by Noah
"We can look back at a time in history where people were told to wear a gold star, and they were definitely treated like second class citizens, so much so that they were put in trains and taken to gas chambers in Nazi Germany."
- Republican Representative Marjorie Traitor-Greene as she tried to cheapen and lessen the horrid truth of the Holocaust by comparing being asked to wear a mask to being sent to the gas chambers.
It seems that the Republican Party has always had a problem with their anti-Semitism. Well, to them, it's not a problem. "Problem? What problem? What's wrong with it?"
I mean, damn, just listen to Nixon's tapes, check out the writings and pontifications of prominent Republican Holocaust-denier Pat Buchanan, or the endless polluted stream of white supremacist groups of "very fine people" that make up an ever-growing already large proportion of today's Republican Party. There was a time when people like Buchanan and former representative Steve King of Iowa were at least considered a mild embarrassment by some republicans but Marjorie Traitor Greene? Not so much. She has been embraced. Trump came along and enabled and encouraged the Republican Party's nazism toward its goal. The reality is that anti-Semitism is such a strong streak in the party now that it has became almost a qualification to join and now that the Republican Party has fully devolved into the Domestic Terrorism Party, they are being much more open about it. True, some of them will still deny it but they will do it with fingers crossed behind their backs and allude to the fact that they can count some Jews among their membership just like they can point to the extremely self-serving Tim Scott in the $enate and Sleepy Ben Carson in the disgraced former president's cabinet.
When it comes down to it, it's what people like the powerbrokers in the Republican Party think. That's why people like Rep. Greene can have such a big voice in the party. That's why she got put forth as a candidate and that's why she got elected. Her party certainly wasn't going to get in her way. This is also why even people who are completely open about being nazis like Art Jones in Illinois get to run as Republicans. Had Jones actually been elected, he would have been as welcomed by House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and the rest of the party leadership and rank and file as Greene and North Carolina's Madison Cawthorn. For today's Republican Party, it's a case of the more nazis the merrier. Strength in numbers!
Back in Nixon's day, we knew what his prejudices were but confirmation came in the form of things leaking out of behind closed door meetings. After that, people like Buchanan just came right out and publicly denied the Holocuast and expressed their anti-Semitism but they were considered to be, at least by the media apologists, merely "fringe" actors on the scene. In the Republican Party now, what was claimed to be fringe is mainstream, not just because it was tolerated and therefore nurtured but because it's a selling point to republican voters and the end result is that there will be more and more people like the heinous bigot who is the subject of tonight's meme getting a more and more prominent podium from which to reach more and more fools. How long before she starts selling Camp Auschwitz T-Shirts openly at her town halls? Dare we ask what the families of people like Louie Gomert, Andrew Clyde, and Paul Goser will be wearing to their Memorial Day family cookouts this weekend?
Ordinarily, I might get tired of writing about Marjorie Traitor-Greene but Marjorie Traitor-Greene is not just Marjorie Traitor-Greene. She is the essence of her party. That is why she is such a loud spokesperson for her party. Many people would say that members of the Republican Party should be appalled by her and want to dump her but they ARE her. The republicans would get rid of her only if they disagreed with her or felt she offended too many republican politicians and voters. Instead, they have obviously made a conscious decision to keep her around as a kind of designated spokesperson. In removing her from her committee assignments, they freed her to speak the party message full time. To them, she offers the convenient advantage of having someone around who will say what they all think and take the flak for it. She is her party and her party is her. She has a job to do for them and she's doing it.
This is only just the beginning. This snowball is running down a steep hill now. There will be more like Marjorie Traitor-Greene surfacing with each 2 year election cycle. Stopping this trend is not just up to the Domestic Terrorist Party. It's up to Democratic Party and each of us, too. History is full of countries that made the mistake of tolerating such people but political parties of all stripes are like two-year-old brats. They will do whatever you allow them to get away with or tolerate and, whether through bigotry, stupidity, or laziness, voters will be enticed and eager to follow them.
Extra Thought For The Day: Now that the attorney for racist mass killer Dylann Roof is filing an appeal of Roof's death sentence, will House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy be offering his services on Roof's behalf as a character witness?