{"id":69972,"date":"2025-09-11T10:53:40","date_gmt":"2025-09-11T14:53:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/?p=69972"},"modified":"2025-09-11T13:23:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-11T17:23:07","slug":"upon-the-death-of-charlie-kirk-the-most-truthful-statement-ive-read-about-him","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/2025\/09\/upon-the-death-of-charlie-kirk-the-most-truthful-statement-ive-read-about-him.html","title":{"rendered":"Upon the Death of Charlie Kirk<\/em><\/font>
The Most Truthful Statement I’ve Read About Him<\/strong>"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

“Because the truth matters more than the eulogies.”<\/em><\/h4>\n\n\n
\n
<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

I came across Samuel Thompson’s statement on Facebutt, where I normally don’t go. This time I’m glad I did. He must be the same Samuel I wrote about 20 years ago in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina: The Untold Story of ‘Hurricane Music’<\/a> and Keeping Up With Sam.<\/a> If he is, it doesn’t surprise me.<\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“The media wants you to believe he was some saint of free speech, cut down in his prime. They’re already sanding down the edges, turning a man who spent his career spewing bile into a martyr. But here’s the truth: Kirk wasn’t about dialogue, he was about domination. He wasn’t about protecting liberty, he was laying the rhetorical groundwork for fascism.” \u2014 Samuel Thompson<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2183,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,23,17],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-69972","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-main","8":"category-news","9":"category-political-culture","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2003\/08\/JanHerman@perch-146x1501.png","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pbvgEs-icA","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69972","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69972"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69972\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":70024,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69972\/revisions\/70024"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69972"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69972"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69972"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}