Image of Obama as Hitler on a Gun whacko’s blog, which uses assorted false comparisons of Obama’s administration to the Third Reich to stir up fear and frenzy.
The free floating hysteria now sweeping the nation is almost too much to process. In the wake of the Newtown massacre and the proposal of some modest, common sense gun control by Obama, gun nut Amerikka is freaking out to a far thee well. Guns are flying off the shelves even as the Colorado Bureau of Investigations in our state barely have the manpower to keep pace with background checks. In the wake of this there exists an irrational fear that Obama is somehow planning to take away guns as “he always planned”. Hence, the images such as that shown which compares Obama to Hitler, although the gun nut bozo who put it up has zero clue what Hitler did and has never been to Germany in his life.
I have, and have actually discussed at length what went on in Nazi Germany with REAL Germans who fought during the Second World War. See, e.g. my blog of Sept. 30, 2010. Among the canards dismissed in assorted visits to Germany (Bielefeld, Dissen, Frankfurt, Hemsbach) :
1) The Nazis “took away people’s guns". IN fact, as former Hitler Youth Kurt Braun reiterated when we visited him in 1985, gun ownership was a non-starter. Most of the German populace at the time never owned even one (there’s no 2nd Amendment in Deutschland which may also surprise gun nuts). Even today gun ownership is amongst the lowest in the world with 30.3 per 100 people in Germany, whereas in the U.S. it’s 88.2.
2) The Nazis "forced women to have abortions". Another nutty idea, since in fact under the Reich laws a German woman could be sent to the camps for HAVING an abortion! Hitler fervently demanded as many births as possible to serve as future German soldiers. To have an abortion was therefore a crime against the state.
3) The Nazis "forced universal health care on Germans". Another screwball trope that’s been spread by assorted whacko anti-Obama –ites with their other BS. In fact, the only people with full access to any health care had to be members of the Nazi party. Others (e.g. Jews, Gypsies) either had to rely for assistance on their own physicians (in the case of the Jews) or on folk medicinal cures (in the case of Gypsies, Slavs). Once Reich laws were passed, and Jewish physicians were forced into hiding then it became almost impossible for German Jews to get health care.
4) The Nazis were “Socialists” and "dissolved all banks". This circulated canard discloses either the low I.Q. of claimants or their abysmal lack of history knowledge or both. In fact, the Nazis, specifically their early set of gangsters- the S.A. (before they were purged and replaced by the S.S.) ruthlessly persecuted socialists as well as communists. Hitler, in fact, believed both to be Jews and he wanted all Jews exterminated as Untermenschen.. Meanwhile, the German Banks applauded the rabid persecution of ALL Leftists whether communists or socialists. German banks, indeed, made possible the massive funding of Hitler’s war machine by repeated infusions of capital. American companies, including FORD, assisted in this. (Source: ‘The Life And Death of Adolf Hitler’, by Robert Payne). Meanwhile, George Prescott Bush – yeah, the grandpa of Dumbya- expedited the investments needed by the Third Reich, to fuel their munitions factories, the Luftwaffe, and the Panzer tanks used by the Wehrmacht.
All of the above are cited to show the degree to which the blogs of gun maniac whackos lie their asses off by employing associative lies (i.e. if they can get Americans to believe the lie that Obama = Hitler and Hitler was a “socialist” they can get them to buy into the bullcrap that he wants to take away their guns “like Hitler”)). The fact is, as Rachel Maddow disclosed two nights ago, Americans support banning high magazine clips by nearly 54%, while they support universal background checks by nearly 94%. Meanwhile, none of Obama’s executive orders (not “executive actions” – which are murders of heads of state) are in any way aggressive and I already went over them in detail, e.g. http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2013/01/el-rushbo-gun-nuts-go-whacka-doodle.html
Other lies the Right’s gun nut whackos have manufactured have to do with the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, i.e. “Obamacare”. The right-wing Noise Machine cranked up its pseudo- indignation because the Obama administration wants to make sure health care professional are allowed to communicate with their patients about guns and gun safety. (Well uh duh! The Rightists have no problem demanding drs. communicate with women concerning impending abortion procedures, which is by far a greater personal freedom issue!)
In other words, the right-wing Noise Machine is furious that the White House is treating gun violence, in part, as a health care issue when it transparently is one. Fact: The United States' life expectancy rate is is far lower than most other affluent countries, in part because of our rate of gun violence far outpaces those other countries.
Meanwhile, taxpayers spend billions each year paying health care costs to treat gunshot victims, the strong majority of whom, research indicates, are uninsured. Taxpayers spend even more money covering societal costs, such as long-term psychological problems, disability, and the loss of productivity suffered by approximately 70,000 Americans who suffer non-fatal gun shot wounds annually.
Following the school gun massacre in Newtown, Conn. last month, Bloomberg News reported:
The cost of U.S. gun violence in work lost, medical care, insurance, criminal-justice expenses and pain and suffering amounted to as much as $174 billion in 2010, according to data compiled by the Pacific Institute for Research and Evaluation in Calverton , Maryland
That averages out to more than $644 in costs for every gun owned in America. As economist Ted Miller, the Institute's principal research scientist, told Bloomberg, "Gun ownership is like smoking, an expensive and dangerous habit."
A 2005 study of hospital charges for firearm injuries in Pennsylvania found that the average charge for inpatient hospitalization due to firearm injuries was $30,814. That figure was more than double what gunshot injuries cost hospitals between 1996-1998. Meanwhile, Caleb Haney is still paying for his head injury hospital costs (est. $2 million) after being one of those wounded in the Aurora massacre. Any of these gun nuts care to help him out? Maybe donate $1,300 for his medical bills instead of buying a new .223 Bushmaster? Didn't think so!
Meanwhile, an in-depth investigation on gunshot violence by the Milwaukee Journal in 2006 reported that the average bill for a shooting patient treated at the city's Froedtert Hospital was $38,000. For gunshot victims who suffered spinal damage, the bill regularly reached six figures.
So yes, gun violence is America represents an epic and costly health care problem, which is why it makes sense to include health care providers in any comprehensive attempt to combat the crisis. Meanwhile, the far-right allegation that Obama now requires physicians to press patients about gun use represents a complete fabrication. So was Rush Limbaugh's claim that Obama's trying to turn doctors into "snitches," and Lou Dobbs' fearmongering about the president turning doctors into "an agent of the federal government."
The right-wing freak-out is built around the fake premise of, how dare Obama recruit doctors to fight his war on gun violence. (See e.g. Drudge Report headline: "War on Crazy: Obama Deputizes Doctors") That may be a conservative attempt to keep the gun debate focused on the issue of gun rights and the Second Amendment and away from the catastrophic, real-life costs that gun violence registers each year.
However, the right-wing media's baseless assertion ignores the obvious fact that the health care industry in this country -- doctors, hospitals, emergency rooms, mental health centers -remains inundated with gunshot wounds daily and deals with the life-changing crisis all the time. (Nearly 300 people are shot everyday in America
But the gun nuts want none of this. They won’t even concede the need to ban high capacity magazines. (Or as the fruitcake nutso who put up the Obama =“Hitler” image put it, “If I wanted to I could make my own high clip magazine as we were taught to do in the Marines, using ‘banana clips’. Not that I’d do it, heh, heh, heh”) Yeah, right! Well, how about we ban all freelance high capacity clips too, and anyone found with a banana clip gets a one -way ticket to Komodo Island, where he can make his peace with the Komodo dragons!
If gun-crazed whackos won’t help themselves using common sense, to get on board in terms of sane firearms regulations including banning high magazine clips, we need to do it for them!
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