and who aren’t satisfied with vague diplomatic answers….).
Nothing I’m hearing about the Chinese economy is good and the country is being run by the worst leader since Mao… (saying something) who’s undone decades of slow economic and social progress and only promises more.
I know a lot less about Israel but IINM there are other problems (many stemming from Neanyahu’s death grip on power)
LikeLiked by 1 person
I think the EU expansion is much more important than the NATO expansion. Russia’s former colonies, most notably Poland, have benefitted enormously economically by ditching Russia and joining the EU. They are clearly losing what’s left of their empire. Personally, I would say what’s best for Russia is if they were to join the EU.
LikeLike
“what’s best for Russia is if they were to join the EU”
Not remotely possible at present…. and even if the government and public were remotely at the levels they need to be the public would hate the EU.
Humiliation plays a large role in the collective national psyche… many thought of the former russian relationship with the West of making massive amounts of money through sell gas and oil as deeply humiliating…. they are world conquerors, not burgeois shopkeepers! Their present economic hardships and massive loss of life are small prices to pay for a sense that they’re an imperial great power…. it’s not something modern minds are very able to understand but…. that’s what it is.
LikeLike
Maybe they aren’t familiar with the right empires. The British and Dutch empires were largely built by their respective East India companies, and the US flag has a suspicious resemblance to the British East India Company flag.
LikeLike
Selling natural resources is a standard third world economy. It’s not surprising that Russians would consider it humiliating that that is all they have to offer to the world.
LikeLike
So … ever stayed in a hotel where the US President chose to have a lively afternoon press gathering?
Back during the Bush I regime, I made the mistake of doing just that.
Among the restrictions: couldn’t leave by vehicle, couldn’t go to the roof, could not dine at the restaurant except by room service, could not go to adjacent office buildings (as they were on lockdown), could not wander about in general, and your only way out was into an attached shopping mall whereupon entering you couldn’t get back in the hotel until Shrub the Elder fucked off back down the road.
And then you were trapped in the mall rather than the hotel, of course.
All of this security was put in place by the US Secret Service in conjunction with the State Police with a level of thoroughness that was clearly planned to the most minute detail.
The idea that some shooter could get within less than 200 metres of Donald Trump speaks volumes as to the severe punishments that are thoroughly deserved by that Secret Service detail, their supervisors, and so far up the command chain that the command chain has to salute itself.
Not buying this one fucking bit.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I read today on some American blog that there is a huge difference between the level of security provided to the US President vs. the protection of presidential candidates.
So what you describe and Trump’s shooting can both be seen as unsurprising.
LikeLiked by 1 person
The front steps of my office building were used in 2020 for Ovama stumping for Biden. My coworkers who went to the rally filmed snipers on the roofs of the surrounding buildings. That the shooter, and not the security detail, was on a roof goes against what I’ve seen for a former president’s security detail.
LikeLiked by 2 people
It is deeply bizarre, indeed, that some mental 20-yo managed to dupe the supposedly highly trained and experienced USSS officers.
I don’t think it’s a conspiracy but simply the exploding unprofessionalism in all government services.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Not just a candidate. *Ex* presidents get a security detail as well.
LikeLike
So…. this stage of US degeneration to third world status is kind of irritating and depressing… can we just fast forward to the stage where politicians fist fight each other during debates that are moderated by big-boobed women in miniskirts while dwarves dressed as bees run around engaging in zany antics and spraying seltzer at the crowd?
LikeLiked by 3 people
That would be *so* much better…
LikeLike
A lot more dignified at any rate….
LikeLiked by 2 people
It’d do wonders for viewership and ratings on the debates.
LikeLike
LikeLike