Sunday, February 23, 2020

Going Low


Lamenting what he sees as Bernard Sanders' march to the Democratic presidential nomination, Chris Matthews goes on about Nazis, Jews, concentration camps, and the Holocaust. Beginning at 1:41 of the video below, he can be seen and heard remarking

That is the name of the game. It's pretty much over unless that changes. I was reading last night- Brian, I know because you're a history guy, too- I'm reading last night about the fall of France in the summer of 1940.   And the general, Renaud, calls up Churchill and says "it's over." And Churchill says "how can it be? You got the greatest army in Europe. How can it be over?" He said "It's over."

So I had that suppressed feeling. I can't be as wild as Carville but he's damn smart and I think he's damn right about this one."





You're reading that right. He said nothing about Jews; nothing about the Holocaust or concentration camps; nothing, even, about Nazis per se. As noted by one who likes Sanders, denigrates MSNBC, and despises the Democratic establishment (whatever there is left of it, anyway):
However, that didn't stop numerous tweets accusing Matthews of anti-Semitism.  One came from the communications director for the candidate, obviously feared by Matthews, whose surrogates include Ilhan Omar and a brazen anti-Semite.

We can write this incident off as just another loathsome manifestation of cancel culture, the "you disagree with me, so just die" impulse. But it shouldn't be necessary for supporters of Bernard Sanders' candidacy to apply the religion (or ethnic or whatever is intended) card to an innocuous, perhaps clumsy, military reference.

Hopefully, this is merely a one-off from the Sanders campaign. Nonetheless, there you have it- a bigot in the White House, and an opposing campaign which may be gearing up to throw up some ugliness of its own.



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