'Political violence is political cowardice'
It's been a harrowing two days in the United States. Today, Bernie Sanders delivered a speech that you'd hope a president might present at an hour like this.
President Trump is incapable, of course, for the simple reason that he wants violence, it suits his agenda — the more the temperature rises in American cities, the sooner his ICE-sourced paramilitary will be deployed, arrests and the detainments will accelerate, the flames of war will be fanned and fostered and the pillars of democracy trampled. Trump broadcast during his campaign that he world bring retribution and revenge, and he absolutely intends to, and that means taking advantage of grievance and anger, of mobilising it as he did on January 6th.
Senator Robert F. Kennedy is referred to in Senator Sanders’ speech, the agony of his assassination, but RFK also delivered two similar ‘healing’ speeches at a moment like this. The first is his flatbed truck speech immediately following the death of Martin Luther King Jr, which is the speech I usually name whenever I’m asked for my favourite political speech of all time. Like Senator Sanders, Kennedy was attempting to turn down the temperature at a fraught moment in the nation’s history.
I’ve written about the structure of the flatbed truck speech before, the miracle of a politician finding words this perfect in less than an hour, a few scribbles on the back of a page containing whatever it was RFK didn’t deliver, jotted as he flew into Indianapolis. It’s when he gets to the Aeschylus poem that it really soars:
Even in our sleep, pain which cannot forget
falls drop by drop upon the heart,
until, in our own despair,
against our will,
comes wisdom
through the awful grace of God.
William Kristol at The
revisited the RFK flatbed speech today on that newsletter’s ‘Morning Shots’. [I highly recommend the newsletter]
I’ve written less about another famous speech Robert Kennedy delivered the next day (5th April 1968), ‘The Mindless Menace of Violence’ at the City Club of Cleveland. In some ways, it has similar themes to the Sanders address from today, although the levels of national grief for a figure like Martin Luther King Jr must have been exponentially higher. It begins:
This is a time of shame and a time of sorrow. It is not a day for politics. I have saved this one opportunity, my only event of today, to speak briefly to you about this mindless menace of violence in America which again stains our land and every one of our lives.
It is not the concern of any one race. The victims of the violence are black and white, rich and poor, young and old, famous and unknown. They are, most important of all, human beings whom other human beings loved and needed. No one - no matter where he lives or what he does, can be certain who will suffer from some senseless act of bloodshed. And yet it goes on and on in this country of ours.
Why? What has violence ever accomplished? What has it ever created? No martyr's cause has ever been stilled by an assassin's bullet. No wrongs have ever been righted by riots and civil disorders. I sniper is only a coward, not a hero. And an uncontrollable mob is only a voice of madness, not the voice of the people.
Of course the grim reality is that rather than stem the tide of political violence, Kennedy himself was gunned down less than two months later.
Today feels equally ominous, not just because of a young life lost, not just because limitless gun deaths and mass shootings are a cancer America is willing to endure as part of its love affair with the Second Amendment, (I’ve given up attempting to argue this issue, the USA will never change its laws to save its people, as Australia did under John Howard in 1996) but also because it feels as if a great nation is at the precipice, and a criminal administration not only doesn’t care, but is actively seeking to drag it over the edge. I don’t do praying, but I haven’t been able to stop thinking about the United States, a country that has given so much to us in Australia, that has been such a cultural and political beacon for the world.
Hang in there, everyone.
Best wishes
Tony Wilson, Speakola library and podcast
Here are Senator Sanders’ words from earlier today. It really is worth a watch:
Bernie Sanders: 'Political violence is political cowardice', Response to murder of Charlie Kirk - 2025
11 September 2025, Vermont, USA
I want to say a few words regarding the terrible murder yesterday of Charlie Kirk — someone whom I strongly disagreed with on almost every issue but who was clearly a very smart and effective communicator and organizer — and someone unafraid to get out into the world and engage the public. My condolences go out to his wife and family.
A free and democratic society, which is what America is supposed to be about, depends upon the basic premise that people can speak out, organize and take part in public life without fear — without worrying that they might be killed, injured or humiliated for expressing their political views. In fact, that is the essence of what freedom is about and what democracy is about. You have a point of view, that’s great. I have a point of view that is different than yours, that’s great. Let’s argue it out. We make our case to the American people at the local, state and federal level, and we hold free elections in which the people decide what they want. That’s called freedom and democracy. And I want as many people as possible to participate in that process without fear.
Freedom and democracy is not about political violence. It is not about assassinating public officials. It is not about trying to intimidate people who speak out on an issue. Political violence, in fact, is political cowardice. It means that you cannot convince people of the correctness of your ideas, and you have to impose them through force. Every American, no matter what one’s political point of view may be, must condemn all forms of political violence and all forms of intimidation. We must welcome and respect dissenting points of view. That’s what our Constitution is about. That’s what our Bill of Rights is about. That, in fact, is what freedom is about.
The murder of Charlie Kirk is part of a disturbing rise in political violence that threatens to hollow out public life and make people afraid of participating. From the January 6, 2021, attack on the United States Capitol, to the attempted assassination of Donald Trump, to the attack on Paul Pelosi, to the attempted kidnapping of Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, to the murder of Minnesota Speaker of the House Melissa Hortman and her husband, to the arson attack on Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, to the shooting of UnitedHealth executive Brian Thompson and the shooting several years ago of Rep. Steve Scalise, this chilling rise in violence has targeted public figures across the political spectrum.
Sadly, this is not a new phenomenon. We all remember the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Senator Robert F. Kennedy, John Lennon, Medgar Evers and the attempted assassinations of President Ronald Reagan and Alabama Governor George Wallace.
This is a difficult and contentious moment in American history. Democracy in our country and throughout the world is under attack. And there are a lot of reasons for that, which need serious discussion. But, bottom line: If we honestly believe in democracy, if we believe in freedom, all of us must be loud and clear. Political violence, regardless of ideology, is not the answer and must be condemned.