1/07/2004

Do We Have To Wait Until He Kills a Few Million Jews Before We Can Say Bush Is Like Hitler?:
So, like, two out of 1500 of MoveOn.org's commercial contest entries contain images of Hitler. And Ed Gillespie and the Republican National Committee have their panties in a wad about it. Joe Scarborough was his usual smarmy fuckfaced self in mocking MoveOn and the ads (scroll down, past the Steve Irwin baby story, 'cause that's so goddamn important). The Rude Pundit is not going to list all the other conservative dickweeds who reacted in mock anger so they could discredit MoveOn.org and, by extension, George Soros.

Of course, if one doesn't want to be compared to Hitler, maybe one shouldn't act like Hitler. 'Cause, like, you know, killing Jews, while heinous, awful, beyond imagining, and everything else the ADL wants said any time Hitler is brought up, was only part of Hitler's actions. 'Cause, like, you know, if you're gonna pretend a weak, defenseless country is a threat to your homeland and then attack and occupy that country and declare it a great victory, and, shit, if you're gonna have camera crews manipulate and control situations so that your image is perfect, and, just for the hell of it, if you're gonna court the conservative Christians' community and clergy and declare certain lifestyles immoral and declare that God hisself has annointed you, well, then, if the moustache fits . . .

Fascism ain't just about killing Jews. Let's hear from an expert, like, say, Mussolini: "The foundation of Fascism is the conception of the State, its character, its duty, and its aim. Fascism conceives of the State as an absolute, in comparison with which all individuals or groups are relative, only to be conceived of in their relation to the State." And, of course, there's the corporative state, that Mussolini installed in Italy and Hitler followed - government for the wealthy corporate interests. As Trotsky says in Fascism: What It Is and How To Fight It, "It may be said that fascism is the act of placing the petty bourgoisie at the disposal of its most bitter enemies. In this way, big capital ruins the middle classes and then, with the help of hired fascist demagogues, incites the despairing petty bourgeoisie against the worker."

In other words, the deal is this: whenever anyone invokes Hitler, of course it's inflammatory, kind of like comparing Vietnam vet Max Cleland with Osama Bin Laden (or at least showing their pictures together, a la Saxby Chambliss). But instead of even beginning to address how actually fucked-up the Bush/Cheney/Ashcroft/Rumsfeld policy is and how it does serve to strip away democracy, which, horror of horrors, was actually supposed to be about how an open, free society is the best way to assure freedom and that freedoms cannot be doled out like condoms at a whorehouse, we focus on the picture of Hitler with his dirty Sanchez moustache and think, "He killed Jews. Bush doesn't kill Jews. Ergo Bush is not Hitler." And we don't remember that Hitler propped his fake successful economy on the back of an imperial war of self-defense.

You don't want your President compared to Hitler? Then stop acting like the German people of the 1930s.

(And the Rude Pundit has intentionally avoided the obvious Prescott Bush/Hitler story here - let's stay focused, people.)