Violence is Not the Only Way

I recently wrote a piece on how violence de is the only way. Given our current path, I foresee a lot of national pain. To be blunt, people will die. Why? At least one of the two major parties is not punishing extremists in the ranks. Why? The leadership fears two things: Donald J. Trump and the Republican political base. Both are symptoms of a very radicalized segment of the population thriving in grievance politics. The problem is that sooner or later grievance leads to violence.

The other party has fewer extremists. It does not reward the behavior, but it is still not able to completely reduce the violent talk from its base. Both partisan bases see the other as the enemy, to be destroyed completely and banished since they are un-American. While one party is more willing to use violence at the moment, this does not mean the other is less likely to use violence in the future.

We know we are in this dangerous dynamic because all violent incidents are now seen through those partisan eyes. We saw the dynamic recently with what looks like a tragic police pursuit, that ended in the fleeing suspect driving through a parade. The first-order cause for that was a long rap sheet and domestic abuse. Yes, the person behind the wheel will be going away for a lifetime, rightly so. But both sides tried to make political hash out of this tragedy, through their own biases. They both…