Rand Paul Responds to Ron: 'Chris Kyle Was a Hero'

[PaulConventionWV]

Americans were in the war. If you are in a war, you fight to win. He saved American lives. I'm unfortunately not stunned by the comparison of Americans to Nazi stormtroopers.

You're contradicting yourself, though. You can't say you're thankful for someone fighting a war like that when you don't think the war should even be happening. Or is it just that you're more grateful for the saving of American lives than you would be for the saving of Iraqi lives if the war had never been started in the first place? I guess I'm just not as patriotic because I don't value American lives over Iraqi lives. Maybe I would if I knew the person but that's a different story altogether.

I don't see how you can say he didn't do anything wrong when he was taking orders from an evil government to do evil things... even if he was saving people who were also there to do evil things for the same evil government. He participated in the invasion of Iraq and tremendously helped the American government achieve its evil agenda.

 

[PaulConventionWV]

No.

Why not?

 

[klamath]

We have the 'Merica, fuck yeaw! crowd and then we have the Dead 'Mericans, fuck yeaw! crowd.
Wonder why Ron didn't use the "live by the sworn die by the sword" line when OBL was killed instead of waxing eloquently about trials and laws.
Oh well.

 

[cajuncocoa]

I for one will be the first to say that if the liberty message needs to become more 'voter friendly' and 'main streamed', you can take 2016 and shove it clean up Ronald Regans wazoo. That's because those friendly to watering down Ron Paul will find yourself where the liberty movement found themselves then: sold out and dissolved awaiting evacuation into a swirling vortex of waste water.

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to awake again.

I've been saying this over and over until my fingers are almost bleeding from posting here every day....but I couldn't have said it any better than you just did.

 

[awake]

Hey folks, how about a best seller that involves an Afghan villager who sniped 150 US personnel in response to a drone attack on his family...? Any one want to call him a hero? or is he a murder? Or better yet : subhuman.

 

[jj-]

Wonder why Ron didn't use the "live by the sworn die by the sword" line when OBL was killed instead of waxing eloquently about trials and laws.
Oh well.

Because he was a member of the government and it's his job to point out the mistakes of the government. You should fix yourself first before criticizing others. It's more important to point out how evil the government, which you're a part of, is, before criticizing others.

 

[QWDC]

Not being total distraught over his death is fine, but to me there is a lot of misguided anger at low level soldiers in the liberty movement. Soldiers today are a product of years of mandatory indoctrination, media saturation, and a living constitution that apparently not only allows, but encourages wars for good worldwide. Don't forget a willing population that happily, or at least willingly, pays into this war machine. Throw in money issues and why wouldn't someone sign up for a military job? Over time, war then melts your mind and the system churns out people like Mr. Kyle. Was he blood thirsty killer before he joined the military? I dunno. It's a pretty common cope mechanism though. Whole thing reminds me of occupy wall-street, people are rightfully angry, but protest the wrong people and look like idiots for doing so.

Change starts with not fueling the war machine. Behind every shot a soldier takes is a population that is doing nothing to stop it from happening. Life is precious, even the warped minded.

 

[TywinLannister]

Was it actually a 'response to Ron' or was it just a general statement on the guy, not precipitated by the tweet?

That is exactly what I said, the title is a fucking lie, it is not a "response" to Ron, they just titled it like that to grab attention.

 

[PaulConventionWV]

Plunder? We didn't take their oil. We didn't take their land. Making a bad strategic decision against a country with a leader who gases his own people and tried to assassinate a US President is far different from making lampshades out of humans and conquering an entire continent. And then subjugating them to National Socialism.

We occupy their land and set up our own puppet government in place of Hussein's. So, in effect, yes, we took their land. Make no mistake, this wasn't a "bad strategic decision." That's a bunch of bullshit propaganda as well. This was done deliberately. George Bush must be laughing his ass off knowing that people bought the excuse of, "Whoops! Bad idea! Oh, well, can't do anything except continue the occupation now!"

And yes, we have "conquered" many countries. We still have bases in Korea for chrissakes.

 

[jmdrake]

Most people here are supportive of the troops in general. Take your typical kid who couldn't get a job and has to sign up for the military. He gets sent over to gun down people in their homes. He probably doesn't want to do it, but he is getting screamed at, drugged up, and threatened by his superiors, and he needs that paycheck, so he does it. Then he comes back fucked up mentally for the rest of his life. While you can't morally excuse that soldier's actions, you know he is a real human being that was used and abused by the state war machine.

Then take a guy like Kyle. We know how he felt about what he did. He couldn't get enough blood. Women, children, it doesn't matter, if their skin was brown they were savages that deserved one of his bullets in their heads. The guy was a fucking psychopath. Criticizing Chris Kyle does not at all mean someone hates the troops.

Kyle's actions during wartime are only "questionable" to a fringe element. Too everyone else, he was protecting the lives of his fellow soldiers, period.

Okay. I know I wasn't going to post anything else on this tonight. But I just had to click on the thread.

Anyway, it's interesting to note that two people on opposite sides of the Chris Kyle debate totally missed my point. It wasn't about Chris Kyle. It was about Ron and Rand Paul and that if...if they are being deliberate and strategic in how they approach this foreign policy debate going forward, that's not necessarily vile and sinister.

And Bastiat, for the record from what I've seen those criticizing Kyle aren't criticizing what he did during the war, but rather criticizing his apparent gloating after the war, or at least his part in it.

 

[misean]

You're contradicting yourself, though. You can't say you're thankful for someone fighting a war like that when you don't think the war should even be happening. Or is it just that you're more grateful for the saving of American lives than you would be for the saving of Iraqi lives if the war had never been started in the first place? I guess I'm just not as patriotic because I don't value American lives over Iraqi lives. Maybe I would if I knew the person but that's a different story altogether.

I don't see how you can say he didn't do anything wrong when he was taking orders from an evil government to do evil things... even if he was saving people who were also there to do evil things for the same evil government. He participated in the invasion of Iraq and tremendously helped the American government achieve its evil agenda.

I'm not contradicting at all. If Americans go to war, I would much prefer that they not die. Chris Kyle was there. His job was to save American lives. He did a great job.

A better question to ask, what were the Iraqis fighting for? I agree that we had absolutely no business meddling in another country. That said, Iraqi soldiers had much less business fighting to keep the rest of the country oppressed under a dictatorship. There is absolutely no moral justification for being an Iraqi soldier. American soldiers on the other hand were freeing a people. So yes I do value and American soldiers infinitely more in this situation than Iraqi soldier.

 

[TheGrinch]

Not being total distraught over his death is fine, but to me there is a lot of misguided anger at low level soldiers in the liberty movement. Soldiers today are a product of years of mandatory indoctrination, media saturation, and a living constitution that apparently not only allows, but encourages wars for good worldwide. Don't forget a willing population that happily, or at least willingly, pays into this war machine. Throw in money issues and why wouldn't someone sign up for a military job? Over time, war then melts your mind and the system churns out people like Mr. Kyle. Was he blood thirsty killer before he joined the military? I dunno. It's a pretty common cope mechanism though. Whole thing reminds me of occupy wall-street, people are rightfully angry, but protest the wrong people and look like idiots for doing so.

Change starts with not fueling the war machine. Behind every shot a soldier takes is a population that is doing nothing to stop it from happening. Life is precious, even the warped minded.

+ rep, and I think Ron was speaking more of the war machine, and Rand was following the standard of not speaking I'll of the dead, with both taking your sympathetic view of understanding how one could end up being a killer for the machine.

 

[cajuncocoa]

You really just look for reasons to hate Rand.

Frankly I think that Rons statement was pretty harsh, but more a commentary on the wars than the warriors who may just be misguided by "defending" their country to the benefit of only a few in reality.

Rand however still has political ambitions, so yes, just like any considerate human being trying to be supportive, he saved his real views for another time.

Its not like its uncommon for people to say nice things they may not fully mean when someone dies.

Ron has earned the ability to be frank and speak about the larger theme at play, Rand hasn't earned the right to be so blunt about a soldiers death (and hasn't had to see it for nearly as long as Ron to be so sick of it)

Your opening line makes me think this might be another of Ms. Eagle's sock puppets.

I don't have to go looking for reasons to criticize (not HATE), Rand is supplying them almost on a daily basis lately.

All of these excuses about saying nice things when people die, yada yada....all besides the point, because I get that, and I am in agreement with you about that. I would have stopped short before calling Kyle a hero, however.

^^THAT'S how it's done.

 

[misean]

We occupy their land and set up our own puppet government in place of Hussein's. So, in effect, yes, we took their land. Make no mistake, this wasn't a "bad strategic decision." That's a bunch of bullshit propaganda as well. This was done deliberately. George Bush must be laughing his ass off knowing that people bought the excuse of, "Whoops! Bad idea! Oh, well, can't do anything except continue the occupation now!"

And yes, we have "conquered" many countries. We still have bases in Korea for chrissakes.

KOREA?????????? We conquered Korea> South Korea was a third world country and now it is one of the richest countries on the planet. What do you mean occupy their land? They have North Korea just to the North. We are there military, unfortunately. North Korea is one of the poorest most oppressed countries on the planet.

In what way has South Korea been worse off for having the United States involved?

 

[Anti Federalist]

I'm thankful for people like Chris Kyle.

Why?

Honestly, I want to know.

No snark, I disagree, but I really want to know.

 

[pcosmar]

KOREA??????????

36,940 dead
92,134 wounded
3,737 MIA
4,439 POW

another one that we should not have been involved in at all.
It was none of our business.

At the Potsdam Conference (July–August 1945), the Allies unilaterally decided to divide Korea—without consulting the Koreans—in contradiction of the Cairo Conference.

It went down hill from there.

 

[PaulConventionWV]

Not being total distraught over his death is fine, but to me there is a lot of misguided anger at low level soldiers in the liberty movement. Soldiers today are a product of years of mandatory indoctrination, media saturation, and a living constitution that apparently not only allows, but encourages wars for good worldwide. Don't forget a willing population that happily, or at least willingly, pays into this war machine. Throw in money issues and why wouldn't someone sign up for a military job? Over time, war then melts your mind and the system churns out people like Mr. Kyle. Was he blood thirsty killer before he joined the military? I dunno. It's a pretty common cope mechanism though. Whole thing reminds me of occupy wall-street, people are rightfully angry, but protest the wrong people and look like idiots for doing so.

Change starts with not fueling the war machine. Behind every shot a soldier takes is a population that is doing nothing to stop it from happening. Life is precious, even the warped minded.

Another saying that comes from the Bible similar to "live by the sword, die by the sword" is "ignorance of the law (God's law) is no excuse." They did something wrong whether they were misguided or not. They're not robots.

Now, maybe I would be a little more understanding if this Chris Kyle dude sincerely thought he was fighting for a just cause, but by reading his writings, you can clearly see that he saw these people as less human than himself and his fellow Americans. That, my friend, is the mindset of a cold-blooded murderer. His only regret is that he didn't kill more of them.

The soldiers should have the wisdom to distinguish defending one's country from doing what an evil government tells you to do so you get paid. They should know better than that. They should know they're not defending they're country. Even if they believe it, it's clearly not true if you have a lick of common sense. They've been manipulated to the point where they have justified going overseas to kill a bunch of people for a paycheck. There's no excuse for such delusion. If the president didn't have an army of willing compliants, there would be no war. That's why it's wrong to participate. Any reasonable human being can tell that we don't have to do this for national defense.

 

[jj-]

Why?

Honestly, I want to know.

No snark, I disagree, but I really want to know.

Because he stopped those Iraqi savages from invading New Hampshire?

 

[fisharmor]

Hey, RPF, I'm confused on this point.
This sniper has only 10 confirmed kills. Is he a hero, or not a hero?

 

[TheGrinch]

Your opening line makes me think this might be another of Ms. Eagle's sock puppets.

I don't have to go looking for reasons to criticize (not HATE), Rand is supplying them almost on a daily basis lately.

All of these excuses about saying nice things when people die, yada yada....all besides the point, because I get that, and I am in agreement with you about that. I would have stopped short before calling Kyle a hero, however.

^^THAT'S how it's done.

Seriously, you're going to play the sock-puppet card, after you've posted thousands of posts in recent months, 99.9 of them to bash Rand over any trivial thing (which yes is this is an incredibly trivial thing to hyperbolize the way you did, when he did nothing but pay honor to a fallen soldier, something Ron has done countless times before now being in a position of retirement where he can be more blunt about the war machine. He never used to go politicizing a soldier's death, which frankly makes me doubt he wrote the initial post, but more likely wrote the REP quote you posted)... But back to the point, you really think that LE is the only one who's way past tired of you jumping on and incesently posting about any little thing with him?

I criticized Rand's statement about Israel, and said that it, along with other things, gives me some concern to watch his votes and rhetoric more closely, but you're simply not even willing to give him a chance (which is fine BTW, but the way you won't let anyone else even continue to form an opinion about him, and just have to demonize what is debateable and unknown, i.e., his intentions, is extremely off-putting. It's far more extreme than just difference in strategy, where you may more likely be right if he goes too far off-path, but we cannot possibly know if he's a trojan-horse in the republican civil-war or sellout at this point. Time will tell).

So maybe keep an open-mind before you jsut jump to the conclusion that because he's respectful of the dead, that it's just another reason that he's a lackey for the war-mongers. There is more evidence to the contrary of that assessment than supports it, no matter how hard you may try to believe there is.