Unfortunately, I was faced with a choice between getting a new issue up in a timely manner and doing a job I would be happy with on the commentary. Consequently, I am leaving that commentary to the next issue of "One Man Watching". 

In the meantime, however, I would encourage you to read the entire text of Patrick Henry's speech. The speech can be found in a variety of place on the Internet. I found it at the site of The Avalon Project at the Yale Law School: Documents in Law, History, and Diplomacy. There is a wealth of historic documents and speeches recorded there, including the Patrick Henry speech.

Regardless of whether or not you agree with him or support present military action, it is one of the parts of our national history that, on my opinion, you must be familiar with to understand who and what we are as a nation.

Brad Pardee
Editor

That being said, I was appalled at some of what I read recently after Rush announced that he was suffering from an ear ailment and was facing the probability of being totally deaf within a month.

I was reading a Yahoo message board where people could post their responses to the story. The first person that posted a message said we should pray for Rush and for the return of his hearing. Not an unreasonable response, if you would ask most people.

However, the later responses can only be described as hateful in the extreme. One person asked why we should pray because Rush losing his hearing was already an answer to his prayers. Another said that it was a shame Rush didn't have a massive stroke to shut down all his faculties. One person even went so far as to say that maybe now he would crawl off and die. 

Even though the story had nothing to do with the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, some people pulled that in, too, saying that Rush is the American Taliban and calling him Osama Bin Limbaugh.

For the sake this discussion, I don't think it matters whether Rush is really as rude, obnoxious, or woefully misinformed as some believe him to be. If those things are true, there are other times and places for making the case. However, I have never once heard him wish for someone to be seriously ill or dead. I've never heard him suggest that anyone was a murdering terrorist. Although he has mocked and ridiculed people based on things they have done, I have never heard him say that he hated them.

It seems extraordinarily hypocritical for those who decry Rush for what they claim is "hatefulness" to then turn around and display some of the most blatantly hateful rhetoric I've seen in recent years. But I suppose that when we get so used to attacking people instead of ideas, it shouldn't be a surprise that the attacks keep coming even in situations such as these, where those ideas aren't even the issues at hand.

A good friend of mine, Dan'l Dannehy-Oakes pointed out to me that I was missing a point, and I think it's a good point. Referring to C. S. Lewis' classic, The Screwtape Letters, Dan'l wrote: "What happened to make the Rev. Falwell speak the way he did was what Screwtape called 'Christianity and,' which is what happens when one let's one's agendas take precedence over the faith -- in this case, Mr. Falwell's conservative agenda took precedence over charity. ... Rev. Falwell placed his agenda, if only for a moment, above the human persons (the images of God) who were destroyed in these catastrophes, above the suffering of thousands, above the grief of millions. ... That he apologized is to his credit. But that he was able to slip this way is a warning to him -- and to us all."

I believe Dan'l is right. I think we saw that during the Clinton administration when the President's relationship with Monica Lewinsky came to light. How many within the Christian community called for us to pray for the healing of his marriage, as opposed to those (me included) that pointed to his dalliance and used it solely as an excuse to criticize him?

It was this same error that Rev. Falwell made. As Christians, it is certainly our responsibility to speak out in defense of what we believe is true, and as citizens in the democracy, it is equally our responsibility to speak out on the social and political issues of our day. When groups such as the ACLU and People For The American Way advocate positions that we believe are wrong, it is appropriate to oppose those positions and their support for them.

However, there is a time and a place for that debate. A time of tragedy and horror in a nation that is grieving together our collective loss is neither the time nor the place. The preeminence of his agenda blinded Rev. Falwell to this fact for a time, and we all ought to watch ourselves to be certain that we don't let our agendas do the same.