The horrifying attack on Paul Pelosi is an attack on democracy

Meridian ID

Description

America is now a nation where acts of political violence by MAGA Maggots are so predictable that for months before an assailant broke into the San Francisco home of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and attacked her husband, Paul Pelosi, on Friday, experts have warned such an incident was likely. Two counterterrorism experts at Georgetown wrote that “with a midterm around the corner, a former president under investigation, and major upheavals occurring on hot-button issues such as abortion and gun control, extremists inclined to violence will be increasingly likely to lash out.” Occasional political violence across the ideological spectrum is as old as America itself. What’s different now is the frequency. In the five years after Trump was elected president in 2016, recorded threats against members of Congress rose more than tenfold, to 9,625 in 2021, according to a New York Times analysis of figures from the Capitol Police. Republicans who believe that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump and that Joe Biden is an illegitimate president are substantially more likely than other Americans to believe that violence is justified to advance political objectives. They are more likely to hold extreme and racist beliefs, to endorse political violence, to see such violence as likely to occur, and to predict that they will be armed under circumstances in which they consider political violence to be justified. This trend is a stain on the nation and something leaders of all kinds — political, religious, community and cultural — must work to reverse. Violence against public officials and their families is the mark of an undemocratic society.