Posted on 09/06/2006 11:47:23 PM PDT by Aussie Dasher
CROCODILE Hunter Steve Irwin's family say they have formally declined a state funeral and will hold a private service within the next seven days.
Irwin's father Robert Irwin today also said a memorial service would be held in honour of his son within the next two weeks at an undecided location.
Mr Irwin said the family had decided to hold a private funeral for family and close friends only.
On behalf of the grief-stricken Irwin family, Mr Irwin read the details from a written statement to a media throng outside the family's wildlife park Australia Zoo on Queensland's Sunshine Coast.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.com.au ...
I understand your point of view. But I completely disagree. I don't care who the deceased president was. If he (or she) was the president of the United States they are entitled to the full ceremony of a state funeral. My reason is the same one I gave ten years ago when I was in the Navy. I was asked by someone who knew of my intense dislike for Mr. Clinton what I would do if I was in uniform and he walked into the room. I replied that I would pop to attention and call attention on deck and give the sharpest salute of my life. It has nothing to do with the man. It's respect for the office. I saluted a lot of officers I thought were a waste of sperm. But you salute the rank. Not the man holding it.
The very idea of state funerals for Clinton and Carter is revolting.
There were Dems who said the same thing about Reagan. At some point you need to set politics aside and do the right thing out of respect for the office. Otherwise we are in trouble. Bill was a slimeball. But he was a slimeball that we as a country twice elected president.
Especially the children...as a friend said, this may be the first person they "know" who has died.
A ceremony would help them with that.
And we have Ross Bloody Perot to thank for it!
not going to happen,
but if it would have...
the body would lie in state
in Westminster Abbey,
or what?
Another flake if ever there was one.
As an Australian, I happen to agree with you. Australia gives out state funerals way too easily nowadays and I personally disagree with it. Irwin is more deserving than many who have been offered them, but I personally don't think he reached the standards required.
We had one last week for a former politician named Don Chipp - a former Cabinet Minister who served his country in various ways for over forty years, including founding his own political party based on his strong moral beliefs. I didn't object to him having a State Funeral, but he was absolutely at the lowest end of the scale for which I think they are appropriate. I don't mind them being more common here than in the US or the UK - but today they are just way too common.
And quite a few people feel the same way.
There are degrees of state funerals, and if they renamed them I'd have less of a problem with it.
Did you think Bob Santamaria deserved his?
May God's love be felt by Mrs. Irwin and His protection extend to Steve's little ones.
You are aware that other countries have varying customs and protocols? Steve Irwin was an internationally renown Australian--for some, he could be more known than John Howard.
Yes. It's been pointed out to me that "State Funerals" in Australia are given out to large numbers of people.
It would have been difficult to get the crocodile to walk straight down the streets of the capitol all saddled up with Steve's empty boots in the stirrups, anyway. (And I think it'd make me tear up big time.)
I'm going to miss him like I still miss St. Louis's old "Mutual of Omaha's 'Wild Kingdom'" man Dana Brown.
I'd rather give someone like Irwin a state funeral then most Presidents or Prime Ministers.
Yes, as it happens, I did - I see him as on about the same level as Don Chipp.
I reckon he contributed considerably more to Australia than Chipp. Never held public office, of course, but what a man!
BTW, it was a wonderful funeral.
Steve Irwin is very deserving of a state funurel. You just don't seem to know a lot about him or things that he has done.
In Carter's case, I'll be throwing a party. :)
Yeah that`s true. I think that is what saved Clintons arse a lot as well was that office. I mean they could have probably charged this guy with enough to lock him away for life, but then on the other end of the scale, you risk harming the office, making it a joke. Either way, the guy was just the ultimate pig. Like my father said, Clinton is the only President he ever saw appear in the Oval office in gym shorts. Take someone like Reagan who constantly wore a suit. Well thank God the SOB is out and he didn`t totally bring down the White House, although it seemed he wanted to once he left office with that trashing.
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