The Lost Cause of Ryan Routh

We must not acclimatize to attempted assassinations. To paraphrase William Faulkner, the tragedy of politics today is a general and universal chaos so long sustained by now that we can even bear it. This is how crises get “defined down”. Once we learn to live with them, we’ll weary of trying to return.

So, tired though we may be, we should ask ourselves: What makes an earnest, liberal man approaching old age do something this deranged? Hippies are seldom gunmen. Many may hate Trump intensely, but it is still remarkable that a man who looks like he makes his own cannabis-infused granola tried to mow down the former president on a golf course.

Any scientist worth his salt will tell you that univariate analyses always fall short. There is never one cause behind anything complicated. In this case, mental illness, past failures, his own free choices, and many more are part of the story.

This man wears his heart, almost literally, on his sleeve. Routh dyed his hair to resemble the Ukrainian flag, and photographs almost always show him holding one too. He traveled to Ukraine to join the struggle. I say “struggle” because concrete evidence that he fought evades me. Nevertheless, Routh set up a website through which to recruit military and financial help for Ukraine. Here he is, having just finished the long journey from Honolulu to Kiev, telling those who will listen to come join him: “A lot of the other conflicts are gray, but this conflict is definitely black and white. It’s about good versus evil”.

Regardless of whether Russia was provoked by western encroachment, or whether the Russo-Ukrainian border was perfectly carved to begin with, Russia invaded a sovereign nation under false pretexts, killing vast numbers of innocent people in the process.

John Carpenter, a Restoration contributor, has criticized Russia’s gangster regime regularly in these pages. See here for his most recent report. Ayaan Hirsi Ali was right to criticize J. D. Vance, who is otherwise the best vice-presidential pick in a generation, for saying that he didn’t care what happened in Ukraine.

But while Russia’s aggression is immoral, the way this situation should be resolved is complicated. How much Russian military might remains? What are the risks of serious escalation? Nuclear escalation? Does Ukraine have the fighting potential, even with increased American help, to recapture the Donbas or the Crimea? Given political pressures at home, would Putin ever settle for a deal without concrete concessions? The answers to these questions require intelligence perhaps available to the CIA, but to hardly anyone else.

We must be very careful in how we evaluate Ukrainian policies. Without classified briefings, we take a good look at Harris and Trump, and cast our vote for whichever candidate seems better equipped to handle this dizzyingly complex problem. While the morality of Russia’s invasion is black and white, the efficacy of Western responses is shrouded in gray mist.

Considering such complications, it is frustrating to watch the media spit out article after article telling us that Republicans are committed to supporting Putin and to the destruction of Ukraine. You might not need a list, but all the usual suspects are up to their de rigeur obfuscation: The Guardian, Politico, The New York Times, the BBC, the Atlantic, and so on. Trump, of course, as with any candidate, is fair game. But the notion that he has some kind of friend-crush on Putin, or that he would betray vital security interests intentionally, is pure madness. Trump does sometimes flatter dictators, even while he threatens them, but that’s just shrewd business. He will say what he needs to say in order to get the best deal. Who can forget his “very good relationship” with Kim Jong Un? No one in their right mind really thinks that his language was aimed at anything other than talking the “little rocket man” off the ledge.

But, crucially, not everyone is in their right mind. Fabrications may not be believable to most, but they were to Ryan Routh: When he saw the kabuki-media version of Trump crushing innocent Ukrainians, he took matters into his own hands.

Whether Routh is deemed sane enough to be morally responsible is beyond me. But those parroting the line, dishonestly and for the better part of a decade, that Trump is a Russian stooge, should surely know better.

As with Thomas Matthew Crooks’ assassination attempt in July, Routh had been told, again and again, that Trump is the aspiring dictator.

Trump’s bombast makes it easier for the regime media. He said he would be a “dictator” for his first day back in office. Only afterwards did he explain this means issuing (legal) executive orders to secure the border and end Biden’s drilling embargo with immediate effect. He ought to stop using such rhetoric. Maybe it’s good television, but it makes the job of his opponents easier and confuses simpletons like Routh and Crooks.

Heather Mac Donald gets it right. Blaming the victim is not the takeaway. Unethical journalists are the real culprits.

We’re often told that the right is disproportionately responsible for political violence. Again and again, Right-wing violence gets airtime while similar action on the Left is explained away. How many more assassination attempts will it take before our media apparatus looks in the mirror and sees the problem staring back?