Trump Assassination Attempt

On November 22, 1963, at about 2:45 pm eastern standard time my team and I were in Block House 32 at Cape Canaveral FL, deep into testing and rehearsing for the upcoming launch of a Minuteman missile designated 443. We were suddenly interrupted by a loudspeaker announcement informing us that President John F Kennedy had been shot and that he was on his way to Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas, Texas.

I was stunned and angry. I was even angry will some of the people in Blockhouse 32 at the time.

I had voted for Kennedy in November of 1960 with my first ever vote in a presidential election. Between 1960 and that day in 1963, I wasted a lot of emotional energy defending him with people around me. Not everyone liked him.

In the Air Force, I was teamed up with a few people who were angry about JFK’s Civil rights proposal and the integration of black and whites in public schools. One officer born and raised in Mississippi, was still angry because his family lost their plantation in the civil war and wanted to hold that against JFK’s civil rights proposals.

So on that day in 1963 I wanted to blame all those people who voted for Nixon as if they had pulled the trigger. It took me years to realize that I was wrong.

I don’t know (and not too sure anyone knows) who killed Kennedy. Lee Harvey Oswald was arrested for the murder, but he was killed the next day before he could talk or be tried. Recently I heard Robert F Kennedy say with confidence that the CIA had President Kennedy killed. I pray that is not true.

Last Saturday, my wife and I were watching TV as Donald Trump began a rally in Butler, PA. Trump was just beginning his speech when he turned his head to the right to point to a large screen pointing out his immigration statistics to the crowd. From our TV we heard a “pop, pop” noise. Trump touched his ear and the first thing that went through my mind was that a bug flew into his ear. But when he saw blood on his hand and he dove for the floor behind the podium and I realized the pops were gunshots. My mind immediately went back to block house 32 in 1963. I was stunned and angry just like before, tears came to my eyes. The event in Butler, PA yesterday drew the same reaction from me as the killing of John F Kennedy in 1963. 

I now know that arguments about medical insurance, tax rates and civil rights were just the things we should be talking about, they are political arguments.

I don’t want to be wrong again and I know that my annoying liberal friends and relatives are not responsible for this terrifying event.

So what is different now?

I think I know what the problem is.

There is a disease that has spread over almost half of our country. That disease is TDS aka Trump Derangement Syndrome. This type of disease did not exist in 1963.

There are things about Donald Trump that people do not like, but the 90% of the mainstream media that is liberal nourishes and spreads this disease.

I know people who have TDS and a low level. They don’t like his bragging and boisterous personality. They don’t like his mean tweets. I personally like Trump, but I get why some people don’t like him.

But here is where it gets dangerous to our country and to Trump personally. Ever since the day Donald Trump entered office, he has faced a constant barrage of allegations of wrongdoing, all amplified daily by a compliant liberal media. None of these allegations accusations turned out to be true and therefore none have stopped him. I don’t have room in this short article to go over them all, but you know what I am talking about.

My point is the TDS has symptoms and consequences that led to this attempted assignation attempt. As I see it the possibilities are, the shooter was:

1. A loner who may have believed that he was saving the nation.
2. A loner who was hired by some radical group motivated by TDS.
3. A loner hired by a group wanting to stop Trumps election drive.
4. And the worst possibility is that this event was a setup which involved people in the current administration who wanted to keep Trump from becoming president just like Robert Kennedy described in the JFK assignation.

I pray three things. First, I pray that this event was just a lone shooter who couldn’t resist the images created in his mind by TDS. Second, I pray that the democratic party and liberal media will recognize the serious danger of TDS and stop nourishing and supporting it.

Finally, I pray that the current presidential candidates will present a clean discussion of the issues facing our nation today, so that in November the voters can elect the best man for the job of President of the United State of America.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Terrell (Terry) Lee Whalen is an author and retired after a 50-year multifaceted career as an engineer, project manager and entrepreneur. He graduated from Colorado State University in 1962 with a BSEE and a commission in USAF. During his USAF career, Terry was the Launch Officer for Minuteman Missile test program at Cape Canaveral Florida, launching 13 missiles in 1963 and 1964. In 1965 he began a position as Project Manager at NASA’s Manned Spacecraft Center, in Houston, TX, playing a key role in Apollo 4, the first unmanned Apollo mission and on Apollo 7 the First manned orbital mission. In the 1970’s Terry left NASA and joined Raytheon Company where he managed aspects of several key projects in systems and displays for air traffic control, sonar, and satellite tracking. In 1980 Terry and his wife Ruth felt an urge to move back to their Colorado roots. So, Terry took engineering jobs at first with Ball Aerospace and later ESAB, an international company, served as manufacturing manager and later engineering manager.

Terry’s entrepreneurial career began in 1985 as cofounder and president of a company established to bring computers and automation to the sign industry. This led Terry away from products and designing to owning and operating a sign business in Las Vegas. After a successful run in Vegas, Terry and Ruth sold the business in 2022. In retirement they are enjoying their 8 grand children and 13 great grandchildren, as Terry pursues a career as an author.