As you now well know, at 6:11 p.m. on Saturday evening, shots rang out at a Trump rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. One person, a 50-year-old man named Cory Comperatore, was killed. Two others, David Dutch and James Copenhaver, were gravely injured. Trump’s ear was grazed by a bullet.
Before the 45th president was whisked away by Secret Service, he emerged defiant with his fist pumping in the air, blood on his ear and face. “Fight! Fight! Fight!” he yelled at the crowd, to which they chanted back: “USA! USA! USA!”
As we would later learn, one of the bullets pierced the top of Trump’s right ear, flying just a hair’s breadth away from his head. One inch. One inch and we would be having a very different conversation. As Niall Ferguson wrote in The Free Press:
“An inch or two further to the left and the bullet that grazed Donald Trump’s ear would have penetrated his skull and very likely killed him. A slight gust of wind, a tremor of the assassin’s hand, an unexpected move by the former president—for whatever tiny reason, Trump lived to fight another day.”
Saturday’s attempted assassination has already shifted the course of this election. How will it shape our politics and our country? And was this violence the inevitable outcome of our painfully divided country, and who is responsible for those divisions?
Those are the subjects of today’s episode. This is an episode in two parts.
The first part is about the unspeakable events that took place on Saturday. Then in the second half, you’ll hear our initial conversation that took place last week about political brokenness, the crisis of trust between the American people and our elected officials—and how to fix it with some help from the Constitution. In light of what happened over the weekend, it feels even more poignant.
The guest in both halves of this episode is Yuval Levin, one of the greatest political analysts and explainers of our time.
Yuval has even been called the “the most important voice in the political culture.” He worked on domestic policy in the George W. Bush administration. He’s now a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, where he studies Congress, the presidency, the courts, the Constitution, and American political life.
He’s the author of several books including The Fractured Republic and A Time to Build. And he just published American Covenant: How the Constitution Unified Our Nation—and Could Again. It gives us a road map to how the Constitution can bring the country together to solve our political troubles.
What I particularly love about Yuval is that when everyone around us seems to be taking the black pill, Yuval is clear-eyed. He’s neither optimistic nor pessimistic. Yuval is just realistic, informed by a deep sense of American history that gives him a perspective on what’s happening now while motivated by a true love for this country.
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Great interview here. But Levin did refer to Fauci as a "great scientist..."
No. He's not. And you'd be hard-pressed to take any examples from the past 4 years, and even the AIDS years, and run the data and prove that he is. He's a politician, and he's in bed with pharma. He was dangerous in the 80's, and he's dangerous now.
I think the part of the conversation about how politicians lie was interesting but missed some obvious points. I think at the heart of the lies, oftentimes, is a contempt for the average American. For example, the thought process is "I think most Americans are bigots and so if I say I am for gay marriage, I won't get elected and therefore I won't have my opportunity to do the right thing and pass and promote gay marriage". So when asked "are you for gay marriage" they said "no". That was a lie and they had the opportunity to tell the truth and give their argument as to why they believed that, but instead they lied to get the job and they did what they wanted. If you don't like the gay marriage argument, then substitute any other one - how about how Obamacare is not a tax. Well the minute it was constitutionally challenged it was argued by the left's own attorneys that it was constitutionally allowable as a tax. This is contempt for the American people and it subsequent disingenuousness is the engine behind the "noble lie" narrative. "It's okay that I lie, because I am smarter, more educated, more cultured, and my vision is the correct vision. Americans are chaotic bumpkins and so they need to be lead to the correct outcome" This obvious contempt for the average American and their values (which include a lot of conservative values) is what is behind the "populist" resentment that is discussed here.
Trust is a two-way street. The leaders have to trust the American people for any trust in the institutions to work. Take the time and make your arguments as clearly as you can.
Even in this discussion, which I thought overall was a fantastic, productive conversation, Mr. Levin says that it is "irresponsible to vote for Donald Trump". That is totally untrue - even when you acknowledge some of the things Trump did wrong in his first term (I think that this is a great summary to start with by the way https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/553984-feehery-6-positive-things-about-the-trump-years-and-6-bad-things/) there are things that he clearly got right. That is the same for any president that has served. So what makes voting for Donald Trump "irresponsible" but voting for Biden in 2020, not? Is it just that Mr. Levin doesn't like him? Make an argument, not a statement.