Please Stop The Craziness

I remember where I was when President Kennedy was shot…on the playground at school. I also recall where I was when President Reagan was shot…traveling from PA to VA. The morning Robert Kennedy was shot Mrs. Michaels told us how she cried when she heard the news. While I didn’t like the policies George Wallace espoused, the news that he had been shot and seriously injured while campaigning for president hit me hard. He was the first presidential candidate I of whom I was really aware. President Ford had two attempts made on his life in the 70’s, but escaped injury. However the list of politicians in this country who have been attacked is long and the record shows much tragedy.

To the above list one can add the following presidents/politicians on whom assassins unleashed their hatred: Add Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley, both Roosevelts, and Harry Truman. Not all died, but all had attempts made on their lives. That is 20% of our presidents, not to mention a Senator and a Secretary of State .  Then there are the civil rights and religious leaders who have been shot from Vernon Jordan and Dr. King to Malcolm X and numerous others. It seems clear that politics and guns in our culture do not mix healthily.

Additionally, over the last 50 years, there have been hundreds of innocent people in our country who were shot at colleges, high schools, malls, gyms, in the workplace, and in churches; by people who had real or imaginary axes to grind. But no one, politician or otherwise deserves to be shot due to someone having a grievance with them or anyone else.

So here I sit watching news reports of people bringing loaded guns to events where our president will be speaking. Is it any wonder why rational people get a little nervous? The second amendment notwithstanding, this dangerous behavior is a simple invitation to disaster.

When guns are coupled with shouting, anger and emotional outbursts reminiscent of rioting and out of control mobs (the emotional fervor against this administration is almost cult-like in nature); then danger is present. When guns are coupled with people who say and believe statements like “Obamanation, Obama’s will have death squads, Obama is the Anti-Christ, he (Obama) will destroy our nation, he (Obama) wants to do as much damage to our nation as fast as he can, or someone should put a slug in his (Obama’s) head;” there is a serious problem! When guns are coupled with imagery equating our president and NAZIS, the SS, and Hitler (read deadly enemy) the chances of someone needing to shoot to defend the nation raises dramatically.

I see no good reason why anyone, other than law enforcement, should be allowed to bring a gun within miles of the president. Some will cry “This is a restriction of my constitutional rights!” And I say in response, “One cannot shout fire (when there is no fire) in a crowded theater without the expectation of prosecution, and that is not a violation of freedom of speech. It seems to me that these folks showing up at town hall meetings, especially where the President is present, are trying to bait the administration. By bringing guns to such events, they are clearly making a statement that goes beyond a simple exercising of their second amendment rights. If the authorities dare to ban such demonstrations, this administration will be accused of trampling the second amendment. In that case I fear the almost unhinged folks will become all the way unhinged.

But imagine this scenario with me for a moment. During the previous administration an American citizen, wearing a turban, or perhaps just looking like they might be from the Middle East, shows up at a presidential event bearing a loaded assault rifle. Do you honestly think those who currently support the folks showing up at meetings with guns would demand that this individual be allowed to exercise his/her second amendment rights? I doubt it. More likely such a person would have been accosted, arrested, hauled off, and perhaps even tortured.

Folks. We have to stop the craziness! We must open our hearts to respectful dialogue. Polite discussion must replace hate speech. Wild tales must cease. Like cream in the proverbial bucket of milk, those who really love our country need to rise to the occasion and demonstrate visionary restraint. We must show that there are more of us who value respectful dialogue and reason than there are of those who would tear us apart through unrestrained emotion that could lead to dangerous acts; like using the guns brought into volatile situations.

Peace

Torture: Simply Wrong

As a child I heard about the evils of Communism. I heard about gulags and Stalin. I heard about Khruschev and godlessness. I heard about torture. As got older, and was able to read for myself, I read about first-hand experiences of people who were tortured for their faith.

I remember reading about people being forced to endure temperature extremes, sleep deprivation, beatings, and violence as others attempted to get information out of them. I wondered how people could treat other people so inhumanely. How could a difference of ideas be so misconstrued as to constitute justification for that kind of evil?

Then came the Vietnam War and people from my town were POWS and endured horrible tortures. “Why?” I wondered. “Why do people treat each other like that?”As I matured I learned to feel pride that my country did not engage in those kinds of behaviors.

The “Soviets” were concerned with keeping their society safe from the myths of religion and political ideas that threatened their norm. The Vietnamese were under attack from our forces and used that as a justification for their mistreatment of our soldiers. Both societies were concerned about protecting their way of life. But even as a teenager none of the reasons I heard made enough sense to me as to justify torture and beatings (as an aside, killing people in general does not make much sense to me).

Now I hear people from my government, and my society, using the same kind of rhetoric to justify “enhanced interrogation” techniques. Good, well-meaning people proudly proclaim, “If just one American life is saved it is worth it.” This is not the head in the sand “we didn’t know what was happening” situation the world encountered after WWII. No! We know what was going on. We have pictures of the degrading treatment in Abu Ghraib. And I seriously doubt that such behaviors only happened in that one prison.

We know that people were being water boarded, an activity that has always been considered torture. A Texas sheriff deputy was prosecuted by Ronald Reagan’s Department of Justice for water boarding prisoners in an attempt to get information. But now we have voices at the highest levels of government saying they are not sure if water boarding meets the legal definition of torture since a doctor was always in the room. Now, since it is to protect our way of life, things that once were considered torture by most everyone, are suddenly not so clear.

I am reminded of our erstwhile president’s statement, “It depends on what the meaning of “is” is.” Redefining “is” caused outrage, and justifiably so. Redefining “torture” seems much more palatable to some of those who were aghast at President Clinton’s “is” fiasco. In my opinion both redefinitions are nothing more than attempts to hide from the truth.

Torture is simply wrong. While I do not want our country attacked, and I do not want American lives lost; I do not believe that safety is worth losing our collective soul. It is wrong to engage in the kinds of behaviors our constitution and the Geneva Convention condemn. It is wrong to adopt methods of treating others, even those considered our enemies, that constitute torture.

Please. Not in my country and not in my name.

Peace,

Leon