A TALLYBAN-JOHN OR A TURN-COAT-HERO?
After all Tallaban Johnny left the country and effectively
relinquished his aliegence and citizenry openly.  All I would have
done to punish Tallaban John, was banish him from ever re-entering the
USA.  Even if T.J. had actually killed a fellow American Soldier, that
does not have the same detriment to the U.S. as a Whited Sueulchre
claiming richeous indignation in the presence of our enemies and the
dishonest Forth Estate othrwise known as the Fifth Column...Grandma
Moses used to say there is no enimy worse than a "House Enimy" "don't
stay on acows back while cursing its skin" I claim no supernatural
spelling powers, and I relagate to myself the right to solesize and
hyperbalize till I know better...Let not manner spoil meaning...

Gosh, you must be a  Republican right? Well, Mr. T.-; JT is a traitor.
 Lucky we didn't execute him as all traitors should be, and for your
accusations to JK; well sir, he does come from a rather wealthy
family, but unlike the mentioned JT he chose to fight for our Country.
 Hmm, fight for, or trait-or....Really this is below me to even
respond, but alas, I felt someone should.

Let me guess...

By "turn-coat hero," you must mean Johnny Depp.

Dear CMiller, I am glad that you deigned to honor me with your
response.  I promise that if I walk away with YOUR views, I will have
won something, not lost, since my views shall remain my views, only so
long as they shall appear to be true views.

Incidentally I am infact a registered Democrat, but as my screen-name
suggests I espouse TOUGH LOVE.  No Party-Animal here.  I endeavor not
to let loyalty  trump honesty. My mantra is "everybody should be a
Democrat until he knows better."

By the way Sir. Miller, may I remind you that Benidict Arnold, did
fight for this country also.  May I also remind that the devil was
also once in Heaven at the right Hand of God.?  Shakespear is known to
have said "tell me what I am, not what I was".  With this last quote,
you could say then why am I not allowing your hero to move on from
what he was?  The answer is: He did not repent, nor relinquish his
habit, it is now his character hense his destiny.

Please help me out here.  Could you refresh my memory on the
definition of "trator"? You see I was of the opinion that a traitor is
one who pretends to be for something but instead works underhandedly
to against it.

El Pinko, you have more of a fight in you than that.
Are you affraid that I may steal your views?
Give it your best shot, I promise that I will be like the Austrailian
Aboriginies, and run over to your side to lend you some armo if you
run out.:)

Defining traitor often depends on which side one is standing... 

Werner von Braun, Rudolf Hess, Albert Speer, Kim Philby, Sol Cambell
(don't worry about this one if you don't follow the English Premier
League!), Oliver Cromwell, Sean O'Callaghan, Blondie (obviously not
quite so serious, but apparently it was at the time if you cared about
that sort of thing), Winston Churchill (in party political terms),
Pizarro, Martin Luther (not King Jr), the signatories to the
Declaration of Independence.... (ooooh, controversial!), nearly every
Scottish clan (from all the others' point of view).......

All the above are heroes to some and traitors to others...

Of course there is always the OED definition....
1. One who betrays any person that trusts him, or any duty entrusted
to him; a betrayer. In early use often, and still traditionally,
applied to Judas Iscariot.

OK Count Rail, I hear you loud and clear. In other wordl it is all
"RELATIVE". I am struggling with a similar delimma with an up-coming
question I am working on, about "LOYALTY versus HONESTY.  As a Tough
Love espouser, I immediately spring for honesty, until!, until I
contemplate the loyalty to my country.  Especially if my country were
Hitler's Germany. I am still working on a Soloman like, solution
before I ask the question.

Let me rein you back in alittle.  We certainly can restrict the
definition of "traitor" to a given discussion, and a given erra and a
given situation so as not to render the question un-answerable. 
Incidentally I did not employ the word "traitor" in my discussion.  It
was C. Miller who introduced it to describe that Tallyban Johny.

My contention is that a person who leaves this country and virtually
walks away from his citizenship to fight for another country, openly,
does less harm to us than one who stays here pretending to be for us
but doing and saying things that are detrimental to our greater good,
while hiding behind the constitution and the Flag which he himself
turned up-side-down on the cover of his book.

America has no trouble addressing open, outside enimies, it is the
HOUSE-ENEMIES like the Peacenics who "does us in" everytime

I find it interesting that you have written so much and yet said so
little. If you already have the answer maybe you should move over to a
forum rather than posing as a person with a question.

TL,

This is the third time that you've called me "El Pinko." I find this a
bit disturbing, since it implies that I am a male who espouses leftist
sentiments. Wrong on both counts. I am a middle-aged female
Bible-beater whose political heroes are Ronald Reagan, Thomas Sowell,
and Robert Bork. While most Google Answers Researchers seem to be
lefties (and some of 'em are outright pinko), please don't place me in
that camp.

PF

Dear Dear PinkFreug-ga, Forgive me for I have sinned. I just took a
chance on a made-up term of endearment.  I ment no harm and it was out
of complete ignorance of any conotations of the word.  I honestly did
not know that the word has the meaning you infer.  as my friend Barry
Farber would say "you are inferring where I did not imply",
Intentionally that is.

OK now that we have kissed and made-up, will you fire some
good-natured shots across my bow?

>> OK now that we have kissed and made-up, will you fire some
>> good-natured shots across my bow?

I'd rather leave the shot-firing to others. Public political debate
isn't something that I enjoy.

~Pink

Dear Manofredearth-ga: "Blessed is he who can pick sence from nonsense"
I consider myself fortunate that you did not attack me (the man).
Persons of your ilk usually abandon the argument and attack the man. 
Thank you, thank you.

I am positive that if you could confute my argument you would not be
nit-picking about "FORUM".  Incidentally would you deign to educate me
as to what constitute "forum"  My humble understanding (without
consulting the dictionery) of a "forum" is a news paper, a swimming
pool, a radio show, the supermarket, a box from which people used to
sell soap any place where one can cmmand attention, etc. Streighten me
out if this notion is incorrect.

Incidentally regarding your grouse that I already know the answer:
Googles Hints on how to ask questions, suggests that one eloberates
and gives his take on the answer.
The fact that you acknowledge perceiving both a question and an
answer, belies your claim that I bable on and said nothing.  Could it
be that I did not say what you wanted to hear?

I personally would never think of defining you as a "CONTANKAROUS
CONRRARIAN", but I certainly could not come to your reacue if I herd
some one else calling you that.  Churchill discribes you to a "T" as
one of that breed of people who while walking down the street,
stumbles over some facts, looks around to be sure no one is looking,
picks himself up brushes himself off, and pretends that nothing
happened.  Sir Winston actually gives a name to such a person.  You
may want to research what Sir Winston said about you.

Now redeam yourself, try to logically challenge my try at answering my
own question.  I am not even asking you to confute it...don't go to
bed with all these facts soiling your conscience. You did not brush it
all off, I know I used to try it myself before I recovered from being
a LIB...

Don't forget that for many people their principles are far more
important and loyalty-inducing than the flag under which they were
born...
Also, is staying in a country you believe to be heading down the wrong
path and fighting against that path necessarily a bad thing?
In the mid-late 1930s in Britain only a very small minority esposued
rearmament against the wishes and desires of the rest of the country
and, arguably, the world. With the benefit of hindsight we can now see
that minority was in the right.
Those who seem to be 'in-house' enemies now could be the nation's
heroes in the future... I'm not saying I necessarily believe that in
this particular situation but it is always worth remembering that only
very infrequently in the history of mankind have things been as simple
as good and bad.
And another point... remember that other Texan president's
oft-repeated comment on J. Edgar Hoover, "It?s probably better to have
him inside the tent pissing out, than outside the tent pissing in". In
other words, keep your friends close and your enemies even closer...

Dear Dear RAI130, permit me to zing you right after I commend your
juicy yet succinct response.  I also note with glee, your keen
awareness of GREY rather than the proverbial "BLACK or WHITE"
situations that most extreamist thrive on.  I often muse that the bane
of the world are the pusillanimous nonentities who freeze when they
have to choose between two "EVILS".
Now here comes the zing: Your logic faltered when you employed the
"wisdom" of the "keep your enemies closer" quote. Inthat the benefits
of keeping one's enimies clocer, is so that you can monitor their
every move, not to cherrish them.  The crux of my argument though, is
about the kind of enemy who hides behind the constitution and a false
vail of being apeacemaker.  The kind of enemy who has the ear and
sentiments of the Fifth Column, AKA (The Fourth Estate)who is abel to
whip up a propaganda frenzy against the government.  With this kind of
friend you don't want to hold him close, you want to ship him off to
the moon.

Regarding minority views being right, my argument was never that
minority views cant be correct.  Infact, despite my being a DEM, I
observe that the GOP are more often right than wrong, yet they are a
minority.  Instead my argument is that a citizen who openly abandons
his country to fight for another, does less harm to the abandoned
contry, than one who fights for his country, then commits sedition
afterwards.  Barry Farber's Grandma would say: "cursed is the cow who
gives a pail of milk then kicks it over afterwards".

There is a season for everything under heaven, a time to criticize our
government, a time to kick it out of office, and a time to bite your
lips and wait til a war is over to take your constitutional turn.