Goodwin's Law Violation in Pennsylvania

[4thofeleven]

 

Pennsylvania Republicans are disavowing an e-mail sent to Jewish voters that likens a vote for Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama to events that led up to the Holocaust. "Jewish Americans cannot afford to make the wrong decision on Tuesday, November 4th, 2008," the e-mail reads. "Many of our ancestors ignored the warning signs in the 1930s and 1940s and made a tragic mistake. Let's not make a similar one this year!"

- Associated Press
 

I’d say this sort of thing is a side effect of the drawn out campaign, as people get sick of hearing the same old arguments for and against the candidates, so crackpot arguments start being used just to interject some novelty into a stale process… but that would be assuming that the US election started with a sane discussion of the candidates.

I have a theory that the United States has never actually fully abandoned its roots as a revolutionary state, and that’s why there seems to be a significant section of the American population who cannot interpret elections in any context other than as the final battle of the forces of good against the armies of darkness…

To be fair, American political discourse does seem to be slowly moving towards sanity; the wild accusations and mud-slinging are fairly subdued compared to those of early nineteenth century American campaign.

Comments

[sunnyskywalker]

No one has been beaten into a coma on the Senate floor this year. Progress!

You might be right about the revolutionary idea, but you'd have to combine it with massive ignorance. (And possibly the Puritan legacy.) I mean, seriously. Who has a better history of oppressing Jews: bi-racial Hawaiians or WASPs? And which presidential ticket has bigger issues with church and state separation? Which party is it again that thinks the Constitution established a "Christian nation?" *headdesk*

[4thofeleven.livejournal.com]

I've always found it rather creepy when American conservatives make arguments based on the assumption that American Jews should vote entirely based on the candidate's Israel policy, rather than on, you know, their domestic policy... It's like they've stopped outright hating Jews, but they're still not entirely willing to consider them fellow citizens...

[sunnyskywalker]

Many of their friends are Jews! But of course they wouldn't want their daughters to marry Jews, because... um, well, you know. (Those Catholics aren't entirely "our kind" either. Especially if they're Irish or Italian.) It's always disheartening when you get one of those "I'm not a racist, but..." statements. It's like that Dilbert comic where prefacing insults with "With all due respect" is somehow supposed to make it not an insult anymore.

[lyore.livejournal.com]

It used to be worse? *feels faint*

[4thofeleven.livejournal.com]

In 1800, one newspaper argued that if Thomas Jefferson was elected, "murder, robbery, rape, adultery and incest will all be openly taught and practiced", and claimed he was "son of a half-breed Indian squaw and sired by a Virginia mulatto father", while accusing him of seeking a French-style revolution in America.

Not to be outdone, the Jefferson campaign said that John Adams was a "hideous hermaphroditical character, which has neither the force of a man, nor the gentleness and sensibility of a woman", and was planning on crowning himself king if elected.

[lyore.livejournal.com]

Wow. Just... wow.