Over on the Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler, DJ, who has been the resident "Loyal Opposition" for over ten years as well as contributing technical expertise to keeping the site thriving, has just announced that he has Stage III liver cancer, probably close to Stage IV. His estimate is that he has no more than a year left, unless he finds a donor organ for a transplant before hitting Stage IV, which even he admits is unlikely.

Please note that the link in the paragraph above is unlikely to be functional by the time you read this, as he has announced the intention to take the post down shortly. He has also disabled comments on the post. The reason?

Please understand as I am telling you this, I am NOT asking for your prayers or sympathy. I do not deserve either. I have known about this for about six months now, and since there have been a few of you asking after my health, I felt that I should come clean as much as I am comfortable with.

[...]

Please understand that I do NOT want your sympathy nor your prayers. I just want to be treated as I have always been. I only want to come clean and let you know that I am not going to be around too much longer.

When I read this, I have the uncomfortable feeling that DJ is selling himself short. Besides, regardless of whether he wants, or feels he "deserves," sympathy and prayers or not, he's going to get them anyway from his fellow denizens of the Rott. Including me. Because we're human beings first and foremost, no matter how far to the Right we are of his political positions.

And so I offer mine, with no Imperial Authority behind it, just one conservative geek among many raising a voice.

DJ, there is such a thing as a "Loyal Opposition." To a certain extent, we need having our beliefs and positions challenged on a regular basis, because that forces us to re-examine them, and help build them up and make them stronger. And your opposition is a lot more articulate than that of most of Ogabe's NSDWP minions, whose entire argument could be summed up in large part as "You're nothing but racist, sexist, uncivil bitter-clinger Visigoths who're being not helpful! WAAAHHHH!! MOMMYYYYYYY!!!" Don't think that goes unappreciated, as vehemently as we may argue against you. Besides which, as opposed as you are to the kind of opinions being expressed on the Rott on a daily basis, you've gone above and beyond the call of duty in keeping the site alive so that those opinions could be expressed...and, as a former manager of a virtual-community site myself, I do know something of what that entails, including things like checking in with the site while on vacation in Maui to make sure everything is copacetic. I doubt anyone could ever "replace" you in either of those two roles; they can only succeed you.

Cancer is a hell of a thing. Many of us on the Rott have gone through it, and/or had loved ones that have gone through it. For my part, my father had throat cancer back while I was in college, and has just recently been diagnosed with, and treated for, pancreatic cancer. An aunt of mine succumbed to breast cancer. My ex-wife had a hysterectomy years before I met her, due to uterine cancer. I would bet that not one of us does not at least know, on a clinical level, what happens as a result of this. We're all qualified to sympathize...and those of us who are of the sort inclined to offer prayers are not only qualified, but called upon to do so when "a member of the family" is in need. You may not believe that there's Anyone on the other end of those prayers to listen to them, and intercede on your behalf...but there may yet be. In an infinite universe, anything is possible.

In the same post, DJ has announced his intention to take a series of bike rides around the U.S. and Canada for as long as he is physically able to do so. To him, I will offer one final benediction:

May the road rise up to meet you,

May the wind be ever at your back,

May the sun shine warm upon your face and the rain fall softly on your fields,

And, until we meet again,

May God hold you in the hollow of his hand.
Old Irish blessing