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No freedom from repercussions

Far too many Americans do not seem to understand the rights granted to us under the First Amendment. What it does not provide is any right to incite violence or to prompt the public to suspect whether one’s employer, private or public, condones racism.

The deputy director of emergency services in Raleigh County, W.Va., is undergoing a lesson on that very subject.

His name is Mark Wilson, and he has been suspended from his government position because of a Facebook post he allegedly made a few days ago. Wilson’s Facebook page featured a doctored picture with the caption, “Be thankful Donald Trump is building the wall! Mine would look more like this.”

Above that was a picture of a man in front of a wall atop which rested the decapitated heads of “people who are dark skinned and of non-European descent,” according to a published report.

If Wilson indeed posted the picture and caption, he ought to be fired. Raleigh Countians should not have to wonder whether emergency services are influenced in any way by race.

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