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Eminentoes
The Bonfire of the Vanity
Christopher Dorner picked a bad way to reach out to his celebrity friends.
Fire a narcissist at the risk of firing up his imagination. Pride remains one of the seven deadly sins, as much as we try to cast the ancient vice as a modern virtue.
The Los Angeles Police Department didn’t fire Christopher Dorner for falsifying a report against a fellow officer or for being an all-around fruit loop. A grandiose figure always sees something enormously sinister in his fall. So Dorner wrote in his manifesto — merely penning one signifies egomania —of his fight to “reclaim my name” and “the conspiracy to have me terminated.” That conspiracy, ultimately ensnaring Los Angeles policemen, San Bernardino County sheriffs, California Fish and Game wardens, and other law enforcement agents, ended with Dorner’s termination in the mountains on Tuesday.
There are worse fates than getting fired. Getting set on fire surely ranks as one of them.
Pride comes before the fall. It did here in the form of Dorner’s lengthy screed ironically extolling gun control and bestowing affirmation upon celebrities who needed it, and wanted it, the least. One gleans from reading the manifesto that Dorner worshipped the idiots on the idiot box and yearned to become one of them.
“Chris Matthews, Joe Scarborough, Pat Harvey, Brian Williams, Soledad Obrien, Wolf Blitzer, Meredith Viera, Tavis Smiley, and Anderson Cooper, keep up the great work and follow Cronkite’s lead,” Dorner advised. “I hold many of you in the same regard as Tom Brokaw and the late Peter Jennings.” They must be so flattered.
“Ellen Degeneres, continue your excellent contribution to entertaining America and bringing the human factor to entertainment. You changed the perception of your gay community and how we as Americans view the LGBT community. I congratulate you on your success,” offered the mass murderer.
“Tebow, I really wanted to see you take charge of an offense again and the game,” Dorner proclaimed. “You are not a good QB by todays standards, but you are a great football player who knows how to lead a team and WIN. You will be ‘Tebowing’ when you reach your next team. I have faith in you.”
I. I. I.
¡Ay, ay, ay!
He watched too much television. He longed to be watched on television. He made a break from on the couch to inside the television in the easiest way possible. He killed—not informed or entertained—other people.
If his imaginary friendships with celebrities didn’t convict Mr. Dorner of delusions of self-importance, then decades-old vendettas did. “Mr. ____, assistant principal,” he wrote. “Remember when you lied to my mother and the police officer in your office about stating that you never stated to me in a private conversation that you know the theft suspect (____) stole my watch. Let me refresh your memory.” About the watch clipped from your locker or your bizarre personality tic?
The stale grudge against the vice-principal makes the five-year grudge against the police seem fresh in comparison. Arrogance and bitterness make familiar bedfellows. Presumptions of our own infallibility obstruct forgiveness of the faults of others. Perfect can’t empathize with imperfect. Not only couldn’t Christopher Dorner let go, he felt compelled to write it all down so that his grievances would live when he didn’t.
Actions, of course, speak louder than words. Taking lives in revenge for losing your reputation requires unfathomable conceit. It imagines one’s status as of greater value than another’s existence. A deficit of self-awareness curses those with an excess of self-esteem. People who stare in the mirror look long but never deep.
When you’re such a huge fan of yourself, you can’t help but inspire a few imitators. After gunning down a married couple unknown to him, kidnapping two maids, and firing upon numerous peace officers, Dorner inspired admirers to maintain that law enforcement engaged in “cold-blooded murder” in taking their cold-blooded-murdering hero dead rather than alive. “Apparently burning people alive is now considered appropriate behavior for the police,” one member of the fan club, despising the California cops nearly as much as the Oxford comma, tweeted. “Judge, jury and executioner.”
Alas, one determined to go out in a blaze of vainglory usually does. Dorner’s cheering section decries that his body endured a few minutes in a conflagration. What about his soul? Christopher, rejecting himself as a “Christ bearer” in his manifesto, instead imagined himself as the higher power. Dethroning God necessarily precludes playing Him.
Christopher Dorner, victim of too much time genuflecting in front of a television set, missed one important message: “Only you can prevent forest fires.”
About the Author
Daniel J. Flynn is the author of Blue Collar Intellectuals: When the Enlightened and the Everyman Elevated America. He blogs at www.flynnfiles.com.
Albert Constantine Jr.| 2.15.13 @ 7:49AM
Mr. Flynn makes a number of points here worthy of dissection or further exploration, but I will start here with his last one.
Apparently, Smoky the Bear has changed the slogan, as now I hear in the public service announcements what sounds like the voice of Sam Elliott saying "Only You Can Prevent Wildfires".
Moe Blotz| 2.15.13 @ 8:03AM
Forest fires help prevent bears.
Bob Grant| 2.15.13 @ 9:20AM
You sure that's not Wilford Brimley?
Denver Todd| 2.15.13 @ 9:31AM
It's Smokey Bear, not Smokey the Bear.
Moe Blotz| 2.15.13 @ 9:45AM
I thought Smokey Bear was a state cop.
Bob Grant| 2.15.13 @ 10:07AM
Played by Jackie Gleason in the movie. Sally Field and Bert Reynolds were fantastic!
Frank Drackman| 2.15.13 @ 10:20AM
Duh, he was SHERRIFF Buford T. Justice...
Doesn't anyone study the "Classics" anymore
Frank
Bob Grant| 2.15.13 @ 10:34AM
Don't lie about the classics. Heretic!
Bill8472| 2.15.13 @ 11:18AM
That would be S-H-E-R-I-F-F, Frank.
Albert Constantine Jr.| 2.15.13 @ 11:50AM
(However)
Sharif don't like it ♬
Rock the Casbah ♬
♬♩♪♫
Rock the Casbah
Bob Grant| 2.15.13 @ 12:31PM
Sharif don't like Bo speedin' thru his jurisdiction.
TLP| 2.15.13 @ 4:54PM
The Clash.
TLP| 2.15.13 @ 5:01PM
You're younger than I thought.
Bill8472| 2.16.13 @ 10:30AM
The Clash are from the 1970s, TLP. You don't have to be all that young to know about them.
Frekki| 2.15.13 @ 2:55PM
It's Smokey THE Bear. I have my coloring book from 1960 stating so. I still like to color, but the libs are trying to take all the sharp objects.
Frekki| 2.15.13 @ 2:55PM
It's Smokey THE Bear. I have my coloring book from 1960 stating so. I still like to color, but the libs are trying to take all the sharp objects.
Frekki| 2.15.13 @ 2:56PM
Damn deja vous.
TLP| 2.15.13 @ 5:02PM
Contest at Tuesday's AmSpec Story on The State of the Union.
Clothing Optional.
We're open All Weekend.
Rhoetus| 2.15.13 @ 10:59PM
It was always Smokey the Bear when I was a kid.
Minuteman78| 2.15.13 @ 8:28AM
Glad they incinerated this worthless sack of excrement. Saved the taxpayers hundreds of thousands of dollars. Simple equation at work: murder people who have not participated in any capital crime against you or your family = termination with extreme prejudice. If this was demonstrated more often, there would probably be less of these showboats out there wanting to be on reality TV, aka the state-controlled media.
TLP| 2.15.13 @ 5:03PM
If Obama had a son.....................................................
Hardcard| 2.15.13 @ 8:41AM
I hope this POS continues to burn in hell for ever!
Bob Grant| 2.15.13 @ 8:47AM
The reviews are in!
Marc Lamont Hill said it was like watching Django Unchained, and was "exciting"...
Occupy LA gives him a Two Thumbs up!...
Mumia Abu-Jamal thinks tha brotha's got it going!
Satan? ....very pleased!
-----
Yea, this guy is already a modern-day folk hero thanks to the "Hip Hop Intellectual" Marc Lamont Hill who will have blood on his hands when the inevitable copy cat wants his fifteen minutes.
Von Mises Jr| 2.15.13 @ 9:09AM
If Christopher Dorner had a brother, he would act like Dear Leader.
loulou| 2.15.13 @ 11:27AM
I wish I had thought of that first!
Frank Drackman| 2.15.13 @ 9:27AM
more like "D'orner'jango, Up in Smoke"
Frank
Albert Constantine Jr.| 2.15.13 @ 11:51AM
Cheech & Chong Meet Django
Frekki| 2.15.13 @ 2:57PM
Bar-B-Que at the OK Corral.
Bill8472| 2.16.13 @ 10:32AM
It's like "Django, the Fantasy, Meets the Real World of People Who Aren't Stupid Hollywood Stereotypes and Can Shoot Back."
Louis Jenkins| 2.15.13 @ 8:56AM
Wow, so much hate for a man who screwed up, and a department that is screwed up as well. Dorner was a liberal, in fact he praised Feinstein's work to ban arms. Now there's a contradiction considering he was accused of having several Barrett rifles. (Mention that too while you're at it.) The PD then rammed down all of the cabin except for one room, and after the cold tear gas didn't work, they shot hot tear gas into the ruins. And then claimed they didn't intend to set the fire even after hearing the cursing LEO say "burn the f--king house down." Reminds me of Waco. I ain't going to say Dorner was justified in what he did, in fact, he was wrong. But the other day I was accused of being an Anarchist when commenting on the situation and that I'd likely be shot. (Were RCV so correct.) We're already in the pre-stages of anarchy. Look at what has happend in LA, and Big Bear, and all the extra people injured in this case, and tell me it is not already occurring! Anyone who lives in California is taking his own life and placing it in his hands. Get out with your life while you still may.
Frank Drackman| 2.15.13 @ 9:30AM
I think the LAPD was simply singin along to R. Kelly's "Burn it Up"
"Girl make it hot like the roof is on fire Burn it Up!"
Frank "Old MC" Drackman
SUBVET| 2.15.13 @ 10:52AM
Louis......I agree with you on most counts....let me throw you a slider. As corrupt as LAPD is it wouldn't surprise me that Dorner was right in his complaint. We don't know the real truth. Worse things have been sweped under the carpet of truth.
How professional is the LAPD when two paper delivery persons get over 40 rounds shot into their delivery truck. One lady shot in the back I see a law suit comming.
Dorner had the PD on their knees, the PD knew something and they tried to squash it. The PD was so scared of this guy that what the officers thought was Dorners truck "for sure" shit.... just silence him.
This whole idea of burn the house down after they made it look like swiss cheese.......I heard they fired over thousands of rounds. Does that sould like they wanted to "capture" this man.
The word CAPTURE is in the news today regarding the reward. Now the LAPD says reward paid for the "capture" of the fugitive.
The other day when I stopped to just see how the "dragnet" was going I watched the camera showing all these law enforcement standing at the ready to do battle with their AR15's in front of the cabin. What caught my eye was one of the major problems we have today. I saw a white overweight [160-180 lb.] women holding a AR15 in full combat gear.
Lower the standards so everyone is equal and what you get is trouble.
Louis Jenkins| 2.15.13 @ 11:06AM
Was she flashing a plumber's grin?
Cpm| 2.15.13 @ 2:47PM
Everybody says Waco, but it is much more like the SLA shootout 1974. The LAPD burned that one down too.
TLP| 2.15.13 @ 5:04PM
Contest at Tuesday's AmSpec Story on The State of the Union.
Clothing Optional.
We're open All Weekend.
spike59| 2.18.13 @ 5:50AM
"a man who screwed up"
---------------------------------------
A man who put the wrong oil in his car while doing an oil change, a man who forgot to make sure the ladder was stable before climbing up to clean the gutters, a man who forgot his wife's birthday...those are examples of a 'man who screwed up'-Dorner was a murdering piece of trash-he killed four people, two of them cops, wounded four others, cruelly taunted the families of his innocent victims, and held a couple hostage for days
Hate? No-but the fact remains that the world is a better place with Dorner taking a dirt nap
Frank Drackman| 2.15.13 @ 9:26AM
Lt. Dorner certainly had poor judgement, with an LA jury odds of a conviction would be ummm about the same as Dick Chaney being Sec Def again...
That being said, he did have good taste in women, Jessica Biel, Natalie Portman, and he's just a little too young to have Winona Rider in his Bank of Spanks...
Well Done, San Bernadino SD, literally "Well Done"...
Frank
C. Vernon Crisler | 2.15.13 @ 10:24AM
There was a Twilight Zone episode about a man who nursed grudges. He wanted to play a trick on some people who had hurt him in some way so he built an underground shelter, staged an end-of-the-world scenario, then brought the supposed malefactors to his bunker.
He offered them shelter if they would apologize to him. (One was a schoolteacher who had scolded him in class.) However, they refused and intimated that human honor and dignity were more important than surviving an atomic blast. So they left the shelter.
The man -- consumed by revenge -- took the elevator up from his bunker and emerged onto a world destroyed by atomic bombs. However, it was not the real world that had been destroyed, but only one constructed in his own mind. His nursing of grudges and the need for revenge forced him into his own private world where everything was in ruins. He constructed his own hell.
In his rants, Dorner said he wasn't a "f-cking Christian." He no doubt has entered into whatever hell awaits those who bring some much pain and destruction to others.
SUBVET| 2.15.13 @ 11:01AM
Vernon........you must be talking about the revenge of the LAPD.....because the truth was about to be told.
Christian......what does that have to do with anything......I say the LAPD wanted to shut Dorner up......can you say corruption.
Frank Drackman| 2.15.13 @ 11:46AM
if the LAPD was really so E-ville wouldn't they have killed D'j'orner back in 2008? Or even in 2005? I mean thats what I would have done, if I was E-ville.
And BTW, even as a Jew, I like me a little "Horst Wessel Lied" its a catchy toon, doesn't make me a Nazi.
Its like the (Redacted) who think the White Devil invented the HIV, the Sickle Cell, and Crime to exterminate the (Redacted), Seriously, if we're that E-ville wouldn't we have just killed em all 300 years ago?
Frank
Albert Constantine Jr.| 2.15.13 @ 11:54AM
This is for you, Her Doktor:
Die Fahne Hoch♬♩♪...
Albert Constantine Jr.| 2.15.13 @ 11:55AM
Bitte um Verzeihung, Herr Doktor (nicht Her).
Frank Drackman| 2.15.13 @ 1:24PM
Die Reihen festgeschlossen....
don't you hate when you get a toon in your head and it won't go away?
Albert Constantine Jr.| 2.15.13 @ 1:59PM
I would have thrown in more lyrics, but I didn't want Waffen SS below getting too nostalgic (and whenever "Die Panzerlied" is sung, that boot stomping really annoys the neighbors).
soljerblue| 2.15.13 @ 10:00PM
SA marchiert mit ruhe festem shritt...
Rhoetus| 2.16.13 @ 10:43PM
Let's bury the hatchet, let's bury the hatchet, let's bury the hatchet in Mr. O's head.
Frekki| 2.15.13 @ 3:01PM
Listen I'm sorry, but if I was a LA cop I would've set the cabin on fire and shot him when he came out. He wantonly killed a cops daughter and her Fiancee. He would be a dead man walking.
Biff| 2.18.13 @ 7:55PM
it was better when Rocky's manager broke his glasses on the library steps...
Bill8472| 2.15.13 @ 10:31AM
Ellen Degneres didn't change my perception of her gay community (or any other as far as that goes), but Anne Heche did. She was a lesbian, hanging out with Degeneres for as long as she thought it would help her career, then, when she thought it would be better to go hetero, she got married to some man. That altered my perception as to homosexuality as a genetic, inborn, thing, and convinced me that it's often a matter of choice.
TLP| 2.15.13 @ 5:07PM
Does anyone know what Bill is talking about?
Bill8472| 2.16.13 @ 10:36AM
It's a mystery for you, isn't it?
Bandido| 2.15.13 @ 10:53AM
Can't decide how crispy critter tastes best: deep-fried, boiled, roasted, sauteed, baked, fricassied or flambayed? Hopefully Dorner underwent each stage, and very very slowly.
TLP| 2.15.13 @ 5:07PM
Contest at Tuesday's AmSpec Story on The State of the Union.
Clothing Optional.
We're open All Weekend.
WaffenSS| 2.15.13 @ 11:43AM
Putting this on the back drop of history; The Germans were much more efficient and up front. Round'em up, transport'em to a central processing center, gas'em and up the chimney you go(the original"Burn, Baby, Burn). The spectacle in San Bernadino was so heavy handed. The words of General George S. Patten comes to mind: "we(the U.S.) didn't win with brilliance, we(the U.S.) over whelmed them(the Germans) with incompetence".
Frank Drackman| 2.15.13 @ 11:50AM
So piloting a B-17 without Radar, Tacan, GPS, through weather, AAA fire, to Germany and Back is "Incompetence"?
You know whats Incompetent? Invading Russia when you're already fighting France, the UK, and the US.
Certainly not "Brilliant"
And I'd call you a worthless piece of shit, if it wouldn't be insulting all the worthless pieces of shit out there, you don't even speak German do you?
Frank
Cpm| 2.15.13 @ 2:53PM
Declaring war on the U.S. when you are fighting the UK and bogged down before Leningrad and Moscow.
Bill8472| 2.16.13 @ 10:35AM
And then, probably for racialist reasons, not to join up with Japanese on a two-pronged offensive toward Southwest Asia.
TLP| 2.15.13 @ 5:09PM
His name IS: Waffen SS.
What did you expect?
soljerblue| 2.15.13 @ 10:04PM
I suspect whatever happened to Dorner inside that cabin was a cold shower compared to what he's experiencing now.
Rhoetus| 2.15.13 @ 11:00PM
BAD COP- NO DOUGH-NUT!
Michele San Pietro| 2.16.13 @ 12:00PM
I guess this Dorner must be a madman and a moron.
Bandido| 2.16.13 @ 2:41PM
No. No justice, no peace. There will be blood.
Rhoetus| 2.16.13 @ 10:36PM
You think that you can trust cops with guns after you surrender yours?
delahaya| 2.17.13 @ 9:19AM
I think its pretty obvious by now that the media is as responsible for these killings as mental illness and "gun free zones" are. They offer instant and widespread notoriety to the losers of society. Every idiot with a real (or usually imagined) grudge knows they will be on the TV with 24/7 coverage if they murder some people. The higher the body count, the more the coverage.
Anthony| 2.17.13 @ 10:29AM
Oooh baby, had Dorner survived, his trial in L.A.would have made O.J.s look like a church picnic.
"If you burn down the cabin in a fit, your can't acquit"!! right Johnny Cochrane? Oh wait, ole Johnny is still doing a slow roasting himself.
Shapiro is too busy hawking on line legal services, so that shyster wasn't up for the struggle.
Oh well, L.A. would have had a free urban renewal project at the hands of the L.A. jury pool.
Too bad, it was sorely needed.
Maybe the next cop to go bonkers will be from San Fran, so vtwin can get into the jury pool.
As the boys say at the baths," If the plug don't fit, you must acquit".
sotto voce| 2.17.13 @ 8:21PM
The couple Dorner murdered were engaged to be married. The woman was the daughter of the lawyer who represented Dorner in the police department's investigation against him. He tried to help Dorner and as thanks for his efforts his precious daughter and her fiance were methodically tracked down and murdered. Instead of celebrating a wedding, their families were forced to hold funerals. The police officers Dorner executed were both fathers of young children, one only four months old. The San Bernardino officer loved music and played the bagpipes at the funerals of other fallen officers. It's awful to think of the pain his family will feel when they hear someone else play Amazing Grace at his funeral.
Dorner's cause of death was found to be from a self-inflicted gun shot to the head, so he didn't burn to death as his morally bankrupt fans are complaining (although after his unspeakable acts, burning alive would have been an entirely suitable form of rough justice). And those same fans who think Dorner's rampage was justified because of his supposed racially-motivated mistreatment by the L.A. Police Department should know that he went on an equal opportunity killing spree: his murder victims included Blacks and Asians.
Biff| 2.18.13 @ 7:51PM
I believe the title of Pryor's third album sums up the psyche of Mr. Dorner quite nicely. Seems he's been carrying around an awful lot of baggage for far too many years. Hard to imagine when his mind actually snapped, or why. All we know is that it did, and the rest is now history.
What is truly sad are the number of idiots who rushed to offer support to this madman. I wouldn't hesitate to group his morbid followers as young (under 35), college-educated (at least partially), mind-numbingly progressive, and share an almost paranoid mistrust of established authority. In other words, the potential future of our country. America is so screwed....
Mark30339| 2.19.13 @ 4:49PM
It seems to me that someone should start advocating for removing guns from law enforcement and military types, because the Dorner case proves they can't be trusted with firearms. Isn't this just an extension of the logic that says ordinary citizens shouldn't carry weapons because they can't be trusted to keep them out of the hands of lunatics and depressed students? Perhaps advocating gun control for law enforcement will help expand appreciation for the axom: "When they outlaw donuts, only outlaws will have donuts."