THE WAY I SEE IT by Don Polson Red Bluff Daily News 9/16/2025
Need for angry retributive justice
I write with a very heavy heart on Thursday, September 11. You’ll read this on Tuesday, the 16th after college football fun, snacks and beverages. However, what last Wednesday and Thursday represented will long be remembered for terrorist violence on a small and massive scale.
The immediate cause for sadness and, yes, anger was the assassination of beloved conservative Charlie Kirk, founder of the influential organization, Turning Point USA, and tireless Christian advocate for right-leaning discourse and debate on a multitude of college campuses. His motto, from his “tabling” spots on campuses, to streams of students willing to try, was simply “Prove Me Wrong.”
He leaves behind a devoted wife and two small children who are incapable of understanding why their father won’t ever come home, hold them, and inspire and lead them in how they should grow.
This was personal in that we financially supported his cause, and watched every streamed appearance and show. We watched the moment of his murder before broadcasts cut it off at the bullet’s impact. Barbara was reduced to tearful sobbing over the murder of someone of such Christian compassion and loving persuasion.
I share the conclusion that it was a sdiabolical act of political violence which is now proven to be inspired by rhetoric demonizing conservatives; polling shows support for such personal violence by those on the left. I wish it were not so.
My blog, donpolson.blogspot.com, has posted commentary. I’ll share one by blogger Konstantin Kisin:
“I hope I'm wrong. But tonight feels like some sort of invisible line has been crossed that we didn't even know was there. The last time I felt like this was 9/11 when the world was about to change forever...
“But to murder a young father simply for doing debates and mobilizing young people to vote for a party that represents half of America? This is something else.
“I fear his murder will be a tragedy for all of us in ways we will only understand as time unfolds.
***
I lived, as a teenager, through the turmoil, terrorist violence and assassinations of President Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy, and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. The hatred behind those killings was clear, from Lee Harvey Oswald, to Sirhan Sirhan and James Earl Ray. I remember the anathema towards MLK by racists in the South and North, for his tireless advocacy and activism for African-Americans, who I grew up with, to simply be afforded the same rights that white Americans took for granted.
I will compare, without drawing equivalency, Charlie Kirk to MLK in that both were motivated by the purest of Christian values and beliefs, Charlie on behalf of faith, family, morality and the Constitution. Witness the international outpouring of praise and tribute, by young people inspired by Kirk’s efforts to reverse 20 years of schooling in leftist, dehumanizing, socialist amorality.
Witness also the ghoulish glee over Kirk’s assassination among the demonic radicals on campuses and among progressives. We can, and should, pray for their deliverance from evil.
***
The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 also strike my heart deeply. I was preparing for a day at the office, with a TV in the background on a morning show. One of the Twin Towers was on fire with some reference to an aircraft collision, likely a horrible navigational, mechanical error.
However, it was like nothing I’d ever seen live, so I woke Barbara up. We watched as the second plane hit the second tower, dumbstruck and shocked that this was exactly what it appeared to be: a terrorist attack on a scale never before seen in America, rivaling the attack on Pearl Harbor that marked America’s entry into World War II.
A nation’s righteous, retributive anger was best expressed by country singer Toby Kieth in “Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue.”
“Now this nation that I love has fallen under attack; A mighty sucker punch came flyin' in from somewhere in the back.
“Soon as we could see clearly, Through our big black eye, Man, we lit up your world, Like the fourth of July.
“Hey, Uncle Sam put your name at the top of his list; And the Statue of Liberty started shakin' her fist
“And the eagle will fly man, it's gonna be hell; When you hear mother freedom start ringin' her bell
“And it feels like the whole wide world is raining down on you;
“Brought to you courtesy of the red white and blue.”
***
The shooting by a young student at Evergreen High School, Denver, Colorado, resonated for my brother who used to hike to a bluff overlooking that school. Sadly, many of us have some connection to scenes of shootings and murder. My real estate driving around Rancho Tehama and its school in the 2000s connects to its mass shooting incident in 2017. God help us all.
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