I Say Nazi, You Say Hitler

Since it is so, so wrong to utter the word Nazi in political discussions (see Durbin, Dick) I thought it only fair to identify those that do. Actually, Cenk Uygur over at The Huffington Post did it for me.

For the record, Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA), Senator James Inhofe (R-OK), Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL), former Senator Phil Gramm (R-TX), Representative Tom Cole (R-OK), Representative Peter King (R-NY), conservative guru Grover Norquist and, of course, House Majority Leader Tom DeLay have all made references to Nazis, the Holocaust and the Gestapo in previous remarks about other U.S. government officials.

Where was the outrage of the media on all of those comments? Nowhere to be found. After all, they had not been primed for outrage by the conservative talk show hosts on television. Again, it must be asked, are they this gullible or are they in cahoots with the right wing media machine?

For the love of God, Rick Santorum just compared the Democrats to Adolf Hitler a month ago. It’s not like it was some long forgotten incident from years past. Why didn’t one single mainstream media outlet ask whether Rick Santorum should be censured?

Senator Durbin referred to outrageous abuses as similar to the Nazis and the Soviet Gulag (although to be fair to him, and to be literal, he said those abuses were not the work of Nazis or the Soviets). Senator Inhofe and Representative DeLay called the Environmental Protection Agency the Gestapo. Senator Sessions compared stem cell research to “Nazi Germany’s abuses of science.” Senator Gramm and Grover Norquist called a Democratic tax plan and the estate tax plan, respectively, the equivalent of what the Nazis have done.

Republicans say people working at the EPA, people who believe in stem cell research, legislators who dare to filibuster and everyone not opposed to the estate tax are Nazis – and that’s not outrageous. But when Senator Durbin points out that reports of abuse from Guantanamo -- that include shackling detainees to the floor, setting dogs upon them, beating them and not giving them any of the rights accorded by international law -- are not the work of Nazis but our own interrogators, that’s outrageous?

And let's not forget Feminazi's and Hitlery. The hypocracy is (continues to be) stunning.