The Democratic Leadership Is Responsible for the Violent Political Hatred Battering America

OLD GLORY TOOK A HIT ON FLAG DAY 2017. But, Americans stand with her and with House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, who was shot in the hip, while multiple Congressional aides were also shot, by a gunman with a rifle who opened fire at a Republican baseball practice in Virginia Wednesday morning. The gunman was shot by US Capital Police, apprehended and taken to the hospital. The shooter was identified as James T. Hodgkinson, of Illinois. Five people were "transported medically" from the scene, Alexandria Police Chief Michael Brown, including Scalise, Zack Barth, a congressional aide to Roger Williams, the gunman and two law enforcement officers -- one of whom was hit by fragments. • President Trump and Vice President Pence were informed about the situation and White House press secretary tweeted : "Our thoughts and prayers are with all affected." Later, President Trump issued a statement : "The Vice President and I are aware of the shooting incident in Virginia and are monitoring developments closely. We are deeply saddened by this tragedy. Our thoughts and prayers are with the members of Congress, their staffs, Capitol Police, first responders and all others affected." President Trump later tweeted : "Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana, a true friend and patriot, was badly injured but will fully recover. Our thoughts and prayers are with him." • Later, Scalise’s office, in a statement, said the congressman was out of surgery by 10:30 a.m. The statement described the whip and third in the GOP congressional hierarchy, before surgery, as in good spirits and speaking to his wife, Jennifer, by phone. “He is grateful for the brave actions of US Capitol Police, first responders, and colleagues,” the statement said. • The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives said it is conducting emergency traces on two firearms, one rifle and one handgun. The Department of Homeland Security was monitoring the episode and the FBI took charge of the investigation. There was one notable departure from the normal level of protection inside the Capitol : three uniformed officers stood watch outside the first-floor office of House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif). In addition, heavily armed Capitol Police cleared the East Plaza in front of the Capitol. Tourists and visitors were redirected and only staff were being allowed. • • • REPUBLICANS WERE TARGETED BY A DERANGED LEFTIST. Representative Ron DeSantis (R-Fla) told Fox News he left just before the shooting. As he walked to his car, a man asked DeSantis if it was Republicans or Democrats practicing. About three minutes the shooting began, DeSantis said. • Representative Jeff Duncan (R-SC) told reporters that he spoke briefly with a man he believes was the shooter, and the he “asked me if the team practicing was a Democrat or Republican team.” Duncan added, “I told him they were Republicans. He said, ‘Okay, thanks,’ turned around.” • A Facebook page believed to be Hodgkinson’s includes pictures of Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders and rhetoric against President Trump including a post that reads: “Trump is a Traitor. Trump Has Destroyed Our Democracy. It’s Time to Destroy Trump & Co.” • In February the gunman posted this : "Republicans are the Taliban of America." • • • REPUBLICANS RESPOND TO ATTACK. Anger about his own colleagues being attacked was clear in Representative Steve King (R-Iowa), who, suit and tie, stopped by the crime scene to pray : “America has been divided, and the center of America is disappearing, and the violence is appearing in the streets, and it’s coming from the left.” King said it is impossible to separate the hyperpartisan climate in Washington -- especially people protesting President Trump -- with Republican members of Congress being gunned down at a baseball scrimmage : “The divisions within the country, people that can’t accept the results of the election that are determined to try to take this country down, take this organization down. This city was filled up with demonstrations the day after the inauguration, where you couldn’t drive down the streets.” • Representative Mo Brooks, R-Ala., told FMTALK1065. "Our security detail was able to incapacitate him at that point. I don't know if he [the shooter] was dead. He was wounded. I don't know how many times he was wounded." Brooks used a belt as a tourniquet to stop the bleeding of an aide who was shot in the leg, said he believed the shooting was targeted : “I can’t imagine him going here for any other reason than to kill as many congressmen as they can. We understand we’re high profile targets.” • Representative Chris Collins (R-NY) on Wednesday linked the political rhetoric of Democrats to the shooting of Representative Steve Scalise (R-La) and others at a baseball field in Alexandria, Va. Collins told the media : “I can only hope that the Democrats do tone down the rhetoric. The rhetoric has been outrageous...the finger-pointing, just the tone and the angst and the anger directed at Donald Trump, his supporters.” Collins said that it was inevitable someone was going to act based on the “rhetoric” toward President Trump and the GOP : "You know, some people react to things like that. They get angry as well. And then you fuel the fires,” said Collins, who is among the most vocal Trump backers on Capitol Hill. • Former Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga), an unofficial advisor to President Trump who is promoting a new book on the President, said the shooting was the result of “increasing intensity of hostility” on the Left. • • • DEMOCRATS TREAD LIGHTLY. Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt) said Hodgkinson volunteered on his presidential campaign and denounced the shooter’s actions on the Senate floor : “I am sickened by this despicable act." Robert Becker, who served as the Iowa director of Bernie Sanders’s presidential campaign, said Hodgkinson had no formal role on the campaign and that he couldn’t find anyone who remembered him. “We had approximately 100 paid organizers on staff,” Becker said. “He was not one of them.” Becker said ahead of the caucuses, about 10,000 people volunteered for Sanders at varying points, but added : “No one seems to remember this guy." • And, the House Democrats tweeted : "@HouseDemocrats praying for our @HouseGOP @SenateGOP baseball colleagues after hearing about the horrific shooting." • The Congressional Baseball Game, a yearly event for charity that lawmakers have long said is helpful in bridging the partisan divide, will go on as planned at Nationals Park on Thursday. • But, a terrorist attack targeting Republicans by a deranged anti-Trump, Russian collusion-obsessed leftist is going to be hard for the Progressive Democrat leadership and its propagandist mainstream media to spin. This attack was a game changer. The mainstream media likes to bash Trump and the GOP for alienating Moslems and fomenting ISIS pushback, BUT, after today's shooting, we may reasonably ask when the Progressive Democrat leadership will stop radicalizing domestic terrorists with their hysterical demonizing of President Trump. • BUT, at a press conference with the Alexandria police chief only 90 minutes after the shooting, Virginia's Democrat Governor Terry McAulliffe called for the usual Progressive remedy -- stricter gun laws : “There are too many guns on the streets." Addressing reporters in his practice gear near the crime scene, Brooks, the Alabama Republican, countered with a fierce defense of the Second Amendment : “We are not going to get rid of freedom of speech because some people say ugly things and hurt some people’s feelings and we’re not going to get rid of the Fourth Amendment's search and seizure rights because some criminals could go free who should be behind bars,” Brooks said. “These rights are there to protect Americans, and while each of them has a negative aspect to them, they are fundamental to our being the greatest nation in world history.” • At a morning press conference in the Diplomatic Room of the White House, Trump called for calm and unity : “We may have our differences, but we do well in times like these to remember everyone who serves in our nation’s capital is here because, above all, they love our country,” Trump said. • • • DEAR READERS, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi took to the floor of the House at mid-day on Wednesday to say the shooting was about "family" and that "we will use it to bring us together."Unfortunately, that thought did not occur to Pelosi last Friday when she hurled one wild accusation after another at President Trump. Speaking to reporters on Capitol Hill, Pelosi said she is worried about the President’s fitness for office, falsely claimed employment has declined and accused him without explanation of authoritarian behavior and undermining separation of powers. And, of course, of getting in bed with Russian President Vladimir Putin. • It might be Pelosi, herself, whose fitness should be questioned. Her news conference was the rambling, disjointed gibberish of a disoriented mind. At one point, she committed a Freudian slip when talking about Trump, saying, “President Bush tries to charm you.” It is not the first time she’s referred to President Trump as “President Bush.” • I hope the Republican Party congressional leadership will not succumb to the siren song of these Progressive Democrats who are trying to run from their responsibility for the terrorist-style political violence that is battering America, all the while remaining determined to bring down President Trump and the GOP. Expressing sorrow for the attack, coming together to publicly show some degree of national unity in the face of a terrorist shooting, is reasonable. What is not reasonable is any Republican effort to allow the Democrat Party leadership to escape responsibility for the domestic chaos and hatred of President Trump they have created. Pelosi, Schumer & Co. may not have pulled the trigger that wounded Steve Scalise, but their hate rhetoric and refusal to accept the American electorate's choice of Donald Trump as President is the background noise that America is hearing right now.The Democrat Party cannot escape responsibility for domestic violence when its leaders, their wholly-owned media, and the political press belittle America's police, encourage violent civil disobedience, and beat a drum for the impeachment of a President who has done nothing worse than being the choice of 53% of the American electorate. I wonder if there exists a grassroots Democrat Tea Party out there that is right now saying, Enough! Throw the Hell Cats out !!!