Dear Editor:

In my almost 80 years I have been a Democrat, an Independent, and now an arch-Conservative Republican slightly to the right of Attila the Hun.

I have been a Freedom Rider, beaten up in Alabama, not murdered by the KKK like Schwerner, Goodwin and Cheney in Mississippi in 1965, been in two armies and one war abroad.

I remember the Kent State killing of innocent students by the National Guard during the Vietnam War and that didn’t lead to rioting, arson, looting or murder. 

I remember the race riots after Dr. King’s assassination, the race riots after the Rodney King verdicts, the race riots after the deaths of Michael Brown and too many other Black men to remember, but impossible to forget.

The utter destruction and the loss of so many businesses all in the name of “No Justice, No Peace” and there hasn’t been peace in many of our largest cities from NYC, Philadelphia, LA to name just three and the murders and maiming of police and innocent civilians dragged from their vehicles and set upon by the mobs.

Now we have a new justification for all the mayhem as the looters walk, not run, into smashed stores unhurriedly and stroll out arms laden with loot. The new word is “Reparations” and that is the justification for all the violence unchecked by the authorities. 

We have become a very violent society and we have also become polarized as a nation and yet more than half the world wants to come here, because its better here than where they come from.

We should take that to heart for all our craziness this is still the best place to live and despite the fact that all our Founding Fathers were slave owners as were other leaders for thousands of years and come together for the sake of our families and neighbors as one nation, indivisible for justice and liberty for all.

I pray we see the light.

Wm. J. Levy

Ormond Beach, Fla.