I just received this as a news tip from FOTM reader CSM. The news is almost a year old, and yet I had not known this. Did you?
Steve Peoples reports for the AP (via Yahoo) that on Jan. 15, 2015, in a 35-min. luncheon speech to the Republican National Committee’s winter meeting outside San Diego, presidential aspirant Dr. Ben Carson compared ISIS or the Islamic State (who chop off the heads of their enemies) to the patriots of the American Revolution.
Referring to the Islamic State, Carson said, “They got the wrong philosophy, but they’re willing to die for what they believe, while we are busily giving away every belief and every value for the sake of political correctness. We have to change that.”
A Republican National Committee spokesman had no immediate response when asked to comment on Carson’s remarks.
After the speech, Carson said it’s “ridiculous” to suggest he was likening American patriots to the Islamic State, claiming the comparison was politically motivated attacks by his opponents.
You decide if it’s ridiculous. Here’s a video of his remarks, followed by my transcription of his words:
Carson said:
“A bunch of ragtag militia men [American revolutionaries] defeated the most powerful and professional military force on the planet [Great Britain]. Why? Because they believed in what they were doing, they were willing to die for what they believed in. The British were not.
Fast forward to today. What do we have? You got ISIS. They’ve got the wrong philosophy, but they’re willing to die for what they believe, while we are busily giving away every belief and every value for the sake of political correctness.”
Carson easily could have made his point about the need for patriotic Americans today to stand up for our beliefs and values, without comparing the barbaric Islamic State jihadists to our Founding Fathers.
Carson has drawn criticism for other comparisons. In Spring 2014, Carson called the scandal over patient care at veterans hospitals “a gift from God to show us what happens when you take layers and layers of bureaucracy and place them between the patients and the health care provider.” In 2013 he called Obamacare “the worst thing that has happened in this nation since slavery,” adding that “it is slavery in a way because it is making all of us subservient to the government.”
See also:
- Conservatives & Christians defending Ben Carson are being played
- Ben Carson’s home is a museum to his ego and narcissism
- Ben Carson vs. Politico on West Point: You decide who’s the liar
- The truth about Ben Carson: West Point, vaccines, meaning of Easter and more
~Eowyn
