MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. DAY

Some civil rights activists in Dallas have their skirts up over their heads over the Junior ROTC marching in the annual Martin Luther King, Jr. parade:

“Guns don't belong in the parade. It's an insult to Martin Luther King's sacred legacy of nonviolence and peace," said Peter Johnson, a former nonviolence trainer with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.”

In fact, accepting the 1964 Nobel Peace Prize, Dr. King said:

"Nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral question of our time – the need for man to overcome oppression and violence. ... Civilization and violence are antithetical concepts."

What Dr. King and his fellow pacifists never fully understand is that it is the very weapons and violence – or, at least the threat of it – they despise so that keep civilization alive so King and his ilk can cry about how guns are so bad. I remember seeing an ad for the Air Force about twenty years ago. It showed the US Seal (Eagle with olive branch and arrows) and an F-15 coming straight at you, low to the ground. It said, "Eyes on the olive branch, arrows at the ready".

Of course, had Dr. King not been killed, I think he would have distanced himself from the civil rights movement as it is in it’s current form. Just this week we got to see how petty and silly the so called “protectors” of Dr. King’s memory are. They protested in Dallas. They accused President Bush of looking for a photo-op as he lay a wreath at King’s grave (of course, had he not done that, he would have been accused of being a racist). In California, union members and civil rights leaders are calling on Safeway to apologize for placing an ad honoring Dr, King because Safeway is currently in a labor dispute of health benefits.

Dr. King, we need you now more than ever.