Fascism on the Rise Archives - KDA Keeping Democracy Alive Podcast & Radio Show · Burt Cohen

After The Shooting of July 13, Is it Over?

·58 min·3 clips

“Image is everything” after Trump’s July 13 rally shooting, with “fight, fight, fight” becoming the central political image.

1. Fascism on the Rise Archives - KDA Keeping Democracy Alive Podcast & Radio Show centers on the July 13 shooting of Donald Trump and its impact on the 2024 race. 2. Host Bert Cohen speaks with Jill Lawrence, a Bulwark opinion writer and author of The Art of the Political Deal, whose political reporting experience at USA Today, the National Journal, and the AP shapes the analysis. 3. The episode asks whether Trump’s Butler, Pennsylvania image has already changed the election and what Democrats should do next. 4. Cohen opens by contrasting issue-based politics like fair taxes, climate change, social justice, workers’ rights, and foreign policy with the claim that “image is everything.” 5. Lawrence says Biden’s age and debate performance have overshadowed policy achievements, while Trump’s raised fist after the shooting created a powerful visual moment. 6. The discussion returns to Trump’s Truth Social claim that “it was God alone who prevented the unthinkable,” and Lawrence says most of the country still does not want Trump. 7. Lawrence argues that Biden has struggled to make the case for his record, including at the debate and in later interviews. 8. She says Democrats need a stronger message on abortion, democracy, and the 2025 project, because Trump’s image alone may not decide the race. 9. The conversation brings in Ronald Reagan’s survival after an attempted assassination and contrasts Reagan’s policy shift on arms control with Trump’s unchanged behavior. 10. Lawrence says Trump’s presidency and social-media posts showed recurring “American carnage” and election-lie rhetoric rather than maturity or restraint. 11. Cohen and Lawrence discuss January 6, including the image of police being beaten and rioters forcing their way into the Capitol. 12. Lawrence says that footage can still matter because it shows the emotional side of democracy and the stakes of another Trump term. 13. J.D. Vance enters the conversation as a vice-presidential choice who, in Lawrence’s view, would go further than Mike Pence in resisting certification if Trump asked. 14. She says Trump chose Vance because he wanted a “mini me” and someone who would stay loyal to power. 15. The episode turns to women, turnout, and the possibility of a Harris-Whitmer ticket, which Lawrence calls risky but potentially galvanizing. 16. Lawrence says abortion is a personal issue for women, families, and voters who remember pre-Roe conditions, and she links that anger to ballot initiatives and turnout. 17. The tone is conversational and argumentative, with Cohen pressing questions and Lawrence answering in long, immediate reflections. 18. The format stays close to current events, campaign strategy, and historical comparisons rather than formal interview segments or roundtable debate. 19. Listeners tracking the 2024 election, abortion politics, and Trump-Biden strategy will get the most from it. 20. Listeners wanting a short, nonpolitical conversation should skip it.

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