David McElroy

I’ve come to the conclusion that most people are confused about what “free speech” means. It seems as though rude people want to use it as a way to avoid the consequences of their rudeness. I think it’s time we realized what free speech really means — and I also think it’s time for more of us to stand up for public civility.

In a discussion on my Facebook page Tuesday night, a woman decided to act out her childhood anger with people where she grew up by calling everybody in the state “inbreds.” I told her that she was being rude and insulting, in addition to inaccurate. After a few minutes of a thread involving six or eight people — all letting her know she was in the wrong — she finally played her trump card.

“What happened to free speech?” she whined.

Nothing happened to free speech, but as my friend Ike Pigott responded, “Speech is free, the consequences aren’t.”

We’ve become a rude and mean society, with many people believing that it’s acceptable to verbally trash others at will — and also believing that they’re being infringed upon if anyone calls them on the behavior. Sometimes the rudeness is political. Sometimes it’s cultural or based in some form of “tribalism.” And other times, it’s just based on saying what feels good at the moment, for various emotional reasons.

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Cleaning out the notebook once again…

I talked to a local elected official Monday night who told me that interest in the primary election today in Alabama is so low that they’re expecting only about 15 percent turnout among Democrats and 45 percent turnout among Republicans. I don’t sense any enthusiasm from voters about any race around here, from presidential on down to family court judge or constable or whatever. I mostly sense apathy.

Up until Monday, I hadn’t even seen a single sign for a presidential candidate around here other than the one Ron Paul sign at the other end of the street where I live. And you know how well Paul is going to do in a state with such a strong social conservative streak. (A poll released on primary day shows this for Alabama: Romney 28 percent, Gingrich 27 percent, Santorum 22 percent and Paul just 4 percent.)

I’ll be a guest Tuesday on a live radio show called “Independent Thinking with Steve Gelder.” Click the link and then click on “Listen live” to join us at noon central time — 10 a.m. on the west coast and 1 p.m. on the east coast. (If you’re in the rest of the world, you’re on your own with the time conversion.)

Steve is a bright and funny guy who’s a Los Angeles-based comedian, actor and filmmaker. We come from completely different places politically, but he’s smart, fair and genuinely interested in other points of view, so it ought to be a lot of fun. I’ve been fighting a cold for nearly a week, so the biggest fun for the audience might be counting the number of times I cough or snort before I can mute myself. If you miss the live show, you can hear it later when the episode is archived.

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As I watch the events unfolding in Afghanistan today, my thoughts keep going back almost 40 years to the fall of South Vietnam. If there had ever been a reason for U.S. forces to be in Vietnam, those reasons had been lost for years before the south fell. If there was any good reason for U.S. forces to be in Afghanistan, those reasons have similarly been lost. Will the fall of Kabul in a civil war be similar to the fall of Saigon?

For more than a decade, U.S. ground forces were heavily involved in fighting in Vietnam. Close to 60,000 Americans died, but the North Vietnamese forces wouldn’t be defeated. The South Vietnamese troops allied with the United States weren’t as effective as the communist troops from North Vietnam. After becoming stuck in a long and bloody quagmire, the American public grew weary of the war.

In 1973, the various sides — North Vietnam, South Vietnam, the Viet Cong and the United States — finally agreed to a peace treaty. U.S. troops left the country, but the other combatants went back to fighting. In late April of 1975, the South Vietnamese capital of Saigon fell — with frantic South Vietnamese desperately trying to get onto U.S. helicopters evacuating the remaining Americans. (The photo above shows Vietnamese going over the wall of the U.S. embassy trying to board U.S. helicopters.)

It was a humiliating moment for the United States. After spending years — and wasting tens of thousands of American lives and untold tax dollars — trying to fight the war, it became clear that the only answer was to cut and run.

It’s time to do the same in Afghanistan. Before another person can be killed who doesn’t have to die, it’s time to get out of that place and let the Afghans fight over their own country.

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