About The times. (Gainesville, Ga.) 1972-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 26, 2020)
EZ3 OPINION Shannon Casas Editor in Chief The Times ’ Gainesville, Georgia 770-718-3417 | scasas@gainesvilletimes.com Weekend Edition-December 26-27, 2020 LITERS Both sides must put country above politics For the first time in my life, I am seri ously concerned about the survival of our democracy. President Trump has contin ued to spew unsubstantiated allegations of voter fraud in an attempt to overturn the presidential election results. Sadly, many Republicans in Congress are still support ing these lies. On the other hand, Gov. Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger have confirmed election results in Geor gia after three recounts. They deserve our respect and our gratitude for placing coun try above politics. Furthermore, U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr stated that there is no evidence of any election irregularities. Finally, the Supreme Court declined to hear a case submitted by red state attorneys general to overturn the election results. So why would so many Republicans in Congress ignore facts to support Trump’s lies? They only care about getting re elected and don’t want to risk the support of Trump loyalists. This attitude threatens our democracy at a time when we are under cyber attack from Russian govern ment agencies. It’s critical going forward that Demo crats and Republicans put country above politics. It’s OK to disagree politically but not to employ tactics that threaten our democracy. Michael Drake Gainesville Letter writers got it right about Trump’s achievements Many thanks to Dick Biggs and Monte Seehorn for stating the obvious in their let ters published in The Times weekend edi tion, Dec. 12-13. They both laid out clearly and con cisely the long list of President Trump’s accomplishments over his four years in office. Unfortunately, the voters were per suaded not to consider how much good the president did and instead chose to vote his personality. It is a loss for the country. Mary Smith Gainesville Democrats will face their creator one day This letter is in regard to the awful condi tion we find our nation embroiled in today. Four years ago, the people of America elected Donald Trump as president. He was and still is the best president we ever had or likely will have ever again. Based on what I’ve seen so far, most of his critics don’t care for him for his way of expressing his views or maybe because they can’t control him to follow their party line. He’s the first president that ever took office and actually followed through on all the things he said he’d do. Even with all the never-ending crap he’s endured from those in the socialist Democratic Party and all those of Hollywood, he gave us four years of prosperity and responsible leadership, something we haven’t had in a very long time. This president doesn’t deserve to leave after only one term and be replaced by traitors who have stooped to levels of lying, stealing and backstabbing that no one would think was possible. Anyone with half a brain knows how they succeeded. As a Christian, I believe there does exist a place of eternal bliss in heaven for those us who love the Lord, and we will go there someday. There is also an eternal place of misery, torment and eternal hopelessness for those who reject our Lord, Jesus Christ. I hope a change of heart might take place with some of these people. But if not, I am confident that the Obamas, Clintons, Schumer and many others of their kind will take their rightful place there. Most in secular America has made their feelings sufficiently clear: They hate Christians and our creator, and we are not welcome in our society. Well, let me be heard also: We don’t like living in a soci ety that spits on our creator, our flag, our national anthem and wipes their muddy feet on the memory of so many of our brave service men and women who suf fered and died so that you could live in a free America. Well, take heart. We will be leaving soon, but I would not want to be in your shoes when you realize we are gone. In closing, I would like to address this remark to our governor, the dishonor able Brian Kemp. There is nothing unique about you governor. You are just another cheap, greedy, politician who is filling his pockets at the expense of those who elected you. Almighty God will hold you to account one day. Now chew on that, big shot. Marvin Montgomery Dahlonega To submit a letter Send by email to letters@ gainesvilletimes.com or use the contact form at gainesvilletimes. com. Include name, hometown and phone number; letters never appear anonymously. Letters are limited to 500 words on topics of public interest and may be edited for content and length. Writers are limited to one letter per month. Letters may be rejected from readers with no ties to Northeast Georgia or that address personal, business or legal disputes. Letters not the work of the author listed or with material not properly attributed will be rejected. Submitted items may be published in print, electronic or other forms. Letters and other commentary express the opinions of the authors and not of The Times. Sen. Cruz shows why GOP isn’t going back to Reaganism Throughout Donald Trump’s captivity of the GOP, many Republicans have held fast to the hope that after he leaves office, the party can return to the sunny Reagan ism of the Before Times. Of course, Trump’s bitter enders have made it clear that they’d be happy to tear down not just the party but the coun try itself to avoid having to live in a post-Trump world. It might have seemed as if we hit rock bottom earlier this month, when the Texas attorney general sued the swing states that decided the election for Joe Biden, demanding to have tens of mil lions of legal votes erased and the elec tion effectively handed to Trump. More than 100 Republican House members and 17 Republican state attorneys gen eral lent their names in support. The Supreme Court rejected that idi otic suit, but no rebuke or reason seems to be able to divert this movement from where it’s headed. Allen West, the head of the Texas Republican Party, issued a statement after the ruling, suggesting that perhaps “law-abiding states should bond together and form a union of states that will abide by the Constitution.” After it was pointed out to him that this smacked of secession talk, West made the bizarre claim that “the real perpetrators of secession are the states, and others, named in the suit by Texas, who enacted illegal and unconstitutional actions resulting in the violation of elec tion laws.” Now, Trump’s team appears to be moving past the election altogether since it has failed spectacularly to alter that reality. Instead, Michael Flynn, the recently pardoned former national secu rity adviser, who met with the president Friday night, has been leading calls for martial law to save the Trump presidency. Over the weekend, Kelli Ward, the head of Arizona’s Republican Party, tweeted to assure Trump that Arizona is “working every avenue to stop this coup,” using the hash tag “CrossTheRubicon.” The best defense of Ward is that she has a thumbless grasp of what that phrase actually means: Julius Caesar’s illegal crossing of the Rubicon river with his troops marked the end of the Roman Republic and the beginning of Caesarian tyranny. As dangerous and ridiculous as such talk is, many Republicans still think this is all a temporary fever, a last gasp of Trump’s cynical performative nonsense aimed at venting anger and raising money off his supporters. They think the GOP can still go back to being the party of Reagan. One reason for skepticism is the latest move by Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas. Cruz has long been a reliable bell wether for the mood of the broader GOP base, which is why he switched from one of Trump’s biggest critics to one of his biggest supporters — and why he offered to argue the Texas lawsuit before the Supreme Court. No politician in recent memory has wrapped himself more in Reagan’s leg acy than Cruz. He’s read all the biogra phies, can quote all the big speeches, and has said countless times that he models himself after the Gipper. So it was revealing that on Friday, Cruz single-handedly scuttled an effort to protect Hong Kongers facing persecution for supporting democracy. The legisla tion would have offered Temporary Pro tected Status to Hong Kongers seeking asylum from Chinese authoritarianism and for Hong Kong residents fearful of returning to it. The measure, so uncon- troversial that it passed unanimously by voice vote in the House, is vintage Reagan. “We shall continue America’s tradi tion as a land that welcomes peoples from other countries,” Reagan declared in his 1981 speech on immigration, “We shall also, with other countries, con tinue to share in the responsibility of welcoming and resettling those who flee oppression.” Indeed, Cruz issued a statement in June commemorating the 33rd anniver sary of Reagan’s Berlin Wall speech, saying “America should remember” that “our principles can tear down walls.” While the Berlin Wall may be gone, he added, “the evils of tyranny still exist today, and nowhere is that more evident than in Hong Kong, where the Chinese Communist Party has moved to crush Hong Kong’s autonomy and strip away their freedoms.” This Christmas season, Cruz said we cannot lend support to potential victims of tyranny because giving them tempo rary protection could be “used by the Chinese Communists to send even more Chinese spies into the United States.” He also suggested that the time-limited, Hong Kong-specific adjustment is really a Trojan horse for the Democrats’ radi cal approach to immigration. None of this withstands close scrutiny. But that’s not the point. If Cruz thinks fighting for Reaganite principles is a political loser, that should tell you some thing about how far we are from a return to Reaganism. Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. JONAH GOLDBERG goldbergcolumn@ gmail.com Jj^^/^^IZ'19 DiawVjbsh.FbstVfritereGtwp LISA BENSON I Washington Post Writers Group Warnock will take Georgia and America in the wrong direction What would our nation look like if every day, every American — of every back ground and ethnicity — were to wake up with the convic tion that they are 100% responsible for the circum stances of their lives? No blame, no victimhood, no excuses saying that what is happening to them is because of someone else. It touches, I believe, the heart of Christianity. At any given moment, you may not have control of what is outside of you. But you have control over what is inside of you. Change what is inside first, and then you will change what is outside. We have faith in a loving God who wants us to take responsibility, and when there is failure, there is forgiveness and another chance. Too many in our country are paying a great price by listening to politicians on the left who are telling them the opposite. Consider the Black Rev. Dr. Raphael Warnock, who is now running as a Demo crat in one of the U.S. Senate runoff elec tions in Georgia. Warnock is a poster child of the left, which embraces the view that the world is unfair, controlled by racists and exploiters. And for some reason, Warnock, like so many of this point of view, chooses to zero in on Israel, the very model of suc cess through personal responsibility, as a problem rather than a solution. Just last year, after visit ing Israel, he affixed his signature to a Group Pilgrim age Statement on Israel and Palestine. That statement identifies Israel as an “oppressive” regime, accuses Israel of segregation, speaks of mili tarization “reminiscent of the military occupation of Namibia by apartheid South Africa” and of “excessive use of force” by Israel in Gaza. These total distortions of the truth in service of a left-wing political agenda should be a wake-up call for those thinking of casting their vote for this individual. Regarding the reality of Israel, we can turn to the nonpartisan organization Freedom House in Washington, D.C., which annually rates 210 nations around the world as being “free,” “partly free” or “not free.” Israel is the only nation in the Middle East rated “free.” But Warnock and his colleagues ignore oppression throughout the region and only choose to attack the one country that is free. This freedom is enjoyed not only by the Jewish citizens of Israel but also by the nearly 2 million Arab citizens of the country. In my first visit to Israel, I couldn’t help but notice the amazing diversity, with Jews from all over the world — White, brown and Black. Regarding the situation in the West Bank and Gaza, where Palestinian Arabs live, their absence of freedom and pros perity is their own choosing. They con trol their future, not Israel. Rather than aspiring to build better lives for their citizens, they choose regimes that set a priority to destroy Israel. In 2005, for example, Israel unilater ally withdrew its presence from Gaza. The Palestinian regime there was free to start building a nation. Rather than doing this, it started lobbing missiles into Israel. The Palestinian Authority prime minister announced, “We are telling the entire world: today Gaza and tomorrow Jerusalem.” Israeli settlers who were displaced when Israel withdrew moved inland, started irrigating the desert with desalinized water and, within five years, were exporting $50 million worth of organic potatoes, carrots and peppers a year. I wrote about it then, quoting the late Art Linkletter, television personality and outspoken Christian, who observed, “Things turn out best for people that make the best of the way things turn out.” I said then that Linkletter’s observa tion captured why Israel has grown and prospered and why Palestinians have languished. The same is true in America. This Christmas, let’s choose freedom and personal responsibility. Star Parker is president of the Center for Urban Renewal and Education, host of the weekly news talk show “Cure America with Star Parker” and a columnist for Creators. STAR PARKER star-parker@ urbancure.org
