I’ve been thinking about Pat Tillman’s death a lot lately. I hate that a man who saw a job that he thought needed doing and did it is now being bandied about a symbol. He was a fascinating contradiction. He was a true scholar-athlete who lived as an individual until the time came for him to join the army — the ultimate willingness to surrender your own will to a larger cause.

What angers me is watching how his name is getting used. I wonder how a man who refused to allow his action to be framed in any kind of larger context when he was alive would take to being made a symbol of all that is right in America — being called an "inspiration" by the White House.

John Scalzi posted an article from the San Francisco Chronicle that gives a different look at Tillman. It reminds us that he was a human being, not just a symbol. I tend to think that Tillman would have been proud to know Toni Smith — that he would have found in her a kindred spirit — a smart, thoughtful person with the courage of her convictions who wanted her actions to speak louder than her words — just like him. It also reminds us that he wouldn’t have thought, contrary to the spin the White House would like to put on this, that — as Bush "kept the Tillman family in his prayers," that Tillman did not believe in God, that his family didn’t believe his sacrifice made him anything but dead.

More, I have been thinking about Rick Reilly’s column from last week’s Sports Illustrated. This is what he wrote:

Pat Tillman and Todd Bates [a high school football player who was not recruited and joined the Ohio National Guard to get a college scholarship and was then killed in Iraq] were athletes and soldiers. Tillman wanted to be anonymous and became the face of this war. Bates wanted to be somebody and died faceless to most of the nation.

Both did their duty for their country, but I wonder if their country did its duty for them. Tillman died in Afghanistan, a war with no end in sight and not enough troops to finish the job. Bates died in Iraq, a war that began with no just cause and continues with no just reason.

Be proud that sports produce men like this.

But I, for one, am furious that these wars keep taking them.

I couldn’t agree more.

If the White House really does think Tillman was an inspiration, and if the President really is keeping his family in his prayers, then I wish he would consider how his policies have caused hundreds of unnecessary American deaths and thousands of Iraq and Afghani deaths. I wish he would pray for wisdom rather than arrogance. I wish he would take seriously the responsibility he has for the lives of Tillman and the thousands of men and women who serve in our armed forces.

But I don’t think that’s the kind of inspiration he was speaking of.

Too bad, because Tillman’s life — and death — deserves it.