"They Tried to Make Me Go to Rehab ..."

Folks like to think that they understand tragedy, but they really don't. Sure, they know it when they see it, but sometimes the greatest tragedies of our time slip right past us.

The 1994 genocide in Rwanda is as good an example as any. Sure, we knew it was happening. We just didn't care until Don Cheadle made us cry several years after it was all over. Of course, that's not to say that I supported a military intervention. I can't tell a Hutu from a Tutsi, and neither can you. That being the case, expecting a 22-year-old from Nebraska to is only likely to get him dead and further complicate foreign policy more than it already was.

Now, I'm not suggesting that Randy Travis' decision to quit drinking is as bad as the slaughter in Rwanda. I'm suggesting that it's even worse. There was absolutely nothing funny about Rwanda, but Randy's adventures over the last twelve months are among the very greatest things I've ever seen.

The "Look Heart, No Hands" singer was arrested Feb. 6 for public intoxication while sitting in his car at a Baptist church in Sanger, Texas. Travis paid a fine and was put on probation for 90 days.

Five months later, the musician was arrested for driving while intoxicated. When cops arrived on the scene, he was completely nude, with his Pontiac Trans Am crashed into several barricades off the side of the road. TMZ reported that threatened to "shoot and kill the Troopers working the case."

The early August arrest was utter nonsense, especially the "threats to shoot and kill the troopers working the case " part. I don't know how worldly you are, but those kind of threats from a naked drunk are the least serious in all of Christendom. After all, where would he hide a gun?

Seventeen days later, on Aug. 24, Travis was cited for simple assault after getting into an argument with another man outside a church in Plano, Texas. The "Diggin' Up Bones" was said to be "extremely intoxicated" when he arrived at the local hospital.

You know, it's just like the Goddamn Liberal Media to only tell half the story about the August 24 altercation. Randy says that he stepped in to protect a woman that he saw fighting with her estranged husband. Was he supposed to just ignore the situation, simply because he was falling-down drunk? According to the cops, he was.

I guess gallantry really is dead.

Most of you come here because I know how life really works. And I'm here to tell you that if you've never been found drunk and naked in the middle of the road and subsequently charged with threatening law enforcement, not only have you not had a good time, you probably don't know what a good time is!

I spent much of this summer on Twitter saying that not only is Randy Travis a hero, he might be the greatest hero of our time. He's certainly more than willing to tell the friggin' government what time it is, which I think should make him the frontrunner for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination. I like Rand Paul just fine, but I like Randy Travis a whole lot better.

But the unholy power of the state has been employed to break Travis' spirit, and it looks like it succeeded.

That's all well and good, if you're some kind of asshole. But rehab certainly doesn't look like everything it's cracked up to be. How do I know that? Glad you asked!

The convertible hit Phillip Moreno so hard that it knocked him out of his shoes and lodged him in the windshield.

As he lay dying on the hood, police said, Sherri Lynn Wilkins kept going another two miles until other motorists swarmed her car at a traffic light and grabbed her keys.

Wilkins, who was charged Tuesday with murder and driving drunk, told police she struck the man after leaving work and panicked. Police said her blood alcohol level was more than double the legal limit.

Her arrest on a street corner between home and her job as a drug and alcohol counselor seemed to be a return to a dark past that Wilkins once celebrated leaving behind. The convict and recovering addict had recently gone back to school, gotten a job and was reuniting with her family, including a new grandchild. (emphasis added)

That's all you really need to know. Drinking is fun and leads to all kinds of magical - and not infrequently, naked - harmless adventures. Sure, it annoys The Man, but it's just good, clean Texas fun!

On the other hand, if you give up the sauce, and especially if you get all evangelical and annoying about it, there's a really good chance that you'll knock a dude out his shoes and lodge him in your windshield while you keep going. That's just common sense, people.

I get that telling people the dangers of sobriety is an unpopular mission, but if I don't do it, who will? You? No, you don't have the balls! It's pretty much just me and Lindsay Lohan (and sometimes Amanda Bynes) on the frontlines of the battle between good and evil.

There are days when it seems that I'm the only one out there for people like Randy Travis. It's lonely, but it couldn't be more worthwhile.