the talking dog

One of the more colorful signs (and themes) I observed early last year during New York's large protest against the Iraq adventure was the "Bush = Hitler" pictures and text. It was thus with interest that I read this week's Pravda entry by David Hoffman, on that exact theme. While some of the parallels drawn (easy resort to warmongering and calling opponents of same "traitors", a national tragedy leading to scapegoating, erosion of civil liberties) are troubling, and would be troubling regardless of hyperbolic parallels to Nazi Germany, others are silly (Bush presiding over a "culture of death" motivated by racism in denying DNA evidence to those on death row; Bush opposition to affirmative action is somehow comparable to Nazi policies; technology may be used to create a master race via preferential health insurance decisions; both Hitler and Bush were appeased by the British) and really do undermine serious arguments to be made against Bush Administration policies.

Godwin's Law famously establishes that in any Usenet-type group discussion (or comment board), the probability of someone invoking Hitler or the Nazis approaches one; by convention, this means that the argument is ostensibly over and the invoker has lost. Given how quickly brains will be turned off with a picture of Bush with a Hitler moustache or even the "Bush is a fascist" or "Bush is Hitler" (including "liberal" brains such as my own), its usually best to
avoid this particular form of agit-prop.

That does not mean, of course, that Bush and his Administration should not be called on its overreaching. The fact is, the lead-up to the Iraq adventure, based originally on "national defense" issues like potential Iraqi nuclear weapons and ties to terrorists who attacked the United States, and only later shifting to "bringing democracy to the Iraqi people" were, in the audacity of their deceptiveness, absolutely evocative of Hitlerian tactics. Similarly, the quiet erosion of civil rights in the name of civil liberties (such as the unconstitutional in camera detentions of "unlawful combatants" or whatever they're called today) would not have been out of place in the Third Reich; of course, our courts are likely to strike down at least some of these abuses. And I agree with Hoffman's questions as to why we, as a nation, seem more upset by the workings of the Bowl Championship Series than we do with hijackings of democracy itself, such as voting machine irregularity, "redistricting", or of course, Bush's very controversial "minority" presidency itself.

Alas, words have power, as even a President with poor diction and command over them has learned. Simple words and phrases may have yet more power ("War on Terror", "Axis of Evil", "Mission Accomplished" come to mind). As such, critics of the abuses and excesses of the Bush Administration must take care to select their own words carefully. The fact is, Bush's handlers have a laser-like focus on what it will take to secure their man's holding power for at least the next four years; it wiill take a laser like focus on setting forth and publicizing the failings of the Bush Administration to bring it down. Most people will, not unsensibly, be turned off by excessive flights of rhetorical fancy, such as the "Bush = Hitler" line.

The fact is, the United States is is not, and isn't going to become, Nazi Germany. That is no excuse for the people of this country to stand by and allow poor leadership to flush what has made the United States of America what it is down the toilet either.

TrackBack (3)

Comments

Bush isn't Hitler, Clinton wasn't a loony liberal and folks who tend to try to demonize, instead of logically critique, their opponents usually relegate themselves to be aligned with the extreme.

However, we'd miss out on about half of the blogosphere if that stuff were eradicated. :)

Posted by Ricky at January 3, 2004 10:31 AM

Bush isn't Hitler, Clinton wasn't a loony liberal and folks who tend to try to demonize, instead of logically critique, their opponents usually relegate themselves to be aligned with the extreme.

However, we'd miss out on about half of the blogosphere if that stuff were eradicated. :)

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Sorry, the page showed that it didn't post the first time.

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the talking dog

January 3, 2004, Sympathy for the Devil

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