When I heard the capitol was vandalized, my first thought was political. That’s the problem.

I’m embarrassed to admit this, but when I heard someone smashed into our State Capitol Sunday night, my first thought wasn’t “I hope nobody got hurt.” It was “I wonder what side the guy was on.”

That could go either way, politically. Far right-wing rage or extreme left-wing destruction.

Let me be clear. I didn’t need to know which side to know how I felt. It’s all beyond the pale. Violence is violence. Wrong is wrong. But my brain immediately went to politics. To teams. To scorekeeping. That’s sick. That’s what this moment has done to us.

Someone knocked over statues. Burned flags. Torched a priceless rug. And my first instinct was to figure out the political angle.

The lieutenant governor immediately condemned it as part of the “significant escalation in violence-tinged political rhet