Carroll Fife tweets that her life’s purpose is “to realize the later-in-life dreams of MLK: To be ‘creatively maladjusted’ in the opposition of ‘poverty, racism & militarism’.” I take Fife at her word that she’s opposed to poverty, racism and militarism, although her definition of those terms, and mine, are not in alignment.
Racism? I’ve said before I think the issue is exacerbated by some peoples’ obsession with it.
Militarism? Definition, please. Does Carroll Fife think that overhead cameras that capture crime in real time is “militarizing” OPD? Apparently she does. Is there any form of technology—robots, perhaps—she’s willing to allow OPD to have? If so, we’d love to hear about it.
As for poverty, everyone is opposed to it. The question is, what are we supposed to do? Fife favors a socialist approach, in which money is transferred from the middle classes to the poor people that form her constituency. My approach is more traditionally American: an up-by-the-bootstraps strategy that encourages young people to go to school, work hard, save, be frugal and moral, raise their own children to honor our laws and values, and not depend on society to take care of them. (I’m on Social Security and Medicare, but I paid into them all my life and am entitled to both.)
Fife quotes Dr. King, I believe: “cowardice asks the questions, is it safe; expediency asks the question, is it politic; vanity asks the question, is it popular, but conscious asks the question, is it right.” (I think she means “conscience,” not “conscious,” but okay…) To which I have to ask, “Whose conscience, Carroll Fife?” The problem is that Fife sanctimoniously presumes that her conscience is the world-conscience, and that it’s right all the time. This, in the way of all megalomaniacs and authoritarians, is an unhumble distortion of how things work. Fife is an elected official: she is supposed to represent ALL the people in her district, but she doesn’t. In fact, her disdain for those who disagree with her is transparent and insulting. As an extremist, she believes that God, or something, sent her here to find housing for the homeless (at the taxpayer’s expense) and to change the laws so that fewer people are stopped by the criminal justice system when they loot, pillage, steal and assault. Fife’s “conscience” therefore seems to me to be a very dangerous thing, a blunt tool that’s incompatible with the responsibilities of an elected official. Carroll Fife, you’re here to listen to ALL of us, not just your fellow radicals and socialists. There are many in your District who profoundly disagree with you, but all we get from you is the middle finger.
You conclude your twitter screed, Carroll Fife, with this astonishing statement: “And we say to our nation tonight, we say to our Government, we even say to our FBI, we will not be harassed, we will not make a butchery of our conscience, we will not be intimidated and we will be heard.” Did it ever occur to you that millions of Americans respect and trust the FBI and other police forces that guard us and our children? Are you really more afraid of the FBI than you are of the drugged maniac stalking the Lower Bottoms with a loaded gun? Your egregious assaults upon the Oakland Police Department will never be forgotten or forgiven. We—the peaceful citizens of Oakland who are tired of the carnage that you and your progressive friends have helped create—also “will not be intimidated, and we will be heard.”
My dislike of your politics, Carroll Fife, is strong, but let me condemn any violent threats you’re getting. I’m sorry you’ve had to endure them. I, too, have gotten my share of the same, from the same sort of rightwing nutjobs. We have, at least, that in common. What we don’t have in common is that I try to see things from all points of view, while you are mired in purblind self-righteousness.
Steve Heimoff