Trump the Tyrant

An Introduction to the Text

 It has almost left the public mindset that President Trump has almost been assassinated during a campaign stop in Butler, Pennsylvania, but given the tremendousness of the event as a whole, I felt inclined to wonder whether what Thomas Matthew Crooks barely managed to do could be ethically justified. To many this question likens abhorrence and the terminality of a Liberal mindset, but once one begins to think sober about it, it comes close to an intriguing question, no less because there are so comparably many incidents of this kind took place in the relatively short history of the United States. Abraham Lincoln was shot in the Ford Theatre; William McKinley was shot at the World Fair in Buffalo, New York State. Before him, James Garfield was shot at a railroad station. Finally, Ronald Reagan was almost shot in broad daylight on a road. One could cynically remark that it must be an American tradition to shoot one's president down every couple of years.

All jokes aside, I wanted to share my thoughts on the subject and have therefore also undertaken to derive examples from history to see if we can find any parallels. So, in the first chapter, his first tenure is summarised a little with less focus on the policies as a whole and more on his governance of the state on the one side and the prosecution that was conducted against him. I assumed that it is not the policies that make a tyrant but how he reacts to pressure laid upon him and how he treats the state that he has been inaugurated into. #

In the second chapter, I have tried to define what a tyrant actually is, so that it is easier for us all to follow the third chapter, in which I have picked select examples of tyranny and tyrannicides in particular. The most examples by number of course came from Ancient Greece, another country with an historical tradition of removing leaders from their office not by legal standards but by political ones. We will see what we can find about their motivations to see if they align with the standards we would apply nowadays, beyond President Trump, of course, but also in general, given the time that has passed since Greece was not yet a united country but rather an allotment of independent city-states. 

In order to not be entirely grounded in the Ancient Age, we of course picked up two European kings' deaths by the people's stick, namely that of Charles I. of England and of Louis XVI. of France. While the latter may not require even an introduction, given the popularity of France's revolution despite its failure on every level except for popularising Republics on Continental Europe. What few know is that Charles I. was the first king to be removed after being presented a just trial, and that the French revolutionaries were inspired by his trial. Whether they are that similar to each other, we will see in the text.

Finally, we will see if we can compare President Trump to any of those cases and therefore argue that his assassination were justified or not, and leave with a few more remarks on the status quo. 

As always, comments by the common communicative means (not here, since I don't check Blogger at all) are welcome as long as they are constructive. Given the controversial nature of the subject, it is advised to first read the text in full and take direct reference to parts of the text when commenting in order to maintain civility and productiveness. Thanks for your understanding. 

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