Letters to the Editor: Maxine Waters explained herself perfectly, but it still won’t matter

To the editor: Rep. Maxine Waters’ (D-Los Angeles) response to the GOP’s attempt to censure her for comments before the Derek Chauvin conviction was eloquent and completely appropriate.

I don’t recall any Republican senator publicly confronting Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) or Ted Cruz (R-Texas) for their outrageous behavior before the Jan. 6 Capitol riot. As far as I’m concerned, both should have been censured if not expelled from the Senate.

I remember Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. using the word “confrontation” quite often, but he never implied that his supporters should take that as a call for violence.

Waters has made her position very clear, but unfortunately, many individuals will not accept her explanation.

Althea Waites-Hayes, Long Beach

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To the editor: I have voted Democrat for president since 1976, and I also voted for Waters last November. But I have to say that her words — “we got to stay on the street … we’ve got to get more confrontational” — had the potential to have caused rioting, death and destruction.

I am glad that Chauvin was declared guilty. I am happy that George Floyd’s family got at least some measure of justice. But I am also relieved because if that hadn’t happened, there might have been rioting, and Waters’ words would have been partly to blame.

Waters can spin it any way she likes, but her words made her sound as if she was setting the stage for rioting, and it’s bad for anyone to do that, Democrat or Republican.

Nathaniel Greengard, Los Angeles