Repel the roadblockers

From Robert Whitcomb’s “Digital Diary,’’ in GoLocal224.com

“As Columbus announced when he knew he was bounced

It was swell, Isabelle, swell.’’

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--- From Cole Porter’s 1935 song “Just One of Those Things’’

I’m with Rhode Island Democratic state Sen. Leonidas  Raptakis, who wants to make it a felony to block a highway, which is what seven activists promoting “Indigenous Peoples Day’’ and denouncing Christopher Columbus did Oct. 13  in Providence on the north-bound side of Route 95, the main street of the East Coast.

This outrageous act, which might have gained the lawless Trump’s “law and order” campaign some voters, could have caused fatal accidents and have blocked such emergency vehicles as fire trucks and ambulances. These idiots belong in the slammer for a good long time. Nobody has a First Amendment right to block essential public infrastructure.

Also, let’s not romanticize Native Americans. Like the hemisphere’s European occupiers, they inflicted their share of horrific brutality. Tribes would fight each other, as well as invading, land-hungry white people, with awful violence. What they didn’t have was immunity to diseases from Europe and Europeans’ weaponry.