Letter: Mob rule

Published 12:15 am Tuesday, July 28, 2020

Regarding the editorial “We should demand that they stop,” (The Astorian, July 21) and the claim that we, as citizens, should demand that the federal agents be withdrawn from Portland:

This opinion seems to fall in line with the popular belief that the anarchists’ actions are simply being overblown by those on the right and Fox News. As a person who splits his time between our homes in Warrenton and Portland, I have witnessed a once-beautiful city on the verge of looking like San Francisco or Los Angeles.

Over 50 nights of violence, graffiti sprayed everywhere and the overall general fear that the antifa uses to keep the taxpaying citizens out of their own downtown area — and I haven’t even touched on the hundreds of businesses that have simply boarded up their businesses and quit. Will these “hardworking” antifa thugs make up the large tax base now lost? Well, I kind of doubt it.

Finally, you may have noticed I refrained from using the word “protesters” … well, for good reason. That ship sailed weeks ago. Yes, there still are peaceful protests happening, but I am not referring to those. The terror and destruction that is happening in Portland, Seattle and other major cities are not protests; this is a concerted effort to destroy our way of life, and to do away with capitalist democracy, all by mob rule.

If local leaders are not going to make any attempt to stop it, it falls on the federal government to protect citizens and their property.

JEFF BRYANT

Portland/Warrenton