In the Crosshairs

I will not go see American Sniper.  I like Clint Eastwood (Unforgiven is one of my all time favorite movies) and I like Bradley Cooper too, but Chris Kyle, God bless his soul, was more than a little off.  His repeated lies about his life after Iraq clearly call into question his honor and reputation, and one specific one has me scratching my head in regards to why anyone would be looking at this guy as a hero.

First things first, I might not respect Kyle the person, but, as much as this might upset some, I do respect the combat role he fulfilled.  Snipers are not a pretty job, but when was war ever supposed to be pretty?  Do our enemies use snipers on us? Yes (all due respect to Michael Moore's uncle who died at the hands of one in combat, but I do, begrudgingly, have to disagree with his bashing of the military tactic).  Snipers have been a infantry basic since guns were invented and someone realized that guy was better at shooting one than that guy.  In American history, snipers have been the difference makers in major battles from the Revolutionary War to Afghanistan.  Our enemies will use them, and so should we.

The modern GOP so wants to go back and make the Iraq War justified and a major success.  It was neither.  It was a made up war, an informercial designed to get the American people to buy the White House's nefarious agenda.  Saddam was a bad guy, but Iraq wasn't behind 9/11, and when that lie came crumbling down, it became a war to stop mythical chemical weapons and nuclear bombs.  Yes, Dems voted for it, but only because the White House was controlling all of the intelligence and lying their asses off.  Regardless, the modern Republican seems to be far angrier at the Dems for voting along with the Republicans.  For the record, 82 Dems voted with the 215 Republicans for war in the House, but the GOP could have passed it without a single Dem.  In the Senate, 29 Dems joined the 48 Republicans who voted for it.  Far more Republicans voted for war than Dems, and a reminder, this was all done at the behest of Bush and Cheney, who had demanded it be done, or else!  Conservatives love American Sniper because it tries to re-write history, implying Iraq was behind 9/11.  They weren't, and rightos need to stop being delusional fools and start blaming the right people for an unjustified war.

But getting back to Kyle, this guy was a liar, and that's no longer just an opinion.  A court in Minnesota has ruled he lied about his confrontation with former Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura, rewarding Jesse millions in damages (for any lawyer, the closing arguments by Ventura's team are a textbook example of how you completely dismantle a weak defense).  Kyle was getting egged on by the right wing media in this country to smear Ventura and he got caught up in the accolades without realizing his liability.  But this is only one lie he's told.

First there is the lie about killing two men who tried to carjack him.  If someone did try to steal his car, he'd have been justified in using force in his defense, but when journalists have tried to validate this story, they come up empty.  Two dead bodies don't just disappear.  There should be a record of it somewhere, but that pales in comparison to the disturbing whopper he told about Katrina.

Chris Kyle claimed he went into the chaos that was post-Katrina New Orleans and killed 30 people who were looting and doing other bad things.  Let's break this down from the top:

• You manage to get into a devastated New Orleans, but you don't try to help the thousands of desperate people all around you, maybe even taking some of them out the way you got in, and instead decide to start shooting them?
• This wasn't a military combat mission, this was supposedly Kyle and a buddy setting themselves up on top of the SuperDome and firing off shots, as regular citizens.
• Your tolerance for people who are in a devastated urban area, who are not receiving any help from the federal government because they are black and vote Democrat, people who are starving and dying of thirst, while their dead family members float by, is so minuscule you feel the best way to deal with them is to shoot them?
• Kyle, from his vantage point on top of the Dome, insisted he could determine who was and who wasn't a bad guy in the unfolding chaos.
• Even if these people were breaking the laws and looting, when did we start implementing an instantaneous death penalty, administered by regular citizens, for the theft of a $100 stereo?
• Kyle, as a regular citizen, decided he was going to be police, judge, prosecutor, jury and executioner and administered immediate justice, gunning down at lest 30 people in the streets of an American city.

If this is true, he should have been arrested and charged with one of the largest mass shootings in the history of this country.  He lied before, and we know he lied on this one too.

But Republicans love to fall in love with an image.  They not only love Kyle because he was unapologetic and expressed a distorted patriotism, and because he was a fervent supporter of the 2nd Amendment, they love him because what he did, shoot Iraqis with glee.  He fulfills the Cheney mantra of all of "those people" being our enemy.  You can't ignore the fact Kyle bragged about shooting Iraqis and African Americans.  This should call into question the true feelings and rationale of any American who calls him their "hero."

Chris Kyle lied.  When did he start?  My experience with liars, especially ones who lie about such ostentatious things, are they have been lying their entire life.