Blog spotlight: Blacknell.net

Local, Politics, Virginia 1 Minute

One of the best blogs on the net, in my opinion, is Blacknell.net. Regulars here will recognize the writer, MB. I find stuff on this blog that I never see commented on anywhere else.

If you want intelligent commentary, head over and check it out 🙂

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9 thoughts on “Blog spotlight: Blacknell.net”

  2. Another monster escapes into death — that was the latest post at Blacknell. That is no way to speak of the dead. Disappointing. I hope this is not typical of Blacknell; it is not the sort of thing I have come to expect on your blog, Vivian.

    How do we judge someone like Gen. Augusto Pinochet. Even the news article Blacknell referenced provided mixed reviews.

    While I hardly think Pinochet was a saint, he did play a role in creating one of the most stable governments in South America. If we are to judge a tree by its fruit,…..

    The judgment of those who have departed us is for God. We can love the dead. We can pray for the dead, but they are beyond the reach of our hatred. Our hate only harms the living.

  3. First an answer to your question of how we judge someone like Pinochet – in shackles before a human rights tribunal.

    No way to speak of the dead? Are you kidding me? What about the thousands that died and disappeared under him? Think Pinochet said a few respectful words every time he got a progress report from the death squads? Torture is okay, but please, don’t speak ill of the dead. How twisted. I place Pinochet up there with Idi Amin and P.W. Botha as psychopaths who escaped this world without ever suffering the consequences of their actions.

    This isn’t about hate. This is about making sure the hateful acts of the living aren’t covered up by some gauzy shroud of undeserved respect for the dead.

    Finally, I’m glad to know you’re an ends justifies the means type, Tom. It’ll help me cut through the BS.

  4. You must be joking, Citizen Tom. The only reason this monster escaped prosecution was due to his age and health. There was ample evidence of his monstrosity, which included arranging for a bomb to go off in a vehicle traveling in Thomas Circle in Washington, DC. It killed Letelier and an American woman traveling in the car with him. Do you like guys who believe in planting bombs in order to achieve political objectives? That bomb could have killed any number of innocent passersby, too.

    It’s a shame that our government fostered and promoted creeps like Pinochet, such was our fear of opposition. Allende was a duly elected leader of his country, and instead of working around him or working to change his mind, we supported his illegal removal. I wish the old buzzard had been prosecuted and sentenced appropriately for his crimes.

  5. Gen. Augusto Pinochet was Chile’s leader. The citizens of Chile, not the citizens of this faraway land, will have to deal with the investigation of any crimes. I suspect trying to prove all the things you think Pinochet guilty of would be far more difficult than you believe. Peter the Great once complained, “Not I, but ten thousand clerks rule Russia.” One of the problems with running a nation is that by being in charge, you get blamed for everything. Fortunately, or nobody would take the job, you also get credit for everything.

    The people of Chile were capable of punishing Pinochet, but they chose not to do so. Why? I can only guess, but I expect they thought the good he did outweighed the bad. Just as no tree produce perfect fruit, each of us is imperfect. We each do both good and bad things.

    If you investigate the wartime history of US Presidents, you will find that some of our most admired presidents, such as Lincoln and Roosevelt, “did” truly atrocious things. Will God punish Lincoln and Roosevelt harshly for all these sins? I do not know, but I hope not. If a Lincoln or Roosevelt have no hope of redemption, what about me?

    Was Pinochet a Lincoln or Roosevelt? I think it best to let God decide that. Nonetheless, I think it safe to say that Pinochet did both good as well as bad. Apparently, for most Chileans, the good Pinochet did outweighed the bad.

    The reference to “judging a tree by its fruit” comes from the New Testament (See below, note 1.). The Bible, the New Testament in particular, does not teach that the end justifies the means.

    The philosophers advised us (note 2) not to speak ill of the dead. Perhaps they gave this advice superstitiously, yet I think the advice itself is sound. The dead can no longer defend themselves so it is cowardly to hate them. Moreover, if someone was truly bad, they deserve our pity. If God decides to punish them as we think they deserve… For our own sakes, if nothing else, it is best to forgive the dead and pray for them.

    Note 1:
    Matthew 7:20
    Yes, just as you can identify a tree by its fruit, so you can identify people by their actions.

    Matthew 12:33
    “A tree is identified by its fruit. If a tree is good, its fruit will be good. If a tree is bad, its fruit will be bad.

    Luke 6:43
    “A good tree can’t produce bad fruit, and a bad tree can’t produce good fruit.

    Note 2:
    “Do not speak ill of the dead.” — The Seven Sages (650 BC – 550 BC), (Bias, Chilon, Cleobulus, Periander, Pittacus,Solon, Thales) c. 650 – c. 550 BC, From Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers, bk. I, sec. 70

  6. MB…

    I wonder…do you have the same hesitancy jwith everyone of all political stripes as you do in “holding off” judgement for a violent criminal like Pinohet?

    I agree with you Vivian Blacknell is worthy reading…

  7. I don’t even know how to respond to such ridiculousness, Tom, so I’ll just leave it here. I hope your children learned about Stalin and Hitler from someone besides you. They were two more who failed to be judged by their people, so, by your standard, ought not to be judged by us.

  8. MB

    The regimes Stalin and Hitler led were certainly hideous. Nonetheless, I am only a man; I will leave the judgment Stalin and Hitler to God. What I condemn and want no part of is what they taught, the beliefs they espoused.

    From thousands of miles away, with nothing more reliable than press reports, we have no business casting our judgment and condemning someone, particularly a dead man, as a monster. Because we begin with a presumption of innocence, we have in this nation the right to a jury of our peers. Instead of conducting our trials in the news media, we try to determine “guilt” or “innocence” in a more orderly fashion. In truth, however, we cannot judge people. All we can do is assess whether a person’s actions make them a threat to others. Even then, sometimes we err.

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