Is anyone watching the Republicans' sickening theatre?

[karynnj]

They are really going after Durbin's statement. Warner, Martinez, and McConnell are itemizing the evils of the Nazis, the Soviets, Pol Pot etc and are showing that we are not like them. Putting our men in uniform in danger etc.

So I guess Durbin gets to be the new Newsweek. Durbin is trying to get time to speak -

[JohnKleeb]

1. While I agree we're not as bad

Having places like Guatamono Bay makes us look really awful to the world and I think encourages terrorism.

[karynnj]

3. We're not as bad but being better thna the Nazis and Pol Pot

is a very low bar. Our values are better than that. All though I agree that the language made him suseptible to this kind of charge. I really dislike the "calling him on the rug" tome of the Republicans, when the administration is the one that did something wrong.

I am more than ever impressed with Kerry's judgement to tread lightly but to mention Abu Grabeh only in passing. (As it was they hit him for over the top language at 27 ignoring Bush was probably drunk at the time that Kerry was demanding moral behavior on the part of his government.)

[JohnKleeb]

5. I agree completely

It makes us look like terrible people. Its a sad thing too, we were part of the forces that freed Occupied Europe.

[Mass]

2. Durbin is now on the floor.

straightening the facts.

GO Durbin.

[Island Blue]

4. Didn't Santorum compare Democrats to Nazis

not to long ago on the floor of the Senate? I really dislike these people more and more with each passing day.

[karynnj]

6. Durbin is good though

he says the real damage was done when we changed our interrogation process. After they said the damage was done when he spoke.

But Santorum's a Republican!

[JohnKleeb]

7. Yeah for fillibustering right wing judges

stupid fucker.

[TayTay]

8. Nobody, but nobody, bothers my Sen. Sweetie

I just wrote Sen. Durbin's office to say how much I support him and how much the remarks of the Rethug Senators bothers me.

Please, if you have a few minutes, drop Sen. Durbin a line and tell him you support him. You just know that the Rethug Hate Machine has targeted him and we need to show that this good man has lots of people from all across America who appreciate him.

I love Sen. Sweetie and I got his back.

[JohnKleeb]

9. I am gonna email him

Hes a great guy.

[Pirate Smile]

10. I loved it when Harry came down to help out Durbin. Reid rallied on

the RW Echo hate machine and all the important issues the Republicans won't acknowledge.

Give'em Hell, Harry!

[beachmom]

11. Maybe we should just all take a break from Nazis

I'm so tired of how everybody characterizes everybody else as a Nazi. I just watched last weekend a German film called "Der Untergangers" about Hitler's last days in the bunker and all the people involved with him and the battle of Berlin (it was nominated for an Academy award). I'm sorry -- that world of Hitler is just completely unimaginable and so insane that it's laughable to me how everyone is constantly making Hitler/Nazi/WWII references to today. Yes, it's true you can take aspects of things that happened during the Third Reich and compare it to today, but in its entirety there is NOTHING that comes close to that crazy ideology and the extreme violence that was perpetrated in its name. Ditto Stalin and the Gulags. Amnesty International made a mistake comparing Gitmo to Gulags and Durbin just made a mistake comparing Gitmo to Nazis. Perhaps they both thought that the inflammatory language would make headlines and draw attention to the human rights abuses taking place at Gitmo and other prisons, but it was an irresponsible use of history (Santorum is just a complete idiot so I'm not even going to address his remarks).

By the way, the WORST Nazi comparison and one that has led to violence, was * and others comparing appeasing Saddam Hussein to the Munich Agreement. Ridiculous! The Munich Agreement ceded land to Hitler for crying out loud, and Iraq is no Germany. In their way of thinking, a pre-emptive strike was necessary or we would have, I don't know, another world war on our hands? Interestingly, Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union was a pre-emptive strike because he was afraid Stalin would strike first. But . . . I'm NOT going to compare * to Hitler, because that is an insult to all of those who suffered and died under his rule.

In closing, I think that the evil of Hitler is still with us. And I'm not talking about the usual suspects -- anti-Semitism, racism, extreme nationalism. What I'm talking about is how because of the atrocities and extreme evil of the Third Reich, it actually is now viewed that going to war with him was a good thing. That WWII was a "good" war, even though Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan weren't the only ones to commit atrocities or bomb innocent victims. The fact that politicians continue to use Hitler comparisons as an excuse to go to war shows how his evil continues to permeate the world. War is never good, and WWII is no exception. Which is why "you don't go to war because you want to. You only go to war because you have to" -- JK

[Mass]

12. I agree,

The problem is that Durbin did not say that. They are distorting Durbin's words the same way they distort Kerry's 71 speech.

I was surprised to see Warner do that, more than anything else. For the rest, unfortunately, nothing surprising.

[karynnj]

13. Agree that they are distorting Durbin's comments

as they did Kerry's from 1971. The problem is how to bring up the problem of these abuses (from Vietnam or Iraq) which all of us feel are anathama to American values without being sunject to this distortion. I heard Durbin's statement when he gave it and his sober assessment of the problem was nothing like their characterization. His comment was that to read the description of the interrogation, you would think it was being done by a totalitarian regime (then he named some of the worst).

The problem is that the Republicans are clearly parsing every Democratic statement and turning it on its head to damage the reputations of Democrats. (Santorum essentially said Democrats were like Nazis = and there was no uproar.) I understand rhetorically why using the Nazis, Stalin, Pol Pot or good ole Ghenghis Klan works - it immediately conveys that these actions are evil and unAmerican. The problem is they are so easily turned around to mean things the speaker didn't mean.

Somehow someone has to turn things back around, to say that a democracy polices itself by demanding that the government act in accordance with our values, not simply with values that are provably better than the Nazis or Pol Pot. The things Durbin (or the 27 year old Kerry) said were wrong were things that were not only wrong, but ongoing - and there was a need to wake people up to demand that they stop. Durbin had it right when he said it was our interrogation policies that were giving us a bad name, not his speaking about it.

[beachmom]

14. Completely agree with the spirit of Durbin's points

But . . . even Kerry said he regretted some of his "language" from 1971. As bad as America was in Vietnam, it wasn't as bad as Genghis Khan. As bad as our interrogation techniques are in Gitmo, it's not as bad as what the Nazis did. I read Durbin's remarks and although he wasn't calling military personnel Nazis, simply by invoking the word Nazi people are going to infer that. However, I think Durbin truly feels this way, so that is why he won't recant. I just don't agree with that kind of explosive rhetoric. Kerry talked that way when he was 27, but as he matured and some of his anger over the war receded, he decided there were better ways of saying things but that he would continue to fight injustices everywhere.

I just think we need to be careful with our rhetoric or else we'll be completely dismissed and people will stop listening.

Having said all of that, I haven't listened to the Repubs' whining and carrying on about Durbin's remarks. I have no interest in what they have to say, since they're more guilty of out of control rhetoric than all of the Democrats put together. It's like calling the kettle black!

P.S. -- Thanks for letting me dissent a little bit on this thread. I really do love this forum, in the fact that you can say what you think and people are still nice to you even if they don't agree with you!

[karynnj]

15. I agree that we do need to watch the rhetoric closely

as proven by the Durbin thing - no one is talking about his legitamate point. They are all standing behind the flag saying "we're not Nazis".

Also, the Republican rhetoric was far more out of control - but no one in the media calls them on it. (Compare Cheney's comments to Kerry/ Edwards in the election and the media never came down on things Cheney said.)

[Mass]

16. Slightly OT, but I found this Jon Stewart video about the fact that

everybody uses Hitler so easily, and I find difficult not to agree, whether it comes from Dems or Republicans:

http://www.comedycentral.com/shows/the_daily_show/videos/jon_stewart/index.jhtml?playVideo=15751