Earlier today, RedState reported on Dallas Cowboys’ Defensive End Micah Parsons and his reaction to hearing of the release of Phoenix Mercury player Brittney Griner.
Upon learning that President Joe Biden was willing to trade Griner for a Russian arms dealer instead of Ret. Marine Paul Whelan, Parsons let loose.
Wait nah!! We left a marine?!! Hell nah
Wait nah!! We left a marine?!! Hell nah https://t.co/3AeQx8K9OZ
— Micah Parsons (@MicahhParsons11) December 8, 2022
Parsons commented soon after that he has nothing against Griner, but as a man who has family that served he was taken aback by Biden’s decision, and that while he’s no fan of Trump he’s not a fan of Biden either.
Parsons later walked back his statement, saying his tweet was a mistake and that he should have been more “educated on the topic.” He said he tweeted out more out of emotion and the thought of his family than anything else.
then the best outcome was accomplished. I pray Mr. Whelan comes home but am extremely happy for Brittney and her family. I am not too prideful to admit when I’ve made a mistake.
— Micah Parsons (@MicahhParsons11) December 8, 2022
Loyal readers don’t need me to tell them why this was a mistake. Offering apologies to the outrage brigades on Twitter will do absolutely nothing for you but tell them that they can make you bend or break with enough pressure. Still, I won’t condemn Parsons for walking back what he said. He seems like a good person, and anyone who isn’t used to political twitter mobs coming down on someone could easily cave in the face of one.
That doesn’t change the fact that he was correct in his initial statement.
What Joe Biden did was give up Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout, also known as the “Merchant of Death” in the international community, in order to get Griner Back. Bout was convicted of conspiring to kill U.S. Nationals, officers, and employees, and conspired to acquire and use anti-aircraft missiles as well as material support to a terrorist organization according to documents.
Griner is a WNBA player who got caught in a foreign country carrying pot cartridges. Outside of being a WNBA player, she’s most notable for being one of the people who protested the United States during the National Anthem. She contends that the anthem shouldn’t be played before games and threatened to not be on the floor if it was playing. She maintained that she didn’t hate the U.S., but apparently didn’t think its anthem should be played before sports games.
Whalen, a marine who served his country, is now four years into his Russian prison sentence. He was sentenced in 2020 to 16 years on trumped-up espionage charges that both the U.S. government and Whalen’s family deny as even remotely being true.
Whalen, for what it’s worth, was a good sport about it when he heard they were trading Griner instead of him, as he saw this as a no-win situation for himself.
“The Biden Administration made the right decision to bring Ms. Griner home, and to make the deal that was possible, rather than waiting for one that wasn’t going to happen,” he said.
Before I continue, I want it made clear that I’d rather none of our American citizens be jailed in Russia and Whalen is likely being held for unfair reasons because they’re using him as a way to trade for something really big.
With that said, trading Griner for Bout is like exchanging Cheez Whiz for A5 Wagyu steak. Bout is an international arms dealer with contacts that go well beyond anything most people can comprehend. So prolific is he that Hollywood based a character around him in the 2005 movie Lord of War.
According to The Guardian, this man has been behind some of the worst players on the international chessboard:
During his decades-long career, Bout is believed to have armed the Taliban and the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan, the Revolutionary United Front in Sierra Leone, Charles Taylor’s regime in Liberia, Unita in Angola, various Congolese factions and Abu Sayyaf, a militant Islamic group in the Philippines.
If Biden and his team were worth a damn, the moment the Russians offered Griner in exchange for Bout, Biden would have laughed into the receiver and hung up. Bout, being an asset to Russian military intelligence in the midst of a war with Ukraine, is only going to be helpful to the Russian cause. There’s no reason to give him up in exchange for a post-smoking basketball player who thinks negatively enough of her own country. At the very least, Whalen would have been a much fairer trade.
But this is the Biden administration, and the last thing it wants to be seen doing is choosing a white, male, military man over a black woman. His base would go absolutely bonkers, and at a time when Biden and the Democrat’s popularity isn’t exactly at its peak, they need all the support from the base they can get.
So Parsons is right. While it’s great we got one of our own back, the fact that we chose to give up such a huge international player over Griner is unfair to Whalen. Moreover, it’s just stupid. Parsons shouldn’t have apologized for feeling something as logical as it was emotional.
