American society is in danger of collapse unless our career political class comes to its senses.
That’s because the rule of law is breaking down. And it is the backbone of every functioning free society. The impersonal rule of law, something almost everyone complies with even when certain aspects of it seem objectable, is critical to a society. When it collapses so does society.
Yet what is happening to it in many of America’s biggest cities gives indications that society is in trouble.
Lawless Cities
In lots of big municipalities many laws are not being enforced or are hardly enforced. These cities are generally ruled by the Democrats. Sometimes this party of the left has ruled in cities over generations. These towns in effect become one-party places, a very unhealthy situation no matter which party controls everything.
The ruling party often becomes contemptuous not only of any opposition but of the concept of law. For instance, one could see some of this even before this summer’s riots when some cities declared themselves sanctuary cities. These are cities where federal immigration laws were not enforced. These were cities in which federal agents looking for illegal aliens were blocked by local law authorities.
A Murder in the Neighborhood
Indeed, just a mile south of my home here in Central Queens County, in South Richmond Hill, a 92-year-old woman was recently killed by an illegal alien. Federal officials later complained that they were tracking the suspect but local police were barred from cooperating by left-wing New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio.
A Prosecutor Who “Does” Politics
Part of the breakdown we see in American society is because this is a presidential election year. Power mad pols do strange things in election years. And this, combined with racially tinged politics, not the rule of law, is becoming the norm in everything.
For instance, here in New York City, Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance has announced he will not prosecute protestors, peaceful, violent or otherwise. Few, if any Democrats, object. One of Vance’s fictional counterparts in the television series “Law and Order,” Jack McCoy, famously said, “I don’t do politics. I do the law.”
Vance is “doing politics.
Mayhem in the Northwest
In Portland, Oregon, there has been more than a hundred nights of mayhem, destruction and violence. Demonstrators claim to be peaceful, yet many of them have been trying to burn down the federal courthouse. There are many reasons for their rioting but one of them is the courthouse and the federal law it represents.
Federal law is tougher than many states and cities, which have adopted no bail laws that amount to a license to riot. Under these incredible no bail laws, people are arrested on charges of serious crimes, then almost immediately let out.
By contrast, federal law does impose bail and stiffer sentences than many of these democratic states and cities. The bigger issue is political. The federal government is headed by the hated republican president, Donald Trump. Trump is the great white whale to millions of Americans who have become Captain Ahabs. They are obsessed with putting anyone in the White House not named Trump.
Federal “Stormtroopers”
Portland and Oregon officials have complained that the federal officials protecting the federal courthouse are the cause of all the rioting. If only the Feds would leave town, they say, everything would be fine.
Still, many concede that, if those federal officers left—officers who are often branded “stormtroopers” by many Democrats—the courthouse would be destroyed.
Complicating the problem is the de facto news blackout. Mainstream media, the biggest networks such as CBS, NBC and ABC, are openly hostile to Trump. They are ignoring much of the violence in cities around the nation or downplaying it. (For more on that, please see my series on media bias). At the Democratic national convention last month, over four days, not a word was said about the rioting. But serious rioting has happened in many places this year and the threat of more haunts millions of Americans in big cities, where it is threatening to overwhelm local law enforcement.
Oregon authorities have rejected the offer of federal help from President Trump. Yet the nightly rioting has become so bad that the Oregon governor recently ordered state troopers into Portland to help the overtaxed local police. However, the head of the state troopers’ union said he didn’t want his members sent to Portland.
Why?
The local prosecutors weren’t making many arrests, he complained. So why should his people risk their lives when they weren’t being supported by local officials.
What is going on?
More in part II.
