Ron Paul has made things worse. On Monday he blamed the death of former SEAL sniper Chris Kyle on “living by the sword” and therefore dying by the sword. Kyle was helping a fellow veteran work through PTSD, when that veteran allegedly killed him and another veteran.
It was a disgusting, trollish tweet. His son, Sen. Rand Paul, had to issue a statement, though that statement fell short of an apology.
Last night Paul responded. Here is his Facebook post, in its entirety.
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
No apology. No acknowledgement that Kyle was murdered while he was doing good. No acknowledgement that Kyle was a decorated veteran who fought to keep America free. No acknowledgement that Paul’s first statement was repulsive and repugnant.
As a veteran, I think Ron Paul should retire and step out of the public eye.
The OB/GYN should also avoid commenting on PTSD and on theology in the future. Paul has shown that he doesn’t know what he’s talking about on either subject. Jesus didn’t preach a strictly non-violent message, and did not condemn military service.
What “violence” does Paul think was going on? They were there to shoot at targets, to help the poor guy essentially “get back on the horse” and deal with whatever was causing him problems.
I’m not sure I get the dig at Rand for his not apologizing for something he didn’t say. He’s done the work of making sure it is known he is not his father.
I dunno, Bryan, I’m usually with you, but Ron usually speaks in terms of what if rather than what is. Have a hard time thinking Jesus would have taken up a gun to defend Israel. Two kingdoms, diametrically opposed, can’t be faithful to both, do you ever think about what the world would be like if Jesus’ words were taken to heart – countries won by the power of God. So a Spirit filled Believer and family is confronted by an attacker with a gun, aiming to kill them all. Does the Believer pull out his gun and shoot him, or is it test for wwJd? Just asking, I think Paul spouts off these things, and doesn’t really have a clue about the deeper meanings of what he says…or not? In any case, Paul’s first tweet was dumb.
Read the post I linked.
I think the Lord’s statement at the Last Supper was meant to illustrate the futility of bringing about His kingdom via force.
What effect did those swords have on anything anyway other than the removal of some poor shlub’s ear which the Lord felt obliged to reattach?
BTW, 12 apostles, 2 swords and nobody seems to have sold his cloak. The Lord wasn’t packing but I think a couple of the apostles were.
You are correct though in that the Lord did not condemn military service and no centurian was ever asked by him to lay down his arms.
“You are correct though in that the Lord did not condemn military service and no centurian was ever asked by him to lay down his arms.”
Exactly correct. I haven’t studied the Bible in a while but I do know from my studies that the Jesus Christ never told men to willingly accept death at the hands of evil men.
It is sad that everything in our morally relativistic society everything gets twisted to make it seem as though the only evil that exists in the world all hail from societies that strive everyday to do good (read: America). When Russia invaded Georgia no one really raised a peep. North Korea sinks a South Korean corvette the world still gives them food. Assad kills his own citizens everyone act as though nothing can be done.
But United States waterboards three terrorists to prevent further attacks and bring the perpetrators justice? EVIL! Israel gives back the West Bank and then defends itself when its reward are multiple rockets purposely aimed at its citizens? EVIL!
The world is worse than an insane place.
The world is OK. It’s the loud-mouths who hog the attention who are insane.
If Rand has half a brain, which it appears he does, he will be telling his father to shut his gigantic gaffe prone mouth, as well as to shut down his twitter account. Rand appears to have a viable future and doesn’t need his looney father and his father’s looney supporters torpedoing a potential successful political future.
“No acknowledgement that Kyle was a decorated veteran who fought to keep America free.”
I think this is the lynchpin of the argument.
Socom assassinates hundreds of people, but few are in control of the list, or understand it.
We have invaded countries thinking it was about freedom, but we get socialist Islamist states, America’s longest war, and are losing all kinds of freedoms at home.
Ron Paul’s comment was pretty irresponsible, because the guys who volunteer for service are good guys.
The problem is we send these guys to kill and be killed and less and less it seems that it’s for freedom of any meaningful kind.
The people in Afghanistan and Iraq that killed and were killed by our troops, some were Al Qaeda, and had plans to harm America domestically. But many, even if they were a minority, were not happy with American troops in their home. It doesn’t matter how hard we were trying to be nice, or how just our cause was, or how irrational they were, we were in their home, so they fought back.
Chris Kyle killed many of these people, some were terrorists with a violent evil ideology. But undoubtedly some were poor ignorant victims of a geopolitical game much bigger than they were.
Veterans with PTSD are victims of the same game. Chris Kyle was a victim of the same game.
Ron Paul is trying to say: why are we playing this game? Is it worth it anymore, or have we perhaps blown the threat out of proportion, and caused much more harm than good? And people like Chris Kyle, who by no means deserved his fate (this is where Paul was careless), nonetheless serve to culturally glorify the work our country is doing.
Look, guys who go through this crap over there because they sincerely want to be in a position to defend freedom, and that means perhaps naively following the orders of elected politicians, they are heroes.
But they are not heroes because they kill people worlds away, many of whom: let’s face reality, wouldn’t care less about America if we weren’t all over their neighborhoods. This aspect of the job, the killing and being killed, makes them victims.
It’s our job to evaluate what we’re doing, and really decide whether this policy makes sense anymore.
It’s disingenuous to hide monstrous policy behind the good work of heroes. Just because it’s good people doing crap work out there, doesn’t make the crap good.
“Then the men stepped forward, seized Jesus and arrested him. With that, one of Jesus’ companions reached for his sword, drew it out and struck the servant of the high priest, cutting off his ear. “Put your sword back in its place,” Jesus said to him, “for all who draw the sword will die by the sword.”
36 He said to them, “But now if you have a purse, take it, and also a bag; and if you don’t have a sword, sell your cloak and buy one…”
How did Ron make it worse, he didn’t say anything else? He retired and is no longer a threat to you Rovites so relax. Just keep eating your own people and watch the House go to the left also. Then you can continue on your path to being democrat clones.