The Ice Queen of Palm Beach has melted.
Following the extraordinary events of Saturday night, an assassination attempt on a former president, Melania Trump shared a uniquely emotional message of support for her injured husband.
Melania traded her six-inch heels for a feather-soft pump and addressed her “fellow Americans” in an open letter that painted an inconsiderate picture of Donald J. Trump as a generous family man.
“When I saw that vicious bullet strike my husband, Donald, I realized that my life and Barron’s were on the brink of a devastating change,” she wrote.
‘A monster who recognized my husband as an inhuman political machine tried to play on Donald’s passion: his laughter, his wit, his love of music and his inspiration.’
(Love of music? I guess Lee Greenwood’s ‘God Bless the USA.’)
The former first lady then ended her note with an elegant but wide-eyed plea: “Rise above the hatred, vitriol and simplistic ideas that fuel violence.”
Following the extraordinary events of Saturday night, an assassination attempt on a former president, Melania Trump shared a uniquely emotional message of support for her injured husband.
Melania traded her six-inch heels for a feather-soft pump and addressed her “fellow Americans” in an open letter that painted an inconsiderate picture of Donald J. Trump as a generous family man.
Yeah, good luck with that.
Trump hadn’t even wiped the blood from his mangled ear when non-binary and unemployed members of Gen Z cried foul over their would-be assassin’s poor aim.
“Oh my god, why couldn’t it have been 2 inches? We would never have heard of him again!” posted one TikTok user who was on the verge of losing his job. Still, the video had garnered nearly 200,000 likes by Sunday morning.
From there, the insane thirst for blood spread from social media to popular culture and even to the halls of Congress.
Less than 12 hours after the shooting, horror writer Stephen King thought it was appropriate to blame the victim.
“An AR-15 style semi-automatic rifle was used in the Butler shooting,” he tweeted. “These are the weapons the GOP – and Trump – want to protect.”
The King believes that anyone who wants to defend Second Amendment rights deserves to be shot.
Who is dangerous now?
A congressional staffer for Rep. Bennie Johnson, the ranking Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee that oversees the Secret Service, posted on Facebook: “I don’t condone violence, but please get yourself some shooting lessons so you don’t miss next time. Oops, that wasn’t me talking.”
Johnson had the good sense to immediately fire his homicide deputy, but that was not guaranteed.
A congressional staffer for Rep. Bennie Johnson, the ranking Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee that oversees the Secret Service, posted on Facebook: “I don’t condone violence, but please get yourself some shooting lessons so you don’t miss next time. Oops, that wasn’t me talking.”
It was Johnson who tried to strip Trump of all Secret Service protection in the weeks leading up to the attack. (Boy, that didn’t age well.)
Forty-eight hours after the attack, any sense of sympathy for Trump or recognition of what the assassination of a likely party nominee in the middle of an election would have done to the nation’s social fabric had been completely lost.
On Monday, CNN contributor and former Biden White House communications director Kate Bedingfield urged Democrats to “turn the gun” on Trump.
And then the conspiracy theories begin!
On the second night of the Republican National Convention, MSNBC analyst Michael Steele wondered whether Trump was hurt or not.
“It’s been three days, almost four, since this horrific event occurred,” Steele said, “… and we still have not received a medical report from the hospital, nor have we received a medical report from the campaign, or from the Trump organization on the extent of the damage to his hearing.”
It’s Ear-Gate.
If I were Trump, I’d have my earlobe repaired and surgically augmented with a middle finger as a reminder to all those who have forgotten basic human decency.
Almost everyone has lost their minds, except Melania Trump.
As First Lady, she deliberately stayed away from the political fray, keeping a low profile during the election campaign and in the White House. According to her husband, she “hates” political life, and what ordinary person wouldn’t?
It’s a stark contrast to Dr. Jill Biden, who seems to delight in nasty, everyday fights.
“We will lose all our rights (if Trump is elected),” she said on ABC News’ The View in May. “You have to believe him when he uses words like dictator, bloodbath, third term, violence,” she ranted hysterically.
How encouraging of you, Jill!
Of course, Melania’s reluctance to get dirty in partisan mud did not protect her from unhinged partisans.
Still, they took every opportunity to criticize her, whether it was for her Christmas decorations or alleged fractures in her marriage. And the most vile of her critics even spread false slander about her son, Barron.
But that’s the reality of living in America today, and only the naive would even consider the idea that the hyperbolic political rhetoric that fuels the crazy and upsets Thanksgiving tables everywhere can be turned off with a switch.
That bug-eyed, bulging-veined, screaming partisan genius may never be bottled again.
However, if there is anyone in the audience today who has the right to say that, it is our Slovenian-born former supermodel and former first lady.
I, for one, look forward to a possible appearance by Melania at the Republican National Convention on Thursday night, because if she does speak, she will be one of the few sensible voices I have heard in a long time.