By now just about everyone has seen the video of Rep. Barney Frank clowning on a crazy right wing protestor who decided it was a good idea to compare President Obama to Hitler in front of a gay Jewish man. While I understand his reaction (and really enjoyed watching it), Rep. Frank should have avoided the all-too-easy ad hominem attacks and stuck to criticism of the protester’s ideas themselves. Here’s what I would have done if I were in old Barney’s shoes:

First, I would have told her that I feel sorry for how brainwashed she’s become, and that the people who instructed her to do what she did care not for her integrity or reputation. It’s unfortunate, because she probably has a family who is now tremendously embarassed by her antics.

Then I would have told her who Adolf Hitler was.

I would have told her that the man she equates with our President harbored the kind of evil that leaves the English language wanting.

I would have told her that the man she believes is synonymous with Barack Obama presided over the systematic and nearly successful decimation of an entire culture, not to mention a plethora of other “undesirable” members of society.

I would have told her that there are people alive today who had to dig their children’s graves, after watching men under Adolf Hitler’s instructions riddle their boys and girls with hot bullets or choke their lungs with unforgiving toxic gas.

I would have told her that were it not for the Greatest Generation and people like President Obama’s grandfather, Adolf Hitler would have triumphed in his dream to wipe an entire culture off the face of the planet.

And then I would have asked her, in light of all that, if she’d feel comfortable trying to convince some Holocaust survivors that President Obama equals Adolf Hitler.

I guarantee you she’d be speechless, completely unprepared to respond because her groomers didn’t care enough to teach her how to save face.

My point is that even though it’s easy to call someone you disagree with an idiot, it’s better to attack their ideas and make a mockery of their sentiments. Once you destroy the idea, you level the movement and reclaim the moral high ground.

Tags: anti-Semitism, healthcare

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 20th, 2009 at 4:26 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.