Recent national commentary by Leonard Pitts Jr., as printed in the Standard-Examiner on Tuesday, Jan. 18, is interesting and enlightening to some degree. Mr. Pitts offers several quotes ascribed to Martin Luther King that show Dr. King to have been in favor of replacing our current democracy with a democratic socialism. Mr. Pitts further explains that Dr. King would fix capitalism with this socialistic movement and was in favor of a guaranteed income for all. Mr. Pitts is successful with me, in convincing me I do not agree with much of MLK’s philosophy and agenda.

One does not have to agree with everything MLK said to appreciate some of what he said, and honor him for that. We ought to be more interested in moving forward, not back, to be fair and even-handed to people of every kind and color. Reparations for racial sins of the past only punish those who did not commit those sins, cause division, and add fuel to the fires of racism — perpetuating, not ending it.

This one thing stands out to me regarding the differences that divide. Democrats are always shortsighted, their solutions only bringing, in the long run, more problems. In the rush to solve every perceived social injustice, their solutions divide us even more. Examples of this are easy to find: inflation, immigration policies that have led to death and misery for many, Americans still left behind in Afghanistan, unkept promises to end the pandemic, (rashly made, I would note), a weakened nation staggering along.

Darrel R. Thompson

Ogden

Newsletter