Editor,, I would like to take this opportunity to discuss something important.
My grandfather was schooled only as far as the third grade, but he was a very educated man, a voracious reader. He and I were discussing the presidency and the Constitution one evening about two years before he died. I was a congressional aide at the time and, up until that moment, I did not understand the profound depth of my grandfather’s thinking.
I will never forget what he told me.
He said that when you vote for a candidate for political office, whether it is for the city council, or mayor, the state Legislature, the House of Representatives, the Senate or for the presidency, you are handing over your proxy to a government official to act and make decisions in your name. You are granting great power, the power to do good as well as the power to do evil. When you give your vote, your permission, you are vesting in that person the power to act in your name, to use the police power of government to do what they will. They could use that power to create opportunities so every citizen can develop themselves to the fullest of their potential, or they could use that power to marshal the police agencies of government in ways that are antithetical to the intent of our county’s founders.
And don’t forget, whatever they do, they are acting with your permission and in your name.
My grandfather, Charlie Garrett, said that the history of this planet is replete with examples of both, so when you vote, choose wisely.
When a government of men and women comes to the belief that they, and only they, know what is best, and that people should be controlled and coerced to do what the government wants, tyranny is not far away, and tyranny will not tolerate the existence of dissenters who speak out.

— David Freeman, Richmond Hill