I’ve been teaching in the Philadelphia school district for almost twenty years. As the summer is starting to wind down, I am beginning to think about teaching once again and daily life in the school or at least as it would have been had it not been set upon by the China virus. I wonder greatly how learning will ever be the same amidst not only the disease insidiously visited upon us by the Chinese communist party but also by the rising tide of violence in both our schools and in our streets in recent months. Call me old fashioned but I don’t like living in places amidst mounting violent crime where life is mocked and made perilous by ravening bands of leftist mobs which glorify the destruction of property and even death as societal goods. The lessons they seemed to have learned in school are “plunder” and with increasing regularity, even “kill!” Human dignity begins with the rule of law and is followed by behaving as if it applies to everyone. But Philadelphia mayor Jim Kenny and district attorney Larry Krasner don’t seem to see it that way.
At about 6:30 p.m. on May 30, I bore witness to heinous violent acts on Chestnut Street between 16th and 19th where people with veritable impunity were bullied, threatened and harassed by roving bands of rioters. I witnessed no law enforcement presence and at this I wondered greatly. I surmised they had been besieged by rioters setting police cruisers aflame to the north and east some time before. Nonetheless, scenes such as these should frighten every American. Both Kenny and Krasner are charged with the protection of all who live and work in Philadelphia. By their intransigence, they failed abjectly and deliberately. What little law enforcement there seemed to have been in effect at the time, missed the point while the ravening behavior of the mob missed the form. Most alarmingly, the police did not immediately arrest those committing crimes very probably at Krasner’s behest and on political pretext. Krasner, therefore, contrived the chaos that day to unfold exactly as it did.
This then is the very essence of objectification of violence by the mob. The more people are made to suffer in dumb anguish the tumults and trammels of chaos, the more fervent their desire for change becomes until at last, they can tolerate no more. In the midst of this moral malaise, they coalesce into a mob where their anger can only be assuaged through riot and plunder in token of legitimate grievances long past but since fairly redressed. By Krasner’s ostensible unwillingness to enforce the law with the alacrity as he most certainly would have done were the polarities both racial and political reversed, progressive apparachiks have learned vicariously and have become emboldened to mobilize far and wide for Krasner will not prosecute criminal acts within his jurisdiction so long as he can harness misery as a cudgel to defeat President Trump and thus consolidate power.
In an article by Ronn Blitzer “DAs backed by Soros, other liberal activists join fray…” (Fox News, 30 July 20), there now exits a patent nexus and insidious comorbidity between the left and anarchy comforted, financed and abetted by George Soros. The history is well known. Questioning the efficacy of the Electoral College, baseless accusations of the President’s mental competence and the Russia collusion hoax figure most prominently. Their abortive attempt to have President Trump impeached and thus frustrate his re-election effort by any means necessary was and remains the chief reason for their insurgency.
This errand is not one which he and the rest of the progressive cabal wish to fail. As history has shown well and good, it eventually will. The chaos the mob wrought which Krasner himself sanctioned is altogether repugnant to both the dignity of free expression and the nobility upon which the country was founded even in its birthplace. Ben Shapiro in “…In Seattle, Portland left's willingness to tolerate violence should frighten all Americans” (Fox News, 29 Jul 20) writes: "In truth, the category of 'mostly peaceful' is a brand-new invention meant to obscure the simple fact that many of our cultural elites are fine with violence so long as those who engage in such violence have the proper goals." The people, in whose neighborhoods suffer most know well that the overwhelming preponderance of police officers are good people and can be prevailed upon in time of dire need. During such times, law enforcement officers are sorely needed. Those in charge should support them. Krasner like so many on the left fail to set the example themselves nor do they allow those in their charge to do so. Such reckless abandon has marred the local economic underpinnings probably beyond redress.
The left’s moral antipathy has run life in every major metropolitan off the rails and nearly ruined it. I confess myself both disappointed and angered. As for our part, conservatives did not riot and deserve better. On November 3, I will not forget this for having seen for myself on May 30. Never at all will I forgive!