Will Asheville be the next lawless wasteland in U.S.?

I see that the enlightened City Council of Asheville has voted to limit police funding.

I feverently hope that Asheville is not going down the same route as Seattle, Sacramento, San Francisco, Minneapolis, NYC and LA. Is Asheville going to become another lawless wasteland?

I moved here after retirement because I felt that the quality of life here was incomparable to almost anywhere in the good, old US of A.

I am beginning to wonder about that decision.

I am also beginning to look at other areas of the country that are more law-abiding and not so caught up in the ridiculous political correctness of the moment.

If necessary, I am ready, willing and able to move off the continent.

I wish Ashevillians would wake up and put an end to this pernicious disease of “woke” anarchy that is gripping parts of our country. Seattle has become unlivable.

Thin Blue Line puts lives on line, merits gratitude

I am disheartened by national press and demonstrators/anarchists slamming our law enforcement officers for doing what we hired them to do. 

Have you ever had to call 911 and hoped an officer would show up soon? 

As I have in the past, for the rest of my life I want to be able to count on a professional, trained and knowledgeable law enforcement officer to come to my and my family’s aid. 

Here is an interface with law enforcement many people don’t have: As an Air Force commander, it was my duty to respond to base emergencies as “on-scene commander.” 

The call came that a Marine Huey helicopter had crashed near Selma, Alabama, with fatalities, my first act was to ask my command center to request police escort with a rendezvous on the way. 

The county sheriff saw me coming and led me at high-speed to the remote crash site. Once there, they ensured media trucks got out of the way and stayed away from our crash recovery. Their aid and professional performance was a blessing to me and the rest of the responders as well as to the families of our injured and deceased. 

As with all human endeavors, there can be a few bad apples. But we need to use precise rifle shot versus a wide shotgun blast to weed out a few bad actors. 

At the same time, we must respect and thank those professional law enforcement officers who are the “Thin Blue Line!” 

Consider this the next time you want to fault or defund our law enforcement: 146 of them have died in the line of duty so far this year as of the end of July, with 72 due to Coved-19, and 29 by gunfire! 

That doesn’t include eight K-9 officer dogs who have died as well. Average age was 46 and average tour of duty was 16 years. That total is in a little more than half way through the year. 

Defund and denigrate The Blue at your peril. Fewer and fewer will want to put lives on the line for you. 

Some day you will call and all you get is a busy signal. You are on your own. 

When I wear a veteran hat, I often have someone thank me for my service. I do that when I meet law enforcement officers. 

I thank them for their service and say I support them for what they do for us. 

Try it yourself, they deserve it! 

Pete Hamill dies Aug. 5, merits salute

Brooklyn’s Pete Hamill was a journalist, author and editor for the New York Daily News and the New York Post, as well as a columnist for both newspapers. 

Hamill was respected for his political observations as well as his sports commentary.  

He was the author of some 20 books covering a wide range of topics. For me, his best work was 1999’s “Why Sinatra Matters.”

It was as if I was sitting in a booth next to them in a restaurant, listening to Pete and Frank discussing important issues of the day. 

 Hamill passed away on Aug. 5th. He had the gift of making this reader read on, page after page. 

As a huge Sinatra fan, I am compelled to say this is among the best compact and concise pieces of literature ever written about the world-renowned entertainer.  

Thank you Pete Hamill — and after a long, distinguished career in journalism, may you rest in peace.

Cawthorn accused of wishing away racism

Madison Cawthorn’s recent take on reparations reflects nothing more than his uncaring naiveté.

His reflection on the Civil War — “600,000 Americans gave their life to free slaves and you’re going to tell me that’s not enough?” — is off by at least half! That’s the half of those deaths laid down to defend slavery and prevent blacks from having an equal place in our nation.

Then, pointing to “incredible African-American men and women” as symbols of success, Cawthorn simply ignores the subsequent legacies of Jim Crow, the Ku Klux Klan and the undeniable anti-black racism which has pervaded our society while affording him privilege after privilege.

However, his opponent — Moe Davis — knows first-hand the effects of that legacy of racism. Like myself, he is a white graduate of a historically black university, and he has taught law at my alma mater, Howard University.

That places Davis in the rarified company of the later Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, as a lawyer who understands the reality of racism Cawthorn simply wishes away.

Western North Carolinians wanting to ensure a Congress attentive to all Americans, including black Americans, can do no better than vote for Moe Davis in the 11th Congressional District.

Overpopulation makes equal schools impossible

Overpopulation makes equal schooling impossible because if one parent has one child and another parent has 10 children, and each child gets equal educational resources, then one parent gets 10 times the educational resources as the other parent.  

Thus, making the children equal makes the parents unequal, and providing equal educational resources to each parent makes the children unequal; so citizens receive unequal treatment under every conceivable policy, making equal opportunity a pipedream.

And that’s before even considering eugenics survivors, with no children, receiving nothing from the K-12 system, all while retirement funding is not local, and smaller, as Japan exemplifies.

Leaders accused of scheming to put blacks on the line for hatred 

would be remiss if I did not thank the Owensboro, Kentucky, Police and Sheriff’s departments for their help and support at the Protest Rally on Aug.1 in their city. 

They are to be commended.

As I stood with the Southern Cross in hand this afternoon in Asheville, I could see about seven or eight cars parking, and a group of middle-age and elderly black folks heading in my direction. Some of them I recognized from my school days.

“H.K., we have been supporters of yours for a long time, and we read what you said in an Open Letter published the Daily Planet newspaper. It is ironic that what you said about this reparation fiasco which the city and county was echoed almost the same by one of the county commissioners as he recognized as you pointed out — this reparation proposal is something that our governments are already doing;  maybe we can expand on it. What say you, Mr. Edgerton?”

I would tell them that this Vance Monument Task Force supposedly was formed to determine where and what would be done with the people’s treasure — the Vance Monument. 

However, somebody had to take the blame for this carnage.... “Guess who? Black folks!”

I would tell them: A scheme was concocted by your black city councilman (Keith Young) to lure you into supporting the Vance Monument take-down, i.e. throwing reparations on the table.

He proposed the one thing that he thought you would buy into hook, line and sinker:  “Reparations for the sons and daughters of slavery”… thinking that he would be forever forgiven for the hate black folks would inherit from a lot of Southern folks for this betrayal.

What he did not understand is that these two governing bodies do not have the resources for the “real reparations,” as I have heard expressed by black folks for my entire life. Nor did they even know how to proceed with this endeavor.

I told them, that what was voiced to me by my elders during the time that I was vice president and president of the NAACP:

(1) Black folks should demand first of all that reparations only be given to those blacks born before and during the period of Jim Crow. 

(2) Demand a one-time, non-taxable monetary payment of $2 million to each qualifying family unit.

I believe that what this (Asheville) council and (Buncombe County) commission have done is tantamount to criminal fraud because they knew that they didn’t have the resources or support of their citizenry for real reparations. They were — and still are — banking that none of the citizens have the knowledge to figure this out.

And, because of the State Monument Protection Laws; I don’t think they have a lawful right to remove this cenotaph that attracts many visitors to this tourist town. And that affects the economy in a positive way. These cenotaphs are a positive for black and white families, and is reflective of the honor that the Africans of this city and county earned in service to the South and her citizens.

Mrs. Aston, from the renowned and prominent Aston family, asked the United Daughters of the Confederacy to erect a monument to the black community for their exceptional and honorable service during the tragic time of the War for Southern Independence as the hoarde army of the North ravaged our city.

I am preparing to take this matter up with the Southern Legal Resource Center for civil and criminal prosecution against the city and county. I will begin asking the proper agents to set up a Go Fund Me Page to fund the lawsuit.  

“To heck with COVID19, HK!”  They would all give me a hug, and God’s blessings. God bless you!

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EDITOR’S NOTE: Edgerton listed his numerous affiliations at the end of his letter as follows: