Betrayal by Jonathan Karl

Perhaps the most direct connections between the Former President Donald Trump and the attempted coup during the acts of sedition that occurred on January 6, 2021, were revealed by the White House Correspondent for ABC, Jonathan Karl, in his book Betrayal. He cites sources from other ABC correspondents as well as interviews with the principals, including Donald Trump.

He documents that the day didn’t evolve from a demonstration that spun out-of-control, but that it was a carefully planned effort to prevent the peaceful transfer of power to a legally elected new administration. Starting with the effort to overturn the election results in the states, each step became more extreme and desperate. The insurrection at the Capitol failed only because of the efforts of a few brave Capitol police. The fact that it didn’t succeed doesn’t nullify how close we came to a mortal blow to our democracy.

A photo of a demonstration by Getty Images published on BBC News in 2020

Gun rights, Gay Rights, Right-to-Work, Black Lives Matter

The recent trial of a teenager who took it upon himself to become a vigilante in a Black Lives Matter demonstration has further split the nation into opposing sides. The dizzying array of social issues that divide our nation have festered into a boiling point of chaos, conflict, political extremism, and boiling anger. We struggle to find the balance between personal self-defense and the need for public safety. How do we regulate the use of guns in an increasingly urban society? The growing prevalence of military weapons designed solely to kill people raises the bar for the growing violence that threatens public safety. We can’t go back to the Wild West where everyone took the law into their own hands and there was no public enforcement of the laws.