President Trump’s method in some of his madness is to restore and reinforce the core American values that have been eroded, corrupted and in some cases denied by the ethics and cultural rot wreaked by the Far Left’s capture of our national institutions. The motives deserve applause, but his execution in many cases, like his “National Garden of American Heroes” obsession, is often hopelessly flawed. I’m being too nice: the theory that it is possible to create a fair and historically valid list of “American heroes” is, as Sidney Wang (Peter Sellers) so sagely remarks above, is stupid, and ultimately harmful.
The latest plans for the monstrosity include reflecting pools, dining facilities and an amphitheater alongside 250 life-size statues of notable Americans. It will require a significant redevelopment of West Potomac Park in D.C., and the statues alone could cost more than the $40 million approved for the project by Congress. But never mind all that: the fact is unavoidable that choosing just 250 Americans to be honored as “heroes” guarantees exorbitant praise for some prominent Americans and unjust exclusion for others. There are probably thousands of American lives that meet the Ethics Alarms criteria for the public to have a “duty to remember” them. Furthermore, perhaps reflecting President Trump’s limited public vocabulary, not all important and productive Americans qualify as heroes, and not all American heroes had much effect on the country and its history. Is the proposed “garden” intended to honor character, achievements, or both? Finally, the choices of who to honor in such a project will be distorted by bias and politics. In fact, that has already occurred.
The list of 250 that has been published confirms all of these fears; indeed, its even worse than I expected. Here are the current proposed “heroes” by category; the list is introduced as being categorized by their primary contributions to our national story, representing “the tapestry of American greatness, men and women who, through faith, courage, and hard work, built the United States into a beacon of hope and industry.”
Right.
I’ll comment after each section.
Ethics Alarms 
“Jeannette Rankin”
Seriously, aside from her being a historic first, her only accomplishments of note are casting no votes for the U.S. entry into both WWI and WWII. Both votes cost her her congressional seat.
With all due respect; how could “both” of those votes cost her her seat? It seems to me that the latter one would be the one that cost her her seat.
This will all boil down to what definition they choose to use for the word “hero”.
Personally I think our culture has been bastardizing the definition of hero for quite some time now and conflating it with other terms like role model. Yes a hero could be a role model, often they are; however, a role model isn’t necessarily a hero. This bastardization has thoroughly cheapened the value of the word hero because people now seem to apply it to whatever the hell they want.
Here is a simple definition…
HERO: someone who shows great bravery, often risking their life (or in the 21st century they knowingly risk massive social canceling, active and persistent persecution, that could destroy most or all aspects of their life) for the common good.
In my opinion; anything beyond that is a bastardization.
Here’s a few early 21st century prominent people that could be defined as heroes, as defined above; Charlie Kirk, Alan Dershowitz, Donald Trump, J.K. Rowling, and maybe even Ben Shapiro. Yes I know most of those are conservatives, feel free to specifically list some Liberals or progressives that you think might fit the definition. Remember, you don’t have to agree with their public position or their public action for them to fit the definition.
I definitely don’t trust President Trump to choose 250 heroes for this proposed memorial.