The guy is basically challenging NRA nut jobs to a show down?

Someone could wind up dead here. I hope the police are looking into this!

the FBI, out National Security team and everyone else is looking into the NRA and THEIR NUT JOBS THAT they have spawned.

The NRA needs to be stopped.

Your quote...

I honestly don't understand your point.

I share your concerns about the NRA and their nut jobs and I support what Bateman is trying to achieve. However, challenging these nut jobs to come meet him face to face when he gets home and to bring their guns with them sounds like a really bad idea. He is inviting a violent confrontation that may lead to further deaths.

... A REAL soldier states that he is disturbed by the hate-mail he has received since expressing dismay at the militarization of our police force and the lobbying success of the NRA..... REALLY !!!!


BTW - he is not a 'grunt' - look him up.

There is a ton of copy about Lt. Col. Robert Bateman out there.

I don't blame him for being disturbed by the hate-mail he has received. However, attempting to provoke an armed show down with NRA gun nuts is not the way to handle this problem.

For Esquire to drag that fact out into the daylight is admirable.

[hr][font color="blue"][center]You should never stop having childhood dreams.[/center][/font][hr]

a very strong way.

A non-violent display of strength would seem more appropriate, especially from those concerned about gun violence and mass shootings.

way back in 2008 - and no one stopped them.

Enough already!!

+1,000

Yes, I too thank Col Robert Bateman!

~ for the dead.

something good being done.

Bateman's approach is running a very high risk of creating more dead...including him.

The 20 children at Newtown weren't enough....it took police officers being killed for him to get fed up?

I can get you more if you can't google it yourself.

but it sounds like he was more upset by the death of the police officers because they were police officers than the 20 little children killed in Newtown. I have to ask why.

Sounds a bit over-the-top macho with this:

in THEIR language.... When cooking he would be that knife you always pick first from the block (if it's not dirty in the sink) because it does the best job at cutting what needs to be cut.

He is....

I've heard of Suicide by Cop. This sounds like Suicide by NRA Gun Nuts.

It is my hope that authorities will intervene before someone winds up dead.

He is a military historian, a West Point grad, & if I remember correctly, an educator.

Understanding the culture of the countries with whom we are dealing may be one of his specialties. Most of the nut jobs out there don't understand the context of where our military is, (& frankly don't seem to care).

He has spoken up against the insanity with the guns in this country in his column.

coming home to take on the other gun nuts is exactly what I am looking for but, I admire his passion and certainly understand his anger.

I have more if you need it.

Apparently he hasn't realized he's made a career off feeding the very machine which has helped lead to the militarization of the firearm rights movement.

Also, he sounds like quite the macho asshole himself.

We don't need career military men to solve this solution. In fact, what we need is for the very idea of a career military man to die out.

Bateman was sent to war by our country. He did not go out and buy a gun and run and defend the poacher Bundy. Nor has he gone on crazed shooting sprees killing innocents for fun. He is in the military and is doing his job.

And, being a career military man, his complicity is deep.

He is a soldier that was sent to do a job.

A cog in the machine.

But if he is such an easily duped individual, and he would have to be pretty stupid for me to believe he is actually ignorant of the violence his employers perpetuate, why should we care what he has to say on the subject?

I don't buy into the false belief that those in the military are simply following orders. Each soldier is responsible for evaluating the ethics of their actions within the context of the system they support.

Bateman is knowingly or unknowingly complicit in the military industrial complex and he is on a very important level complicit in furthering the militarization of society in general. Either way, it's not a shining endorsement of his intellectual or ethical character.

We don't need macho military men to fight our fight. He is, ultimately, incidental to the movement and, in many ways, even its enemy.

Have you served? You seem to be very aware of the facts. That everyone, every soldier is complicit in furthering the militarization.

And I refuse to defer to Bateman's "authority" because he has made a career out of death and destruction.

Every soldier, every last one, in some meaningful fashion, is complicit in the furtherance of the military industrial complex. How deep that complicity runs depends on the level of participation by the soldier. A career soldier is deeply, deeply involved.

As I've said, when Bateman acknowledges his own responsibility and renounces the violent lifestyle he currently enjoys, I will begin to consider him a possible ally. Until then, he is just a tool.

But his comments sure don't feature it.

Sounds more like one of the guys I don't want coming home and being a police officer.

About 7500 miles.

I'm sure I'll find a lot of good uses for it.