Breathtaking.

After witnessing the events in Washington D.C. on Jan. 6, a day that was anticipated to go down in history, I was moved to write down my thoughts before the full force of the mainstream media/pundit machine pushed the narrative in the direction of their perspective. While I may be a bit late given the calls for invoking the 25th Amendment or Impeachment to remove President Trump from office, perhaps my view of an American tale of two women will help some reflect on where we go as a nation.

One woman — Heather Heyer — was in Charlottesville, VA on Aug. 12, 2017 to protest against keeping statues of Confederate officers in a park. A counter-protestor — James Fields — drove a car into a crowd, striking and killing the 32-year-old woman who was exercising her right to represent her views. The other woman — Ashli Babbitt— a 36-year-old Air Force veteran, was in Washington D.C. on Jan. 6, 2021 for the “Stop the Steal” rally to protest the election of Joseph Biden as president. Babbitt was shot and killed inside the U.S. Capitol building after she and a mob breached barriers and ignored orders of law enforcement to leave the building.

From my perspective, these women and their tragic deaths frame the presidency of Donald Trump — Heyer the beginning, and Babbitt the end. Six months into the Trump presidency, the mainstream media pointed fingers at Trump as the cause of Heyer’s death due to statements he made that were clearly misconstrued and distorted to label him as a racist. These allegations and many others were consistently made throughout his presidency. Such allegations against Trump enraged many of his supporters, perhaps even Babbitt. While the “Stop the Steal” rally was intended to complement efforts to protest the certification of electors for Joseph Biden with some considering the possibility that Trump would be declared the winner of the election, it actually sealed his defeat.

Ironically, my political views are probably more like Babbitt’s than Heyer’s. And yet, I must acknowledge that Heyer was in the right to peacefully protest as was Babbitt until the moment she crossed a barrier and illegally entered the Capitol Building. Trump supporters often specify the thin Blue Line with respect to law enforcement and ironically Babbitt crossed a thin line that separated her legal right from her commission of a crime. Perhaps these women’s deaths have meaning in the fact that truth results from tragedy and in the end we all need to acknowledge those thin lines we encounter in our lives and rise above the rhetoric and vitriol of the mob. Babbitt and Fields crossed such thin lines but Heyer did not.

I feel strongly that the allegations Trump instigated the tragic events of Jan. 6 be rejected. One can make analogous allegations that the treatment of Trump’s presidency by his political opponents as well as the mainstream media incited Babbitt and the mob to invade the Capitol building thus maintaining the finger pointing cycle. Rather, if we truly believe we are an American people, we need to acknowledge the views of the thousands who gathered in Washington D.C. on Jan. 6. Not the mob but those that walked up to the barriers of the Capitol building but did not cross the line. As Trump stated in August 2017 after Heyer’s death, there were good people on both sides. On Jan. 6, those good people were the police defending the Capitol and the people who peacefully had their voices heard and then went home. I believe deep down in my heart that the American way mandates we make our views clear but then do not act to the end result that property is destroyed and God forbid, Americans die at the hands of Americans. My view of the American way is that in the end, if we cannot achieve consensus on something, we agree to disagree and peacefully go our separate ways. The American way was framed in our country’s Declaration of Independence, which stated that our Creator intended all Americans are deserving of mutual respect with the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Let’s pray these two women become known as martyrs in the legacy of the true America we all know and love.

Robert A. Morrison lives in Lower Makefield.