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Death
of a Messenger
By Paul A. Ibbetson Don’t kill the messenger! You’ve heard that saying before and it has as much relevance today as in the past. Ages ago before the wondrous technologies for long distance communication were available; the means of sending messages between individuals over great distances fell to the responsibility of the humble messenger. The messenger, whether on foot or horseback would battle all assorted dangers, be it inclement weather, sickness, wolves, or rogue bandits to see his message delivered safely to its recipient. Unfortunately, surviving the successful delivery of a message was often the hardest part of the job. You see, sometimes people would become angry with a message that they did not wish to receive and the messenger was an easy outlet for this misguided anger. Recently, I was an observer of a death of sorts of a fellow carrier of the conservative message of truth. A fellow radio associate and conservative columnist Chuck Armstrong, found himself at the end of the proverbial sword from his college newspaper publisher when his weekly opinion column contained comments about the violent aspects of the religion if Islam. Armstrong penned the column after researching the topic which included personal communications from well known scholar Robert Spencer. Not only was Armstrong’s column rejected but insinuations of racism were put forward. When Armstrong questioned the validity of rejecting an opinion piece on this topic, he was fired as a contributing columnist for the college newspaper.
Now you may be thinking that Chuck Armstrong was attending a liberal
college where the conservative ideas and opinions are squelched as a
matter of college policy, maybe at Berkley or the liberal breeding
grounds of Columbia University, right? If you thought that was the case
you would be way off. Would you be surprised if I said it was at Kansas
State University? Yes that’s right, here in the heartland, the Bible
belt, the place I like to call common sense central from the growing
scourge of liberalism. Yes even here, to bring forth a message that
asks people to think hard about a religion so relevant to current
events in the nation doesn’t get you a debate, it gets you fired. I
would leave it in the capable hands of the American people to read Armstrong’s
article and make up their own minds if his message pains them
because it’s off base, or if it only hurts because it’s painfully
accurate? |