"The Rittenhouse Acquittal"

                                                                     Sydney M. Williams

Thought of the Day

“The Rittenhouse Acquittal”

November 21, 2021

 

“He wishes none of this had happened.

But as he said when he testified, he did not start this.”

                                                                                                                                Defense attorney Mark Richards

                                                                                                                                November 19, 2021

 

Supporters of Kyle Rittenhouse were quick to take a victory lap, as news of his acquittal came across the wires – that it validated the right of self-defense. On the other side, Jesse Jackson spoke for the Left who saw Mr. Rittenhouse as a vigilante: “It seems to me that it’s open season on human rights demonstrators.” When did violent rioters, with criminal records, become human rights demonstrators? As a Presidential candidate, and despite both the accused and the victims being white, Mr. Biden referred to Kyle Rittenhouse as a “white supremacist.” After the jury’s decision, and now as President, while he called for calm and acknowledged the jury had spoken, Mr. Biden said the verdict made him angry. Was his expression of anger supposed to subdue a combustible nation, already polarized? 

 

Of course, the young Mr. Rittenhouse is a winner in that he does not have to go to jail, but the heroes of the story are the jury, the judge and Mark Richards, all of whom stood firm despite personal threats. And Mr. Rittenhouse’s acquittal does not condone what he did. Even though legal, the very fact that a seventeen-year-old would carry a loaded AR-15 down a public street into a melee of rioters was crazy. What were his parents thinking? He should not become a poster boy for the Right. He appears an immature, not very bright, kid. The maintenance of civil order is supposed to be the responsibility of the police. If anything, this trial was an indictment of the politicians who ordered the police to stand down. This incident exposed the risk to the public of those who want to “defund the police.” No municipality, state or country can function without the rule of law. And laws must be enforced. In a democracy, if one does not like a particular law there are legitimate means of getting it changed, without taking to the streets in violent protests. 

 

Protests across the nation, following the death of George Floyd on May 25^th, 2020, caused, according to The Hill’s estimate, two billion dollars in damage and 18 deaths. It is as though the Ku Klux Klan lynch mobs of Jim Crow days have returned, only this time under the hateful banners of Antifa and Black Lives Matter. Cities from Seattle to New York, from Minneapolis to Hartford, Connecticut have seen a rise in murders and violent crimes, mostly black-on-black. A refusal by politicians to take responsibility for that rise has meant a loss of life and property by mostly inner-city black families. The idea that “victims” are not responsible for their actions dooms them to a life of subservience. When people are taught that failure is a function of race, not a lack of effort, what incentive do they have to succeed? When a poor, ill-educated young white man is told he is an oppressor, how is he supposed to respond?  He carries a weapon to a demonstration.

 

The entire incident was sad and unnecessary. But it says far more about our politicians than about Mr. Rittenhouse and his unfortunate victims. We live in a remarkable country, one prized by people all over the world, especially in poor, third-world countries., yet despised by the Left’s elites. It is both a privilege and a responsibility to live in this great nation. If our young are not taught our entire history what happened in Kenosha, Wisconsin fifteen months ago will become even more common. No one can want that.