We all realize by this point that Kyle Rittenhouse is innocent of all the charges against him. If the jury in Wisconsin isn’t terrorized by the threat of mob retaliation, he should walk out of the courthouse a free man. And any conservative or Christian college worth its application fee should be scrambling to admit him on a four-year-long free ride.

Rittenhouse got a much rawer deal than Nicholas Sandmann, who only suffered media (and not a legal) lynching. I hope Rittenhouse is ready to sue into bankruptcy any and every one who spread the filthy lie that he is a “white nationalist.” That should include Chris Wallace, Fox News, Joe Biden, and a long list of other MSM offenders. In a just world, Rittenhouse would walk away with tens of millions of dollars in punitive damages.

A Hothead or a Hero?

But more than an innocent man, is Rittenhouse a hero? A hapless fool? A reckless young boy whose mother should have corralled him into cowering at home through the George Floyd riots along with the rest of the men in America — including the police of the cities where those riots happened?

These are important questions. The nature of the American right might hang on the answers. With his customary negative infallibility, David French has pitched in to help. Overwhelmed by the evidence, French had to admit that it appeared Rittenhouse was not in fact guilty of first degree murder. But nevertheless, French sniffs, Rittenhouse “had no place” in Kenosha defending businesses against looters:

The movement to make a hero out of Kyle Rittenhouse is both ridiculous and dangerous. He was a foolish kid wielding a deadly weapon.

But even foolish kids have a right of self-defense. Based on the evidence, acquittal is reasonable. Validation is not: https://t.co/mUz8aJHp75

— David French (@DavidAFrench) November 16, 2021

Would Rittenhouse Have Been a Hero for Wielding a Gun in Baghdad?

Now for those with short memories, David French was one of the biggest cheerleaders for our misconceived, futile Iraq war. (He even served there as a military lawyer in the Green Zone, which was safer for Americans than most Democrat-run cities are now.)

That war, launched on lies and corrupt intelligence, saw 17-year-olds with guns in ferocious danger. But they were defending a foreign country, and an artificial government which George W. Bush had created. They were ordered to stand by and permit a genocide of Christians, the local scapegoats for America’s actions, whom George Bush didn’t care enough to protect.

Antifa Has Done Us More Harm than Saddam

Apparently it’s not irresponsible for men Kyle Rittenhouse’s age to sign up and go fight for foreigners against people who pose no threat to us. (Again, to recap, Saddam Hussein played no part in 9/11, and had no “weapons of mass destruction.”) Antifa has done far more harm to America than Saddam Hussein ever did.

But blue state mayors and governors let Antifa, and its Marxist allies in Black Lives Matter, run rampant in a dozen U.S. cities, causing two billion dollars in damage and killing at least 12 Americans. The police and National Guard were ordered to stand down, the streets handed over to Marxist thugs. Whole sections of American cities, such as Seattle, became totalitarian enclaves run by political gangs.

The Good Samaritan Stepped Out of the Road

And Kyle Rittenhouse was one of the few Americans to stand up and say No. He drove a few miles across from Illinois to Wisconsin, to the town where much of his family lived, and tried to help out. Like the Good Samaritan, he stepped out of his routine to help out strangers afflicted by thieves. When threatened and assaulted, he accepted a borrowed weapon. When hunted like an animal, he fought back bravely and responsibly, not harming any innocents. Rittenhouse risked his life to protect the livelihoods of strangers, whom he saw as his neighbors. “Greater love hath no man … .” If Kyle Rittenhouse isn’t a hero, then neither is Nathan Hale, who was the same age as Rittenhouse when he died for his country.

Is David French such an isolationist that he advises an Illinois First policy? Should Americans in Illinois let extremists take over the streets of the state next door? By that standard, Rittenhouse was a reckless interventionist, embarking on a military adventure on foreign soil. Or perhaps French is the priest and the Levite in Jesus’ parable, who shunned the robbery victim out of concern for their own “purity.”

No Surrendering the Streets to Extremists

In fact, the idea that patriots should hide in our homes while extremists take over our cities is completely un-American, irresponsible, and un-Christian. It was timidity of that kind that let the Ku Klux Klan dominate whole regions of our country in past decades. Such cowardly “me-first” self-seeking is what let the brownshirts rule the streets of Germany’s cities. In those cities, too, the local authorities sided with one brand of rioters, slapping them on the wrist but persecuting their victims. That’s how Anarcho-Tyranny works.

Antifa dates back to the Germany of the early 1930s, being the direct descendant of Communist street-fighters. Apparently it learned from the playbook of its victorious Nazi rivals. Will we imitate the cowed, baffled, passive citizens who let their advanced nation slide into totalitarianism? Only if we listen to the likes of David “Vichy” French.

John Zmirak is a senior editor at The Stream and author or co-author of ten books, including The Politically Incorrect Guide to Immigration and The Politically Incorrect Guide to Catholicism. He is co-author with Jason Jones of “God, Guns, & the Government.”