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A Bad Way To Deal With Things

A couple of weeks ago, Donald Trump Jr.’s wife Vanessa was sent to the hospital for observation after opening an envelope containing white powder. Luckily she was fine; the powder was determined to be nonthreatening.

It got me thinking. No matter how angry some of us are with President Trump and his antics, please, do not attempt to assassinate Mr. Trump. Seriously. That would be disastrous to the nation, for it would deepen the rifts of values and ideologies and may destroy, for generations to come, any chances for reconciliation and healing our nation desperately needs.

The hobbled reputation of our government will not get any better with such an action. That requires new leaders and policies, not snuffing out a single person. Our government was designed to be complex for reasons.

Sure, it can be argued that Mr. Trump’s actions have had deleterious effects on public trust. Plus, his often loaded, xenophobic pronouncements don’t help divisions either. An assassination attempt -- let alone a successful one -- would surely throw us into precarious uncertainty.

Like the aftermath of the assassinations of Lincoln, King, and Robert Kennedy, the divisions evident then deepened into rifts that took generations to heal, assuming they actually did. We shouldn’t simply know history; we must learn from it.

Violence doesn’t solve problems; it opens a Pandora’s Box of unintended consequences. The best any of us can do is stay engaged, educate ourselves, and vote. After all, aren’t those the most fundamental of American values?

I am Joseph Flynn, and that is my perspective.

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