Gotcha! Knee-Jerk Tyranny :: By Daniel Payne

Are people getting tired of all this “Gotcha!” political nonsense? Many people call themselves adults, but instead, they act like toddlers. Only difference is, they’re actually determined to eliminate each other.

When one group simply states a fact or “tells it like it is,” another group shoots back with a “Gotcha!”

“The current administration has botched the withdrawal of coalition military forces from Afghanistan, leading to terrible loss of life.”

“Oh yeah? Well, what about what happened in Niger during the previous administration?”

“The terrorist attacks that killed so many American troops in Afghanistan are very tragic and terrible.”

“Oh yeah? Well, January 6th was worse!”

And on and on it goes…

No one on this planet is perfect. Still, it’s hard to understand people who make it their mission to find fault with every single effort that’s simply trying to defend against greater threats.

When the fault hunters do find a genuine (or perceived) fault, they gloat over their victorious findings, as if solely based upon the faults they’ve found, all greater evils in the world will cease to exist. It’s as if they don’t understand that unintended mistakes are made by imperfect beings along the way of making new discoveries and trying to protect and promote prosperity and freedom.

Of course, willful negligence exists, and when willful negligence is obvious, it needs to be strongly dealt with. However, to criticize obviously honorable intentions as if they’re dishonorable seems like an agenda to find any type of fault within the efforts of honorable groups or entities.

Obviously, there is now a very concerted and concentrated effort to criticize and find fault within all entities that provide protection to the free world, from the military down to local police departments, and everywhere in between. Who among them is grateful for their peace and security? Who among the constant fault hunters is actually thankful?

Does “Gotcha!” actually solve problems?

“Telling it like it is” is a far more productive alternative to “Gotcha!” However, the proper response to “telling it like it is” may involve humility or contrition, which in turn might lead to actual solutions. The likelihood of a contrite response in this day and age is about as likely as everyone on our planet actually working together in a truly God-honoring way (irony intended).

When are people going to stop acting like children playing a never-ending game of “Gotcha!” and instead start working toward genuine solutions?

It seems way past bingo that any news or other media outlets are interested in leading an effort to actually solve our problems. It’s as if spiritual wickedness is pulling the puppet’s strings. (Again, irony intended.)

Personally, I don’t trust or respect anyone whose knee-jerk reaction to every problem more aligns with tyranny than freedom. Any reasonable person wouldn’t rush toward tyrannical solutions without any thought to freedom.

It’s like they’re actually gleefully trying to pick apart people (like Harvard professor Martin Kulldorff, etc.) who are just trying to side with freedom… a sick and twisted, perverse trampling of freedom under their feet.

Why not seek to defend the same people you claim concern for against brutality and tyranny? Why cut and run and leave them in the lurch?

The high-and-mighty progressives, who deem themselves mentally and morally superior, immediately condemn those whose only crime is to lean away from dangerous “solutions” that may launch us straight into tyranny.

They’re not gonna beguile me into believing that their only concern is for the public good. If they’re so concerned for the common good of their neighbors, where’s their concern for their neighbors’ freedom? Oh yeah, that’s right; most of their neighbors are just tinfoil-hat-wearing phobics too unintelligent to understand what the adults are doing for the common good.

Maybe it’s the same concern they’re currently showing toward the civilian population in Afghanistan.

In reality, people who only offer solutions that remove freedom are akin to raging lunatics.

“Why do the nations rage, And the people plot a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, And the rulers take counsel together, Against the LORD and against His Anointed, saying, ‘Let us break Their bonds in pieces And cast away Their cords from us.’ He who sits in the heavens shall laugh; The Lord shall hold them in derision. Then He shall speak to them in His wrath, And distress them in His deep displeasure: ‘Yet I have set My King On My holy hill of Zion. I will declare the decree: The LORD has said to Me, ‘You are My Son, Today I have begotten You. Ask of Me, and I will give You The nations for Your inheritance, And the ends of the earth for Your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron; You shall dash them to pieces like a potter’s vessel” (Psalms 2:1-9).