We hear so often that, in many prisons, it’s the inmates — street gangs, primarily — who are in charge. Through threats and actual deeds of violence, prison administrators and guards are cowed and cowering, not doing their duties under law. Criminals, not crime-fighters, rule over daily life.
The same is too often true in communities and neighborhoods close by. Fear of harm, even death, overrides any impulse suffering residents may feel to protest, much less to take real, concerted action against criminal gangs. Law enforcement gets little or no information or cooperation in their efforts to identify and charge the perpetrators who seem to be running rampant. Those who know something don’t say something because, very simply, they are scared to death. They don’t want to risk their lives, or the lives of their loved ones.
That same toxic dynamic is at work in our national politics, sad to say. A convicted criminal facing dozens of other charges, Donald Trump, strikes fear into the heart of any GOP officeholder who might dare to oppose him. He goes on vicious attack, threatening to banish him or her in the next election. Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger are Exhibits A and B.
So craven sycophants that they are, almost every Republican in Congress bows a knee to Trump, swearing fealty to MAGA ideology and idiocy.
My questions for them are these: How can they look themselves in the mirror every morning? And when, if ever, will they wake up to what they have become — inmates in gang leader Trump’s prison?
Fred Reklau
Oak Park