Re: “SPD interim Chief Barnes’ defiant words put city at risk” (June 12, Opinion):
I applaud interim Seattle Police Chief Shon Barnes for his willingness to run towards hazard to guard the folks of Seattle. We anticipate that of first responders. Chief Barnes calls for nothing much less of his officers. It’s solely honest that he commits himself to the identical.
We shake our heads in smug indignation when authoritarian governments throughout the globe assault and arrest their political adversaries and sweep up their folks in raids to be taken to detention facilities with out clarification. We inform the world that within the U.S. everybody, citizen or noncitizen, has a proper to due course of and the presumption of innocence.
Op-ed writer Sakara Remmu states that “Seattle and its folks have already got a federal goal on their backs” and “ … (metropolis leaders) danger triggering the very army response that threatens states’ rights and the protection and liberty of … residents” as a result of we now have “an administration that has embraced vengeance as a precedence.”
These phrases ought to chill us to the core, however ought to make us extra, not much less, decided to respectfully specific our opinions.
We maintain sacred our First Modification proper to free speech. We must always not need to cower in worry of a army response from our authorities.
John Vassall, Seattle
