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Culture War Roundup for the week of February 10, 2025

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It might seem weird that the Secret Service would not do anything in reaction to someone telling them they see a guy on the roof with a gun... but at the end of the day, it's a job for them. We all have bad days on the job when we're tired or whatever. Besides, if I my job was protecting Trump for years and having to stand around in all kinds of weather conditions listening to him ramble for hours, and someone told me that there was a reason to think Trump might be about to get shot, I can easily imagine even as an elite Secret Service operator being like "fuck who cares, I'm tired of all this shit".

I think you don't know much about the Secret Service. They are extremely dedicated to their jobs. While their reputation as elites has taken a (justifiable) hit lately, they go to great effort to recruit and train people whose job is literally to take a bullet for their charge if need be. And part of that job is, obviously, a full understanding that these people will be chosen by the political process, and it may be someone you personally don't like. This is why I find conspiracy theories about how the SS has been infiltrated by the Deep State and set up Trump to to be assassinated extremely unlikely. Incompetence and sloppiness is easier to believe than the SS not only turning into a treasonous conspiracy but deciding that letting an untrained mentally ill teen take a shot at someone. This is comic book villain plotting.

A Secret Service operator being like "fuck who cares, I'm tired of all this shit" would be someone who is having a breakdown of some kind and needs to be relieved of duty. It might have happened (they are human beings) but it would not be normal.