Althouse: "John [Lindh] was a scapegoat, wrongly accused of terrorism at a moment when our grieving country needed someone to blame because the real terrorist had gotten away."

May 22, 2011

"John [Lindh] was a scapegoat, wrongly accused of terrorism at a moment when our grieving country needed someone to blame because the real terrorist had gotten away."

"Now that Bin Laden is dead, I hope President Obama, and the American people, can find it in their hearts to release John, and let him come home. Ten years is enough."

A NYT op-ed by Frank R. Lindh, a lawyer.

67 comments:

Paddy O said...: "the real terrorist"

Ah, just like Hitler really was the real enemy, so all those nazis who were "just following orders" were freed after WW2.; 5/22/11, 9:17 AM
KCFleming said...: "But John’s case was never about evidence. It was based purely on emotion...

John acknowledged only that he had aided the Taliban and carried weapons. For this, he accepted a term of 20 years’ imprisonment.

He remains idealistic and spiritual, and a practicing Muslim."

Bin Laden is dead, but militant Islam persists, and Lindh still practices it.

He admitted his crime and accepted the jail term. Ten years is but half, and far too short. He's lucky to be alive.; 5/22/11, 9:18 AM
Insufficiently Sensitive said...: Ten years is just about the down payment. Even Marin County residents have to consider that they're part of the USA, and that taking up arms against it is a deluded form of fratricide.; 5/22/11, 9:26 AM
Charlie said...: Marin County claptrap.; 5/22/11, 9:26 AM
Richard said...: Thanks for ruining my day! That poor innocent boy was made a scapegoat by the evil George Bush. He just wanted to defend those humanitarians, the Taliban, so they could continue to do theIr good deeds. You would think that the father would have the decency to at least admit that his son did something wrong. Instead he blames Spahn's father for being vindictive. May he and his son rot in Hell!; 5/22/11, 9:26 AM
Instugator said...: Dude, your son is an admitted terrorist and has survived to tell the tale. Be thankful you visit him now and will get him back in 10 years.

Scapegoat, hardly.; 5/22/11, 9:27 AM
Right is right! said...: Until this little shit renounces Islam, a reduction in his sentence should not even be considered.; 5/22/11, 9:27 AM
Shouting Thomas said...: From the oped:

In post-9/11 America, John became a symbol of “the other.” He was called the American Taliban. A traitor. Detainee No. 1 in the war on terrorism.

Gee, Lindh is "the other.!"

He's just like blacks in the Jim Crow South.

Give the guy whatever he wants!; 5/22/11, 9:29 AM
Shanna said...: John acknowledged only that he had aided the Taliban and carried weapons.

He wasn't a terrorist, he just carried weapons and helped terrorists. Why can't you crazy people understand the distinction?; 5/22/11, 9:31 AM
Phil 314 said...: As a lawyer and a father should do, he has advocated for his son.

I'm wondering what connections Dad has to get this into the NYT; 5/22/11, 9:33 AM
virgil xenophon said...: "You pays you're money and you takes your chances.."; 5/22/11, 9:34 AM
Henry said...: I'd let him go after he rebuilds the Buddhas of Bamiyan.; 5/22/11, 9:34 AM
virgil xenophon said...: * "your"---preview is my friend, but I do not visit her far often enough..; 5/22/11, 9:36 AM
SGT Ted said...: Leftism is a mental disorder, marked by its rejection of reality in favor of comforting lies and self serving delusions. This mans editorial blaming the consequences of his adult sons choice to become a violent radical Islamic warrior on George Bush is case in point.

Young Lindh is a traitor, not a scapegoat. He should have been executed as a traitor.; 5/22/11, 9:37 AM
Right is right! said...: If Obama had any balls and was a true patriot he would fry this useless maggot on the 10th anniversary of 9/11 this coming Fall.; 5/22/11, 9:38 AM
Henry said...: p.s. Pogo -- glad to read the good news about your wife. Hope she has a speedy recovery.; 5/22/11, 9:38 AM
TMink said...: The dad lobbyed for his son, but he did not tell the truth. He blamed and covered for his son, which is similar in intent, but based on lies.

All 20 would suit me just fine.

Trey; 5/22/11, 9:41 AM
TMink said...: Sgt Ted nails it for me.

Trey; 5/22/11, 9:41 AM
windbag said...: Bullshit. Come home to a firing squad, traitor.; 5/22/11, 9:42 AM
Fred4Pres said...: Johnny Walker Lindh was no scapegoat. He was a committed traitorous jihadi. I am sorry he decided to leave Marin County to take up arms with the Taliban, but he did. He was captured with forces hostile to the United States.

He and his lawyer then took a 20 year sentance. They agreed to it and he plead to it.

So pound sand. And don't count on Obama Wan Canhopi to bail you out. He will throw your client under his reelection bus.; 5/22/11, 9:42 AM
Fred4Pres said...: Lindh's dad should blame himself. If he bothered to be a father instead of running off and finding himself, his son might not have gone down this road.

I don't care he is gay, but a real man takes care of his family first. It is too late to fix what you screwed up.; 5/22/11, 9:47 AM
Right is right! said...: They should also put a blindfold on his dad for creating this anti-American worm and still providing aid and comfort even today. This father and son duo should be shot as traitors.; 5/22/11, 9:49 AM
Right is right! said...: The dad is a fag? That explains a lot.; 5/22/11, 9:51 AM
Donald Zeiter said...: Read Doug Stanton's book about the beginning of the Afghan war and you will see that Lind did not just carry weapons for the Taliban. He was a total p.o.s. when he was captured and during the fighting when the prisoners tried to kill as many Americans as possible.; 5/22/11, 9:51 AM
Curious George said...: Phil 3:14 said...

"I'm wondering what connections Dad has to get this into the NYT"

Seriously?

Ring RIng

"NYT Editorial Board"

"Hello, my name is Frank Lindh and my son is John Lindh, a scapegoat, wrongly accused of terrorism and harshly treating by Bush and his minnions. John’s case was never about evidence. It was based purely on emotion. Rummy lied about what he had done"

"SHUT UP! You had us at "Hello".

Mr. Lindh, you ask the America people to find it in their hearts to let your son come home. Can't speak for all, but I just checked my heart. It said "no".; 5/22/11, 9:53 AM
KCFleming said...: @Henry:
Thanks. May come home tomorrow!; 5/22/11, 9:57 AM
edutcher said...: "John acknowledged only that he had aided the Taliban and carried weapons. "

What part of, "Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.", eludes him?

windbag is right. He should have been executed.; 5/22/11, 9:59 AM
Anonymous said...: In post-9/11 America, John became a symbol of “the other.”

Oh, please!

The nut certainly didn't fall far from this tree.; 5/22/11, 10:03 AM
The Crack Emcee said...: Fred4Pres,

Lindh's dad should blame himself. If he bothered to be a father instead of running off and finding himself, his son might not have gone down this road.

I don't care he is gay, but a real man takes care of his family first. It is too late to fix what you screwed up.

What Boomers Need To Hear - Statement #3,975; 5/22/11, 10:05 AM
David said...: I looked into my heart, just as the man asked.

My heart says John should remain in jail for the rest of his term.

It took my heart but a moment to reach this conclusion.; 5/22/11, 10:31 AM
holdfast said...: This case is a gross miscarriage of justice - terrorist traitor POS should have been executed almost a decade ago.; 5/22/11, 10:33 AM
Austin said...: Mike Spann; 5/22/11, 10:39 AM
edutcher said...: Pogo said...

@Henry:
Thanks. May come home tomorrow!

Good for the both of you. That's always a welcome step.; 5/22/11, 10:43 AM
george said...: Is it any surprise that the son went astray when the father resorts to such outrageous calumny to excuse his behavior? How many times has that pattern been repeated in the past?

This is why the NY Times is such a POS paper. Senior makes no rational arguments and there is no news value in a father trying to expiate his own sins in raising his son by repeating the same pattern of denial and excuse making that caused the problem in the first place.

This article is every bit as sensationalistic and prurient as any sex scandal in the National Enquirer. It is pure leftist pornography.; 5/22/11, 10:58 AM
chickelit said...: Is Lindh pronounced with a lisp?

Out of how many thousands of families having a son in jail, the NYT decides to give voice to this one in particular.
Why?

(a) Because Lindh senior's opinion is of pressing national importance and he represents an otherwise unheard voice?

(b) Because the NYT champions the downtrodden and the shat upon?

(c) Because the NYT has an unrequited hate affair with GWB and just needs to keep rending the nation.; 5/22/11, 11:08 AM
Kev said...: (the other kev)

Like Ernest Hemingway in the Spanish Civil War?! I don't remember Lindh being captured driving an ambulance.

What a fucking loser. He invokes all the MoveOn/Daily Kos bogeyman - Bush, Rumsfeld, Ashcroft and Giuliani, spits on a father who lost his own son father fighting for his own country ('respect', my ass), and excuses all of junior Lindh's actions with the standard canard of 'misplaced idealism.'

San Andreas can't level the pesthole that is Marin County fast enough.; 5/22/11, 11:13 AM
MadisonMan said...: Couldn't they have waited 'til Father's Day to publish this?

If my son were a convicted terrorists and I were a lawyer, I'd probably do something similar to what Lindh's Dad is doing. I wouldn't expect anything to come of it however.; 5/22/11, 11:42 AM
PJ said...: From a lawyering point of view, this would be malpractice if it were genuinely addressed to "the American people." No, the pitch here -- "Admit that you were not only wrong but irrationally vengeful!" -- is not made for the purpose of persuading anyone who ever thought Junior's conviction and sentence were justified. This is an attempt to get to the President while he may be in a football-spiking mood with an offer of a context in which football-spiking can be dolled up as justice-dispensing. And why wouldn't the NYT be proud to facilitate?; 5/22/11, 11:48 AM
Anonymous said...: Sorry Daddy, you're an idiot, and Little Johnny got off way too easy.

Peter; 5/22/11, 11:52 AM
Chef Mojo said...: The little shit got it easy with 20 years.

He remains idealistic and spiritual, and a practicing Muslim.

Yeah. And that worries me. There are, and were, a whole bunch of idealistic, spiritual and practicing Muslims down in Cuba with this nasty tendency to go back to what they were doing before they were captured when they got released.

It's obvious what Frank Lindh is trying to do, but "Free John" doesn't inspire the same elan as "Free Mumia," does it?; 5/22/11, 12:15 PM
Dustin said...: As unconstitutional as this would be, I do find a requirement of renouncing Islam to be pretty appropriate from the death dealing supporters of OBL.

I know, I know: taqiyah.; 5/22/11, 12:34 PM
Joe said...: From the op-ed "In fact, in a plea deal in October 2002, the government dropped its most serious accusations against John, including terrorism and conspiracy to kill Americans."

Good lord; this guy's a lawyer? Of course charges were dropped, that's how plea deals are done. How about we drop the plea deal and put Lindh on trial?; 5/22/11, 12:35 PM
Robert said...: Tell Lindh Hemingway wasn't in the Republican Army, he was a screenwriter and journalist in Spain. He drove an ambulance in Italy during WWI for which he was decorated by the Italian government. Does Lindh think that Hemingway, despite all his faults, could possibly have taken up arms on behalf of the Taliban?; 5/22/11, 12:47 PM
William said...: It does not seem to me that twenty years is such fearsome punishment for an act of treason. However, when you consider what Bill Ayers and his crowd got away with, Lindh has indeed been punished harshly.; 5/22/11, 1:11 PM
paul a'barge said...: Good lord. Have these mutts no shame?; 5/22/11, 1:18 PM
Chef Mojo said...: John Lindh won't have to serve for much longer. I'm sure Obama will pardon him as he leaves office. Out of "compassion," of course.; 5/22/11, 1:26 PM
Fen said...: Release him. Then hang him as a traitor.; 5/22/11, 1:31 PM
Michael said...: This asshole is the reason you have to submit to a vast TSA apparatus. He is the lone guy who the TSA can point to to explain why profiling is risky and why "anyone could be a terrorist."; 5/22/11, 1:36 PM
Skyler said...: We can forgive a man for defending his son. But we need not go mad and agree with him. We simply should pity the father and point him out to others who don't guide their sons to have a better moral center.; 5/22/11, 1:37 PM
glenn said...: Moral of the story:

When you encounter terrorists on the battlefield shoot them in the head. After that they don't cause problems.; 5/22/11, 2:17 PM
dbp said...: I would not be defending my son or daughter if theycommitted treason. Unless, of course I didn't really think they did anything wrong.; 5/22/11, 2:35 PM
BEK477 said...: John was a willing participant in terrorist activities. He deserved capital punishment.

His life sentence is just. End of the debate.; 5/22/11, 3:08 PM
Anonymous said...: I have the feeling that Dad is preparing the battlefield for a presidential pardon.; 5/22/11, 4:58 PM
Sebastian said...: BEK: He didn't get a life sentence, though. He'll be out in 10 years.; 5/22/11, 5:02 PM
Freeman Hunt said...: Good lord:

His parents had separated and his father, Frank Lindh, had declared himself gay, while his mother, Marilyn Walker wandered into New Age spiritualism. When their 16-year-old son converted to Islam and started roaming the suburban malls in kaftan and skullcap, they encouraged his "spiritual journey" even when it led a year later, in July 1998, to a pilgrimage to Yemen to learn Arabic and study in the religious schools of Sana'a. His mother looked Yemen up on the internet, and despite the country's reputation for kidnapping and religious extremism, allowed her quiet, brainy and eccentric child to leave.

"Some people are seekers, and he is one of them. I know that sounds New Age, and some people won't get it. But he wasn't doing this out of a void. He wanted this kind of life out of a pure motive," Marilyn Walker told People magazine.

John's father also agreed with the trip to Yemen. "We always accepted [his] interest in and conversion to Islam," Frank Lindh said, adding: "If you were going to study French, you'd go to France."

There's more at the link.

Try not to be morons, parents.; 5/22/11, 5:48 PM
The Drill SGT said...: Father...During the prison raid in which John was captured, another young American, a C.I.A. officer named Johnny Micheal Spann, was fatally shot.

Me thinks he rewrites history. The facts as I understand them:

Captured as part of a OBL funded group of arabic speaking "foreign fighters"

wile in prison tells the CIA he's Irish. knows of the planned prison break. fails to disclose.

woulded in the fighting, as one of the holdouts (7 days) he is "recaptured"....

let him rot...; 5/22/11, 7:05 PM
Celia Hayes said...: Umm .. simple answer - as the mother of a military recruit who began service in the Marines in 1998 - no. Join with the Taliban, be with the Taliban, rejoice at the bombing of the USS Cole, which killed a number of US military recruits of the same age that John whatever-his-name-was -- live with it. Serve the sentance. Grow old in captivity. Suck it up, hard-charger.; 5/22/11, 7:10 PM
Ralph L said...: "Can my son come home so he can stone me?"; 5/22/11, 7:36 PM
Valentine Smith said...: The kid Lindh sought and found a way to say the ultimate Fuck You to his parents. He joined a religion that would torture and kill his father on sight. Mommy no doubt would only be burned as a witch.

Think his folks actually got the message? At last?; 5/22/11, 7:39 PM
Mark said...: Traitors used to be hung.

This is a classic opportunity for Lindh's friends, family, and hired guns to STFU.; 5/22/11, 8:53 PM
Issob Morocco said...: He should be pilloried by society for being such a naive idiot at best and a traitor to our country at worst.

And to have his father, the shingled one, shill for him pleading it is too long, well, things have a way of working themselves out in the end. The more you caterwaul, the more suffering you will know.; 5/22/11, 9:42 PM
Freeman Hunt said...: It does look like a case of youthful rebellion. Because he was rebelling against stereotypical Boomers though, he joined a violent, fundamentalist religious sect. Yet because they were stereotypical Boomers, they weren't bothered by it and instead thought he was a "seeker."

You can't win, man.

Heh.; 5/22/11, 10:21 PM
Fred4Pres said...: Look on the bright side, young Johnny will only be in his forties when he gets out. He can move to Yemen and marry a nine year old. Win Win.; 5/22/11, 11:37 PM
Fred4Pres said...: Ironically, Johnny might not screw up his own family as bad and his mother and father screwed up him. Becuase there is no where to go in Yemen but up.

I exaggerate. Somailia is worse. But Yemen is just slightly better.; 5/22/11, 11:40 PM
J said...: John Lindh is a piece of shit.

I wonder how Frank Lindh really feels about raising a piece of shit.; 5/23/11, 12:32 AM
J Allen said...: Got the fathers love part, with that said...yes his parents are also to blame because they allowed him to 'find his own way'. They probably never told him "don't touch that because it's hot" because they wanted him to figure it out for himself.

Having deployed to foreign lands and loosing friends, KIA and WIA, my sympathy for Walker ends at the last letter of double tap. It's fast, cheap, and involves little to no suffering (for you sensitive types).; 5/23/11, 9:24 AM
Sigivald said...: John acknowledged only that he had aided the Taliban and carried weapons.

Huh.

Aiding enemies of the United States during time of war? What does that remind me of...?

Why, treason, that's what it reminds me of.

He was working with admitted and acknowledged enemies of the United States, and bearing arms in their service, and for this he should be let go because some other dude (even though admittedly an Important Other Dude) is dead?

Yeah, no.; 5/23/11, 4:10 PM