This has been the week from hell in the U.S. We have faced multiple threats to our security and our peace: a pandemic
that has crossed the threshold of 100,00 lives lost; lack of national leadership
that will result in many more deaths from Covid-19 in the coming weeks; another black man killed by
police using unnecessary and excessive force who has become the latest symbol of
racial oppression; massive peaceful protests
that have spread from Minneapolis across the U.S. and into countries around the
world; looting and troublemaking during the night by white nationalists,
anarchists and criminals who have infiltrated and hidden among the protestors making
the police response complicated and difficult; and the final absurdity—an out
of control would-be emperor launching an attack on unarmed and
non-violent protestors by militarized police in full battle gear to clear the
street in front of the White House so that he could have a photo op at the
historic St. John’s Church.
Our democracy is not threatened by protests
against excessive force used by bad cops, but it is threatened by bad cops who use
the color of their uniform to treat blacks differently and with greater force than
they treat whites under the same circumstance.
The protestors held up signs and shouted:
Hands Up,
Don’t Shoot
No Justice, No Peace
I Can’t
Breathe
I’m old enough to experience this protest with a sense of déjà vu. In the late 1960s I witnessed our cities
burned down with the frustration of decades of physical and emotional abuse of
blacks. In those days we marched with
the iconic leadership of Martin Luther King, Jr. and while protestors marched
during the day, destructive criminal elements used the chaos to torch our
cities and loot our stores largely but not entirely during the night. The looters made it hard to hear the voices
of the oppressed demanding freedom, but ultimately the message got through and
the Civil Rights Movement was largely successful.
We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into
physical violence.
Martin
Luther King, Jr
Washington DC has a tradition of protests. Our Constitution asserts the right of
citizens to assemble
peaceably and to petition the Government for redress of grievances. Which is
what they were doing—when without warning heavily armed Park Police backed up
by Mounted Police fired tear gas and flash grenades and moved against the
stunned protestors, pushing them off the street and out of the park.
Why were nonviolent protestors acting within their Constitutional rights attacked? Not because they were rioting
but because the President wanted a photo opportunity for his campaign! His staff thought a show of military force
would make him appear strong and in charge, apparently to counter the fact that
he spent the previous evening cowering in his bunker under the White House
because he was afraid of college students protesting in Lafayette Park.
The Rector of St. John’s did not know that Trump was
coming to the church for a photo op. Trump only wanted the church and the bible as
props. He had no interest in entering
the church for prayer or opening the bible.
The Episcopal Bishop of Washington was annoyed. As reported in The Guardian she said: “Let
me be clear, the president just used a Bible, the most sacred text of the
Judeo-Christian tradition, and one of the churches of my diocese, without
permission, as a backdrop for a message antithetical to the teachings of Jesus.
We align ourselves with those seeking justice for the death of George Floyd and
countless others. And I just can’t believe what my eyes have seen.”
Believe it.
Trump has no values, no principles, no integrity, no consideration for
anyone but himself and his reelection.
That is why he is so dangerous and so unpredictable. That is also why our democracy is in
danger. He is flirting with use of the 1807
Insurrection Act to send the US military to quell lawful protests by considering
them a form of “insurrection.” He got little
pushback from his Republican allies.
What might he do if he sees the election slipping through his fingers?
"When peaceful protesters are dispersed by the
order of the president from the doorstep of the people's house, the White House
- using tear gas and flash grenades - in order to stage a photo op at a noble
church, we can be forgiven for believing that the president is more interested
in power than in principle," Biden said in a speech in Philadelphia on
June 2.
We have an alternative. Let’s use it.
