During a discussion of political violence on Wednesday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s “All In,” MSNBC Political Contributor Ben Rhodes stated that “We obviously have a government that makes a lot of people in this country feel unsafe.” He also stated that “we already have the United States military deployed in the streets of an American city, and getting ready to move into another one. And so, you worry about, frankly, kind of a government overreach here in terms of what kind of authorities Donald Trump may claim,” and “we just have to be honest that that’s part of the dynamic here that is so worrying.”
While discussing political violence, UC-San Diego Political Science Professor Barbara F. Walter gave the conditions for political violence, host Chris Hayes then said, [relevant exchange begins around 36:40] “Ben, the first point that Barbara made there about sort of declining democracy, declining faith in institutions as a part of this breakdown, this sort of spiraling feeling that I think a lot of people are having, aside from a feeling of deep sadness, but also a kind of darkness tugging on us, I imagine that’s been in your thoughts today, given what you’ve been writing about recently.”
Rhodes responded, “Yeah. Chris, like, we just have to acknowledge that it does feel like we are in a kind of spiral, and it’s hard to feel where the bottom is. And one of the things that we’ve seen in this country and other countries is, first of all, that political violence tends to beget political violence. It tends to be a contagion. I’d add to Barbara’s factors the degree to which, just in my life in politics, the introduction of social media has added another component for kind of radicalization that is contributing to this dynamic, and just a sense that there’s really not some safety net underneath us. We obviously have a government that makes a lot of people in this country feel unsafe. And, like you, Chris, I was obviously appalled by this act. I also felt a lot of trepidation about calls for retribution and where this is going to lead, in terms of both the government’s response and responses among individuals. And I think that’s what’s so concerning, is, it’s both the question of, what is our government going to do to try to lower the temperature? And that seems unlikely. And what are individuals going to do in this kind of contagion of political violence that we’re living through?”
He added, “We’re talking at a time when we already have the United States military deployed in the streets of an American city, and getting ready to move into another one. And so, you worry about, frankly, kind of a government overreach here in terms of what kind of authorities Donald Trump may claim, in addition to kind of what kind of emotions he’s stirring up. And so, we just have to be honest that that’s part of the dynamic here that is so worrying.”
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