Word: mccaffreyã
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 2006-2006
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Ryan McCaffrey??s December 13 op-ed, “The Wronging of a Dictator,” embodied an unforgivable flaw of the brutal dictator he eulogized, Augusto Pinochet: arrogance that attempts to excuse inhuman brutality in the name of ideological purity...
...McCaffrey??s apology demonstrates his ignorance of this basic concept of the value of life. In defending Pinochet, he claims that the tyrant stood for “the principles on which Western nations were founded,” principles based in the free market. This misapprehension is unsurprising, coming from a young conservative, but no less troubling. There are three key foundational principles we respect in this Western nation, so much so that we know them as the “unalienable Rights” of “Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness...
There is no small irony in McCaffrey??s comparison of President Salvador Allende to Fidel Castro, because it is Pinochet who will be remembered alongside the Cuban dictator. Throughout his apologetic treatise, McCaffrey argues that Augusto Pinochet should be absolved of his crimes because he committed them in the pursuit of his uniquely pure ideology. But like Castro, who stated explicitly his desire to be absolved by history, Pinochet will find no absolution. He will be remembered only as a tyrant, a murderer, a traitor to his country, and a betrayer of his countrymen...