Paul Hackett burst on the scene in 2004 as a telegenic Iraq veteran and trial lawyer who was willing to take the Howard-Dean-Democrat-Party line against the war to run against Jean Schmidt in Ohio's 2nd Congressional District.
Now we know what he really is: a libertarian vigilante.
It seems that awhile back, at about 4:30 a.m. some gentlemen drove their vehicle into the fence around the Hackett property in the tony Indian Hill neighborhood. Hacket grabbed his AR-15 rifle, jumped in his pickup, chased the men down, ordered them out of their car and prone on the ground, and waited for the police to pick them up.
NRA types will laud Hackett's action. Democrats anxious to pretend that their party is in sympathy with NRA types will laud him as well.
SWNID won't. Hackett bugs us. We assert that Hackett's action reveal what he thinks himself to be: a Nietzschean Superman, one to whom normal laws don't apply. Why should he call the police? He's a rich, Indian Hill lawyer and a marine!
Investing egotists like Hackett with political power is not the way to preserve the integrity of our Republic. We say this confidently--and more confidently than we say many things. We know something about egotism, after all.
SWNID also is happy to live safely and quietly within the city limits of Cincinnati, and not the Wild West of the insensitively named Indian Hill where nuts like Hackett drive around in pickups carrying semiautomatics.
11 comments:
Every month in its monthly magazines the NRA lauds non-kooky people who stop intruders in their houses. I seriously doubt this incident will be printed, or lauded.
Dear Anonymous,
Every caricature is outlandish, that's why they are funny. For instance, a caricature of anonymous blog commentators might include some sniveling middle aged house wife who lacks the self confidence to attach her name to her opinions. This is outlandish, yet funny. SWNID's caricature of Hackett, Libertarians and the NRA is particularly outlandish. Luckily for his readership, it is also particularly funny.
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Anonymous, the NRA magazine may not cover Hackett with glory, but you should check out the comments left by Enquirer readers on their web site. When I was there, about 3/4 said that the world would be a better place if more people did what Hackett did.
The NRA will ignore this story because drawing attention to it will hurt them with both their political friends, who don't want to be aligned with dangerous kooks, and their political enemies, who don't want to be aligned with hypocrites.
Jim,
I agree. But I wonder if the most vocal can also be the most paranoid about protecting consitutional rights.
I will revise my previous thought and say that the NRA may ultimately defend Hackett's ability to do what he did, if he in fact broke no law, because the NRA will never relinquish ground on the 2nd amendment and what is constitutionally legal (even if it is exceptionally abusive and stupid). I don't blame the NRA for protecting the right to own and bear arms even if it means they protect kooky (yet legal) behavior. To say it another way, I see a difference between the NRA's protecting his constitutional right and endorsing his specific behavior. First amendment rights are equally burdened.
The only kook here is SWNID himself. Hackett has no political ambitions. He may be egotistical, but so is SWNID and most others.
The most farcical statement is that Hackett thinks he is above the law. On the contrary, citizen's arrests are enshrined in the laws of most states.
SWNID should read a little history of the West and not get his info from John Wayne.
And the idea that you can rely on the police to protect you is not only dumb, but wrong. The courts have ruled over and over that police have no obligation / duty to protect anybody. 99% of the time they show up after the incident has completed itself (notice I didn't use the word "resolved"). So join SWNID and choose unilateral disarmament and noble victimhood and be smug while you're at it. We'll be sure to superglue the smirk into your face as you lie in your coffin (for the visitation).
I on the other hand choose responsibility. That is responsibility to my society, to my family, to the perpretrator, and to myself. Nothing, absolutely nothing, reduces crime more in a neighborhood than consistent, armed resistance.
SWNID better hope that I'm around the next time he is a potential victim. I won't hesitate to put somebody down if the situation calls for it. I'm sure the gratitude will be overflowing from Mrs. SWNID if not from SWNID.
I'm shocked to find out that SWNID is getting his info from John Wayne. Isn't it against Biblical teachings to contact the dead?
Anon:
Sarcasm (n.):
1 : a sharp and often satirical or ironic utterance designed to cut or give pain
2 a : a mode of satirical wit depending for its effect on bitter, caustic, and often ironic language that is usually directed against an individual b : the use or language of sarcasm
Or something to that effect.
Anon:
1. If Hackett has no political ambition, then he's been walking backwards on the Damascus Road. It was just months ago that he was complaining about being frozen out of a statewide campaign by Democrat fatcats.
2. If you think that a citizen's armed pursuit of someone who has committed a class-three misdemeanor against your real estate is protecting your family and the equivalent of using deadly force to meet a threat to life and limb, we recommend that you re-enroll in those classes that are required for your concealed-carry permit.
3. What justifies SWNID's satiric "kook" characterization is the way that gun advocates will endorse any action taken by a "citizen" with a gun versus a "criminal," no matter how asymmetrical the armed response is relative to the danger posed by the crime.
We need the Hacketts of this world, both Buddy and this guy, but for different reasons. Buddy to keep sane those of us who are somewhat normal and this twerp to scare the crap out of real criminals who read what he did. He gives them the assurance that they have no assurance that when the enter a property they won't be met by a NRA type carrying a phaser set on kill. I hope the ones who can't read go to his house and receive a Darwin award this year. Those boys he chased down probably have a different view on the frailty of life than they had before. Let us also hope the police allowed them one phone call to mommy for clean boxers.
OK, brave anonymous posters, we break a SWNIDish rule to ask a pertinent question: Do you think that a citizen is justified to threaten deadly force against someone who drove his car into the citizen's fence? And since no threat is credible unless sometimes exercised, do you think a citizen is justified in shooting someone who has driven into that citizen's fence?
We're all for the second amendment and agree that the threat of force is a deterrent to crime. But we think it's trivializing what is in a literal sense deadly serious to talk about drawing guns to apprehend suspects in minor property crimes.
We hope that some of you are being sarcastic, because if you're not, you're the very stereotypes that your political opponents like to exploit.
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