We need many more elected leaders up and down our political system to emulate the nonpartisan approach of Utah’s governor, Spencer Cox, who declared that “We will never be able to solve all the other problems, including the violence problems that people are worried about, if we can’t have a clash of ideas safely and securely, especially those ideas with which you disagree.”
We need mayors, governors, members of Congress, we need currently serving elected officials and those who are no longer in office, and we need them from all major parties. Pundits and personalities have their place, but elected officials have won the voluntary support of other citizens and thus speak with special authority.
Is anybody organizing such an effort? Would it not do the nation good to see a large gathering of proven leaders of every stripe standing for the equal right of everybody to participate “safely and securely” in the never-ceasing conversation that is the only way to improve our country?
Michael and Beret Kischner, Seattle
