I was in a mall when I first learned of the passing of Andrew Breitbart. I’d just booted up my laptop in preparation for #ThrillerThursday. Before heading to Twitter for the hashtag party, I stopped by Brad Thor’s community forum and logged in. And there it was.
It seemed hard to believe, that one so invaluable to our cause could have passed from this earth at such a young age. Perhaps it is fated that the brave, along with the good, die young.
I didn’t know Andrew personally, but he was an inspiration to me, as he was to so many conservatives. A self-described “Happy Warrior”, he was a gladiator for truth, a man who always “rode toward the sound of the guns”. His unique brand of citizen journalism turned network media on its ear, exposing their complicity in the graft and corruption of American politics. There were those who called him a “yellow journalist”, acknowledging in their very accusation that they had forgotten the proper role of the Fourth Estate.
His on-line presence was fiery and confrontational. It cost him friends and won him allies—by the hundreds and thousands. At no time was this more apparent than the massive outpouring of grief on the Internet yesterday.
Yet grief was not the only reaction to Breitbart’s passing. And in their response to his death, the Left was as completely unmasked as they’d ever been by his own investigations.
It was a uniquely chilling sight: the very people who had condemned the summary execution of Osama bin Laden—rejoicing in the death of a courageous journalist who had done nothing but offend them with the truth.
As I said yesterday, if you wanted to know what the American Left really thinks of free speech, you need only look at their macabre celebration of the death of one of its most valiant practitioners.
Yesterday we witnessed the death of a man, but not of a movement. And there is only one way to truly honor his death. Pick up the flag and carry it forward. Ever forward. Hold your representatives accountable to the truth. Stand unafraid. In the words of Andrew Breitbart, “walk toward the fire”.
Requiescat in pace.