Trump Assassination Attempt and the Golden Spike

In Part 4 of the Operant Conditioning series, I used the golden sike that united the trans-continental railroad:

Why do we need to do this? Because we have lost the art of constructive debate. Both sides rely on far more on opinion and biased interpretations of events. Bost sides are guilty of manufacturing “facts” that support the opinions. Otherwise it is like the Central Pacific Railroad and the Union Pacific Railroad working to their own plans and never meeting with the Golden Spike that united the nation.

While that was about understanding and analyzing a hypothesis for operant conditioning in today’s complex and challenging environment, it is very germane in the attempted Trump assassination.

There have been a lot questions asked on social media as well speculation on how and why the attempted assassination happened. These can be boiled down to a few scenarios:

• Trump orchestrated the event. I suspect this is the least likely scenario. Not impossible but not very likely. Who wants someone to take a shot at them, when so much could go wrong.
• The Republican party orchestrated the attempt. Trump may not be the party’s favorite choice. Look at how poorly the party supported hi when he was president. His first two years, Republicans controlled both houses in Congress and they still accomplished very little. This scenario is ore likely that the Trump scenario, but is still low probability.
• The Democratic party orchestrated the attempt. The Democratic party clearly hates Trump. They filed for impeachment twice and some Democrats have called for an assassination. President Biden said they need to put Trump in the bullseye. Perhaps just colorful language but I this environment perhaps not very smart. This scenario is possible, especially since DHS and USSS denied giving Trump extra protection and the seeming gaffs in coverage, but I suspect the probability is still low.
• The shooter acted on his own. The most likely scenario, but there are many questions. Did the Democratic party’s comments radicalize the shooter and prompt the event? How did he get into position? Did the site commander deny permission to engage the shooter before he fired? If so why? Was there confusion about whether the shooter was part of the seemingly poorly coordinated and integrated team? If so, why?

To date, we have heard very little from the USSS and the presidential administration about the event. To an extent, this is to be expected. The investigation will take time and premature statements could bias or undermine the investigation.

The questions are, will we ever get truthful answers and will anyone be held accountable? In today’s environment, I am less than confident. But that may be expectations set by operant conditioning over the last eight years.

We need the golden spike that will unite the union. We as citizens, the real owner-operators of the Republic. Must demand answers from our employees and hold them accountable. We must demand answers from our employees and hold them accountable. And this should be a non-partisan investigation. Virtue must govern their efforts and the citizens need to push for the truth.