A Nation of Killers

The world has gotten a great deal less dangerous. By any measure.

Violent crime is in free fall in the Industrialized West (I left out Japan. They never bothered to have a crime problem.) The statistical probability of being killed in War is the lowest in over 150 years (since the advent of industrialized slaughter—the American Civil War).

Yet Americans are turning out in droves to bear witness to an "American Hero" in the movies. A man who murdered/killed 160 people from a position of some distance.

Do you have a strong opinion in favor of such activity? Can you suspend your belief system for just a few minutes while I use my reasoning to see if I might shake that just a little?

Let me start by saying that the world is indeed an imperfect place. That some people are simply so dangerous to their fellow man that the threat that they pose must be neutralized by killing them or imprisoning them. I get it. Even a Quaker can admit that a woman has a right to defend herself from rape and murder, as do men, and that government has taken on that responsibility (I do not support capital punishment. I am speaking of the transactional moment), or perhaps I should say that a Free Quaker can admit this.  It then follows that someone, a human being, must undertake the process for the government. In short, and as disgusting as it sounds, the government must employ people who are willing to kill based on nothing more than the word or command of others.

Does that in any way change the ugliness of that occupation? We do not publicize the names of the executioners in our prison system for a very good reason—they are in the business of killing a helpless human being. For whatever reason, and perhaps a very good reason, society has determined that that human being must be killed. If the execution was done by firing squad—you know, killing someone from a safe distance—isn't that pretty much an execution by a sniper? I know, we call it a firing squad, but "a rose by any other name..."

Thomas Young was an American serviceman serving in the Army and stationed in Iraq. Mr. Young was going about his duties when an Iraqi sniper shot him. The Iraqi sniper either was not as good as the American Sniper or the Army Medical Corps was better at keeping seriously wounded people alive. Either way, Thomas Young temporarily survived his sniper shooting, though paralyzed and in grievous and agonizing pain for the remainder of his short life. He wrote an open letter to President George Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney here. I really think it should be required reading for admission to the movie, "American Sniper"—but this is a "free country". So who am I to tell people what they must read.

Thomas Young had parents. He had a wife. They live in agony to this day. as do the families of thousands of Americans who were killed in Iraq/Af-Stan et al. Was the Iraqi sniper a hero, too?

The people who the "American Sniper" shot? Like our murdered servicemen and women they were human beings. They had plans for Life after war. They had mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, children. Thousands and thousands of human beings whose lives were directly destroyed by our American Sniper.

But they all deserved to die, right? I mean, they were resisting an armed invasion of their country by a nation intent on making sure that their Oil was available for American consumerism—including movie tickets for "American Sniper" and gasoline (from Iraqi Oil) to get to the movie theatre to go see our hero murder their family members. Any examination of this is unwelcome as not supporting the troops or unpatriotic. But I do support the troops. I support bringing them home to enjoy the Truth and Beauty of Life and letting the rest of the world come to their senses, or not, on their own.

So Michael Moore, a guy I have almost no political affinity for whatsoever but a thinking man by any measure, expresses an opinion that the worship of this "American Sniper" activity is at least questionable. The "patriotic" go on the offensive, distributing a letter from another individual that is willing to kill on command.

I thought I would post that letter (here is the original) and translate it for those patriots who love a good bombing:

(quote)

(translation is mine)

Mr. Moore-

Good afternoon there sweetheart, I hope this finds you alive and well. You can thank our men and women of the armed forces for that, by the way, and that also includes us cowardly snipers. It seems you’ve found time between licking the jelly off your fingers and releasing your grasp of a bear claw to tweet some junk about snipers being cowards.

(Translation: Good afternoon there you physically inferior fatso. I hope you drop dead. You should be thankful that I can't kill you, too. Because I would. Yes, I would kill you because you dare to question my belief system and the system that indoctrinated me. I am a &***ing hero—and you are nothing. How dare you question all of the killing that the American Military does to enforce U.S. Dollar hegemony, the continued trade in cheap oil, to maintain American Corporate dominance, and the continued flow of tribute from the rest of the world in order to fund the American Social Programs that people on the Right claim they hate while supporting people like me?)

My buddies and I got a good laugh over the tweet, so I thank you. For a guy worth $50 million dollars, you sure have quite a bit to bitch and cry about. I guess like a moth to flame, you too gravitate towards things that are popular and in the moment—in this case it’s snipers. Too bad for you that your attempt at being relevant via your 70+ year old family experience has failed. It has only made you look dumber than a bag of hammers. Next time you should try something more original than going after snipers for one reason or another…that was so last month.

(Translation: My people are better than you, damn it. You might have made an immense fortune with your intellect and moved millions of people to think and question... but you are inferior to me even though I had to take a job in the military because I had no other real prospects as I am not able to make movies, or write books or speeches, or program computers, or perform surgery, or paint, or think great thoughts. I can kill, however. And that makes me important. In fact, it makes me G-d like. I have the power of life and death. And I love it. You are old and irrelevant. I am young and by virtue of that, I AM relevant. So there. Oh, and I will be young and beautiful forever.)

It’s typical of “men” like you to criticize the intestinal fortitude, focus, discipline and patriotism of a sniper. It must stem from an inferiority complex or something. But hey, it’s okay cupcake. We snipers are thick skinned and the efforts of world class turds such as yourself to portray us in a negative light only makes us laugh. If you and I were in the same room, I’d throw you a smile and gently pat you on the head knowing you’re nothing more than a mouth breathing, Crisco sweating waste of space not even worthy of being in the presence of a sniper. It’s almost funny how people like you preach things like ‘acceptance’ and ‘not passing judgement’ or ‘labeling people’, but then are the first to do so when a person is in some way dissimilar from you.

(Translation: It's typical of fat men with low testosterone to criticize men with high testosterone and big muscles. We are better than you. We have big muscles. From the department of redundancy department. We killers and deciders of life and death are G-d like, and you scum-bag philosophers engaging in free-thinking had better be careful or us guys with big muscles will kill you, too. By the way: It is OK for me to judge you, civilian cowards. You must not examine my life or my choices because I am a %***ING HERO, Damn it!! Don't you get it??!!)

So tenderfoot, I leave you with this final thought: what if you found yourself in some sort of hostage situation where you were held at knife-point by some crazed person and they were dead set on making an example of you by bleeding you out on Hollywood Blvd in front of the world, and the only way out was with the precision aimed fire of a sniper? Would you want that coward to take the shot? Because knowing how you feel about snipers such as myself and your hatred of firearms, I’d probably drop the mag, roll the bolt and go get a Jack & Coke before helping you out.

(Translation: So fat man with small muscles and a double chin: Keep your mouth shut. Your opinions are of no value to us men with large muscles and six packs who are G-d like with the power of life and death. In order to overcome your critical thinking, I am going to use hyperbole. This will work well with the non-thinkers that adore me, my big muscles and my big gun that I use to engage the power of life and death because I am G-d like while you are nothing. Yes. I have taken your money to pay for all of my toys and killing machines, the 900 bases in over 150 countries because we just LOVE freedom and my G-d like power and if you don't pay for it one of my kind will come and kill you/torture you/beat you/imprison you.)

With complete disrespect for you and all you civilian cowards,


Sikes

(Man with big muscles/big gun)

(unquote)

Did I miss anything?

You see, I fully realize that we need men like this to kill some people (think terrorist kidnappers engaging in the beheading of innocent young women) because those people have given up their right to life because of their behavior. That does not make killing those people any less of a disgusting thing than it is. And by forgetting what a disgusting thing it is, and by glorifying it, we have opened the door to accepting the killing of people in their own land for their own oil.

"Once men have accepted self-sacrifice as good, they have accepted the idea of sacrificing others, too." - Ayn Rand.

This is not fighting for my freedom. This is killing for money and natural resources and to support U.S. dollar hegemony in order to fund the American social programs—Medicare, Social Security, Medicaid, SNAP (food stamps), and the other "welfare" programs. The American Left asserts their innocence in this and their opposition to the endless wars but it is the economic demands of their do-gooder programs that make these wars inevitable. These programs exist only because of the tribute the American military collects from the rest of the world by forcing them to use the U.S. dollar and the SWIFT system to settle international trade.

None of this is self-defense. This is that self-sacrifice/sacrificing others nonsense on a grand scale.

The Insanity of Government Violence

Last evening the state of Georgia executed Andrew Brannan, a Viet Nam (close) Combat veteran, for the murder of Sheriff's Deputy Kyle Dinkheller. The murder was captured in one of the most disturbing videos I have ever seen. The only reason I saw it was that is was posted on a thread I was commenting on. I wish I had not seen it.

I am not going to comment on the righteousness of capital punishment. I am certainly not going to defend the murderer. No, my analysis is going somewhere else.

To my mind, here is what happened:

Our government took a young man, Andrew Brannan, taught him how to kill, taught him that killing was a "goodness" in the "right circumstances" (of course, those circumstances were to be determined by other people. Primarily for money (and "the economy"). After the government no longer needed Brannan's services in the most stressful environment one can imagine, and after teaching hime that killing was OK, the government terminated his services and wished him well walking around amongst the rest of us.

Brannan was suffering from Mental Illness, PTSD and Bi-Polar disorder. Of course, he was a "War Hero", so no one considered that maybe, just maybe, Brannan should not be in possession of firearms. Heck, Brannan probably should not have been in possession of a motor vehicle, but I digress.

Then another government agent, Kyle Dinkheller, pointed a firearm at Brannan because of Brannan's erratic behavior, triggering Brannan's government training to stand his ground and fight when under threat of death by firearm. Brannan murders Dinkheller in the subsequent shootout.

Here is the chain of events:

Government takes Brannan, trains him to kill in order to stop the spread of Socialism (at the same time that same American Government is expanding Socialism domestically in the form of Medicare and the War on Poverty programs). Brannan piles up a bunch of murdered bodies in Southeast Asia, and is awarded a medal for his efforts.

Brannan returns to America with the serious mental health issues often caused by the stress of killing human beings in an environment in which they are also trying to kill him. He murders Kyle Dinkheller. The State steps in and murders Brannan.

So now we have bodies from Southeast Asia to rural Georgia. 2 of those bodies belong to people that were willing to kill for the State, and who were in turn trained by the State to kill, and who were eventually killed by agents of or from the State, past or present.

I wonder:

Does the U.S. Army now maintain Brannan's grave with a little flag and a bronze marker noting the medal he was awarded? Or does being ignominiously murdered by the State negate that?

Do the American people know how many innocent and unarmed Americans have been shot during traffic stops because the Deputy Dinkheller murder video is used as a training video in police departments across America? Come on, who wouldn't be jumpy after watching that video?  But does anybody tally up the cost/benefit analysis of that training? You know, how many cops saved versus how many innocent people killed or maimed during traffic stops as a result of that "training video"? Of course not. No more than the cost/benefit of any of the other silly "programs" that our Statist policy wonks dream up. The 99.999999999% of us are unarmed regular folks trying to make it home alive from work. 100% of the police are ready for a shoot out during every traffic stop. The mounting evidence of that disconnect is piling up around the country.

The answer to our rising body count in State sanctioned violence is not more and better violence. That way lies disaster and madness, me thinks.