Okay, here's the one reason why you shouldn't compare Bush to Hitler

[Dave Sund]

It trivializes a lot of things. And a lot of those things shouldn't be overlooked. Like the senseless slaughter of millions upon millions of innocent people. As much as we all hate Bush, Hitler is quite possibly the closest thing this world has ever seen to pure evil.

If that's really not enough for you (and it should be), then think of this:

It trivializes Bush. Instead of laying out a well-reasoned argument as to why Bush is a criminal and liar, a thief, a murderer, and sending this country down a dangerous path, you resort to the lowest common denominator. You turn your entire argument into a joke. MoveOn is still unjustifiably viewed in an unfavorable light because one submission contained a Hitler reference.

So, yeah. Give me all the comparisons, bring me all the reasons why you think they should be called such. Just because I want to tell all those right-wing pigs to fuck off doesn't mean I'm going to say it in those words.

[jobycom]

1. Hitler wasn't Hitler, either. If someone had awakened the world to him

before he became the full-blown Hitler of legend, the world would be a better place.

Bush is the same guy. Bush is just as evil as Hitler, and will achieve Hitler's numbers if given the chance. He has nukes, and one of his first actions as president was to circulate a memo justifying using those nukes in first strikes against seven nations, including Iran and North Korea. Listen to his supporters, they want Bush to use them. Listen to Bush--he wants to be remembered, and he doesn't care how. He told a reporter in 99 that he would love the chance to go to war because it would solidify his place in history.

Bush is making a lot of noise about Iran and North Korea, and now and then about China, but he doesn't have the troops to pull off attacks on those countries. But he has nukes.

You know Bush wants to use them. You know he lies awake at night dreaming up scenarios in which he can use them.

If we don't wake people up to the comparison between Bush and Hitler, Bush will make Hitler look like a pixie.

So I'll continue to make the comparison. It's all too accurate.

[Dave Sund]

3. The comparison trivializes the situation

Too many people throw around Hitler comparisons that anyone who does so is immediately seen as a joke. And any further discussion of the issue is lost in the comparison.

No one will listen if we keep saying it. It will become background noise, ignored. Our better course of action is to notify people of the actual crimes of this administration, and not distract people with inflammatory rhetoric. Comparing Bush to Hitler looks like name-calling. We have far better insults to use for these assholes. For God's sake, let's use better rhetoric.

[jobycom]

10. Do both

Call him Hitler, back it up with facts. The name gets a reaction, the facts open the eyes.

The comparison is completely valid, down to the buzzwords the two dictators used to justify their invasions. Terrorists, liberate, freedom, they will welcome us. It's the same guy, and calling Bush what he is doesn't trivialize anything. What worries me is when people are afraid to attack Bush where he lives because they are afraid people will frown at them.

Endure the frowns, proclaim the truth. Bush hates the comparison, which is why they are so quick to attack us when we make it. If it was trivial , Bush and Rove wouldn't care.

[Dave Sund]

15. The facts are completely ignored

If you call him Hitler, everything else you say will be completely overshadowed by that. Period. You'll be completely ignored. A logical look at it would tell you that. Hitler comparisons have become synonymous with the internet and childish dialogue.

Like I said, I may want to tell all those assholes to fuck off and die, but I realize that if I do so, I'll never convince anyone that I'm right. Because I'll look like the asshole.

[jobycom]

18. And you would be the asshole for saying it, but what you are saying

is that empty namecalling is bad. True. When I call bush Hitler, I back it up with facts, not more namecalling.

You're under the mistaken impression that I just don't get what you are saying. i get it. It's just wrong. Now, look at what I'm saying as completely as I looked at what you said. When you make the comparison of Bush to Hitler, and back it up with arguments proving the point you are making, people don't tune you out, they get involved in trying to prove you wrong. If you have the facts, they can't do that, and in the process of trying, they hear what you are saying, and it makes them question what they know.

That's what we want. When we just start reciting facts (DSM, Yellow Cake, no WMDs, whatever) they immediately think "Old news" and tune you out. You have to jolt their minds open, or they won't open. Hitler is good jolt. I've had a lot of success with the bastard.

[Dave Sund]

19. What I was trying to get at

And maybe I didn't do a good enough job of it, was that calling him Hitler is so cliche now, that it sounds like empty namecalling. And a lot of the "comparisons" I've seen take a ton of liberties with the story.

[jobycom]

24. Yes, as I've said, I get that.

you explained it fine in your OP. You don't seem to have responded to my points, though.

And frankly, I don't even think the empty namecalling is fruitless. I think if people here that comparison made enough times, even without a strong argument to back it up, it begins to stick with them. They may not agree, but it does. Most of us Democrats who supported Clinton all through the impeachment will now and then drop a racy joke about blue dresses, lying, or whatever, because even if we don't agree the issue was serious, it's become such a part of his identity that even we make the comparison.

Bush is Hitler. I will shout that every time I get the chance, because if people hear it enough, even if they don't agree, they will remember how many other people made the comparison. It will stick. And it should stick. That comparison should never go away, lest Bush gets the chance to compile the number as well as the type of atrocities Hitler had committed.

Don't forget, at Hitler's five year mark he was just getting started, too.

[mtnsnake]

26. Well said, jobycom.

Until someone proves that Bush is NOT like Hitler, let the comparisons continue!

[Karenina]

38. NEVER AGAIN

means NEVER AGAIN to ME. So as I see it HAPPENING AGAIN I SCREAM TO THE ROOFTOPS, IT IS HAPPENING AGAIN! IT IS HAPPENING AGAIN! Although I understand the emotional rejection of the comparison, it is based on ego rather than truth. The NAZIS that have seized the American government have the technological advances at their fingertips to DWARF Hitler's profanities. How many WALKING DEAD in Iraq? You know, those ones poisoned by the Ami "gift" that keeps on giving, who will slowly and painfully expire??? Oh, I forgot. THEY don't get COUNTED...



See my post #36 for links facts SUBSTANTIATING the contention.

[Lefergus70]

41. That's what I tell my wife, but in public...

I don't use the Hitler or Nazi comparisons because I'm aware that a lot of people automatically reject any argument that includes them. Semantics is crucial in the U.S. today; that is why Karl Rove has been able to take a complete numbskull and make him governor, then president - just tuning the language. Remember, Reagan put liberals on the defensive just by saying they were, well, "liberals".

That said, general terms are wide open on the accelerating path to impeachment: liar, deceiver, mass murderer, incompetent - the list is long and even Rove's marketing ploys can't defuse their force.

[HockeyMom]

6. Having spent many an hour talking to the two Germans I knew

who fled the Nazis, I agree with you. People do not realize that Hitler did not gain complete control in one fell swoop. He started doing things one step at a time. First, this freedom went, then that, on and on. The foundation had to be put into place first so that the majority of the people who opposed him had no power left to do anything about it.

Without getting into specifics, that is the gist of what those Germans told me about life under the Nazis.

[jwirr]

22. I would agree that we lose some of the audience

when we blatantly call bushie a Hitler, but I will also say that I do know the history of Hitler's rise and fall and many incidents in the rise of the present power system reminded me so strongly of this that I went into the net to find sites that detailed the Nazi rise. When I was through I was even more convinced that there are many similarities. That does not mean that bushie is as successful at it as Hitler was or even that they have the same methods/goals in mind. The two men are different. I personally think that someone running the show for bushie is a student of Nazi history and sees these methods as a way to take control and uses them.

[jobycom]

Karl Rove

ROve is a history lover, and consciously models his candidates on historical precedences. He modeled Bush's 2000 campaign and image on William McKinley, for instance. Here in Texas he tried twice to set up scandals that mimiced Watergate and Reagan's stolen debate notes.

He is consciouly mimicing Hitler's speeches, his excuses for invading, his handling of his opponents, etc. The misdirection he uses whenever he is attacked is classic Nazi technique.

There are even murky issues that raise some people's gaurd. 9-11 mirrors the burning of the Reichstag so closely that some people wonder if Rove brought about 9-11 for the same reasons, either LIHOP or MIHOP or a milder version of LIHOP. The anthrax attacks are scary, too. Hitler gained power by having enough members of the opposition party murdered to gain control. In the days after 9-11, exactly two US Senators were targeted by anthrax. If one of those attacks had succeeded, the Senate would have been turned back over to Rove's party.

I'm not accusing him, but I won't say I don't wonder.

[Igel]

12. If people wanted to claim

"Bush is going to be as bad as Hitler," I'd support their right to the comparison.

Or "Gitmo could turn into something as bad as the GULags." Possibly a fine comparison.

Both of them assert a possibility, an opinion, without asserting present-day equivalence.

But then, neither has the punch. Because it's precisely possibility and opinion that are made explicit.

[kodi]

28. it should be noted that unlike Bush, Hitler was a self-made man, and vet

yet both share common traits; delusions of grandeur, lack of empathy, and bloodlust.

Bush isn't worse yet, but give the son of a bitch more time and he might get us all killed.

[jobycom]

29. True enough

Though I would rather swallow my tongue than praise Hitler even in that minor way.

Interesting thing, though. You know who historians calculate killed the largest percentage of the earth's population? Not Hitler. Ghenkis Khan. His standard approach was to besiege a city, and offer the citizens their lives if they would surrender. If they did, he would usually require tribute from the city, take a few slaves, and ride away. If they refused, he would wait them out, then offer them whatever terms they asked to surrender. When they surrendered, he would break his agreement and kill every last one of them, man, woman and child--except those he found useful, whom he would enslave. After he conquered Baghdad, travelers for weeks afterwards would describe the clouds over the city as they approached. When they got closer, they realized the clouds were the flies eating the dead.

Nowadays, Ghenkis Kahn gets played sympathetically (but poorly) by John Wayne, and people don't remember him as a monster. Hitler's reputation, sadly, will soften, too.

Though not while I'm alive, if anyone pays any attention to me.

[kodi]

32. Ghengis Khan was the most important figure of the 2nd millennium CE

he set in motion the entire world.

there is another film about him, starring omar shareff as khan.

[jobycom]

33. That's debatable

But I have actually taken that position many times, myself. :-)

[mtnsnake]

2. You shouldn't let Republicans push you around.

And that's what's happening if you're upset that "they" might find it in poor taste if someone makes derogatory comparisons about Bush.

[Dave Sund]

7. You're missing the point

Calling him Hitler causes everyone to ignore what's really going on and focus on the Hitler part. They won't look at what crimes were actually committed. The outrage won't be directed at Bush, but at us. There's a better way to go about it. Talk about the crimes, don't resort to namecalling.

I've been guilty of throwing around the "fascist pig" label a few times. And sometimes it's justified. But in trying to convince others to open their eyes to what's going on, we can lose the namecalling and focus on what's actually happening. I don't think that's unreasonable, do you?

[mtnsnake]

13. Just the fact that you bring this topic up, it invites the comparisons

even more, because it gets everyone thinking - is he or isn't he like him?

In his own way, Bush is even scarier, because he's going about his way in sneaky little steps, letting others do his dirty work for him along the way. Hitler was way more obvious.

When Clinton was getting slandered as everything under the sun, I don't remember anyone from their side advising for their people to stop the name calling.

I honestly don't know if Bush is really like Hitler or not, but I for one don't mind anyone making the comparison. It is an arguable subject, is it not?

[jobycom]

14. I see your point, I just think it's wrong.

Comparing Bush to Hitler isn't namecalling. It opens up a window of opportunity. You tell someone Bush is Hitler, they look at you with cynicism and tell you to prove it. It gives you a chance to lay out what he's done. It's worked well for me. If you just start reciting facts, those facts are so against what people have heard from the media that they don't even notice. You have to jar their attention somehow, open their minds to listen. They listen, if only to prove you wrong. That's when you make sure you have the facts, and they can't prove you wrong. It gets people to thinking.

I've had friends come back to me two weeks after such a discussion to ask me more about Bush. Once they realize that I am serious about the comparison, it nags at them. They begin to question how they know what they think they know. It opens them up.

It's not namecalling, it's a comparison.

[camby]

4. I think it was Wesley Clark who said last week on Fox

that the first person who uses the word "nazi" to refer to its political opponents -- loses. The Nazi and Hitler comparisons have been used by both sides, and all it does is give the opposing side justification to make accusations of irrationality and bias.

[dweller]

5. yeah...whatever.

http://www.amics21.com/911/fasano.html

dp

[Lone_Wolf_Moderate]

8. I say we put a moratorium on all Hitler analogies.

The fact is, Bush is not Hitler. The soldiers at Gitmo are not Nazis (not that Dick Durbin actually said they were), Iraq is not a Holocaust, and Gitmo is not a gulag. The Nazi/Stalin/Pol Pot analogies trivialize the debate, and force the debate out of the bounds of reason.

[mtnsnake]

25. Wow, I'm glad you feel so warm and fuzzy about things! n/t

[dbeach]

9. National Archives show prescott bush had nazi dealings..

maybe where the bush/nazi comparisons began..??

It just makes me wonder about this over privleged and underinvestigated family??

beneath every bush is dirt.


http://www.nhgazette.com/cgi-bin/NHGstore.cgi?user_action=detail&catalogno=NN_Bush_Nazi_2

“Bush - Nazi Dealings Continued Until 1951” - Federal Documents
By John Buchanan and Stacey Michael
from The New Hampshire Gazette Vol. 248, No. 3, November 7, 2003

After the seizures in late 1942 of five U.S. enterprises he managed on behalf of Nazi industrialist Fritz Thyssen, Prescott Bush, the grandfather of President George W. Bush, failed to divest himself of more than a dozen "enemy national" relationships that continued until as late as 1951, newly-discovered U.S. government documents reveal.

Furthermore, the records show that Bush and his colleagues routinely attempted to conceal their activities from government investigators.

Bush's partners in the secret web of Thyssen-controlled ventures included former New York Governor W. Averell Harriman and his younger brother, E. Roland Harriman. Their quarter-century of Nazi financial transactions, from 1924-1951, were conducted by the New York private banking firm, Brown Brothers Harriman."

[Dave Sund]

11. It's funny how some of you are so tied up in the rhetoric

That you miss the point of what's said.

Hypothetical conversation #1: (Based on many discussions at this board and others)
"Bush is terrible! He's Hitler!"
"No he isn't. You're only making yourself look foolish by resorting to such a comparison."
"You don't think Bush is dangerous! You're a neocon!"


Hypothetical conversation #2: (Based on MANY discussions at this board and others)
"No Democrat is pro-abortion"
"Howard Dean is anti-choice!"
"What he's trying to say is that we need to change how we talk about being pro-choice."
"No he's not, he's selling our women's rights!"

And so on. Those of you who have been here longer than me know this already.

[jobycom]

16. It's funny how you are so sure your opinion is absolute

that you miss what others have said.

We can trade barbs like that all night. The fact that this thread is gaining this much attention tells you all you need to know, though. The comparison is very effective at opening dialogue, and since we have the facts on our side, we shouldn't be afraid of dialogue.

[Dave Sund]

17. Oh, yes, it sparks debate

But not the type of debate we want to spark. Particularly not on the national level. They go on the attack with misdirection, and we fall for it. Maybe you're right, maybe if they stuck to their guns and kept with the comparison it could open some eyes. But we don't have any people who would do that.

I just don't see the need for over-the-top rhetoric, particularly a comparison as played-out as Hitler. A lot of people have become desensitized to Hitler references in the era of the internet, that they just shut off.

I'm all for a bit of artistic license, but the Hitler references have become a little cliche, no?

[jobycom]

21. I don't consider it over-the-top rhetoric, I consider it an accurate

historical comparison, and an historical warning. True, it sends the Repubs off into tangents. Just back up what you say, though, and you expose their misdirections for what they are. You make the comparison, they respond with a "How dare you?" statement, and you follow up with "I dare because it's true, and here's why." If your point is valid, they can't leave it hanging, they have to respond, and then you're in.

[dbeach]

20. silence works for the busheviks...

it sure seems to me at this stage in amerika that this is a comfy form of fascism with just a light dose of fear thrown in to keep the peasants confused...

But this could change fast..tommy franks said of the next terrorits attack could bring on martial law...

its bout the privlege..SOS for hundreds of yrs..the elites soften us up and then slam us...

55 million died in WW II

..what next??

[KalicoKitty]

23. The parallells between Bush and Hitler are so similar.

The way Hitler started out....


Patriot Act II - Final Piece Of Police State Puzzle
The Bush administration's allies in Congress, led by J. Dennis Hastert of Illinois, the speaker of the House, have launched another assault on constitutionally protected civil liberties with a bill many are calling Patriot Act II (PA II). However, it is not to be confused with the 2003 version of Patriot Act II. But according to the Associated Press, in a draft of the House GOP legislation, many of the provisions are similar to the draft copy of the "Domestic Security Enhancement Act of 2003" that leaked out of the Justice Department in January 2003.

Many Democrats and civil libertarians charge the new PA II authorizes heavy-handed infringements on civil liberties. House Democratic leaders and civil liberties advocates said on Sept. 22 that the Republican bill ostensibly responding to the findings of the 9-11 commission would go well beyond the panel's recommendations. It would call for broad new powers for law enforcement agencies, they said, and would include new authority to conduct electronic surveillance in terrorism investigations. Among the provisions, said AP, are measures on the deportation of aliens who are suspected of being linked to foreign revolutionary groups which have been labeled as terrorists, mandatory pretrial detention for terrorism suspects, warrants against non-citizens even when a target can't be tied to a foreign power and enhanced penalties for threats or attempts to use chemical or nuclear weapons.

John Feehery is a spokesman for Hastert. Feehery told AP that criticism of the bill was unwarranted as of the evening of Sept. 22, because the legislation was still not in final form and was not ready for release to the public. A spokesman for House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas) agreed on Sept. 22 that House members were still working on a final version of the legislation.
But critics warn that the proposed law is aimed against the entire U.S. population, not a minority of Arab immigrants.

The proposal, they say, would grant the government the power to strip citizenship of native-born Americans and deport them without any evidence of wrongdoing, even though this would be contrary to the Constitution.

It would also allow for secret arrests, secret trials and secret torturing of "suspects." Habeas corpus, Americans' most sacred right, would be eliminated.

The law would also remove all restrictions on police spying on citizens.

More:


http://www.rense.com/general57/ldpope.htm

[Blue_In_AK]

27. Bush may not be Hitler

but I don't think there can be much doubt that the Republican Party, in its current incarnation, has definite Fascist leanings. And as others have pointed out, Hitler wasn't Hitler "the Boogeyman" in 1933. It took time for him to morph into the monster he became. If ** declares martial law in 2008 and cancels the next presidential election, then the Hitler comparison will probably be more on point, and all of our lives will be in danger.

[ezekiel333]

30. "trivial fascism"

"It trivializes Bush. Instead of laying out a well-reasoned argument as to why Bush is a criminal and liar, a thief, a murderer, and sending this country down a dangerous path, you resort to the lowest common denominator."

"trivializes", really, telling the truth is trivial? Like the corporate whores have not melded with our government forming a fascist state?

How about we call it what it is, "FASCISM" and stop trying to play by their "framing" rules. After all, truth hurts.

Go ahead and censor your voice/comments, they want you to weaken your voice and I am sorry to say for some of you the game is working, but do NOT FUCKING TELL ME TO.

[Dave Sund]

34. This is what I was speaking of, above

Shit, even in the sentence you quoted, you have me saying that we should lay out well-reasoned arguments about WHY Bush is a criminal, a liar, a thief, a murderer, and sending this country down a dangerous path. Essentially, it's every argument each and every one of you makes about why he is Hitler. It's just saying, maybe if you drop the whole "Bush is Hitler" part of it, then you might start to be heard.

Because what happens is that "Bush is Hitler" becomes the focus of the debate. Anyone who disagrees with the statement gets the reaction you just posted. We've seen it in this thread. The word Hitler becomes the focus of the conversation.

The main reason I don't like the comparison is because it doesn't put the focus on Bush. The problem is, that everyone you talk to thinks one thing when they hear "Hitler:" millions of dead people. And by that standard, Bush looks like a freaking saint. By comparing him to Hitler, we're setting the bar so ridiculously low, for a President with ridiculously low expectations already.

You don't believe me? Look at the arguments made last week. They used the Nazi comparisons for Gitmo to say "hey, look, things aren't that bad!"

It's not the way to go about it. No matter how bad Bush is, he's done nothing nearly as bad as what Hitler has ever done, and that makes any comparison to Hitler make Bush look good by comparison. And any comparison that makes Bush look better than the person he's being compared to is a bad one to make.

[ezekiel333]

37. A fascist is a fascist...

Been a lot of chatter here lately about what "we" are supposed to say, especially regarding the current fascist state we live under. Makes me wonder sometimes about the enemy within.

[Enraged_Ape]

42. Word up, bro

I just love all the "helpful" advice I've been seeing on this board of late that we should be even more appeasing and acquiescent than we are now. Yeah, like it's worked so well.

I'm sorry, but if I see someone look and talk and act like a Nazi, I'm calling them a fucking Nazi. Same goes for Hitler.

[agincourt]

31. I think more of Milosovic,

Not so much a normal tyrant, but a politician that is successful and horrible for his nation. Hitler like Bush, however, would tell his followers or have his followers say that it was god's will for him to be leader. Some of Bush's psuedo-intellectual patsies tried to say different, but Bush's followers are always saying that he's some gift from god. We should say Hitler did this, Bush does this, instead of saying Bush=Hitler.

[Gregorian]

35. Well then why are so many making the comparison?

He's certainly headed in the right direction. And there are a number of uncanny similarities. A few of which are pointed out in this thread. Hitler wasn't elected by a majority either. What about his grandfather and Rove's grandfather. We've got two extremely Nazi oriented people in those two, however relevant that may be.

My feeling is- do we have to wait for the gas chambers before we can make an accurate comparison? By the time we can make a realistic comparison, it'll be too late. He's already killing Iraqis in numbers that none of us know.

[Karenina]

36. Because with a little research

anyone can connect the dots between the *BFEE and the Nazi regime. It's NOT just that they are "like" nazis, THEY ARE NAZIS and have been ensconced in the U.S. government for over A HALF A CENTURY.

These links will help...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=3034092

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=3493251

[snickersnee]

39. you shouldn't be allowed to call * "Hitler..."

...until you are ready to act like you believe it.

[madeline_con]

40. Check this out...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x3935734#3935741

[dbeach]

43. operation Paperclip invited the Nazis into the us govt

in exchange for info..and their help in fighting the USSR in the cold war..

It seems to me that the plan has allowed the real nazis to do the unthinkable which is to overthrow the US govt..coup after coup
from JFK to 9/11 to 11/0/04

SOS

Prescott bush was a nazi agent and his wall st pals colloborated with the nazis for yrs

see National Arhcives
see Paperclip
read 'American dynasty" by kevin Phillips..