John Wilkes Booth. Charles Hinckley. Lee Harvey Oswald. Even Squeaky Fromme. They sound like assassins. But Cole Allen? Nah. Maybe a relief pitcher for the Dodgers.

Now, I guess it is the assumption of the White House that Allen was sitting in his house in Torrance, California, minding his own business, winding down his day, planning his next teaching assignment, when he decided, on a lark perhaps, to turn on Jimmy Kimmel and heard Kimmel joke about young Melania looking forward to her post-Trump years, after her almost 80 year old husband kicks the bucket. The joke (which none of us consider either tasteful or funny) tickled young Allen, who immediately decided to pack up his weapons, jump on the next Amtrak, check into the Washington Hilton, and attempt to make Melania’s dreams come true. “It’s the eighth inning,” Allen said to himself, “and time for me to show them what I have, to show them that my fastball can get their screwball.” And away he went.

And a beautiful ride it was. From the Pacific Ocean through the desert, the Rockies, the heartland, all the way to the shores of Lake Michigan and then beyond. He and his weaponry check into the Washington Hilton the night before the White House Correspondents Dinner, and he is treated like any not-quite-a-star major league reliever, and takes a room for two nights (that’s a guess) at $356 a night (according to Booking.com), leaving them credit card information to be processed after he departs. Whether he has $712 in his bank account to reimburse Visa or Discovery (used everywhere) or whomever was probably irrelevant to him, because he did not expect to leave the hotel alive. He thought he would more likely leave a martyr to the cause.

His plan to assassinate the leader of an independent (and major, truth be told) country was not well thought out, it appears. Or at least it did not turn out to have been well thought out. If his major target, Donald Trump, had been the assassin, rather than the target, he would have gone about it much differently. He would not have been so personally involved in the actual act itself. He would have stayed watching Jimmy Kimmel (and those other late night show hosts, all at the same time) in his personal quarters, and – say – asked his Pete (that is, Pete Hegseth, not Pete Buttigieg) to “take it from here”. And his Pete would have obliged, just as he did when Donald Trump did decide to assassinate the leader of another independent (and major, truth be told) country, the Ayatollah K.

A digression. Have you noticed that the parents who name their child Pete typically have last names that are hard to pronounce and spell? The Allens named their son Cole, not Pete. Had they named him Pete, history might have been different. No major league team would have called up a relief pitcher named Pete Allen. Not a chance. I asked AI about Major League Petes, and they told me about Pete Incavaglia, and Pete Vuckovich, among others. Who were the others? I am not going to list them because they destroy my theory.

Okay. Back to the main theme. I wouldn’t say that just because Trump himself acted as an assassin (indirectly) that he should be fair game for other assassins. Not at all. I, in fact, have been against assassination my entire life, and see no reason to change my opinion now. But just saying, there is some pot-calling-the-kettle-blackism here.

I immediately knew that the initial reaction of the Trump White House would be: if we had this event in the White House ballroom (to be constructed), this never would have happened. Maybe not. Maybe so. Maybe Cole Allen just would have needed a different approach. He might have been the guy hired to inflate the balloons, you know. So, I think this argument is specious (as if once the ballroom is completed, the president will never leave the White House grounds), and I must say that I am appalled by the letter that the Executive Department still known (to some) as the Department of Justice sent to the National Trust for Historic Preservation, telling the Trust that it is time for them to drop their law suit to stop the despoliation (why isn’t it “despoilation”?) of the White House grounds, telling the Trust that its continuation of the lawsuit puts the First Family at extreme risk. As if this would even be a reason to stop a lawsuit, if true. Think of all the litigation brought by or supported by the DOJ that puts all of us at extreme risk. For shame.

Now, as I said, I do not want to see Donald Trump become another target of assassination. But there are things I would like to see. I would like to see Donald Trump become so fearful of another attempted assassination that he decides that enough is enough and that he resigns the presidency, and moves back to Palm Beach, where he can golf and enjoy Jimmy Kimmel in (relative) peace.

Is that possible? As they say, truth is stranger than satire.