Why Craig Hooper and his argument are truly odious…

This won’t be as much fun as my sticks and stones game, so feel free to skip it. But I wanted to do a serious post pointing our how Hooper’s arguments are fatally flawed, and how his ad hominem attacks on Matt are so intellectually vacant. I sincerely believe that he has engaged in the most base line of attack of all time, I also believe that logically it is completely unsupportable.

Now, bear in mind that his original posting was to attack a piece of Crush’s. Now, had it ended there, that would be fine. But what he does is goes from point A to point B and on down the line. Crush writes something up discussing how there is too much Gov’t, wack job believes we have too much Gov’t, wack job kills cop, ergo Crush killed the cops. Now, that argument is so ridiculous and nebulous that it really doesn’t even deserve attention, which is what Jimbo argued when he finally checked in with me.

But, what Craig does is possibly even worse. Now remember, Crush has his own blog, so he can try this case in the court of public opinion by merely responding to this asshole. But Craig has to do something in between parts A and B. You see, Crush writes at Blackfive, and Matt is the *owner* of Blackfive, ergo, Matt shot the Cop. But then, we go a few steps more, and asserts that Matt has unjustly enriched himself by “wrapping himself in the flag” and using wounded warriors (presumably) to do so.

Now, what does Matt’s enrichment (alleged, not true) have to do with the Cops being shot? Well, all we have is the line of reasoning.

That line of reasoning is completely unflattering to anyone who claims to have a doctorate. Seriously, it’s like a 3rd grader with a crayon who’s making up a story as he goes along. It is shameful, and THAT is what we should be guarding against in the milblog community, not perceived threats that aren’t truly there.

OK, so then, in the comment section, he goes on to change his argument slightly to include anything said by a commenter is by definition the fault of the blogger him or herself. The gotcha game on blogs is as old as the genre, and it is still the weakest argument construction available.

This segues nicely with a recent 9th crcuit decision that deserves quoting here.

Indeed, precisely because Kehowski’s ideas fall outside the mainstream, his words sparked intense debate: Colleagues emailed responses, and Kehowski replied; some voiced opinions in the editorial pages of the local paper; the administration issued a press release; and, in the best tradition of higher learning, students protested. The Constitution embraces such a heated exchange of views, even (perhaps especially) when they concern sensitive topics like race, where the risk of conflict and insult is high. See R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul, 505 U.S. 377, 391 (1992). Without the right to stand against society’s most strongly-held convictions, the marketplace of ideas would decline into a boutique of the banal, as the urge to censor is greatest where debate is most disquieting and orthodoxy most entrenched. See, e.g., Gitlow v. New York, 268 U.S. 652, 667 (1925); id. at 673 (Holmes, J., dissenting). The right to provoke, offend and shock lies at the core of the First Amendment.

Now, I know this isn’t a First Amendment case, since no one in Congress is trying to stop us from saying anything. Nonetheless, if the First Amendment is predicated on such things, especially when shocking or offensive, and that this type of speech actually spurs discussion, why would Milblogs be any less of an appropriate area to hash them out in?

I don’t believe I have ever advocated violence against anyone, although I suppose it is possible in some pissed off post about Matthis. But I sure as shit am not taking the responsibility for a comment someone left. The whole idea of speech is to discuss things, dipshit here wants to take a whole portion of that speech off the table, because in his holier than though world he has assumed the mantle of arbiter of good taste and civilized discussion.

Fine, run your blog the way you want, but stop impugning the names of those better than you. And make no mistake asshole, Matt is a better man than you will ever be who has done more for troops than you ever could. I’ve been with Matt as he took guys out from Walter Reed, when he took vets to see the Nationals, when he just sat there and listened or picked up the tab. So, excuse me for telling you to shut the F* up. Matt is too much of a gentleman to take serious umbrage, luckily I am not so burdened.

Category: Politics