OPINION:
As a voter, I feel responsible for understanding our basic laws, their functions and the consequences of violating them. I expect others to do likewise. Recently, however, more voters seem unaware of our laws. Perhaps it’s time to restore civics and law classes in public high schools.
As a longtime youth counselor, I have spent decades teaching and urging our youths not to interfere with law enforcement officers doing their jobs. Still, people are being taught the exact opposite, reversing decades of work dating back to the teachings of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. during the Civil Rights era and its nonviolent protests.
Democratic socialism contradicts our democratic principles, and, sadly, Democratic leaders are embracing it out of desperation for any standards at all. It’s against the law to sanction criminal activity, which, in my opinion, is what Democratic public officials locally and in Congress are doing. The First Amendment does not protect rhetoric that incites violence, and it’s illegal to release the personal information of federal law enforcement officers.
Voters need to hold Democratic leaders accountable for igniting the public incidents we’ve been seeing, and liberal media outlets for biased coverage that incites public violence.
Whenever I talk to my Democratic friends, the priorities of their party seem unclear. Today’s Democratic Party has adopted positions protecting criminals, inciting protest riots, undermining the judicial system and supporting illegal immigrants.
If public officials supported federal law enforcement by turning over arrested illegal immigrant criminals instead of releasing them back into the communities, then law enforcement could do its job in a way that would not disrupt any community. Instead, they oppose these officers, often violently, and then cry victim when their actions result in physical harm. Barring that, they blame the current administration for the chaos they have created.
GREG RALEIGH
Washington
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