Is nation headed for another Kent State tragedy?

In May 1970, the anti-Vietnam War movement reached one of its peaks with protests coast to coast after President Nixon ordered the invasion of Cambodia, broadening the war to include Vietnam’s neighbor. Within days, National Guard troops opened fire on protesters at Kent State University in Ohio, killing four students and wounding nine.

It’s hard not to worry that we are now headed for a similar tragedy. The events in San Diego County on Oct. 18 — which amounted to President Donald Trump’s latest “bleep you” to California Gov. Gavin Newsom, his nemesis — once would have seemed unfathomable. Marines at Camp Pendleton marked the Corps’ 250th anniversary with an event that included the highly unusual firing of live rounds over Interstate 5. The state’s decision to close the freeway on safety grounds was vindicated when a round detonated prematurely over the 5, scattering shrapnel that dented two CHP vehicles. This was one more example of why the millions of Americans who turned out that day for “No Kings” rallies have cause to be appalled at Trump’s assault on healthy norms.

Nevertheless, it’s also unnerving to see the increasingly edgy remarks from mainstream Democratic figures. On MSNBC, Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin ominously said that “we may be nearing” the moment when “elections don’t matter” because democratic institutions have failed. On his podcast, legendary Democratic strategist James Carville called for his party to round up Trump “collaborators” after it regains power and publicly humiliate them by shaving their heads and having the public spit on them as they were “marched down Pennsylvania Avenue.”

Yes, of course, this is not to suggest any equivalence at all between their rhetoric and what Trump has actually used his power to do. It is to suggest that if you’re worried that cool heads are increasingly hard to find — and that tragedies are increasingly likely as a result — you should be. As a result, America may be headed for paroxysms not seen since the days of Presidents Johnson and Nixon. This is not a development to root for.