The Trump Head-Turn, Revisited

Don't Blame Providence

"Everyone to whom I talked at the Convention agreed on one twist of the narrative," reported Anthony Lane in The New Yorker. "In the  instant when Trump, cheating death in Pennsylvania, stood up with blood on his face, raised a fist, and shouted, 'Fight, fight, fight,' the election in November was won."

            I thought the same -- though changing won to lost -- at the time.

            And yet today, Trump trails the joy ticket, Kamala and Coach, in the polls.

            What happened?

            Is “the narrative” messing with us, for the sake of suspense, and so that Trump's eventual triumph will gut us all the more?

            Or is there a narrative twist -- a semi-twist, a twistlet -- that makes a big difference, and that nobody seems to have noticed but me?

            There is no denying that Trump's head-twist, toward the blow-up of a chart depicting immigration levels, is key. The universal assumption is that Trump's turn toward the chart turned him away from the bullet. And if you are MAGA, you assume that twist to have been a divinely inspired twist of fate. "You will never be able to convince me that that last second turn of a head was anything other than a miracle," says Trump’s doltish running-mate J. D. Vance. "I absolutely believe that."

            Well, Vance is liable to believe anything. But even God believes it, says Trump on TV:

            Dr. Phil: "You believe you have more to do. You were spared for a reason."

            Trump: "Well, God believes that."

            Trump’s version of faith: God believes in him.

            I don’t know about you, but if I were God -- and I realize this is a leap -- I would be put off by someone presuming to tell people what I believe.

            Christ, I guess, doubted God's intentions (hast Thou forsaken me?), but Christ didn't go around saying, "I don't knowww . . . , I have to wonder sometimes . . . , but, hey, God keeps telling me He believes I have more to do, and, I mean, God’s opinion counts for something -- "

            If I were God, I would be sick and tired of being condescended to by Trump. I would also be rubbed the wrong way by Trump saying, "I took a bullet for Democracy."

            "Took it, did you?" I'd be muttering. "Tip of the ear's hardly even a flesh wound. I let them nail my son -- "

            After all, arranging the trajectory of that bullet can’t have been easy. Senator Ron Johnson — angling, perhaps, not to blatantly take credit, himself, for the course of the bullet (he being the source of the chart Trump turned toward) — asked online the other day: "Serendipity? Or Providence?" A man named Donovan Noggle, who seems to know a lot about these things, stepped forward, on X, to set the senator straight:

            "It's all Providence, Senator. That's how close to the vest it's played. I am sure spaces throughout that day were changing and coming together for just that danger, close as you can get to survive. Everything on that day was set for [that bullet] to miss its mark. Wind, temperature, and humidity are all in motion for that one bullet. Right from the factory to the number it was in the magazine. Providence guided it. Doesn't mean evil is dead, it's just regrouping."

            I guess we can all go along with that last sentence. But what else are we going along with?

            We are going along with the assumption that when Trump inclined his head to the right, to regard the chart in question, he turned it out of the path of the bullet.

            Remember, the bullet came from Trump's right. It skimmed the top of Trump's right ear. Some blood was drawn, but hardly "pouring everywhere," as Trump claims, since in fact the top of the ear is not the "bloodiest part of the body." But there was blood. Just enough. And according to Trump in his address to the Republican Nominating Convention, there was love:

            "When I rose, surrounded by Secret Service, the crowd was confused because they thought I was dead, and there was great sorrow. I could see that, on their faces, as I looked out -- they didn't know I was looking out, they thought it was over. But I could see it, and I wanted to do something to let them know I was okay. I raised my right arm, looked at the thousands and thousands of people that were breathlessly waiting, and started shouting, 'Fight Fight Fight!' . . . Then the crowd realized I was okay and roared with pride for our country. I never heard anything like it. For the rest of my life I will be grateful for the love shown by that crowd on that fateful evening in Pennsylvania."

            And what is the amazing thing, to Trump as to everyone else apparently?

            "The amazing thing is that prior to the shot, if I had not moved my head at that very last instance, the assassin's bullet would have perfectly hit its mark."

            Why did he turn his head? To look at "the chart that saved my life." A chart depicting immigration levels, to the Trump administration's advantage. The chart is grossly inaccurate, according to ABC News. For one thing, "It appears to claim Trump left office sometime in April 2020. . . However, Trump didn't leave office until January 2021," by which time border crossings were rising.

            No reason to believe that anything produced by the office of Senator Johnson would be accurate. At the RNC, Johnson planned, he says, to give a unifying message, but his people "literally loaded the wrong speech." Which he didn't know how to take out "without screwing up the teleprompter." So he went ahead and called Democrats "a clear and present danger to America."

            The chart, however, was effective. We are told (and no one but me seems to disagree) that it saved Trump's life, by drawing his head almost entirely away from the line of fire. The chart also deflects our attention from the following narrative twistlet, from Trump's convention speech:

            "Behind me, and to my right, was a large screen that was displaying [the chart]. In order to see the chart, I started to take this turn to my right. And was ready to begin a little bit further turn, which I'm very lucky I didn't do -- "

            Whoa.

            The shot came from Trump's right. It grazed his right ear. He turned toward the bullet. He is, indeed, very lucky he didn't turn further to the right, because that would have brought the roundness of his head into the bullet's path. Stand with your right ear against a wall, representing the vertical plane of the bullet, and you will see.

            Trump said it himself: it was luck.

            Which Trump has never needed God for. The editor Michael MacCambridge summarizes:

        Can we agree that Cheeto Mussolini is the luckiest SOB who ever lived?  When he runs his businesses in the ground, there’s always been some foreign investor (often Russian) there to bail him out. He benefits in 2016 from James Comey’s fucknuttery, and Hillary running an historically awful campaign. Fifteen minutes before he gets voted out, RBG dies and he gets to pack the Supreme Court, which will come in handy later. When he tries to actually be at the scene of the crime for the coup attempt on Jan. 6, the Secret Service saves his ass by refusing to take him there. When he’s caught dead to rights in the Georgia case, Fani Willis clouds the water by sleeping with her lead prosecutor. When he stupidly takes all the top-secret documents to Florida, he is bailed out by the most craven, least competent judge he appointed, endlessly delaying the case, then throwing it out. When the GOP is ready to move on, they coalesce behind Ron DeSantis, the awkwardest, most charisma-challenged person you’d ever want to meet, who sends the GOP base running back to Trump. When he shows up for the debate with nothing but the usual pack of lies, he gets a Bingo free space because his opponent spectacularly craters, in a demonstration of his own diminished faculties. And when an assassin tries to kill him, he only grazes Trump’s ear — just enough for blood to create a dramatic visual that will convince his cult that he’s some combination of John Rambo and Jesus Christ.

            Now, finally, maybe God has seen enough. Maybe God has been preoccupied by something going on in the Milky Way, and has just now noticed Trump. Once briefed by minions, God is apoplectic.

"Think I'd sacrifice a good fireman for this creep? Feh!" goes God. (And it takes a lot to make God go, "Feh!") "What does this Grump -- what is it, Bump? Dump? Trump? Like a trumpet? Oh, for crying out loud -- What does he want? 'Votes'? 'Money'? 'Judges'? Start cutting him off. He won't know what hit him."