There are two ways to look at the July 13 shooting in Butler, Pennsylvania. One, is that there is no place for violence in our politics. It was wrong for the shooter to see killing Donald Trump as the solution to anything. On that the vast majority of people are agreed. The other aspect of last Saturday’s tragedy that is still with us is that Donald got a boo boo on his ear and he is playing it up as being maimed in combat. He’s a war hero now. He, and I quote, “took a bullet for democracy.” So what is this apology from the FBI? This posted recently on Truth Social.
Which is another way of saying “shrapnel,” because shrapnel can be fragments of a bullet or fragments of something the bullet hits. And Christopher Wray used the word shrapnel when he testified before Congress this week. So whether the FBI is trying to humor Trump, or trying to stay off his shitlist in the event he would get reelected, we don’t know. But I guess “fragmented into smaller pieces” is as good as we’re going to get.
The New York Times has a 3-D model, which they claim shows that Trump was hit by the first of eight bullets. But they do make the obvious point that if Trump would release the medical records there would be no discussion.
Nearly two weeks after the assassination attempt on former President Donald J. Trump, there’s still no official report from the Trump campaign or from state or federal governments about what caused the wound on his right ear.
This lack of clarity has left the issue unsettled and fueled speculation online about whether he was hit by a bullet or shrapnel — or perhaps something else.
But a detailed analysis of bullet trajectories, footage, photos and audio by The New York Times strongly suggests Mr. Trump was grazed by the first of eight bullets fired by the gunman, Thomas Crooks. Subsequent bullets wounded two rally goers and killed a third.
What has helped stoke confusion is that Mr. Trump himself has said he was hit by a bullet, but his campaign has not released any official medical reports, nor has Mr. Trump’s current physician weighed in.
No, Trump’s got Ronny Jackson calling in from happy hour in Texas, with all sorts of suppositions. And that is precisely what raises suspicions. If we had gotten a simple medical report and bill of health from the emergency room, none of this would be going on. So it’s reasonable to assume that Trump knows he wasn’t hit by a bullet — maybe just by a piece of a bullet — but the hair splitting and speculation could stop if he would just release the report.
The F.B.I. said it was examining numerous metal fragments found near the stage to determine whether a bullet — or pieces of it — had grazed Mr. Trump’s head, bloodying his ear.
A key piece of evidence in The Times’s analysis is a live video feed that captures Mr. Trump’s reaction as the first three gunshots are fired. The crack of the bullets are heard as they pass the microphone that Mr. Trump speaks into. Almost a second elapses between the first and second shots.
During this brief interim, Mr. Trump starts reaching toward his ear, according to footage and audio of the event analyzed by The Times and Rob Maher, an audio forensics expert at Montana State University.
“He flinches, and his right hand already starts reaching for his right ear during that time between the first audible shot and the second audible shot,” Mr. Maher said.
It’s part of law enforcement procedures that all this be investigated and theories made. That still does not change the plain fact of the matter that Trump doesn’t want his medical report released and we can only assume that that’s because they will state something along the lines of what the FBI has stated, that it was a bullet, or a piece of a bullet, or maybe the doctors found something else. But we won’t know until we see the report, right?
So how many more weeks before Hero Trump allows that to happen?
Trump is so f*cking demented and twisted that he thinks the key to winning this election is making absolutely certain that everyone believes his ear was nicked with a bullet and not something else. That’s it. That’s his platform right now. Vote for me, I’m a war hero.
— Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) July 26, 2024
That’s about the size of it. That and making people believe he never heard of Project 2025. But there is a larger story going on, the one that has plagued me for almost two weeks now and that is that the entire mainstream media was just fine going with Trump’s announcement on Truth Social that he was shot. Nobody demanded a medical report, nothing. It wasn’t until the Director of the FBI was before Congress and said that maybe it was shrapnel that suddenly this story has exploded across the media spectrum.
We are much closer to an Orwellian Ministry Of Truth than anybody wants to look at. I personally am appalled.
Dimwit Trump and any search for any truth about anything, anywhere, are mutually exclusive.
You can have Trump OR the truth, but never at the same time.
In the near future, truth will prevail, leaving no room for Dimwit Donny.
The report must say he was hit by something other than a bullet or even a fragment or we would have already seen it.
That actually was not an apology.. ::chuckling:: What fools those repugs are.
It doesn’t happen often but I can’t say I agree with you about the medical report. It would I’m sure describe the size, location and severity of the wound precisely. With this particular wound it might speculate on it possibly having been caused by a bullet barely grazing/nicking Trump, or by shrapnel. However that wound you showed a blown up picture of yesterday indicated a quite small wound. When cooking people have been known to get a bit careless with a knife in prep and nicked themselves about that much.
Remember, the docs at the hospital had various accounts from Trump and others brought in for treatment. And if the body of the man who died hadn’t been brought in they’d have learned at least one person died of a gunshot wound. They would also be able to determine (people get shot a lot more often in rural/small town “real Mur-i-Kuh” than most people realize) at least a couple of victims sustained serious gunshot wounds. Remember, they were treating Trump. They weren’t watching videos of the incident. So, it would be natural for them to consider and even note the possibility of a VERY lucky bullet wound to Trump’s ear – as in lucky because it barely caught a tiny spot on his ear but they’d of course leave out any references to luck or good fortune in their report. However given the wound Trump had and knowing there were multiple shots and likely hearing that cops, COPS near him were hit by shrapnel they’d have included that possibility also
However EITHER would be a guess. I’m of the belief the reason Trump refuses to allow the actual medical report to be released is because it includes the possibility of a shrapnel wound. So you’re absolutely right that Trump would ONLY want people considering the “struck by a bullet” scenario he’s painted. He wouldn’t want any medical records that might muddy that narrative to see the light of day. The level of threat those doctors, nurses and for that matter anyone at that hospital with access to the records is enormous.
The ONLY way I think it might be proved that Trump was struck by anything other than an intact bullet or shrapnel from a partially disintegrated bullet instead of say a piece of aluminum railing from the stands or fragments from the dead firefighter’s skull is a top Mass Spectrometer analysis of a swap of the wound. Even that would be a maybe, and if it was a bullet FRAGMENT not actually clear anything up. Unless it was from a different round than the .223 fired from the shooter’s gun. Let’s not go down the rabbit hole of a possible second shooter.
In the real world, not what you see on TV that type of analysis isn’t as neat and precise like you see in TV shows. In a circumstance like this it might well be inconclusive. And THAT is assuming someone took an actual swab right after Trump arrived, AND kept hold of any bandage the Secret Service held against his ear on the ride to the hospital. That it got sealed up in an evidence bag and sent off to someplace like the FBI lab in Quantico for analysis. How much do you want to bet that wasn’t done? Or if started that Trump’s detail took custody of it and it’s long since been destroyed?
I say we’ll never know for sure exactly what struck Trump. Nor, while he or his heirs draw breath will release of that hospital report ever take place. Even if Congress were to a Warren Commission style investigation and report Trump would fight like hell to keep that sucker under wraps. We all know it. And that’s the best evidence of all that the report suggest not just a lucky as hell it was so slight bullet wound but also possibly shrapnel. The strength of that inference can be measure by how much Trump refuses to allow full release of his medical records.
I know nothing of guns. However, I have heard that the AR15 is supposedly the same as an M16 except for the “automatic” part. Yet if the bullets fired from that AR15 hit a teleprompter and some people in the audience, it seems like an AR15 simply “sprays” in the general direction. Would you say that the typical AR15 is simply a semi-automatic M16, or is it that you have to know your M16/AR15 (probably true), or the guy was a bad shot (maybe also true), or is it just an over mythologized lousy gun for shooting long range, or something else?
Also, if Trump was grazed by the first shot, I cannot think the iconic picture from NYT was that of a bullet. As I understand it, the photographer began taking rapid pictures _after_ he started hearing shots and later found that photo in the collection.
First of all the CONVICTED ORANGE FELON is a coward. Second he was not on a battlefield or anywhere near a war. Third it is not possible for Mr Bone-spurs to ever be any kind of hero. Forth I don’t believe he was grazed by a bullet. All he is is an orange tinted bag of puss and $hit!
Trump’s not releasing the medical report because it keeps him in the news. And, of course, the grift….
If Mr. Overripe Mangos’ lips move , lies come out, plain and simple.
Whenever Spray Tan Mussolini speaks, lies are emmitted. Case closed…
I’ve a feeling that statement might have come from the person in charge of FBI publicity and not from Wray. Wray knew what he was talking about and stated it in front of, what, a congressional committee was it? He would not be talking out his ass during such a time and this was after enough time has passed so that many views of all the footage at the event could be parsed and scrutinized to death f.f.s.
Kind of wonder if maybe t.s. put that out and is saying it came from the FBI. It isn’t as if that s.m. platform is used for any truth-telling so lying about who created and sent a message would be entirely in keeping with their standard M.O. Hell, they’re sticking with their bullet bullshit so why not tell more lies and attribute them to others?
Remember in 2016 how Trump refused to release his tax records (as EVERY presidential candidate had done since George Romney did it all the way back in 1968)? He claimed he couldn’t do it because he was being audited (which was BS that the press wouldn’t push back on; the IRS can’t release a person’s tax records without a valid warrant but the subject of an audit is under no such restrictions).
And now, in 2024, it’s his medical records. (And wholly ironic since Trump was leading the charge that Biden undergo a full series of tests to prove his continued fitness–mostly mental but certainly physical tests weren’t off the table. And the experts are all pretty much in agreement that a “bullet”–even just “grazing” his ear as it allegedly did–can cause brain issues over time.)
not to be a conspiracy theory, but what if there. was something in the medical report beyond just the injury. trump blood pressure? trump frantic response, trump psychotic response.
I don’t believe it was a bullet or part of a bullet. I can believe it was shrapnel if glass counts as sherapnel. There was a a scratch on his right cheek whic was too straight, too long, too thin, and too isolated to have been made by a bullet, or even a piece of a bullet. But a piece of glass (as, for instance, from a teleprompter) could have made it.
That photo showed practically no damage or blood. I make historical costumes as,a hobby. I made the mistake of using a rotary cutter because someone tol.me it gave a cleaner cut than scissors. I got a cut on my fingers. It bled like a stuck pig,considerably more than Trump’sear . As a kid I had two stitches in my chin. Much more blood than Trump’s,ear. Any head wound bleeds like crazy. Trump’s ear would, didn’t.
I suspect it was a glass shrapnel from the teleprompter.rolls here who know far more than I do about guns have said velocity isn’t affected, so why weren’t one of the police and Secret Service standing behind Donnie getting actually shot?