Chris Kyle's death seems to confirm that "he who lives by the sword dies by the sword." Treating PTSD at a firing range doesn't make sense
— Ron Paul (@RonPaul) February 4, 2013
Well, that kicked up a firestorm
that even made it onto Fox News (quoting me! Cool!), which you can read about here.
So Ron Paul felt the need to
clarify. I mean it’s not an
apology. It’s not taking it back, it is
clarifying what he said earlier.
Oh, no, actually it’s digging his
hole even deeper. From his Facebook page:
As a veteran, I
certainly recognize that this weekend's violence and killing of Chris Kyle were
a tragic and sad event. My condolences and prayers go out to Mr. Kyle’s family.
Unconstitutional and unnecessary wars have endless unintended consequences. A
policy of non-violence, as Christ preached, would have prevented this and
similar tragedies. -REP
See, notice that none of that
even contradicts prior statement. Calling
it tragic doesn’t negate his initial implication that it was Kyle’s bad karma
or something like that come back on him.
In fact, the idea that this was somehow his just deserts for having
served this country in Iraq or something is actually reinformed by this statement. What he thinks is that he can say something
that sounds kind of like he is walking it back, while in fact reinforcing his
previous point.
And as a point of fact,
non-violence in foreign policy is neither practical or Christian. I have long said that the most Christian act
our armies ever did was to liberate the concentration camps. I simply do not believe that Jesus has
outlawed self-defense, and he certainly hasn’t outlawed selflessly giving or
risking our lives in the defense of others.
Consider for instance, the story of Col. Joshua Chamberlain at the
battle of Gettysburg. He was every bit
the idealist in the war, believing that it was a holy war to end the blight of
slavery. “But the cause for which we
fought was higher; our thought wider...” he once said, “that thought was our
power.” And in the Battle of Gettsburg,
he and his 20th Maine was the end of the line, at Little Round
Top. If his unit gave way, the
Confederates could move their cannons onto that height and bombard the rest of
the Union line. The battle almost
certainly would have been lost. This
was, in all bluntness, one of those moments in the war when the Union might
very well have lost if it went the other way.
And it very nearly did. As they
were fighting his unit began to run out of ammunition. So he ordered a daring bayonet charge on the
enemy and won his portion of the battle and possibly the entire Civil War. And he did so for the most Christian reasons,
to see his brothers and sisters in chains in the South be freed.
Or Sgt. Dakota Meyer, one of the
few living recipients of the Medal of Honor.
Here is the President presenting the medal to him:
When you listen to this story of
a man who braved incredible danger in an attempt to save his band of brothers, and
ultimately was only able to save their bodies, and how he risked his life over
and over to save good Afghan, I cannot help but say that this man acted in a
profoundly Christian manner. This is not
to denigrate good people of other faiths, but if we are going to talk about
what a Christian should do, this is it.
Which is why, I suppose, that Mr.
Meyer took Ron Paul to the woodshed on twitter:
Hey @ronpaul have you lost you mind? That sword protected your freedom. Guess since I live by it I deserve to get murdered as well? #wow
— Dakota Meyer (@Dakota_Meyer) February 4, 2013
It is ironically almost exactly
the same message that some twitterer named Razor said earlier today...
@ronpaul So all veterans, once done serving our nation with honor, deserve to be murdered as civilians? Wow.
— Razor (@hale_razor) February 4, 2013
...but the difference isn’t
really the message but the messenger.
How bad was it? So bad that even his own son, Rand Paul, was
distancing himself from his father. From
Ben
Shapiro:
In the aftermath of
Ron Paul’s despicable tweet today slamming US Navy SEAL sniper Chris Kyle,
murdered on Saturday while helping a fellow soldier learn to cope with post
traumatic stress syndrome, Paul’s son, Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) has told
Breitbart News exclusively, “Chris Kyle was a hero like all Americans who don
the uniform to defend our country. Our prayers are with his family during this
tragic time.”
Thank you, Rand
Paul. And God bless you, Chris Kyle.
Some are saying tonight that Ron Paul has deep sixed the political
ambitions of Rand Paul. But I think Americans can and do recognize
that the sins of the father do not belong to the son. I mean, that principle is actually built into
the Constitution itself. In the Treason
clause, you might have noticed an odd phrase “no Attainder of Treason shall
work Corruption of Blood.” It is a
rebuke of an old English doctrine called the corruption of the blood, where if one
member of your family was found to be guilty of treason, the entire family was
punished. By rebuking it, it was saying,
you are not responsible for the actions of your family—even those you are
married to. Your father can commit treason
and it shall not be held against you. Certainly
we can the same attitude about saying something monumentally dumb. And I think most Americans tend to
agree. They might wonder how far the
apple falls from the tree—his very name suggests his father wanted to ensure
his son was as libertarian as he was—but we will judge him on his own
merits. As he should be.
Hat tip: Twitchy.
---------------------------------------
My wife and I have lost our jobs
due to the harassment of convicted terrorist Brett Kimberlin, including an
attempt to get us killed and to frame me for a crime carrying a sentence of up
to ten years. I know that claim sounds
fantastic, but if you read starting here, you will see absolute proof of these
claims using documentary and video evidence.
If you would like to help in the fight to hold Mr. Kimberlin
accountable, please hit the Blogger’s Defense Team button on the right. And thank you.
Follow me at Twitter @aaronworthing,
mostly for snark and site updates. And
you can purchase my book (or borrow it for free if you have Amazon Prime), Archangel: A Novel of Alternate, Recent
History here.
And you can read a little more about my novel, here.
---------------------------------------
Disclaimer:
I have accused some people,
particularly Brett Kimberlin, of
reprehensible conduct. In some cases, the conduct is even
criminal. In all cases, the only justice I want is through the
appropriate legal process—such as the criminal justice system. I do not want to see vigilante violence
against any person or any threat of such violence. This kind of conduct is not only morally
wrong, but it is counter-productive.
In the particular case of Brett
Kimberlin, I do not want you to even contact him. Do not call him. Do not write him a letter. Do not write him an email. Do not text-message him. Do not engage in any kind of directed
communication. I say this in part
because under Maryland law, that can quickly become harassment and I don’t want
that to happen to him.
And for that matter, don’t go on
his property. Don’t sneak around and try
to photograph him. Frankly try not to
even be within his field of vision. Your
behavior could quickly cross the line into harassment in that way too (not to
mention trespass and other concerns).
And do not contact his organizations,
either. And most of all, leave his family alone.
The only exception to all that is
that if you are reporting on this, there is of course nothing wrong with
contacting him for things like his official response to any stories you might
report. And even then if he tells you to
stop contacting him, obey that request. That
this is a key element in making out a harassment claim under Maryland law—that
a person asks you to stop and you refuse.
And let me say something
else. In my heart of hearts, I don’t
believe that any person supporting me has done any of the above. But if any of you have, stop it, and if you
haven’t don’t start.
No comments:
Post a Comment