“The radicals on the right oftentimes are radical because they don't want to see crime,” Trump explained, as if systematic constitutional destruction and threats to militarize American cities represent merely vigorous opposition to petty theft. “They don't want you burning our shopping centers; they don't want you shooting our people in the middle of the street.” One can only admire the exquisite inversion: the man who posts AI-generated memes threatening military assault on Chicago now positions himself as the voice of peaceful law and order.
The cognitive dissonance required to maintain Trump's position would be impressive if it weren't so dangerous. The same movement that spent months minimizing January 6th as a minor disturbance, dismissing Charlottesville as isolated extremism, and spreading conspiracy theories about the assassination of Democratic legislators in Minnesota now presents itself as the victim of dangerous left-wing rhetoric following Charlie Kirk's murder.
But here's what makes the gaslighting particularly spectacular: Kirk himself spent years engaging in exactly the kind of rhetoric that Trump now claims is exclusively a left-wing problem. Kirk mocked the attack on Paul Pelosi, promoted conspiracy theories about the Minnesota legislative assassinations being false flag operations, and built his entire brand around the kind of eliminationist rhetoric that treats political opponents as existential enemies requiring destruction rather than fellow citizens requiring persuasion.
The man who made light of an elderly man being attacked with a hammer in his own home is now being martyred as a victim of the very political toxicity he helped create and amplify. The irony would be delicious if it weren't soaked in blood.
Trump's justification of right-wing extremism—"they're radical because they don't want to see crime"—represents the classic authoritarian move of treating systematic constitutional destruction as law enforcement, military deployment against cities as crime prevention, and elimination of democratic constraints as necessary security measures. When your definition of "crime" includes democratic opposition to authoritarian rule, then opposing crime becomes indistinguishable from supporting authoritarianism.
This is how authoritarians eliminate moral categories: by redefining violence as peace, oppression as liberation, and systematic criminality as law enforcement. When Trump claims unlimited authority to execute suspected drug traffickers without trial, that's not crime prevention. It's state-sponsored murder. When he deploys military forces against American cities, he's not fighting crime—he's committing constitutional violations that would make the Founders reach for their muskets.
But the most insidious aspect of the gaslighting is how it weaponizes Kirk's assassination to silence criticism of the very authoritarianism that creates conditions where political violence becomes inevitable. They want his death to function as proof that accurately describing Trump's systematic constitutional destruction somehow causes violence against conservatives.
This is precisely backwards: political violence becomes more likely when democratic alternatives get systematically eliminated, when constitutional constraints disappear, when peaceful opposition gets criminalized through immunity doctrines and weaponized federal agencies. Trump's destruction of democratic institutions doesn't prevent political violence—it makes political violence the only remaining form of political expression for people desperate enough to use it.
The same authoritarian consolidation that threatens democratic governance also creates the instability that makes assassination attempts against political figures from all directions more likely. When you eliminate legal accountability, democratic oversight, and constitutional constraints, you create exactly the kind of chaos where desperate actors turn to violence because systematic alternatives have been destroyed.
Trump's response to Kirk's assassination—justifying right-wing extremism while blaming left-wing rhetoric—reveals the complete moral bankruptcy of the MAGA movement. They want to use Kirk's death to silence their critics while ramping up the very authoritarian behavior that makes more political violence inevitable.
by Mike Brock, Notes From the Circus | Read more:
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[ed. See also: The 35% Answer:What to do when a Third of Your Country Lives in a Weird Fantasy (TER):]***
Democracy only works if we can agree on what happened. Not what it means, just what actually happened. We can debate whether a war was justified. We can't debate whether it occurred.That basic requirement is now broken. (...)
When someone claims Trump reduced the deficit, they're not just wrong about economic policy. They're wrong about reality. He added $7.8 trillion to it. When they claim crime is at record highs, they're denying FBI statistics showing violent crime near its lowest levels since the early 1970s. When they believe a billionaire who gold-plates his toilets actually cares about working families, they're living in a fantasy where a man who stiffed his own contractors for decades is somehow their champion.
This isn't a difference of perspective. It's a rejection of reality itself.
For democracy to function, people need to share basic facts even when they disagree about everything else. We need to agree that unemployment is either 4% or it isn't. That a hurricane either hit Florida or it didn't. That elections are valid when people you don't like win, not just when your team wins.Through a combination of social media algorithms, deliberate propaganda, and partisan news ecosystems, roughly a third of the country has moved to a different dimension. In their dimension, some argue that dragons are real but dinosaurs are fake. Climate change is a hoax but weather control machines exist. The moon landing was staged but JFK Jr. is coming back. And at the center of it all, a man who cheated on all three wives and called American war heroes "losers" is actually a noble patriot who loves his country and is just misunderstood by everyone who's mean to him.
That agreement no longer exists.
They believe a man who wouldn't rent to Black families genuinely cares about them. A man who mocked a disabled reporter is their champion. A casino owner who bankrupted casinos is their business genius. They donate their last dollars to defend a billionaire who wouldn't let them set foot in Mar-a-Lago. It's like believing in Santa Claus, except Santa Claus at least gives presents to children instead of taking their parents' Social Security.
The comfortable liberal assumption is that this is an information problem. If we just fact-check harder, teach media literacy, or find the right messenger, people will come around to reality.
This is delusional.
These Americans aren't confused. They've chosen a story that feels true over facts that don't. Everyone has access to the same internet. The FBI crime statistics, deficit numbers, vote counts, death rates, Trump's actual business history, his documented lies, it's all right there. But millions have decided that all of this is fake while anonymous posts about microchips in your flu shot and Trump's secret genius reveal hidden truths.You can't educate people out of beliefs they didn't reason themselves into.
