By Hal Brown
When someone posts on social medias in all caps it is considered to be the same thing as shouting. Trump's call to his followers to protest if he's arrested made the news and not, for him, in a good way. This was interpreted as his instructing his followers to engage in violent protests.
Anyone with any common sense wanting to help Trump weather the coming storm of legal entanglements knows that violent protests on his behalf will turn at least some sentiment among his less zealous supporters against him.
Considering what occurred after his January 6th speech there's no way he couldn't have known the power he has to incite violence with his words.
Not long after the media pointed this out the walk-back from others in the GOP and ardent Trump supporters began. Pence told Jonathan Karl that the American people know they should protest in a peaceful and lawful manner.
Ali Alexander, who as an organizer of the “Stop the Steal” movement staged rallies to promote Trump’s baseless claims that Democrats stole the 2020 election from him, warned Trump supporters that they would be "jailed or worse” if they protested in New York City.
“You have no liberty or rights there,” he tweeted.
One of Alexander’s allies in the “Stop the Steal” campaign was conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, who amplified the election fraud claims on his Infowars show. Alexander posted that he had spoken to Jones and said that neither of them would be protesting this time around. Reference
None of these interpretations of what a call to protest means comes from Trump, the one person who could have influenced the very people who could assure that protests, if any, were peaceful.
Here's one reply posted to Trump's Truth Social post (clicking below will enlarge but not go to Trump Social):
.
The simple fact, as shown in the post above, is that there are people who may want to express their support of him in a violent manner. These are a group of people who don't look at Jan. 6th as a total failure. Rather they look at it as a success even though it was a failed coup that they think but for the traitor Mike Pence almost succeeded.
Trump never apologizes, never reverses a position that may disadvantage him, never admits he was wrong about anything. It's been pointed out the he could have urged supporters to peacefully protest in his posts, but really, can you see him even considering that? There no way he'd go back and post "ops, I really meant to use the word peacefully".
On MSNBC Ali Vitali said they are trying to put Trump's comments through a filter that doesn't actually exist. She made my point. I see the filter as really being an interpretation device. What comes out of Trump's screaming mouth (shown in DonkeyHotey's often reposted caricature) for his own sake should be filtered.
Trump's worst enemy is his unfiltered brain. That brain is our friend. It's also a friend to Ron DeSantis who would be a more difficult candidate to defeat if he wins the GOP primary.
Update:
On the other hand you have stories like this:
Please scroll down to the comments link and let readers know what you think. Sharing on social media, also through the links below, is appreciated. New to the blog, note that the archives are on the very bottom of the screen.