Obama condemns holocaust- predictably, National Review disagrees

Posted: 2/1/13 at 12:17pm

The right must disagree with every....single....word Obama says. If Obama embraces a Republican plan (Everyone needs health insurance) they will quickly and UN-ironically condemn it and maybe even say its unconstitutional and, of course, socialist. Some thought last week's remarks by Republican Senator John Cornyn might have been the most ridiculous example of this phenomenon ever. Horrified by Obama's nomination of a two term Republican Senator and Viet Nam War Hero to serve as secretary of defense, Cornyn proclaimed “Chuck Hagel’s nomination as secretary of Defense has already done damage to the security of the United States.”

But the race to heights of Obama-denouncing absurdity is FAR from over. Take it away right-wing mouthpiece National Review: "President Obama issued a statement yesterday to commemorate International Holocaust Remembrance Day. He noted that survivors who bore witness to “the horrors of the cattle cars, ghettos, and concentration camps have witnessed humanity at its very worst and know too well the pain of losing loved ones to senseless violence."

Well that statement can't possibly stand! Those Nazis were perfectly sensible!

"By the early 1930s, the Nazi party had hundreds of thousands of devoted members and repeatedly attracted a third of the votes in German elections; its political leaders campaigned on a platform comprising 25 non-senseless points, including the “unification of all Germans,” a demand for “land and territory for the sustenance of our people,” and an assertion that “no Jew can be a member of the race.” Suffice it to say, many sensible Germans were persuaded."

I can only hope that Obama will use his his weekly broadcast tomorrow to warn Americans NOT to eat yellow snow. Bon Appetit, tea partiers!




National review Updated On: 2/1/13 at 12:17 PM

[ghostlight2]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 12:27pm

Wow. I just...wow.

[Wynbish]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 12:37pm

The one thread I actually want mikey, et al to respond to

What has become of me?

Posted: 2/1/13 at 12:48pm

I admit to Trolling for Trolls this one time.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 12:52pm

The right does disagree with everything the president says no matter what, but doesn't the term "senseless violence" imply that the victim was chosen randomly?

The Holocaust may have been "senseless" in that it makes no sense, but it was the result of a deliberate campaign to rid the world of Jews and Communists. That campaign was expanded to include homosexuals and Romas, but it was not "senseless" in the meaning of random. It was, as the National Review says, the result of policies voted on by the German people and approved by large numbers of Lutherans and other German Protestant denominations and tolerated to some degree by the German Catholic Church.

Putting a specific group or groups of people into cattle cars and taking them to extermination camps should not be compared to a drive-by shooting or even a school shooting.

To do so trivializes each kind of death.

Updated On: 2/1/13 at 12:52 PM

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 12:57pm

To be fair, they were always really into Reagan going to Bitburg.

Updated On: 2/1/13 at 12:57 PM

[Reginald Tresilian]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 1:02pm

PJ, I don't at all agree that "senseless" equates with "randomly chosen."

"Random violence" is a very common phrase; if the president had meant to convey that, I'm sure he would have used it.

The deaths were senseless in that they need not, should not have happened.

[fingerlakessinger]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 1:06pm

Ok. Where is that dumb bimbo Abby? I want her to respond to this.

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 1:11pm

Do we suppose the Papa John's franchisees are Jewish?

Posted: 2/1/13 at 1:17pm

Yeah I think it's splitting a pretty fine hair to attack someone for saying the extermination of Jews was "senseless." I guess if you interpret that to mean without logic or plan, you could argue that the Nazis had a plan- kill all the Jews, take their property and "purify" their nation. If you take it as meaning not reasonable or lacking in judgement, well, I think we can all agree that was NOT a good plan- it was not reasonable and did not show good sense.

I guess in this case I'd use Nazi death camps as an example of "senseless violence" and the Allied response and the death of Nazi soldiers in the ensuing melee as "non-senseless violence." Of course, If I were a German of the era I might see that differently.

I wonder PJ, if you'd merely read Obama's statements, instead of this attack on him for making them, would you have objected to his use of the word "senseless"?


Updated On: 2/1/13 at 01:17 PM

[suestorm]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 1:22pm

^^misleading headline^^

quite funny after a number of you... esp you JOEKV...had issues with my headline yesterday, that btw was supported in print....no one i can tell is disagreeing thath The Prez rightfully condemmed the Holocaust

seems only PALJOEY understood the article.

Updated On: 2/1/13 at 01:22 PM

[PalJoey]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 1:24pm

I only objected because you brought it up.

Posted: 2/1/13 at 1:30pm

Yeah I think the article is pretty illustrative actually. We should look closely at exactly what words mean (not what we THINK they mean) but also at how those words are perceived, rightly or wrongly.

I will always remember a journalism teacher who ripped into me for saying that a particularly army was "decimated" in a battle- as the teacher (correctly) pointed out, that word means "to kill one tenth of" and in this case, more than half the troops were killed. So in my attempt to make the act seem MORE outrageous and severe, I actually underplayed the violence. It was 30 years ago and still sticks with me.

[ghostlight2]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 1:35pm

^^^

THIS!

[suestorm]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 1:36pm

the headline suggests that NR disagrees that the holocaust should be condemmed as the Prez rightfully did.
thats kinda TROLLY of you JOEKV... misleading to inflame... please change it. thank you! LMAO

Updated On: 2/1/13 at 01:36 PM

[ghostlight2]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 2:02pm

The only one it seems to be inflaming is, you, sue. The NR is disagreeing with the president's use of word "senseless", and is deliberately misinterpreting it.

Words matter.

Posted: 2/1/13 at 2:04pm

Rejected (but still totally accurate) headlines for this post include:

National Review praises Germans embrace of the Third Reich as "sensible"

National Review hails Nazism as "non-senseless" regime

National Review slams liberals for condemning violence as "senseless."

The one I rejected as being misleading was "Conservatives SURE love Nazis!"

[suestorm]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 2:06pm

GHOSTLIGHT. The Headline Im referring to is the JOEKV headline of this thread.

its TROLLY....

He slammed me yesterday accusing me of doing the same thing... I actually did agree with him on that poing and changed it....just pointing out hypocrisy.... Whats good for the goose....

its just nice if people admit they made a booboo, thats all. but only a big person can do that.

that is all.

Updated On: 2/1/13 at 02:06 PM

[Jordan Catalano]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 2:10pm

Is it really, though?

[brdlwyr]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 2:24pm

I do not agree that "senseless" necessarily means "random".

[suestorm]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 2:35pm

Yes Sir. the thread headline is the definition of misleading. NR did not disagree with the Holocaust being condemmed.

Posted: 2/1/13 at 2:59pm

Here's the article:

President Obama issued a statement yesterday to commemorate International Holocaust Remembrance Day. He noted that survivors who bore witness to “the horrors of the cattle cars, ghettos, and concentration camps have witnessed humanity at its very worst and know too well the pain of losing loved ones to senseless violence.” (We noted below how some in Europe chose to mark the day, which takes place each year on January 27, the day Soviet troops liberated Auschwitz.)

The idea that all violence is “senseless” violence is one that has taken deep root on the left; it’s also, unfortunately, one that poses a major impediment to understanding the world.

Nazism may have been an ideology to which the United States was — and to which the president is — implacably opposed, but it is hardly “senseless.” By the early 1930s, the Nazi party had hundreds of thousands of devoted members and repeatedly attracted a third of the votes in German elections; its political leaders campaigned on a platform comprising 25 non-senseless points, including the “unification of all Germans,” a demand for “land and territory for the sustenance of our people,” and an assertion that “no Jew can be a member of the race.” Suffice it to say, many sensible Germans were persuaded.

On September 12, 2012, President Obama also lamented the “the kind of senseless violence that took the lives” of four Americans in Benghazi. That, you may recall, is the day the president supposedly said the murders occurred as a result of a non-senseless terrorist attack carried out by jihadists.

This sanitized version of events, both past and present, is surely more comforting. It’s also truly senseless."

This writer reported The Presidents comments, then neatly eviscerates the president for making them and labels liberals unable to understand the world for doing such a thing as condemning Nazi violence as senseless.

He then gives us a thumbnail sketch of Nazism as something the USA and the President are both "implacably opposed" to (And hey, go look up what implacably means- I did: "Impossible to appease." So does he think the USA should have NOT been so UN-appease-able dealing with Nazis?- guess that is another discussion) and misses a chance to badmouth the Reich himself.

THEN he moves on to hail the Nazi regime as popular, well-organized and sensible and somehow manages to make the Nazi Manifesto seem like Hitler's "Contract with Germany."

He ends up with a last swipe at the President condemning terrorist attacks and, well, I can't make head nor tail of his word salad. You tell me what he meant before he calls Obama the word he objected so strenuously to being applied to the Holocaust.

Hence my title "Obama condemns holocaust- predictably, National Review disagrees." The only word that could possible be unsupported by the article would be 'predictably' and that's only if you haven't listened to anything conservatives have said about him the last 6 years or so.

[suestorm]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 3:04pm

OK,fine. i stand by my statement that your headline at least is dishonest, but you disagree and i respect your opinion, however wrong it may be :)

[suestorm]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 3:04pm

ooops. repeated post

Updated On: 2/1/13 at 03:04 PM

[Reginald Tresilian]

Posted: 2/1/13 at 3:13pm

It is truly fascinating that nowhere does the author of that article condemn the Holocaust. Or even suggest that, oh I dunno, things might have gotten even slightly out of hand during the Third Reich.

He criticzes Obama and "the left," but the Nazis get a free pass.

I'd love to hear more about how denying German citizenship to Jews is, in his own words, a "non-senseless" platform point.



Updated On: 2/1/13 at 03:13 PM