No Greater Love

by John Stevenson

The January 29 U.S. Navy SEAL operation in Yemen went awry when the SEALs lost the element of surprise.  Chief Petty Officer William “Ryan” Owens was killed in the ensuing battle.  In his February 28 address to a joint session of Congress, President Trump honored Ryan and his widow, Carryn. 

Trump said:  “…the Bible teaches us there is no greater act of love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. Ryan laid down his life for his friends, for his country, and for our freedom---we will never forget him…Ryan’s legacy is etched into eternity.”  The wall-to-wall standing ovation lasted for what seemed an eternity.

Trump’s gesture was widely acclaimed by commentators across the political spectrum.  You can’t get to the Left of CNN’s Van Jones, whose praise was effusive: “He became President of the United States in that moment, period…That was one of the most extraordinary moments you have ever seen in American politics, period.”  Jones continued: “He did something extraordinary. For people who have been hoping that he would become unifying…they should be happy with that moment.”  And Jones even suggested “…if he finds a way to do that over and over again, he’s going to be there for eight years.” 

Paying tribute to heroes and their families in presidential speeches is not new.  A few examples:  President Obama did it with a severely wounded Army Ranger, Cory Remsburg.  President Bush (the younger) acknowledged the widow of Johnny “Mike” Spann, the first American death in Afghanistan.  President Clinton acknowledged the widows of police officers killed in the U.S. Capitol shooting incident in 1998. 

Nevertheless, despite the fact that such tributes have become common practice, and despite the fact that Trump’s gesture has drawn praise from Republicans and Democrats alike, not everyone was delighted.  Some examples from the fringe:

MSNBC’s Chris Matthews called it “grotesque.”  Bill Maher said “I wish she hadn’t allowed herself to be used as a prop.”   Activist and director Rob Reiner called it “disgraceful.”  One of the ladies of “The View” said “He [Trump] exploited that widow’” and another “hated it last night.”  And of course Michael Moore heavily weighed in, saying that Trump used Carryn’s loss to score political points:  “And to use that as, just put another notch on his belt.”

But worse was yet to come.  At least Moore, Matthews, Reiner, and the ladies of “The View” were criticizing Trump---and Carryn only tangentially.  Dan Grilo came right out and insulted Carryn herself.  Grilo is a self-confessed volunteer for both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.  He tweeted: “Sorry, Owens’ wife, you’re not helping yourself or your husband’s memory by standing there and clapping like an idiot. Trump just used you.”

Grilo apologized for his “poorly worded tweet.”  Grilo’s Twitter account was soon deleted, and he was promptly sacked by his employer Liberty Advisor Group.  Liberty posted an apology and explanation on its web site, which concludes:  “Liberty’s culture places a high value on the men and women of America’s military who fight to defend us…We honor them. We want to express our sincere condolences to Mrs. Owens. We also apologize to all those who have served this nation…and anyone else who was offended by [Grilo’s] comments.”  Perhaps he’ll show up as a commentator on CNN or MSNBC.

Certainly there are others that shared such hatred of Trump’s tribute to the Owens but fortunately had the common sense or common decency to skip the opportunity to attack the gesture.

Taya Kyle, widow of “American Sniper” Chris Kyle, commented on Moore and his ilk who had insinuated that the tribute was a publicity stunt.  She said the classless response “…makes me sick to my stomach…makes me angry because he’s saying that she’s a fool and doesn’t know she’s being used…”    And: “It totally negates the meaning behind this. And the meaning of it---for all the people watching who cried with [Carryn]---is that some valiant people are out there fighting, not for Republicans, not for Democrats. They’re fighting for this country. And God bless them for it.”

While You Were Gone....

by Chris James

     In case you missed them, I'm going to cherry-pick for your delectation a few examples of what's going on in the bountiful world of professional hypocrisy.  First, the definition of hypocrisy, per the Oxford dictionary: Claiming to have moral standards or beliefs to which one's own behavior does not conform.  This rather lukewarm definition does not really give the sense of what goes on in the real world.  But a dictionary-approved list of the major synonyms does: Pretense, dissimulation, cant, affectation, insincerity, deceit, dishonesty, duplicity, fraud, etc.

     Most people, surely, must recognize that hypocrisy is the mega-multi-vitamin pill that powers the average politician.  As the matchless Sir Winston Churchill slyly pointed out: "A politician has the ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month and next year.  And to have an equal ability to explain why it didn't happen."  But, not all politicians are created equal.  Henry Kissinger: "Ninety percent of politicians give the other ten percent a bad reputation."  So, let's start with a real-world politician.  None other than your fave and mine, the Governor of the Great State of California, Jerry Brown.  He's an interesting study, having succumbed to early stage senility as Governor Moonbeam in the 70's, at around 40 years of age.  From there, his career went downhill, but he slowly clawed his way back, ultimately retaking the Governorship in 2011.

     From his normal, numerous, garden variety mountain of political hypocrisies, I'm going to select a recent one that got up my nose.  Not too long ago, the newspaper carried the story of Brown's reaction to the infrastructure problem.  Like many of his predecessors, he has done little - if anything  - to fix the problem.  But the customary rumble of disaffected "voices off" has become a tumult this year because of attacks mercilessly raining down on the infrastructure by - well - rain.  As reported, Brown's delayed, disingenuous reaction sounded as though he, alone, had discovered the problem. One could almost hear him saying, deadly serious: "I was shocked, I tell you, shocked...."  Been there, done nothing and then late to the table!  Not bad.  Especially when this entirely fake reaction is welded to the context of his obsessive contribution to solving the state's infrastructure problems.  Yep, that ultimate brimborion*, the High Speed Rail project.

     Another recent announcement that caught my eye was that Colin Kaepernick plans to test the waters of the free agency system.  Unless you've been off the planet for an extended period of time, you'll recall that Kap - as we affectionately call him - was the San Francisco 49ers star quarterback who mysteriously descended into the quagmire of really mediocre mediocrity, and was unable to free himself from it.  To take his mind - and ours  - off his bench-warming plight, he came up with the idea of kneeling when the National Anthem was played at the game.  He received quite a bit of support for his heroic protest gesture; there was even a number of imitators.  However, there also seemed to be a lot of people who thought that he was an ungrateful lout.  You might say that the whole issue was controversial!

     I am not a great fan of football; soccer is my game.  What got up my nose (it's a generously accommodating nose) was the staggering amount of coverage this episode generated.  I was thoroughly sick of being bombarded by Kap, and all the derivative antics, in the newspaper's main section and sports section.  For the latter, the column inches necessary to keep the inferno raging meant that other sports news had to be sacrificed.  First to go was the, already meager, soccer coverage.  Of course.

     Back to the present.  Buried in Kap's announcement of free agency was his promise that, post the free agent draft, he wouldn't be kneeling any more.  So much for principles.  When it comes to getting a job and a pay-check, whatever all the kneeling palaver stood for in the first place went right out the window.

     Talking of soccer, when the U.S. women's soccer team won the world cup in 2015, it was a national triumph.  But a local newspaper reporter, after damning the achievement by faint praise, excoriated the team because they had not represented the U.S. well.  His "logic"?  He discovered that there was only one "ethnic" on the 23 person team.  (Way up my nose!).  First, what an egregious word "ethnic" is; an adjective, bastardized into a noun, that is condescendingly used in the manner of terms like "alien."  The ethnic in question was insultingly identified by her color; the rest of the team wasn't the same color, but they came from a multitude of ethnicities (the correct word), nonetheless.

     Fast forward to a recent international women's soccer tournament in the U.S.  The home team, ranked number one in the world, is drawn against England, ranked number five.  The U.S. loses the game 1-0.  This is the first time that the U.S. has lost a game on home soil since 2004!  Thirteen years!  What would our reporter have made of that?  Well, since the U.S. team now has on its roster four "ethnic" players (using his criterion), then are we witnessing the "triumph of origin over performance"?**  Absolute rubbish; of course not.  How do I know this with such certainty?   Because the winning English team had five identifiable "ethnic" players on their squad.  So much for the ultra-hypocritical, life-blood draining "diversity for diversity's sake" ethos.  Performance counts, you sniveling hypocrites - regardless of any baseless ethnic quotas that you pull out of the hat.  Just because you throw the word "ethnic," or even "ethnicities," around does not make your pathetic attempt to manage by identity any the less racist.  Bloody hypocrites!  

* Brimborion (n) = A totally useless, utterly nonsensical thing.

** For a different publication, I wrote a satire on this very subject back in October 2015.   It was reprinted on the Common Sense site in March 2016.  It's in the archives.

Disparate Treatment

by John Stevenson

Chelsea (nee Bradley) Manning freely enlisted in the U.S. Army and served as an intelligence analyst in Iraq.   Manning, who was openly gay, was bullied earlier in life and this continued in the Army. 

He has been diagnosed with gender dysphoria.  This means, as I understand it, that he thinks he is or should be a woman.  Notice that I use the biologically correct but politically incorrect masculine pronoun.  This is because Manning is and forever will be genetically male even if he receives “gender reassignment surgery,” which he has not yet. So with that digression, back to the point.

 Manning’s military job gave him access to a wealth of classified material which he found troubling.  This included material known as the Iraq War Logs and the Afghanistan War Logs, secret U.S. State Department communications, assessments of Guantanamo detainees, and a video showing unarmed civilians being shot and killed. 

Manning turned over this trove of damaging information to WikiLeaks.  Of course the demonstration of America’s inability to keep secrets is damaging to our relationships with other governments and to our ability to secure the cooperation of civilians in enemy terrain.

Manning’s crimes were discovered, and he was arrested and tried by a court martial.  He was found guilty of espionage and other charges and sentenced to 35 years in prison.  Immediately after his sentencing, Manning announced, “As I transition into this next phase of my life, I want everyone to know the real me.  I am Chelsea Manning.  I am a female.  Given the way I feel, and have felt since childhood, I want to begin hormone therapy as soon as possible.” 

Manning’s espionage earned him support among anti-war activists, who saw him as a “whistleblower” rather than a criminal.  His announcement as “transgendered” gained him support from LGBTQ activists.  A double helping of sympathy from the Left.  On Jan. 17, 2017, President Obama commuted Manning’s prison sentence.

Eddie Slovik had an extensive criminal record, which caused him to be classified 4F, unfit for military service.  But in 1944 Uncle Sam needed warm bodies, so Slovik was re-classified 1A and drafted into the U.S. Army.  In August 1944, Slovik found himself in the infantry in France.

When Slovik arrived at his assigned rifle company, he promptly informed his company commander that he was not cut out for combat and requested to be reassigned to a support unit behind the front lines.  His request was denied and he deserted the following day.

Slovik worked his way to the rear, where he found a non-combat unit and turned himself in.  Officers there urged him to return to his infantry unit but he steadfastly refused, preferring a court martial for desertion rather than a combat assignment.

Slovik was tried by a court martial, found guilty, and sentenced to death.  He had thought he would only have received a dishonorable discharge and prison time.  He wrote a letter to Supreme Allied Commander Dwight D. Eisenhower, begging for clemency. 

In the hard winter of 1944-1945, Eisenhower was concerned with low morale and a rising desertion rate.  Ike confirmed the sentence, and Slovik was shot dead by a firing squad in January of 1945.

Poor Slovik---he should have been born seven decades later and claimed to be female.