To those who proclaim “All lives matter,” I want to retort, “Good, now let’s put it to the test. Does that mean cops can start shooting at you and yours willy-nilly?”

If you’re not appalled by the stream of news reports of police shootings of innocent blacks, you’re not listening. All lives are not given equal respect in American society, as the shootings are proving. All lives cannot matter as long as this inequality continues. This has to stop – it’s intolerable in a just society. To ignore this, we together need to fix the problem where it exists – sometimes, dare we say, where it’s been sanctioned.

Let’s be blunt. Black lives, we must insist, have not mattered when it comes to too many officers with guns. We’re hearing too many stories from too many law-abiding citizens who have too many reasons to fear officers and others acting on flimsy premises. It’s bound to fan panic and, unfortunately, ugly reactions.

The officers, in turn, are at risk from the availability of handguns and military rifles. Let’s be blunt. For the arms-ownership crowd, we need to advise, “Watch out how you embrace the Second Amendment, because one interpretation does indeed put public officials at risk.” It’s one reason I insist on the “well regulated” part of that amendment, the crucial phrase that’s currently overlooked.

It’s time to face reality and facts, rather than continue the smug ignorance. For all of the heated bombast about foreign terrorists, the biggest threat to any sense of personal security in America these days is domestic. I’d put people toting guns in public as the No. 1 reason. Where has any of that recognition been admitted in the GOP speeches? Or of that from those toting guns?

Yes, black lives matter. Start there, where the omission seems greatest, in assuring that all lives matter.

Listening to Donald Trump, I keep feeling I’ve heard this before. And then it hits me: George Wallace, 1968.

Only I never, ever, thought I’d be hearing such hate and despising and pettiness from the Party of Lincoln.

Or what was once the Party of Lincoln.

You may remember reading a story that ends on a complete surprise, yet as you reflect on the details of the plot, you realize it makes perfect sense. In fact, the shock of the conclusion echoes backward, causing all of the revealing details to retell the tale with fresh urgency.

I have a sense that’s where we are with the rise and fall of Donald J. Trump’s political chimera.

For months we’ve watched aghast as he blustered through a remarkably inept and scattered field of White House hopefuls whose biggest mistake came in failing to take him seriously enough to challenge him directly. Had any of them done their homework, they would have had the ammunition to demolish Trump’s claims of business success – the sort of thing Warren Buffett is doing with his quip that a monkey throwing darts to pick stocks would have had a 150 percent return on his investment at a time when Trump’s namesake company lost 90 cents on the dollar. They could have pointed out all the years Trump paid little or no federal income tax, all the contractors and would-be students he stiffed, his string of failed businesses, from Trump Airlines and Trump Casinos to Trump University and Trump Vodka.

But they didn’t. Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz, and Marco Rubio all squandered their time and treasuries trying to take down each other while letting Trump skip through unscathed.

Even then, though, behind his bullying and bluster, Trump’s thin skin was showing as his Achilles heel. (Sorry about the mixed metaphor, though it rather overlaps.) If only they’d baited him rather than wither in his sarcastic fire. Shown some backbone and muscle. Some true resolve. If only they’d been courageous when it counted.

Many Americans have been appalled by the string of slurs and outrageous – patently, factually false – statements Trump made heading into Cleveland, alienating group after group, yet nothing has pierced that flood of hatred and bile until now.

I’m speaking, of course, about Khizr Khan and his wife, Ghazala.

Much will be written in analyzing how their steel-willed bearing, self-discipline, self-control, authentic emotion, and pointedly brief statements pricked the aura of assumed invincibility around Trump. Daily now, he has burst forth with new brazen volleys that turn back on him as that shell collapses. How many of us are rising each morning with a morbid obsession to learn of his latest idiotic blunder in what’s looking like a death by a thousand self-inflicted cuts? Historians will likely view these few days as a turning point not unlike that at Gettysburg in the Civil War.

Remember, especially, how much the Khans differ from Trump when it comes to character.

Together, they’ve turned the controversy from any debate over right-or-left political issues to Trump’s utter lack of moral integrity – his basic nature of “undisguised sadism” as the Wall Street Journal’s Brett Stephens has written, even the “permanent dishonor” he’s bringing upon the Republican Party.

As I was saying about that table-turning flash, this is it. Everything Trump had apparently evaded is now rising anew, and everywhere he turns, there’s a fresh flank to face. One by one, new commanders are leading their charge. Just look at how Warren Buffett, Michael Bloomberg, Eric Cuban deflate Trump’s capabilities in business. We have military and their families lining up on their own, and a four-star general who knows far more than Trump about foreign policy. Add to that former secretaries of state along with the specter of Trump’s Russian shadow. As for “law and order”? His court cases and fear of releasing his tax returns suggest a crook. The public flight of Republican bigwigs is just starting, largely on the character issue. You can add to that a growing chorus of  offended women and minorities. Put another way, Trump’s spinning and trapped. He’s finally vulnerable and wounded.

Of course, that doesn’t mean he’s finished. Any number of things can come up between now and November 8. Even Gettysburg was far from the final days of the Civil War.

For anti-abortion voters, this has already been an especially troubling election, one they see as having to choose between the lesser of two evils. Or more accurately, among four – they have no advocate at the head of a ticket in this race. Can Mike Pence keep them in the Republican camp? We’ll see.

Another factor to consider is Gary Johnson and whether he can woo dissatisfied conservatives and pragmatic Main Street Republicans to his Libertarian ticket as a refuge. To do so, he’ll have to focus his firepower on Trump rather than Clinton and establish himself as something other than a pot-smoking, mountain-climbing lightweight. Would enough Republicans, convinced that a vote for Trump is already a lost cause, be willing to cast their ballot elsewhere as a matter of conscience – of registering their protest? This may be the Libertarians’ golden moment, if they can seize it. Otherwise, they face fading into the sunset or the dust, depending.

As for Jill Stein? She seems to be Trump’s last, best chance as of now.

In light of Donald Trump’s stubborn unwillingness to release his federal income tax filings, it’s fair to ask. Did he even file them in the first place? (Failure to file, I’ve read, is a far less serious offense than filling out something wrong or patently false.)

Without any evidence to the contrary, it’s an open question. The best we can come up with is his claim he’s being audited. Not that other candidates under audits didn’t release theirs anyway. Even Richard Nixon.

It’s also fair to assume that if Trump did file, he paid little or no taxes – embarrassing numbers in comparison to everyday Americans.

Without any evidence to the contrary, it’s an open assumption.

Now, though, support for that claim grows. As the Washington Post reported on Aug. 1, “What we know about Donald Trump and his taxes so far,” he paid no federal income tax in 1978 and 1979, and little or none in 1984, 1991, or 1993. That from a man worth an estimated $4.5 billion by Forbes or $10 billion by his own bloated claims.

Think about it: you or I paid more than a billionaire! Wanna talk about fair? Or sacrifice?

The Post article, among others, cites court cases where Trump claimed deductions without documentation. Another case of “believe me”? The judges weren’t impressed.

I’m beginning to believe we’ll see state secrets thrown open in the release of Hillary Clinton’s emails long before we see Trump’s shady taxes – and remember, the Clintons had no reservations in making their filings public.

Why haven’t the Republicans been howling about Trump’s cover-up, then? And that’s just what it is. Not that they mind howling “Crook!” and “Liar!” over far lesser matters. at least when it’s not one of their own.

~*~

While we’re at it, consider his mockery of self-made billionaire Michael Bloomberg while boasting of his own business success. The mayor of New York City manages a budget of $82 billion in the full glare of public scrutiny, vastly overshadowing Trump’s private operations. Bloomberg, the sixth richest person in the United States, served three terms in that capacity.

And as fellow billionaire Warren Buffett said Aug. 1, challenging Trump to sit down with him and compare their filings, a tax return reveals a lot more about a person’s finances than financial statements do. “You’re only afraid if you’ve got something to be afraid of,” Buffet explained. “He’s not afraid because of the IRS. He’s afraid because of you,” the public.

No wonder investors love Buffett and respect his $63 billion worth. He tells it like it is, whether it’s stocks or politics.

And Trump’s response? A petulant, “I don’t care much about Warren Buffett.”

Oh, Donald, Mr. Buffett is unquestionably one of the most successful investors ever and one of the world’s wealthiest men. Trump, you really should be listening — and that includes listening to your superiors.

For now, I’m forced to agree with the story making the rounds: Trump knows releasing those returns will kill his campaign. And that’s what Buffett and Bloomberg are smelling, shrewd money men that they are. So, is Trump ready to prove them — and us — wrong? The ball’s in his court and the clock’s ticking. Or, should we add, the courtroom of public opinion?