Is there a lesson in ‘Clockwork Orange’?

Published 1:30 am Friday, January 30, 2026

Years ago I read a book titled “A Clockwork Orange.” It is about a vicious homicidal criminal of the worst sort. “Little Alex,” as he

calls himself, having been sentenced to a long stretch in prison, becomes the subject of a governmental rehabilitation experiment. It is a pilot project, and if successful, can lead to a program of drastically suppressing a person’s criminal impulses so that felons can be released into society.

The government’s ultimate goal is to make room in the prisons for all the anticipated political prisoners.

Interesting story, I thought, but that could never really happen.

That was before we met Donald Trump and his Department of “Justice.”

Anything is possible.

Charles DeBruler

Everett