it’s bad for presidents to threaten people with guns
They do this indirectly all the time. This is the basis of all laws of the federal government. Yes, I think it’s bad, but I don’t think it’d be fundamentally any worse for Trump to point a gun at Pence than for, say, an FBI agent (acting under the aegis of the Executive Branch, i.e., the President) to point a gun at a drug dealer.
But I agree it’d have been a stupid thing to do for many reasons: the threat wouldn’t be credible, he’d get removed from office even if it works, people he needs to govern would turn on him, voters will switch to supporting Democrats, … that’s not winning.
Edit: This is also the basis of my criticism of the rabble-rousing on January 6. It’s primarily a matter of aesthetics.
So the problem is just that it wouldn’t help him win? So if threatening Pence with a gun would have made him president, and the supreme court said that he was immune from criminal prosecution, it wouldn’t affect if you’d vote for him again? (Ignoring that it would be his third term.)
They do this indirectly all the time. This is the basis of all laws of the federal government. Yes, I think it’s bad, but I don’t think it’d be fundamentally any worse for Trump to point a gun at Pence than for, say, an FBI agent (acting under the aegis of the Executive Branch, i.e., the President) to point a gun at a drug dealer.
But I agree it’d have been a stupid thing to do for many reasons: the threat wouldn’t be credible, he’d get removed from office even if it works, people he needs to govern would turn on him, voters will switch to supporting Democrats, … that’s not winning.
Edit: This is also the basis of my criticism of the rabble-rousing on January 6. It’s primarily a matter of aesthetics.
So the problem is just that it wouldn’t help him win? So if threatening Pence with a gun would have made him president, and the supreme court said that he was immune from criminal prosecution, it wouldn’t affect if you’d vote for him again? (Ignoring that it would be his third term.)