Stochastic Probability

Applied to politics = 

Stochastic terrorism is the use of mass communications to incite random actors to carry out violent or terrorist acts that are statistically predictable but individually unpredictable. In short, remote-control murder by lone wolf.

It's not like we aren't aware of this shit, Mr Trump.

At each step, plausible deniability increases through the diffusion of responsibility. "Oh, it was just a lone nut, nobody could have predicted he would do that, and I'm not responsible for what people in my audience do."

Trump knows what he's done, even if his intent at the time was nothing more than one of his usual stunts to say something heinously inflammatory in order to generate some free media.

And the statements that have come from his campaign are again the usual bullshit aimed at kicking the news cycle around to keep the coverage going - to give the story legs.

"It's called the power of unification – 2nd Amendment people have amazing spirit and are tremendously unified, which gives them great political power. And this year, they will be voting in record numbers, and it won't be for Hillary Clinton, it will be for Donald Trump." --Jason Miller, Senior Communications Advisor.

That's a near-perfect, classically content-free "explanation".  Notice, there's nothing in there that even tries to pretend that Trump is condemning violence against a political opponent.

Charlie Pierce put up a quote from (I think) Hunter S Thompson, and tag-lined it with this:

What he said on Tuesday is something Donald Trump does every day of his life, on purpose, as a matter of policy and a perfect expression of everything he stands for. It seems one could stoop even lower than Nixon to be president.

And of course, the usual asshole apologists were out to make sure we got a good dose of False Equivalence:

Here's the point on this little piece of your freak show, Mr Halperin: If it was bad for Hillary to say what she said in 2008, then it's bad for Trump to say what he said 2016.

See how that works?  Bad is bad is bad.  You don't get to say Hillary was wrong to do it back then, so it's OK for Trump to do it now. dick

But what riles me now is that neither The Hillary gang nor the Press Poodles are getting after this with any kind of zest or gusto.

"Here's what Americans need to hear from you, Mr Trump, and in no uncertain terms:

- you are not calling for violence

- you condemn violence against any political opponent at any time for any reason

- you reject the support of anybody who'd even think violence against a political opponent is in any way OK

- you understand that sometimes we get a little nutty, but everybody has to leave their guns out of this

- be passionate; be vocal; be steadfast - just don't be a dick"

Are ya getting any of this, Mr Trump?