This is one for my friends to the left of center.

I don’t care much for Christopher Columbus, one way or the other. He wasn’t even the first European to reach North America – that was Leif Ericsson, 500 years earlier. You can make a case that Columbus was an awful person, and I might even agree.

But are you sure you want to make the case that groups of people should be able to destroy public (or for that matter private) property, as long as they feel it’s really really right? That some causes are just more important than the slow, dirty work of seeking consensus and working via a process?

Especially done with the implied threat of violence against anyone who might have tried to stand in the way?

Before you answer, remember: six weeks ago many of you were up in, for lack of a better term, arms over multiracial groups of protesters, some of them openly carrying firearms, demonstrating peacefully at the Michigan capitol and outside the Minnesota governors’ mansion. The demonstrators broke no laws [1], and there was certainly no violence – and yet many of you acted like that was a threat to democracy.

But actual law-breaking and vandalism, and a very clear implication of potential violence (and in many cases, it goes well beyond implication), is OK – as long as its’ the correct cause?

Because there’s a statue of Floyd Olson on the Capitol grounds. He was a socialist demigogue who governed Minnesota long ago, and there’s no rational way to deny that his policies have caused far more damage than good, especially to disadvantaged communities in this state. Olson represents the worst traits of this state – jamming down equality of outcomes as one-size-fits-all decree, with dire effects on the poor. Did he do as much harm as Columbus? No, but we’re talking principle, here, so let’s not quibble about degrees of evil.

It’s high time someone – me and my friends who feel strongly about the damage Olson and his cronies did to this state – did something about that goddess-forsaken statue. And if the process doesn’t work fast enough (and in a state dominated by the Urban Progressive Privilege that Olson’s policies cemented in place as the dominant class, it won’t), then we’ll have to “expedite” things ourselves.

Because if you’re not part of (our) solution, you’re part of the problem (as we define it).

So – are you SURE you want to set this as a precedent?

[1] Open carry is legal in the Michigan capitol, and let’s not even pretend any of you know the actual statute re “brandishing”, so I’ll not allow the conversation to get side-tracked over that subject.