When I went with a buddy to go see Inherent Vice recently, there was a trailer for the new Clint Eastwood film American Sniper. I'd seen it before, and seen the countless commercials in which Bradley Cooper has a terrible, godawful Southern/Texas accent. I can honestly say that my level of interest in seeing the film has remained at the "wait for it on cable one night when there's nothing else on" level (like with most of Eastwood's directorial projects; I acknowledge that he's a master of the form without necessarily liking his stuff enough to seek it out. I mean, Gran Torino was good but not great). So I guess that makes me a Commie pinko homosexual liberal elite who wants to destroy this country and take a shit on the bald eagle while wiping my private parts with the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.
Because, of course, people had to make this political. First on the left, with Seth Rogen saying the film reminded him of the film-within-a-film Nation's Pride (from Tarantino's masterpiece Inglourious Basterds) and then Michael Moore weighing in that snipers were "cowards." This caused the predictable Fox News attacks and Breitbart exposes that basically revealed what you already knew: Moore is fat and Rogen is un-American (literally: he's Canadian). Shit storm of shit storms, do your worst! Now it's almost considered a patriotic duty not just to see the film (again, with Bradley Cooper's atrocious accent) but to also dump on those who don't like it as much as you do.
Fact is, I acknowledge there's plenty of bullshit on both sides of the debate, but I'm more inclined to highlight it when it's on the far, far, far right of the spectrum. I'm a liberal, after all, or what passes for one in South Carolina (i.e., I don't mind that Obama's in charge of the country). I've read Marx (Richard Marx, Hold On to the Night: My Life In and Out of Lite-Rock Radio...I kid, but how awesome would that be?), I have never voted for a Republican since I was old enough to vote for the important stuff like "president" or "dog catcher," and I can't be blamed for the fact that Lindsey Graham is somehow still in office when everyone knows that he's...well...just so masculine (sorry, I don't want to upset that drama queen). So yeah, I'm not in the target audience for American Sniper, at least not in terms of unquestioningly accepting that Chris Kyle (the real-life guy, whose accent, I assume, is far more accurate than Cooper's) was an American hero with no shades of grey to upset the dominant narrative of his sacrifice for us.
But that's just it: I can't dismiss out of hand that Kyle, whatever his faults, was an important figure in the Iraq War, just not in the way that Sean Hannity would have you think. Kyle served in Afghanistan and Iraq, racked up over 150 kills as a sniper in both theaters, and came home only to be gunned down by a fellow veteran on a shooting range in 2013/2014 (can't remember which). His is a story of tragedy, of a life cut short due to an act of kindness on his part. That part I don't dispute. What I have a problem with is the notion that Kyle, or anyone else in the military who served in Iraq, was "protecting our freedoms."
Someone on my Facebook page said "freedom isn't free," and he's right. But it doesn't always have to be purchased at the end of a gun barrel. In fact, the more often it's gained through other more peaceful means, the better it is for everyone involved. But you'd expect me to say that, right? Godless America-hating liberal that I am, I am the son of a military veteran, a man who saw action in Vietnam. He came back home, hooked up with my mom, and never came around when I was growing up. I am the son of someone like Chris Kyle, someone who fought in a war and who never could come back to who he was before. I love this country, and I would gladly die to protect its freedoms. But nothing about Iraq was about defending our freedoms, or those of the Iraqi people. We went in under false pretenses, with no exit strategy, and a pie-in-the-sky understanding of just what the conflict would involve. Countless soldiers went over and died, and none of them got a fucking movie made about their life (by Clint Eastwood, nonetheless). None of them have been wrapped up in the flag, apple pie, and America by the shit-headed gutless cowards on Fox News, the pompous arrogant SOBs who helped Bush promote that war and looked the other way when the facts didn't line up with what they wanted. Freedom isn't free, yes, but it also isn't subject to abuse by those very people we put in charge of making sure we get to keep it.
But far be it from me to try and suggest that we shouldn't try and have a debate about the Iraq War, or the legacy of George W. Bush. Because then someone with a Twitter handle and a position of "celebrity" might attack me and call me names. Blake Shelton did that, to the Rogen/Moore crowd (and for the record: I find Rogen okay if not compelling as an actor, and Moore may be an overinflated gasbag of liberal/paranoid invective, but Fahrenheit 9/11 is one of the most important documents ever filmed). I guess hearing about that (and his using the old chestnut of "defending our freedoms") is what triggered this on my part. I couldn't give two fucks about Blake Shelton, or any of the other folks attacking Rogen and Moore (again, I'm a pinko liberal Commie-Nazi), but resorting to attacks when the facts aren't in your corner, when the idea of being subtle gets outweighed by the need to have the loudest megaphone in a sea of sound-bites, really pisses me off.
All of this is not to say that American Sniper is a bad film, or a good film; I haven't seen it, I don't plan on seeing it anytime soon, and I reserve the right to be wrong about everything I've said about it (except Cooper's accent; seriously, dude isn't even trying). But Chris Kyle didn't die to protect my freedoms anymore than he died to protect yours, or Sean Hannity's or Michael Moore's. He died because a crazy person shot him. Out soldiers died in Iraq because a president who was too busy worrying about his legacy to care about the consequences launched a war on a former enemy who had no ties whatsoever to 9/11 simply because the climate was ripe for such lying and chicanery. Freedom isn't free, but that doesn't mean it can't be destroyed with the very guns that a lot of people claim help uphold that very principle. And also, people should really see Inherent Vice, it's fucking amazing.
Now if you'll excuse me, the soapbox I'm on is getting awfully crowded.
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