Back in March 2005 The Washington Post profiled the Khans. If you want a better understanding of the late CPT Khan and his parents, click on across. In the meantime here’ some excerpts:
His son was always reading books about Thomas Jefferson; that part of his passion was certainly his father’s doing. When the boys were small, Khan would take them to the Jefferson Memorial. He’d have them stand there and read the chiseled, curving words about swearing hostility against tyrannies over the minds of men.
It was not exactly surprising, he continued, that Humayun quoted Jefferson in his admissions essay for the University of Virginia, a line about freedom requiring vigilance. It was a bit surprising, though, when he signed up for ROTC and told his dad that after graduation in 2000, he wanted to join the Army.
They had dinner conversations about it, Khan said, looking down at the wooden conference table. He told Humayun that he wouldn’t have control over his life, but his son insisted, and that was that.
“He said that it seems only fair and logical to join the Army,” Khan said. “Because he wanted to complete the journey — he felt that ROTC had completed him as a person, and he wanted to give back. That’s what he wanted to do.”
It was logical, Khan said, and how was a lawyer going to argue with logic?
Humayun finished his four years of service and was preparing for law school when the Army called him back to duty. As he was moving into Iraq last year, Khan called him and they spoke briefly, a conversation he has turned over in his mind a million times since.
His son said, “Remember I wrote that article for admission to U-Va.?” Khan said, pausing, taking the pen cap off and putting it on again, his voice steady. “He said, ‘I meant it.’ He said that. He wasn’t going there through some thoughtless process, or thoughtlessly following orders. He thought he was serving a purpose.”
On June 9, four months after his arrival in Iraq, Humayun was killed by a car bomber.
Do click across and read the whole thing.
Trentrunner
You know, this isn’t really a “win” for “our side.”
I’m just reminded of the horrific cost paid for a completely useless war.
Agrippa
Good article.
The Khans are far better people than Trump. And, Trump knows it.
Baud
@Trentrunner: The only win for our side can come from crushing Donald Trump and his party in November.
gogol's wife
“You have sacrificed nothing and no one.”
Unforgettable words. Unforgettable courage.
cokane
WaPo is slaying it this election
Tom Levenson
@Trentrunner: Agreed. Demanding simply human kindness of a Presidential candidate shouldn’t be necessary, and it is cruel added grief for the Khans that they felt it necessary to do so here.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
So many levels of danger in this for the Republicans. Mr. Khan, the lawyer, will keep at this – he’s on a mission to try Donald Trump in the court of public opinion. He’s already included Ryan and McConnell as Trump’s co-defendants. The Cheeto will keep digging because he can’t let anything go, and since Fox never showed the Khan speech, those braindead moron viewers have no idea what’s happening to them. Khan is in the conservative bubble OODA loop.
JPL
As Mr. Khan stated, Trump has a black soul.
Cacti
But do they have granite counter tops?
gogol's wife
@JPL:
Oh, he said that? Where?
It is so clear that he is speaking for himself — he’s no campaign surrogate. He’s channeling all of us who see this as a moment of supreme danger to the republic.
cokane
@Cacti: you joke, but this is coming
rikyrah
@Agrippa:
Trump doesn’t know it.
But, the GOP not disavowing him certainly does.
Leto
He and I served in the same area, two years apart.
Every time Drumpf enters a public space people need to turn, point and say, “Shame… Shame… Shame…” until he no longer enters the public space.
rikyrah
@cokane:
He’s a Harvard-trained lawyer. He’s not going to be living in a shoebox.
It’s fascinating to watch the GOP try and defend it.
Nope. Keep Trump locked to them at the hip.
JPL
@gogol’s wife: Cnn Here’s the link
cokane
@rikyrah: i think you missed my point. the personal smears, turning over every stone to find some dirt, Breitbart & Co. are on it right now
WaterGirl
@lamh36: From the article you linked:
Terrorism is a different religion. What a powerful statement.
(my comment, previously posted on a dead thread)
scav
@Trentrunner: In part, it depends entirely on the definitions of “our” and “side”. It’s not a narrowly partisan issue, certainly. But a straight-up personified reminder and recognition of the cost of things, of slogan-waving, of simplistic jingles and sound-bites is all too often needed. With booster-slaps.
RaflW
I sincerely hope that this moment just disembowels Trump. It seems Trump-stench is already messing up Paul Ryan’s neatly organized reputation as a moral leader.
JPL
@rikyrah: Trump’s comments about Ukraine/Crimea in a way were worse. The leadership doesn’t want MSM, to spend time discussing, Trump’s/Putin’s foreign policy views.
Baud
@JPL: That’s for Hillary’s September ads.
D58826
@JPL: I think the more accurate phrase would be he has a black hole where his soul should be. It simply sucks all of the light out of the universe.
MikeBoyScout
The story of the Khan’s is the story of our USA.
It is the story of hard work and sacrifice.
Capt Khan is an American Muslim hero.
Honor. Courage. Commitment.
The American story of the Khans is why I’m proud to be an American veteran.
rikyrah
@cokane:
oh, I know that. But, they were gonna try it, either way.
BR
@WaterGirl:
I’ve been very impressed by the poetry of Ms. Khan’s comments, both the sentence you just excerpted and what she said in the interview with Lawrence O’Donnell about her son coming back as a hero.
amk
@Cacti: Apparently, he is a big shot lawyer. He can have all granite tops he wants.
BR
I don’t want to bring Colin Powell into the argument, because it’ll just be a distraction for Trump if it becomes a big thing, but Powell made a powerful statement in almost exactly the same situation in 2008, when he was endorsing Obama:
RaflW
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
I think this is the master chess move. McConnell of course isn’t getting bleating tweets that Ryan is (check out @JeffreyGoldberg for a particularly nauseating one), since we all know full well the crapuscular measure of Mitch.
But I think we are watching the bursting of Ryan’s bubble. Finally. The man has written budgets that the freakin Pope has decried, but he’s gotten a pass. This, finally, seems to be tarnishing Ryan’s utter bullshit rose of moral purity.
Tokyokie
@Agrippa: No, Trump doesn’t know it, because he is bereft of a conscience, a deficit that has colored everything in his existence. But those of us not so disabled are fully aware of it.
Trentrunner
@scav: It’s interesting.
One can always honor the sacrifice, freely and fully given.
But it sure leaves a bad taste in my mouth to think of that sacrifice given for a needless war he was lied into.
Imagine what this young man with his fully developed moral compass and personal bravery could have done, had he lived.
D58826
@MikeBoyScout: The continuation of the African American solders fighting for the Union in the Civil War, the Buffalo soldiers, the Tuskegee airman, the Japanese American soldiers fighting in Europe in WWII and the Navajo code talkers..
Magatha
I kind of wonder if this could be Trump’s “Greg Stillson” moment (you know, from Stephen King’s The Dead Zone). I mean, it should be, but maybe since there seems to be no “peak wingnut” point, maybe there’s no way to Greg Stillsonize Donald Trump.
Leto
@D58826: It’s funny how we do better when we utilize all of our resources.
scav
@Trentrunner: That indeed should very well be a part of the reality slap. The multiple costs to our society and culture as well as to the individual families.
JPL
Peak Wingnut is a lie!
Redshift
Thanks for your detailed answer to my classification question, Adam! (Just catching up now.)
scottinnj
Props so far to Clinton/Kaine in terms of letting this play out without any distractions from their side. Or to paraphrase Obama ‘please proceed Mr Trump”. though I hope that while Trump is flailing in the water they have some cinder blocks ready to throw him.
this is also taking away from some other real winner of comments. Trump also responded to Bloomberg saying ‘I can hit a golf ball further than he can’. On a normal day that would be a winner of comment…but..
scottinnj
@RaflW: The only thing Trump could say which would cause Paul Ryan to retract his endorsement is to support expanding Medicare.
Elmo
@Magatha: Today’s GOP would insist that Stillson was protecting the boy, was in the act of putting the boy behind him, and only the Liberal MSM would dare to suggest otherwise. Then they would inspect the boy’s family home for countertops and make dark suggestions about setups and conspiracies. Stillson would not lose a single GOP vote.
JPL
@scottinnj: Well he didn’t say nanny nanny boo boo, so it doesn’t count.
MattF
@scottinnj: Dems put the Khans out there and hoped that Trump would bite. And he did.
Villago Delenda Est
@Tokyokie: And are so pissed that the ethical bones in our body are holding us back from wallowing in the wealth we could have extracted from the rubes.
gindy51
@Trentrunner: His passing may serve to demolish Trump.
Villago Delenda Est
@Elmo: “I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, okay, and I wouldn’t lose any voters” — Donald J. Trump
gogol's wife
@JPL:
Thanks.
Baud
@MattF:
I find that overly cynical. Anything’s possible in politics, of course, but I don’t believe the motivation for inviting the Khans to speak at the convention was to goad Trump into responding to what they had to say. In fact, the Khans say they did not clear their speech with the Dems before giving it at the convention.
ThresherK
@BR: Once in a while Powell does something which makes me think he can be redeemed (if an agnostic like me can use that word).
This was one of those times; at this point in 2008 there was something for him to risk on the wingnut welfare gravy train by writing this. He was the “good soldier” for the right with that awful speech and the yellowcake. He could have just shut up, but he didn’t.
Villago Delenda Est
@scottinnj: I’m not sure if I’d want to be working oppo for Clinton/Kaine. On the one hand, there’s so much out there. On the other hand, you have to make choices. The gripping hand is finding the most damning thing Drumpf has said.
JPL
@Baud: That’s true. I imagine that O’Reilly will try to spread that lie though.
Baud
@JPL: But we shouldn’t.
MattF
@Baud: Demonstrating the fact that Trump is a thin-skinned bully is not cynical. It’s an essential fact that needs to be presented and stressed.
Baud
@Villago Delenda Est: It’s a jobs program unto itself.
Baud
@MattF: I’m doubtful the Dems specifically intended to use this tragedy to goad Trump. It’s perfectly approach to put a face to the hateful rhetoric Trump spews, and I think that was the intent in presenting the Khans.
gogol's wife
When a Christian shoots up a church in South Carolina, it’s not Christian terrorism. The DNC was reminding us that “Muslim” doesn’t mean “terrorist.” God knows the MSM won’t do that job.
JPL
Here is a tweet about McConell’s statement about the Khan family…. link
The misspelling of the name is unfortunate, and I wish he would have repudiated Trump, but unless Trump is arrested for murder, I don’t see it happening.
pseudonymous in nc
I don’t know how Mr Khan has voted, but I do know that the GOP was perceived as the natural party of Americans who came from south Asia for a long time, and Bush got a lot of their votes in 2000. One reason his words are so devastating is that he speaks like a Republican who no longer has a party because a large chunk of its base embraced Trumpism and its leadership is going along for the ride while hiding their heads in the back of the car.
MattF
@Baud: I’ll agree that ascribing motives to shadowy organizations is probably a mistake on my part. It is tempting, though.
jsrtheta
@Agrippa: No, he doesn’t. To him, no one on earth is better than he is. He has no such insight as you ascribe to him. He is incapable of insight in any event.
MikeBoyScout
@D58826: Quite right. Our herstory clearly shows we have always (ALWAYS!) been #StrongerTogether.
JPL
@JPL: McConnell corrected the typo, fortunately. At least he didn’t say vote for Trump at the bottom of his statement.
rikyrah
@pseudonymous in nc:
.
I think he voted GOP too.
D58826
Yurtle has issued a stmt in in which he praises the Kahns for their sacrifice and the bravery of their son. He never mentioned ‘old little hands’. Pretty much like Ryan yesterday.
And then we have Rancid Pubis – ‘we’re not going to disagree with anything that our nominee doesn’t agree with’
But there was one statement issued today that fully supports ‘old little hands’ comments about the Kahn family. I just don’t see it being a big talking point for the GOP since it was issued by ISIS. But I guess you have to work with the allies you have and not the ones you want.
RandomMonster
@Baud:
I agree. It’s not cynical at all to simply demonstrate that American muslims are decent people, and that some of them are exemplary and heroic. The only thing that’s cynical here is Trump’s villification of these people..
Villago Delenda Est
@rikyrah: I think there’s a clear tell that this is indeed the case from Khizr Khan’s speech: “He disrespects other minorities, women, judges, even his own party leadership.“
D58826
@RandomMonster: I also agree. I think they were invited as one of many regular Americans with a story of their lives to tell. This one just set of a huge response, even if Trump had kept his short fingers off the tweeter machine. Sometimes in these human interest stories one just makes a connection. Not sure you can foresee that or plan for it.
RandomMonster
@D58826: You’re right. The ‘story’ the democrats need to show and tell — at a convention and in general — is that we’re a party of diversity, equality, and tolerance. And we do that with strong examples like the Khan’s.
cokane
so where’s the photoshopped star trek ii screaming into the tricorder photo already
KHAAANNNN
Mnemosyne
@Trentrunner:
It is a tricky needle to thread but, as we saw in the aftermath of Vietnam, not allowing space for people to mourn their war dead — even those who died in a stupid, useless war — just causes even bigger rifts further down the road. So I think it’s possible to both honor the Khan family for their sacrifice and pledge to try and make sure we don’t get into any new stupid wars.
Soylent Green
@Leto:
It will have no effect, because Trump is shameless.
I would ask Cersei if she has any leftover wildfire.
amygdala
John Lewis and the Khans.
“We can all learn from this family.” Well, all minus one, maybe.
Raven Onthill
Gods. Could we stop telling ourselves that war is good for us? Jefferson, Jefferson believed that classical republican stuff about the martial virtues. It didn’t make sense in his time, and it makes even less sense now.
Damn, damn, what have we lost?
wjs
Each and every time I look at the back and forth on this story, I’m struck by the notion that the Khan family would be Reagan Republicans if this was 1985 or so. I think they would be Reagan supporters and would embrace what we now know to be that form of patriotism and service (it all turned out to be bullshit, of course). They would not support social liberals. There’s an offhand chance they would on an individual basis, but, as a generalization, these folks would not be out of place as Reagan voters.
The GOP’s problem is that socially conservative, patriotic Americans cannot and will not support the party as it is and they will not support Trump. This leaves not only the Khan family but Hispanic Americans and Asian Americans no other party to turn to by the Democratic Party. The autopsy on the Republican defeat of 2012 explained all this. None of the people who understand what’s happening are in a place to correct the course.
wjs
@pseudonymous in nc: Aw, shoot. You said it better earlier.
Miss Bianca
@pseudonymous in nc: One of the things I’m finding devastating is how many on the left are refusing to welcome – or see the potential in welcoming – moderate Republicans to take shelter under the Democratic tent. That that’s just one more sign of Hillary Clinton’s unprecedented and dangerous corruption – more “triangulation”, if you will. Never mind that we’re inviting them to take shelter under the tent *under our terms* – unabashed support of women’s right to choose, expanded social services net, raise taxes on the wealthy, etc – rather than “pivoting to the center” or some such crap. I’m really getting disillusioned with radical white leftists. I’m starting to see them as just as big a threat to rational democracy as the radical right-wing.