μολὼν λαβέ or Come and Git ‘Em
I have no comment to make, just a column to recommend.
https://retiredmustang62.wordpress.com/2015/12/06/its-just-too-much/
I’m angry. I’m angry that my country has been attacked. I’m angry that innocent people were killed and maimed by at least two other people who were, as far as we can tell, dedicated to a death cult (ISIS). I’m angry there’s a real (albeit relatively small) possibility similar people could not only attack my country again, they could do so in a way that directly and immediately threatens my family. But there’s more.
I’m angry that my government, in the person of the President of the United States, has chosen to dance around the question of why the two now dead murderers chose to commit their atrocity. I’m angry that there is such mealy mouthed discussion about the two murderers. Instead of plain and direct speech, we have been subjected to countless references to them “possibly” or “maybe” having become radicalized or that their actions were those of terrorists. Really? The two parents who abandoned their 6 month old daughter “may” have become radicalized? The two who had multiple homemade bombs on R/C toys in their apartment “may” have had a motive that extended beyond an argument at the place one of them was employed? That one of the two appears to have lied on her visa application “may” suggest she was radicalized and might have even come to this country for the specific purpose of committing some horror? Attempting to destroy their digital tracks “may” indicate this was a terror attack? Wearing cameras to film the carnage and pledging allegiance to the leader of the death cult that is ISIS “might” suggest radicalization? Again, really? But there’s more.
I’m angry that a representative of my government, the Attorney General of the United States, would be so vile as to refer to the events in San Bernardino as in any way “wonderful.” I’m angry that she would be so disgusting as to suggest she is more concerned about violence toward Muslims in general than she is terror attacks against this country. I’m angry she would even remotely suggest citizens exercising their First Amendment rights might potentially subject them to the full wrath and fury of the U.S. government. And yes, I’m angry some of my fellow citizens apparently want to paint all Muslims with the same brush. But there’s more.
I’m angry so many on the left view this as an opportunity to attempt to deprive their fellow citizens of any reasonable attempt to defend themselves should they ever be in such a situation. I’m angry they would suggest those who don’t embrace what the left has decided is the only answer to violence are somehow unconcerned with the violence and its victims.
I’m angry they would either forget or ignore the fact that the Declaration’s “unalienable rights” of “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” cannot exist in the absence of a way to defend them. I’m angry they would pretend “the security of a free state” is in no way endangered when one or more assholes chooses to unleash their terror on the unsuspecting, the unprepared and the innocent. I’m angry they would pretend that same security is not threatened when one or more other assholes break into someone’s house with the willingness or even the intent to do harm to those who live there. I’m angry they would suggest that perhaps it’s reasonable to prohibit the possession of firearms by those whose names are on the same watchlist so many on the left have rightly decried as unconstitutional. I’m angry they would deny those folks, who’ve been neither convicted nor even charged with a crime, the right to defend their lives and the lives of their families. I’m angry they can so effectively and callously declare those folks lives, and the lives of their family members, are worth less than the lives of the rest of us.
Bravo, Amen, and by all means read the whole thing.
Addendum:
Allow me to explain the allusion. Herodotus reports that Leonidas I, leader of the Spartans, upon receiving a command from the Persian King to lay down their arms, returned the typically laconic Lacedaemonian reply: “Having come, take thou them.” Note that the phrase is in the second person singular. Leonidas is asking the Persian Great King personally to take the weapons from the hands of the Spartans.
The Texans returned a similar brief defiance to General Santa Anna when the Spanish demanded the surrender of their cannon.
On a related note, Dallas will not be Paris.
I love the mom with the baby toting the firearm. Any of you young ladies who want to be equal to a man: Get an equalizer. Running to the men in government to reward you equality as a gift, nay, as a token of their wooing your vote is something real men would never do.
About John C Wright
John C. Wright is a practicing philosopher, a retired attorney, newspaperman, and newspaper editor, and a published author of science fiction. Once a Houyhnhnm, he was expelled from the august ranks of purely rational beings when he fell in love; but retains an honorary title.
