Where does it end? The crass stupidity and ignorance afoot in this country like a mutant swine flu virus run amuck. How many brains are already infected we don't know, but on the conservo side it looks like most of them - from the evidence: denying global warming imps, to the subset seeking to make it 100 times worse with the Keystone XL pipeline, to the degenerates who removed a key banking regulation that could bring on another financial crisis. And now, some mutant asshole comparing Obama to Hitler, for god's sakes!
Republican Congressman Randy Weber (R-TX) on Tuesday took the debate to reprehensibly offensive levels when he tweeted that "Even Adolph [sic] Hitler thought it more important than Obama to get to Paris. (For all the wrong reasons.) Obama couldn't do it for right reasons."
Are you kidding me? Turning Obama into Hitler (who had his storm troops INVADE Paris) because he didn't join the security nightmare mob scene in Paris to selectively mourn the Charlie Hebdo satirists who consistently poked the hornet's nest because they could? (And let's bear in mind even Pope Francis declared that while using violence in the name of religion is wrong, so is insulting others' religions.) Aren't people thinking? Haven't they seen the news of problems in the Secret Service - with four major security breaches - and the overhaul just yesterday by Assistant Director Joseph Clancy in replacing four high officials? Imagine the nightmare scene had Obama stood with freakin' millions in gay Paree with these security vulnerabilities. See also:
Let's get this clear: whatever your take is on the Charlie Hebdo incident and attack, the jaw-dropping insult from a sitting member of Congress was unconscionable. Further, it can only really be understood when you realize that the conservative media in America have been wallowing in that kind of mindless garbage for most of Obama's time in office. (UPDATED: Weber has since apologized as he should)
Freely engaging in the kind of rhetorical bomb-throwing that had previously been seen and heard on the far fringes of American politics, mainstream conservative commentators have embraced the Obama-is-just-like-Hitler narrative and have proudly paraded it around for years, either oblivious to, or unconcerned with, the offensive implications. In previous blog posts I have noted many outbursts of this Hitler - malarkey, including some clueless folks posting repugnant images such as:
Wallowing in self-pity and convinced of the dark forces moving against them, conservatives launch attack after attack, insisting they're fighting forces at home akin to Hitler's Nazi storm troops. They complain louder and louder that America has become like Nazi Germany under Adolf Hitler when 6 million Jews were murdered during the Holocaust.
This country's perception of "free speech" has now been so badly fucked that something as innocuous as a debate over Obama's scheduling is met with a Republican Hitler-based denunciation. This is a mark of insanity and intemperance - which would be bad enough among the bigot punditry like Limbaugh and Hannity - but is inexcusable coming from a lawmaker. (In Germany such comparisons would earn the guy 3 years at hard labor)
But sad to say, this kind of rhetorical bomb throwing has been a mark of conservative shame throughout the president's tenure. Let's also recall that Fox News chief Roger Ailes accused the management of National Public Radio of having "a kind of Nazi attitude" when it fired commentator Juan Williams. Then we beheld how the former Fox host Glenn Beck immersed himself in odious Hitler rhetoric during Obama's first years in office, while the then-burgeoning Tea Party movement did the same, and so did Rush Limbaugh. The latter pig obsessed over Obama-Nazi comparisons in 2009:
"Adolf Hitler, like Barack Obama, also ruled by dictate." Limbaugh thought it was "fabulous and fantastic and hilarious that a women shows up at a Barney Frank town hall meeting with an Obama-as-Hitler poster and the Nazi stuff."
Note that none of these assholes have likely ever been to Germany or actually spoken to real Germans that fought in WWII - including in the Wehrmacht under Hitler - as I have. So they don't have a damned clue what they are yapping about, other than from comic books. See e.g.
Then, last year, billionaire venture capitalist Tom Perkins submitted a Wall Street Journal letter to the editor hyping an alleged "progressive war on the American one percent" and compared it to Nazi Germany's anti-Jewish riots. (WSJeditors, a Fox analyst, and Michelle Malkin all defended Perkins from the criticism he received following the distasteful
And I've already bashed this fool elitist for that outburst, e.g
http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2014/01/tom-perkins-another-whiny-rich-asshole.html
http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2014/01/tom-perkins-another-whiny-rich-asshole.html
Then there was cornpone moron Mike Huckabee who likened abortion to the methodical extermination of the Jewish population in Germany under Hitler. This jerk not even conscious that one mandate under the Reich laws of Hitler was forced abortions, mainly of Jewish women and forced births demanded of "Aryan" women - or dispatch to the camps.
More recently, the latter day Fox News contributing numbskull Dr. Ben Carson claimed America is "very much like Nazi Germany" in that it has a government "using its tools to intimidate the population." Clearly this jerkoff who calls himself a doctor has no clue - not one - of the level of intimidation in Nazi Germany in the late 30s, early 40s, when neighbor regularly spied on neighbor and people's doors were broken down in the middle of the night by Gestapo agents - taken to hidden locations - and forced to endure rectal rehydration, genital mutilation and whipping until they expired. Those that didn't were dispatched to Nazi concentration camps. Don't take my word! DO your own research, including getting hold of the book, 'The Holocaust: A History of the Jews of Europe During The Second World War', by Martin Gilbert.
Carson, who was actually expected to mount a presidential campaign, recently defended his ignorant comments:
"I know you're not supposed to say 'Nazi Germany.' But I don't care about political correctness," suggesting additional Hitler rhetoric could be a cornerstone of Carson's upcoming campaign.
But it isn't a case of "political correctness" as this imbecile claims, but of getting historical facts correct. Sadly, assholes like Carson, Beck, Huckabee, Limbaugh and others get away with their BS because for too many 'Muricans the 2nd World War is like ancient history - and most haven't read one single serious monograph on the Nazis, the Third Reich, Hitler himself - far less actually gone to Germany and spoken to the people who lived at the time.
For years, the Anti-Defamation League(ADL) has been grappling with the mainstreaming of Hitler rhetoric especially in the punditry and the political class (namely American conservatives) - which ought to know better.
Last year the ADL again tried to raise a red flag, declaring, "The six million Jewish victims and millions of other victims of Hitler deserve better. Their deaths should not be used for political points or sloganeering. This type of comparison diminishes and trivializes the Holocaust."
But do these toads care? Hell no! They will continue to spout their ignorance and rhetorical bombs against Obama so long as they know their main audience is woefully ignorant of the facts of history. This is why they can exploit it!
See the Pope's take on the limits to free expression here:
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/19f31342-9cb6-11e4-a730-00144feabdc0.html#axzz3OuY6oOIM
See also:
http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/19f31342-9cb6-11e4-a730-00144feabdc0.html#axzz3OuY6oOIM
See also:
No comments:
Post a Comment