GOP Nazi Rhetoric Continues and Backfires

David Streeter — November 9, 2009 – 11:26 am | Abusive Holocaust Rhetoric | GOP Hypocrisies | Health Care | Republicans | Stop the Smears Comments (0) Add a comment

Ever since the summer, fanatical right wing activists and politicians have used rhetorical comparisons to Nazis, Hitler, and even outright anti-Semitism to try and coerce members of congress into voting against President Barack Obama’s health insurance reform agenda. Fortunately their lies about death panels, forced euthanasia, and government tyranny did not stick, and the House of Representatives passed a health insurance reform bill over the weekend. And it appears, at least for the moment; their disgusting cavalcade of Holocaust rhetoric has backfired.

But the bill’s passage did not come without loud and sickening displays of Nazi related rhetoric. Representatives from various Holocaust rhetoric using factions, including “wing-nut” GOP activists, Tea Partiers, 9/12ers, Beck, Limbaugh, Fox News fans, and full blown right wing lunatics, converged on Washington for a second round of protests filled with signs and slogans equating Obama and his plan with Nazism and promoting anti-Semitism. Thursday’s protest spilled over into the halls of congressional office buildings, resulting in arrests. GOP Representatives who spoke, sanctioned, and encouraged the protest included: protest organizer Representative Michelle Bachman (R-MN), House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH), House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA), House Republican Conference Chairman Mike Pence (R-IN), Representative Steve King (R-IA) and Representative Virginia Foxx (R-NC). But Congressional attendance and speaking at the protest are not the worst parts of this sad chapter in American history. Rather it is the selective ignorance, or worse, that allows the presence of Holocaust rhetoric in our political discourse.

Boehner is a leading culprit. While Boehner gave his address to the mob, protestors held up signs that connected health insurance reform to the atrocities at the Dachau Concentration Camp. When asked by the press about what he saw, Boehner’s office issued a statement saying: “Leader Boehner did not see any such sign. Obviously, it would be grossly inappropriate.” The sun must have blinded Boehner because the protest was outdoors, right? Or maybe he is so set on derailing Obama’s agenda that he is blind to what his office considers “grossly inappropriate” behavior. Given the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s previous efforts to get him to stand up to blatant misuse of the Holocaust and outright anti-Semitism, he can’t claim ignorance.

However, there may be some light at the end of this very dark rhetorical tunnel. The sole Jewish Republican Congressman, Cantor, finally commented on the use of Holocaust analogies, albeit rather feebly. Cantor’s exact words were: 

“Do I condone the mention of Hitler in any discussion about politics? No, I don’t, because obviously that is something that conjures up images that frankly are not, I think, very helpful.”

Holocaust imagery is “not very helpful?” Is that all Cantor has to say?

But Cantor is not the only lackluster Jewish Republican on this issue. The Republican Jewish Coalition (RJC) has also not done nearly enough condemn the rhetoric spewing from their party—trying to obstruct Obama’s agenda seems to be a higher priority.

Nevertheless, NJDC is continually monitoring the situation and has pledged to get tough on the “epidemic” of Holocaust rhetoric. NJDC’s CEO, Ira N. Forman, and President, David A. Harris, have both weighed in the situation and it remains one of NJDC’s top priorities. Three weeks ago, Harris appeared on MSNBC’s Morning Joe and squared off with the dismissive Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski over Holocaust rhetoric. However, their confrontation further highlighted a lack of willingness by conservatives to fully confront Holocaust rhetoric. Given last week’s protest, it appears that Harris’s call, along with those of other Jewish and interfaith leaders, for an end to Holocaust rhetoric has not been heard strongly enough, prompting NJDC to take stronger measures.

Last week, Forman wrote a post on Talking Points Memo in which he promised to the GOP that NJDC would “stick it in your ear” if they do not “make it clear that anyone who uses Holocaust comparisons is not welcome under the GOP tent” and “make it clear that outright anti-Semitism has no place at any GOP event.” Forman also pledged to “take GOP Holocaust comparisons and anti-Semitic statements to the Jewish electorate and to other fair-minded American voters and paint you [GOP] as the party of bigotry and insensitivity toward the Holocaust.”

It appears though that right wing use of Holocaust rhetoric and other instances of right wing lunacy are hurting the GOP at the ballot box. Both Paul Krugman and Frank Rich wrote in The New York Times that the right wing’s misconduct, including Holocaust rhetoric and anti-Semitism, hurt the GOP in the special election for New York 23rd’s Congressional seat.

But what is most upsetting about this trend is the embarrassment that GOP Holocaust rhetoric and anti-Semitism are causing to our country. People around the world are starting to notice, including Representative Steve Israel (D-NY), Andrew Sullivan of The Atlantic, political pundits David Shuster and Alan Colmes, and a delegate to September’s G-20 summit in Pittsburgh, all of whom are shocked by the trend. But if that is not enough, author and Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel tweeted last week “on the GOP Tea Party’s anti-Semitism and Holocaust comparisons: ‘This kind of political hatred is indecent and disgusting.’”

As Harris told Politico over the weekend:

It’s not simply ‘inappropriate;’ it’s vile and disgusting. Anti-Semitic suggestions that the President of the United States takes his orders from ‘the Jews’ are despicable. The continued desecration of the memory of the Holocaust on 5x8 foot banners in front of the GOP leadership is outrageously out of bounds. It has to stop, once and for all. It is incumbent upon Representative Bachmann and the GOP leadership to rein in the Party’s base that they have been stirring up since the town hall meetings of last summer. It is not too late for the Republican Party’s House leadership to stand up and show some moral leadership when it comes to such hateful rhetoric and vile Holocaust comparisons—especially when it’s employed right in front of them.

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