Get Real

Once again, an unsuccessful assassination attempt.  And from every corner of the political spectrum comes the hue and cry of “this is not how we settle our differences in this country.”

That statement is a wish, not a comment on reality.  It is a very good wish.  The world should be that way.  But it is not.  If we take “differences” to mean conflict over policy, territory, or religion, the statement that “this is not how we settle our differences in this country” is patently false.

We settled our differences with France over territory in the French and Indian War.  Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton settled their political differences with a duel that cost Hamilton his life.  We settled our “political differences” with England in two bloody wars, the American Revolution and the War of 1812.  We settled our differences over taxes with the Whiskey Rebellion being violently put down.  We settled our differences with Mexico with the Mexican–American War of 1846–1848 resulting in the US taking what is now California, Nevada, and Utah as well as part of Nevada, Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico and Wyoming in addition to recognition of the Republic of Texas.  We settled our “political differences” on the topic of slavery with 4 years of Civil War costing over 600,000 American lives.  We had a few political differences with Spain that led to the Spanish-American war in 1898 and the US intervention in the Cuban Revolution that resulted in the US take-over of Guam, Puerto Rico and  the Philippines.  I believe that both WWI and WWII were fought over “political differences.”

Moreover, we have had 4 Presidents assassinated – each occasion driven by political differences.  Then there are the 54 other political assassinations since 1842 (Mayors, Governors, Representatives, etc.)

Then, of course there are the lynchings of Black people and people of color in the US – some 3,385 from 1883 to 1941 along with over 1,000 white people.  I am of the belief that  denying one’s civil rights via murder should be considered to be political at the least.

These numbers exclude those people of color sentenced to death in hugely disproportional numbers to white people.   As an example, a study of interracial murders since 1976 shows executions of 299 Black people executed for murdering a white person, but only 21 White people executed for murdering a Black person.  Again, it seems to me that bias and discrimination are the result of “political differences.” And we solve those differences quite violently.  As of two days ago, Missouri executed Marcellus Williams, a Black man, despite the prosecutor questioning his guilt and an offer of life in prison. The Governor of Missouri called this “closure.”

And those statistics are only for people who died.  The levels of political violence, hate crimes, crimes against property, harassment, and abuse dwarf the numbers of people murdered.  The murders and the violence experienced by millions in WWI and WWI and Vietnam and in China during the Cultural Revolution, and in Cambodia, and during the Ukrainian famine, and in the Russian Gulags and here in the US are not aberrations.  It is the history of humanity. 

So please, pundits and politicians, do not tell us that violence is not how we solve political differences because that is demonstrably not true.  And quite frankly, it has never been true in the history of the world. 

Should we condemn most political violence?  Yes, of course.  But to pretend shock and amazement is theater and drama, not reality.  

To say, however, that “violence is never the answer” is to me both hugely inaccurate and naive.  How else do we confront irredeemable evil?  What does the world do with a Nazi Germany and an Adolf Hitler?  Or a Pol Pot?  Or a Vladimir Putin?  Or terrorist groups like Black September, Baader–Meinhof Gang, Islamic Jihad, Hamas, Hezbollah, or Shining Path?  Yes, start with negotiations.  If and when differences can be settled by negotiation rather than violence, great.  Eventually it did work in Northern Ireland and in the Balkans, but not without the preceding violence.

But what do you do when confronted with an evil that seeks your destruction (of your way of life or your actual life) and whose course will not and cannot change?*   When the negotiation approach is a demonstrable failure, violence is, in fact, the only answer. Or prepare to capitulate, be overcome, or die.

That’s the way the world really works.

*One definition of a fanatic is one who cannot change their mind and will not change the subject.

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