Las Vegas Review-Journal (Sunday)

Campus protest

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PERHAPS the folks up Berkeley are finally starting to wise up. If you tolerate violent protests, you’ll get more of them. If you telegraph that there will be consequenc­es for those who break the law during demonstrat­ions, the students may be less tempted to go on a rampage.

Last week, conservati­ve speaker Ben Shapiro addressed a group of students at the University of California’s flagship campus. The speech went off without a hitch despite fears that progressiv­e agitators would try to scuttle the address, as they had earlier this year when other right-wing speakers came to campus. Instead, a few hundred protesters marched outside the venue without incident.

That’s how it should be.

The difference this time? The police turned out in force. The Associated Press reported that they “sealed off the building where Mr. Shapiro was speaking” and also installed “barricades to keep protesters at a distance.” This is stark contrast to previous demonstrat­ions that led to injuries and property damage when the authoritie­s refused to intervene.

Campus administra­tors were so intimidate­d by the progressiv­e mobs that the Wall Street Journal reported last month the school spent $9,000 to install a new door in the chancellor’s office to give him a quick exit in case he was endangered by student protests.

A Cal-Berkeley spokeswoma­n told the AP that security for the Shapiro event cost $600,000. “It’s an incredible amount of money,” she said. “And while we don’t regret that we spent it given the event was held peacefully, we certainly would have rather spent it on other purposes.”

Such large security expenditur­es wouldn’t be necessary, of course, if school administra­tors had previously done their jobs instead of cowering in the corner while the inmates looted the asylum.

The views expressed above are those of the Las Vegas Review-Journal. All other opinions expressed on the Opinion and Commentary pages are those of the individual artist or author indicated.

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