Saturday’s assassination attempt in Pennsylvania has upended what has already been a chaotic presidential race. We are living in a firehose of events for which there is no pause button. But we can’t afford to let one existential issue distract us from another. They all need to be dealt with.

The assassination attempt was pure evil. Worse, it was profoundly un-American. Every decent person will condemn it wholeheartedly. That’s not the way we do things here.

In response to the shooting, there have been multiple calls, including from the president, to turn down the temperature in American politics. Many Republicans argue that claims that Donald Trump is a threat to American democracy are inflammatory and caused the shooting itself. They want such rhetoric stopped.

We have to be able to walk and chew gum here. It is perfectly possible both to condemn political violence and dangerous rhetoric. And that is exactly why Donald Trump must never be allowed in the Oval Office ever again.

Dangerous rhetoric is Trump’s stock-in-trade. He’s based his entire campaign around it. He calls people vermin. Fascists. Communists. Enemies of the people. He’s also responsible for fomenting more political violence in America than anyone since Jefferson Davis. Remember Cesar Sayoc? Do you........

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