Look: I’m inclined to be more forgiving to the parents of a young man who’d been taken prisoner for being a naive, snot-nosed, entitled, ruthlessly indoctrinated piece of self-loathing shit. We’d all — well, most of us (Amanda Marcotte and others like her tend to view offspring as monsters out to steal the joy of having no real responsibilities and a drawer full of unimaginably stained sex toys that needn’t be locked up) — do whatever we could to try to get our child back if we knew s/he was still alive, and in the real world, when you aren’t Liam Neeson and the world is truly huge and traveling costs big money, you’ll likely thrash about for just about any answer. In the case of Berdahl’s father, he tried to form a bond with the captors; to learn their languages and culture; to understand their rancid cause. He deluded himself, but he also Tweeted about other prisoners being held in foreign lands, so it seems to me he was really just lost, a man who loved his imperfect son, and was willing to do just about anything to get him back. Is he an anti-war activist? Perhaps. I honestly don’t know what he was like before his son was captured. And if he was, perhaps that rubbed off on his son, which led the useful idiot to think himself a demi-Messiah, a man who was going to heal the world with empty platitudes about Hope and Change and the brotherhood of humanity — only to be slapped in the face by reality, itself in this tied indirectly if not directly to a different kind of brotherhood, one that has no interest in the pablum shoveled into this kid’s brain, and no interest in his underlying assumption that, because he cared and showed contempt for his own country, he’d get eaten last.
The tragedy here is a tragedy of progressive anti-war propaganda and our failure to name and identify our enemy. This family is just a cautionary tale, albeit one that was able to survive by selfishly making every other son or daughter who dons a uniform a target going forward. I blame them for not being smart enough to see through what it was they were being fed. But if I step back and ask what I might do to get one of my son’s back, I can’t say for certain — as much as I’d like to — that I wouldn’t have floundered around looking for any way to do and settling on the one that seemed the most promising.
All of which is a long way of saying until we know more about the father, let’s reserve judgment and show a bit of sympathy, particularly those of us who are parents. And yes, I understand how parents of other sons lost trying to find this potential AWOL soldier might not react with the same attempt at compassion — and perhaps rightly so. None of which means we shouldn’t hold the Administration in utter contempt, of course, because they didn’t have the same motivations as did Bowe Bergdahl’s father. In fact, their motivations appear far more insidious, weakminded, and detrimental to the well-being of every citizen in this country. And for that they should be curb stomped.
And if it turns out that Bergdahl’s father instilled in his son the simplistic sanctimony that he expressed in his letters condemning his own country, then it is perfectly righteous to note that, though we feel for his grief, he in many ways brought it on himself; and that the return of his son, while a blessing to the family, came at the expense of the country, and for that he should be forever contrite.
Anyway, those are my passing thoughts this morning. They weren’t easy to articulate, so go easy on me. I love this country and I detest those who were born in liberty who speak out against it and through their actions try to weaken my own. In this case though, my love of my own children is allowing me to leave a crack in the door for some sort of understanding.
God help me.
When I’ve thought about Bergdahl senior (and that not much) I find my mind wandering off to the father of Ed Snowden, a father who also once was prominent on the public scene insisting or assuring this and that about his son fled to China — now Russia — but who now has mysteriously disappeared from view, fading to the background we know not where.
i think about the parents of the kids who got killed looking for poor little bobo
This is all very simple. If Bergdahl deserted, he goes to prison. If he collaborated, he goes to prison for life. If he conspired with the Taliban to get those guys out looking for his loser ass killed, he hangs.
Because shooting’s too good for his sorry ass.
But this is America post-fundamental transformation, so it’s not simple anymore, is it?
Come now Ernst, so harsh. Isn’t an Oliver Stone film biography much more fitting?
Bergdahl’s father instilled in his son the simplistic sanctimony that he expressed in his letters condemning his own country … then it is perfectly righteous to note that he in many ways brought it on himself
Though not a parent, I don’t fault the father for wanting his kid back, same as I don’t fault Cindy Sheehan for being grief-stricken at the loss of her son.
However, Sheehan was a soft-headed moron whose son managed to turn out OK in spite of her, whereas Bergdahl appears to have been cut from the same hippie cloth as his father.
If not, whatevs. Junior’s behavior was still shameful, and I see Senior’s Arabic/Pashto homage as more of the same reprehensible “multiculti” moral posturing that the White House relishes rather than a means to identify with his lost son.
Junior actually thought Three Cups of Tea was real. He wanted to live it. So naturally, he joined the military and then ratted them out.
As early as 4/29, Obama aides announce the “Don’t do stupid shit” policy.
On 6/1, Obama (possibly without approval of congress) sets the price for American soldiers and gives the Taliban a victory.
How does 6/1 square with 4/29?
And, if 6/1 wasn’t “stupid shit,” what does the administration consider “stupid shit”?
Yes, it seems the nut didn’t fall far from the tree.
I think the main point is to ask,
who in the hell was it who taught this puke to hate his own country, and why?
. . . what does the administration consider “stupid shit”?
Looks like the answer to that is “leaving Guantanamo filled with jihadis”, i.e., failing to accomplish the very first IWonPenPhone initiative.
Questioning the Unicorn Prince?
Thinking you built that?
Being proud of your country despite never being elected president?
Continuing to argue about Obamacare?
Expecting the president to obey the law?
In order to answer most any question concerning the ClownDisaster’s aims, it is generally sufficient to recall to mind his principle.
what does the administration consider “stupid shit”?
“Negotiating with terrorists is stupid shit. Not the Taliban or Hamas, those people aren’t terrorists, they are just fellow humans are just trying to express their person-hood, but those Republicans and small-government types who revere that document that was written by privileged white slave owners like, a hundred years ago? Fuck them.”
(I hope this view into the mind of the current regime has helped.)
ProTip: When you are claiming that they are holding “prisoners of war”, it helps to actually know what that term means, according to the Geneva Convention (not to mention the four conditions that MUST be met to qualify for those GC protections). See also “unlawful combatant”, and learn why the Taliban does not qualify. We could hold a drum-head court-martial and summarily execute any Taliban captured, either in the field or in village raids, and we would be entirely within the law. We might not get very good press from other countries, but we don’t get very good press from our own Administration, so why not?
At some point, hopefully soon, a General Court-Martial should be convened. The facts of Bergdahl’s absence can be established, and he will have a chance to protest his innocence. I can’t see what benefit is gained by delaying the process.
I went over to a certain site to poke the beehive:
If the details of this story are true, Obama’s decision to trade five dangerous Taliban terrorists for Bergdahl is inexplicable:
No, there is nothing inexplicable about it. At least somebody in the administration had to have known about this guy’s tendencies, since he was being investigated before he disappeared. And how do you explain his father’s going full-Taliban at the White House?
Assuming the president is not kept completely in the dark over stuff like this, you can come up with only one conclusion: maybe the president is not the “good man” our host has portrayed him to be on a number of times. Maybe that whole “fundamentally transform the United States of America” thing really was true after all.
To those claiming that critics of the swap are heartless and that the promise of “no American soldier will be left behind” is unconditionally sacred, I ask: would you have exchanged all of the Gitmo prisoners for Bergdahl? If not, why not?
Far be it for me to disagree with our host (which seldom happens), but when I see the guy’s father with an Islamic beard go to the white house and basically quote the Koran, I’ve got to assume a spade is a spade. And that since the son not only deserted, but decided to leave his stuff behind and join the Afghani’s and left notes to that effect, that the apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree.
If not, why not?
Why limit oneself to a single Rose Garden ceremony of celebration conveying the victories of Islam, when many such ceremonies can be had? Besides, the life experiences of the various captives necessitating the exchanges to come would not otherwise be engendered, so think of all that potential “fun” to be lost at one fell swoop.
Follow the trace of jihad!
Hamas?
Ok by us. Who‘s asking, since we don’t want nobody what nobody sent?
I think we should get out the rumor that the 5 guys have tracking devices implanted in their bodies.
They will either be shot, beheaded, or mutilated by surgeons looking for the devices. At minimum they will not be allowed to play any reindeer games or be sent on false missions rendering them mostly harmless.
As do I. And were I one of them I’d be royally pissed. But not necessarily at the father, for the reasons I already noted.
It’s easy I suppose to be glib; but I wasn’t trying to do so here, so if you want red-meat self-righteousness, I know a site where men of HONOR post where I’m sure you’ll find exactly what you’re looking for.
On the whole wouldn’t we simply prefer that each of the five have brand spanking new American delivered copper-jacketed lead tracking devices implanted in the backs of their heads tomorrow, rendering them quite still and perfectly traceable due to a permanent lack of motion?
I Callahan: it’s a bit more complicated if (and it’s a big if) you can believe the WaPo story on the father’s trajectory. At one point he evidently was going to try to go over and rescue his son himself. At another, he learned local languages in order to be able to communicate with his son’s captors.
Like I said in the post, if the parents indoctrinated their son with the kind of mush-headed anti-Americanism that led him to believe himself to be embraced by 9th century throwbacks, then yes, I blame him, and my sympathy wanes a bit. But hell, we all of us here love this country and would probably be happy to die for it; but many of us wouldn’t want our children to do the same.
It’s complicated for me. Thought I’d share. Feeling very parental this morning.
IDK, I was going for the getting killed by his own guys, like what Phil Marlowe did to Eddie Mars in “The Big Sleep” .
To be sure bgbear, but there are times when manifestly welshing on a deal has a salient utility. Not to mention that trusting jihadis to act unwittingly on one’s own behalf isn’t nearly so determinate as pulling a trigger with dispatch.
This truly might be family vs. self-hating culture.
“Give us your unwashed masses, yearning to be free. We’re so, so sorry to introduce them to this patriarchal nightmare of a country, but we hear Africa’s amaze-balls.”
My answer earlier.
Mr. Jeff the reason I think daddy taliban is not a very good person is because it’s wholly unbelievable that baby taliban has forgotten how to speak english.
wholly. unbelievable.
There’s something very sketch going on with that dude. No idea what. But putting an islamic gloss on this pitiful sad situation is so far beyond appropriate that daddy t has forfeited all sympathy from me.
We’re in Victory Mosque at Ground Zero territory.
And I don’t think that’s glib at all.
Victory Mosque at Ground Zero is itself merely a recapitulation of Al-Quds sitting atop the site of the Second Temple, so to be expected if any expectation is ever warranted. And if at Ground Zero or atop the Temple, why not in the Rose Garden? Heck, IWonPenPhone can’t see any reason why not, and it’s his ceremony to make.
I’m not so much down on the Father for wanting his son back and being happy that he was returning. I don’t even mind too much that the Father spoke from the Koran in Arabic to his son at the Rose Garden presser. I do mind that “Iwonpenphone” smiled ear to ear at a certain exact moment.
gives me the wiggins
Yeah, about that…
And here I thought they were Calvinists.
So dad just just had a Queen earworm?
Easy come, easy go, will you let me go?
Bismillah! No, we will not let you go. (Let him go!)
Bismillah! We will not let you go. (Let him go!)
Bismillah! We will not let you go. (Let me go!)
Will not let you go. (Let me go!)
Never, never let you go
Never let me go, oh.
Rid yourself of the wiggins with a blast of Pepto-Bismillah.
jihadis are queer and something to be feared – bismillah shave
Ubaldo gives me the willies. Leadoff walks flow from his ass like drizzly shit from a duck.
But. . .
Roughned Odor. Playing second base. Roughned Odor.
A name to practically take us back to 1920s baseball, and yet . . . the young man is Venezuelan.
Decent of his parents to bestow such a name though, over other stinky possibilities.
it is – >Rougned Odor<
does he smell like sulfur? chavez wants to know.
Strike “happy” and substitute “willing if needed”.
Which part of what I quoted would you not want your child(ren) to do? The “love your country” bit or “die for it” bit? [Yes, I am living up to my screen name here.]
When you wear the uniform, the dying bit can come with it. Somebody’s got to do it. When you volunteer to do it, you get to be called an “adult”.
No father wants to outlive his children. Lord knows it happened often enough in the olden days, and still today in time of war — but that doesn’t make it easier to bear.
I’d guess the thought of one’s child held in captivity in the asshole of the world, likely tortured, would induce teh crazee reactive. But now that he’s home safe, a reversal is immediately necessary. DadBowe should’ve shaved that shitty camel-tail bead in the Rose Garden, and loudly named every Taliban or Hamas terrorist he’d previously embraced as welcome to seesaw on a swordfish.
The longer it takes for him to reverse his prior activities, the more likely he needs be considered a causal.
I rather doubt WithHonorAndDistinctionBowe was ever tortured, unless we consider learning to run up and down the Hindu Kush like a billy-goat torture, but was treated with the commonplace Pashtunwali custom, an honored guest in the Haqanni home. Especially if he made it known he was on their side of the conflict.
At the very least Papa Sasquatch should have preferred to be thought a fool than to remove all doubt.