They say a picture is worth a thousand words, this one may be worth millions of votes and the Presidency of the United States. As President Donald Trump raised his fist to the crowd, blood cascading down his ear, the election was won.
Not since an attempt on Ronald Reagan in 1981 has an assassination attempt been made on a President, and never before in an age of social media will an image be so seared into Americas consciousness. Questions will undoubtedly be asked of the proficiency of the secret service; many videos are emerging that seem to show the crowd noticing the gunman before the secret service. The gunman, a 20-year-old Republican named Thomas Matthew Crooks from Pennsylvania, the state in which the shooting took place, lies dead. The FBI has said Crooks acted alone but bomb-making materials were found in his car and home. We may never know his motives.
In a fractured country, a country whose politics seems driven by the flames of hate and division, fanned, and profited on by Donald Trump, those shots will resonate throughout the world. For those on the right of American politics, those who argue that the election in 2020 was stolen, those who attempted an insurrection on January the 6th, this will feel like a vindication of all of their fears and conspiracies.
America is broken, the facade of peace and democracy in the country have finally been smashed. Violence is back on the political menu after 43 years. Never before in modern political history has the country been so polarised, and never before has the choice of President appeared so dystopian. On the one hand, Trump, a convicted felon, and on the other, Biden, a man who with each passing day appears more and more unwell.
The stakes could not be higher, gone are the heady days of the 1990’s and 2000’s where American hegemony was unquestioned and unchallenged. In the East, authoritarianism rules the roost, China continues their march unimpeded to global economic superiority. In the West, Europe is tearing itself apart, disillusioned with the European project and unwilling to fund Ukraine’s defence against Putin’s aggression. In the Middle East, the blood of Gaza’s children continues to wash across the streets of Palestine and Israel continues to move further into the place of a pariah.
It has been said that the Presidential debate between Biden and Trump felt like the fall of the Roman Empire, a hallow admission that this once great nation, the greatest nation that has ever existed, was crumbling. Much comment has been made of Chinese or Russian attempts to destabilise America, last night proved they need not bother. America is at war with itself, it has been a Cold War for some time, last night the first shots were fired.
Since Charlottesville in 2017, where White Supremacists violently opposed Black Lives Matter protesters it has been evident that an anger and resentment has been bubbling below the surface. Thomas Matthew Crooks has brought these feelings into the light, the disillusionment of American people can be ignored no longer. Even the most skilled political operator, a Lincoln, a Kennedy, or an Obama would struggle to mend the divisions in this country, and so one must wonder how either Trump or Biden could ever hope to improve this country’s reputation and trajectory.
Saturday's shooting was as shocking as it was representative of a deeper political problem in America, a problem which goes beyond Trump and Biden, a problem which has been imbedded in debates around Civil War Statues, States Rights and Abortion, America is no longer a collection of United States, each state wants and desires drastically different ways of life. The wants of the coastal metropolitan areas of Los Angeles and New York are wholly incomparable to the desires of the South and Midwestern states.
Yesterday was a dark day for America, the world and democracy.
Image: Takayuki Fuchigami / Associated Press / Alamy Stock Photo
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