Thread by @Noahpinion

I feel the winds changing. In 2016 people were worried about ISIS and Islamist terrorism. We had San Bernardino, Orlando, Paris, etc.

Now we have El Paso, Christchurch, Pittsburgh, etc.

White supremacist terror attacks are clearly the biggest threat to Public Order.

https://twitter.com/WalshFreedom/status/1157824397165678592

That's not to say white supremacist terrorism wasn't actually a threat back then. There was Dylann Roof. Breivik.

Nor is it to say that stochastic terrorism is the only kind of violence that matters, or even the only kind that scares people.

But people like their Public Order. People don't like to feel like they're waiting for the next attack to happen. Terrorism produces terror; makes people feel like they're under siege. No one likes to feel under siege.

In 2019, white supremacist terrorists, many of them claiming to act in the name of Trump, feel like they're rampaging unchecked.

That is going to bring out a countervailing force. The people will demand that something be done about this plague of 8chan terrorists.

Alone, I don't think Trump's racist tweets or rallies would have electoral consequences for him. But this constant drumbeat of terror attacks, really could, I think, result in historic losses for the Republican party.

When terror strikes, people want to know who to go after to make it stop. The "state sponsor". People simply refuse to throw up their hands and attribute terrorism to ambient discontent or shadowy untouchable cabals.

To many people, Trump and the GOP now look like the "state sponsor" of this stochastic terrorism. The institutional figures encouraging a breakdown of Public Order.

And I think that could have electoral consequences come next fall.

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