The Man In The Arena

Why it matters that he fights FAIR

I know it’s been quite a while. Wonder if anyone is still out there to listen?

All energy has been devoted to caring for my wonderful, terrible, ailing wife.

But once upon a time, for a long time, I stepped into the fray, even long before the tech of today.

No one can know their influence, but I see so many young ones doing exactly what I did, when I was young and so few of us were there. And they are doing it BETTER.

Charlie Kirk did it better than I ever did, or probably ever could.

HERE: is a short message I just sent to a close relative, (and rare enough, still friend):

I understand why you don’t mourn for Charlie Kirk. I might not mourn much for Pelosi, say, or Ilhan Omar, were they to pass. However, if they were brutally assassinated for holding views that I happen to find repugnant, I would still recoil in horror at the act, its’ inhumanity and its’ consequences. It is unfair and antithetical to American ideals, to bully, beat down, or downright murder a person over a disagreement of policies or opinions. That cheapens us all, precludes dialog or learning, and leaves no way forward short of, eventually, Madame Guillotine, or even the wholesale Death Camp and Gulag. That cannot be a thing any decent person could celebrate.

You disagreed with many of his views, I suppose, supposing that you actually have taken time enough to witness and digest sufficient direct source materials, of which there is far too much to even casually peruse it all. I was never a big fan of his, based on his opinions, or even his excellent command of rhetorical argument in debate. On some things, very close; on others, not nearly.

However, I have ALWAYS appreciated a “Man in the Arena”, when that person remains as honest as possible, admits their own mistakes usually prior to being caught and called out on them, and especially if they are kind and humane to the person on the other side of the argument. I have always attempted to be, and genuinely admire, a person who can debate ideas without resorting to logical fallacies, especially ad hominem, and worst of all calls, actual acts of violence. Mr. Kirk, imperfect as are we all, was all of those things, in my own fact-based and truly ruthlessly rational opinion.

It has been my decidedly difficult path to try always, (and not without occasional fail), to castigate an antithetical view as a bad idea, and not to ascribe the bearer of such views as a BAD PERSON.

I was wrongly slandered as a Nazi by Antifa, in person and in print. Does that mean they have the right and moral imperative to slaughter ME? I have never raised a hand or arms in anger against anyone, unless they presented a direct, immanent, and reasonably REAL threat of harm to myself or others. This is a standard worth adhering to.

So, if you find little or nothing to mourn in Kirk’s death, perhaps you might consider shedding a meager tear for the looming possibility of the demise of free and open speech and dialog.