Do you think Buchanan is just dumb? Or, is he putting forth some crap that he knows is bogus?

I think it's some of both...

|I'm on a project low b/w until Monday so I'll have to wait and watch then.

re: #1 slartybartfast

Do you think Buchanan is just dumb? Or, is he putting forth some crap that he knows is bogus?

I think it's some of both...

He's losing it. He thinks he can shape the world with his ideas. It is just another brand of Fascism.

It's the leadership vacuum, somehow that always sucks the cockroaches out of the woodwork.

Checking out, back tomorrow maybe

I'm watching now. Buchanan and any of his defenders are most certainly being taken to school.

re: #5 ploome hineni

..unless and until Buchnan is shunned and ridiculed by the media, inculding FOX

And World Net Daily.

I can't wait to watch them all. Buchanan is a....some many names so little time.

It could be that the media doesn't know enough to shun him.

It's the Hoover Institution, Charles, not the Hudson.

re: #11 godfrey

It's the Hoover Institution, Charles, not the Hudson.

Right - I was just correcting that. Trying to post and write code at the same time...

re: #9 Quilly Mammoth

I can't wait to watch them all. Buchanan is a....some many names so little time.

I'll start. He's an:

anti-Semite
bigot
jerk
arrogant prick
fascist
chauvanist
nationalist
pro-apartheid
appeaser
isolationist
relativist

for whom the nastiest circle of Hell awaits.

Just finished the first video- and at the end VDH nails it. The "Final Solution" was already in play with German policy in the 30s without the cover of war. It's like buchanan wants to completely ignore the nazi party platform.

re: #12 Charles

If it's iPhone/Ajax compatibility code, all is forgiven. In fact, I'll hit the tip jar with happiness.

re: #1 slartybartfast

Do you think Buchanan is just dumb? Or, is he putting forth some crap that he knows is bogus?

I think it's some of both...

just dumb

OT ,, but the USA has swept the womens FENCING medels at the Olympics

Way to go, Ladies !

re: #1 slartybartfast

Do you think Buchanan is just dumb? Or, is he putting forth some crap that he knows is bogus?

I think it's some of both...

He knows it's bogus crap. He's dumb to think we'll buy into it without question.

So if he's the Fearless Party Leader, who's his useful idiot who actually believes his crap?

re: #1 slartybartfast

Do you think Buchanan is just dumb? Or, is he putting forth some crap that he knows is bogus?

I think it's some of both...

Pat Buchanan is anything but dumb. He's a crafty paleocon racist, who knows exactly what he's doing and who he's appealing to with these kinds of disgusting books. After being pretty much discredited in the 90s by both right and left, he's now weaseled his way back into acceptance, and is all over the mainstream media making conservatives look like Neanderthal racist throwbacks. The man is despicable.

Great viewing, thanks for posting.

re: #17 sattv4u2

OT ,, but the USA has swept the womens FENCING medels at the Olympics

Way to go, Ladies !

Up next: USA women's fencing team vs. Ghadaffi's Gorgeous Guards.

re: #19 Charles

the media is also despicable, touting this man as a face of 'conservatism' They know exactly what he is and exactly why they are doing it

re: #22 sattv4u2

the media is also despicable, touting this man as a face of 'conservatism' They know exactly what he is and exactly why they are doing it

One of the worst media offenders though is Fox News, and specifically Sean Hannity, who has Buchanan and his sister Bay on his show all the time. Laura Ingraham has also been giving Buchanan air time.

re: #23 Charles

yes. I've never understood Hannitys infatuation with Buchanan

Was Buchanan always like this? For some reason I remember him differently back in the 80's. Maybe I just wasn't paying enough attention.

It's very nice to see someone finally taking Buchanan to task.

re: #25 cjstavern

I was wondering the same thing. I suspect he was always like this but he's clever about hiding his agenda.

The man defines the term asshole.

re: #25 cjstavern

Was Buchanan always like this? For some reason I remember him differently back in the 80's. Maybe I just wasn't paying enough attention.

he's always been somewhat off the reservation, so to speak. He was a young hatchetman for Nixon, part of the group that beleived the presidency was above the law.
During the Reagan years, he was somewhat more rational, but since then he's been headed more and more towards david dukeland IMHO

re: #25 cjstavern

Was Buchanan always like this? For some reason I remember him differently back in the 80's. Maybe I just wasn't paying enough attention.

I remember something about the 3rd party money left on the table - back when Perot ran. Buchanan elbowed all others out of the way - took it and never looked back. A world class snake.

re: #28 pingjockey

The man defines the term asshole.

A sphincter-factor of 10 (on a 10-point scale)...

I used to read Joseph Sobran. I couldn't understand why Sobran obsessively criticized Lincoln, FDR, and Churchill. Then I read somewhere that these types criticize the winners because they can't openly defend the losers.

Damn, didn't mean to kill the thread... :(

re: #19 Charles

Pat Buchanan is anything but dumb. He's a crafty paleocon racist, who knows exactly what he's doing and who he's appealing to with these kinds of disgusting books. After being pretty much discredited in the 90s by both right and left, he's now weaseled his way back into acceptance, and is all over the mainstream media making conservatives look like Neanderthal racist throwbacks. The man is despicable.

There was a time that I thought that Buchanan had some value.
A little loopy, but interesting. Thats all over. He is made it clear that he is an anti-semite and thats they way to understand his opinions.

Horrible ....

Please don't turn this into a flame war but what's the Catholic thing Hitch keeps bringing up?

re: #36 Killgore Trout

till where i know, Pope pius was extremely anti-Hitler and anti-Nazis...

Hitchin in part 4; "I've never cared for him. He's never found my G-spot."
/Heh

re: #32 LesLein

Splat Pukecannon and his buddy Sobran represent the Father Coughlin/Francisco Franco/Ante Pavelic strain of the Catholic Right. In sum, he's a clerical fascist.

re: #37 loveguru

He's talking about a modern group.

the far right and far left both like some of what pat PUKEANAN is pushing example both use the term NEO CON when they are talking about pro israeli people.

but the far leftist version is the one that is entering the public square

re: #39 Colonel Panik

Ah, thanks. I've never heard of Father Coughlin before.

Adieu, mon amis. I know that our Euro freind Forever; from that last thread would find this tres disgusting.
I am off to throw some delicious dead animal on the grill.
While wafing the pugent aroma, I will indulge in a cigar & a refreshing adult beverage.
I will then serve the beast & rip it with my canine incisors. Slurp!
Further I will have some Carbanet.
I will then dwell on what makes John Wayne our greatest modern philosopher.
God bless America!

re: #40 Killgore Trout

They both are speaking Rubbish.....

re: #42 Killgore Trout

Ah, thanks. I've never heard of Father Coughlin before.

A true "progressive". You should read Liberal Fascism- you;ll learn a lot about Coughlin and his ilk.

re: #43 opnion

Adieu, mon amis. I know that our Euro freind Forever; from that last thread would find this tres disgusting.
I am off to throw some delicious dead animal on the grill.
While wafing the pugent aroma, I will indulge in a cigar & a refreshing adult beverage.
I will then serve the beast & rip it with my canine incisors. Slurp!
Further I will have some Carbanet.
I will then dwell on what makes John Wayne our greatest modern philosopher.God bless America!

chaps ?

re: #45 Sharmuta

An excellent suggestion. It is a book that is so thick with detail, you really have to read it twice.

Buchanan has been way out there for years. Perot Party . That says it all.

re: #48 pat

Perot Party

Is that anything like a Tupperware Party?

re: #47 rawmuse

An excellent suggestion. It is a book that is so thick with detail, you really have to read it twice.

Maybe I could go through it a second time- if I can get through this foot high stack of reading I'm currently working on.

re: #49 sattv4u2

Perot Party

Is that anything like a Tupperware Party?

No; Tupperware is useful.

re: #49 sattv4u2

Perot Party

Is that anything like a Tupperware Party?

I wish it was just a perot guys in a telephone booth.

re: #42 Killgore Trout

Ah, thanks. I've never heard of Father Coughlin before.

father caughlin lead a group called the silver shirts as well as the america firsters who kept america out of the war till pearl harbor was attacked.

jewish mobsters were known to have broken up some of the silver shirt rallies in new york city.

re: #51 goddessoftheclassroom

No; Tupperware is useful.

DING

re: #41 yochanan

I'll probably get in trouble for saying this, but I see so little difference between the "far left" and the "far right" today that they seem almost indistinguishable to me.

Example; Dennis Kucinich vs. Ron Paul. Can anyone define any significant difference between these two in practical terms? I can't.

I may begin referring to both sides as simply being "far out"- of their minds, that is.

With Buchanan being the definitive proof of the hypothesis, as it were.

/As Reagan said of the left-wing set, both lots have left the understandable universe, IMHO

cheers

eon

re: #51 goddessoftheclassroom

No; Tupperware is useful.

{GODDESS}

Your e-mails were HILARIOUS!

MWAH!

re: #49 sattv4u2

Perot Party

Is that anything like a Tupperware Party?

Just like it, except at a Tupperware Party you have high quality goods for sale. Not so much for The Perot Party. (but I collect the bumper stickers,lol)

re: #55 eon

Example; Dennis Kucinich vs. Ron Paul. Can anyone define any significant difference between these two

Kucinich has a hotter wife

Tip: Tupperware Marinaders. Best ever.

re: #55 eon

i think one of the differences is how they deal with other minorities for example la raza and NOI. would be one area were the far left and far right would differ both would isolationist and anti semitic now. so there are differences but the both don't like me all that much.

re: #59 pat

Tip: Tupperware Marinaders. Best ever.

Mine was a lemon - it leaked. I liked the idea of just flipping it over to marinate, though.

re: #25 cjstavern

Was Buchanan always like this? For some reason I remember him differently back in the 80's. Maybe I just wasn't paying enough attention.

He's just more like he ever was than he used to be, a bag of mixed nuts.

re: #55 eon

Example; Dennis Kucinich vs. Ron Paul. Can anyone define any significant difference between these two in practical terms? I can't.

UFO sightings?

# 39 Colonel Panik,

I agree with part of you post, but as Jonah Goldberg's opus indicates, fascism is really left wing. Take Father Coughlin. He initially supported the New Deal. When Coughlin criticized the New Deal for not going further left, the left denounced him as right wing. (It was a habit for the left to denounce their opponents as right wing, which is why Hitler and Mussolini are considered right wing.)

Among the things Coughlin proposed:

A guaranteed annual wage
Nationalizing public necessities
Conscripting wealth when there's a wartime draft

If anyone wants to have some good comebacks ready when hearing about Bushitler, read Goldberg's book.

[Link: www.amazon.com...]

re: #24 sattv4u2

yes. I've never understood Hannitys infatuation with Buchanan

I seem to think of it as Buchanan is someone Hannity wishes to emulate. A sort of mentorship.

re: #55 eon

Example; Dennis Kucinich vs. Ron Paul. Can anyone define any significant difference between these two in practical terms?

One has a blimp, the other has a flying saucer.

re: #42 Killgore Trout

Ah, thanks. I've never heard of Father Coughlin before.

I'll enjoin in a temporary truce with you to say that Buchanan was an avid listener to Coughlin's radio show as a youth. He's mentioned it several times.

You probably don't know much about Ante Pavelic, either.
Here's an interesting tidbit:

Declaration of War On the United States and Britain by Ante Pavelic, "Poglavnik" of the Independent State of Croatia: December 14, 1941

re: #1 slartybartfast

Do you think Buchanan is just dumb? Or, is he putting forth some crap that he knows is bogus?

I think it's some of both...

Buchanan thinks that if he can destroy the moral underpinnings that were used to justify the Second World War...

... he can keep the United States from coming to the aid of Israel when Iran and its Arab allies move to annihilate it.

The nature of Buchanan's argument -- that Hitler could have been contained if the West had just recognized and given into his claims for "German" land that had "mistakenly" been given to Poland -- exactly echoes the current argument on both the Far Right and the Far Left that the founding of Israel was a mistake, that Britain and the UN had no right to give "Muslim" land to European Jews, and that everything between Islam and the West would be hunky-dory if the West simply forced the Jews to evacuate Israel (or stood idly by while Islamic forces committed genocidal cleansing of the Jews from "Palestine").

re: #55 eon

Have you ever heard of Eric Hoffer? He basically said the same thing in his book, The True Believer.

His theory is that the Communist and the Nazi are natural allies and what attracts someone to the fringe is a deficiency in themselves. Which fringe they move to is purely circumstantial, they go to whatever ism is most available to them.

re: #64 LesLein

Point taken. Fascism is so far right it's left and so far left it's right.

re: #68 stuiec

Game...set...match.

re: #65 hazzyday

I seem to think of it as Buchanan is someone Hannity wishes to emulate. A sort of mentorship.

You must not watch/ listen to him much (Hannity, that is) he is strongly pro Israel. He wants tight borders but is in no way an isolationist (as is Buchanan). There are many more divides, if you care to continue

re: #66 itellu3times

One has a blimp, the other has a flying saucer.

LOL

re: #64 LesLein

How would you answer Mann's review (on the Amazon site) that Goldberg is primarily out to shock?

"Scholars would support Goldberg in certain respects. He is correct that many fascists, including Mussolini (but not Hitler) started as socialists -- though almost none started as liberals, who stood for representative government and mild reformism. Moreover, fascism's combination of nationalism, statism, discipline and a promise to "transcend" class conflict was initially popular in many countries. Though fascism was always less popular in democracies such as the United States, some American intellectuals did flirt with its ideas. Goldberg quotes progressives and liberals who did, but he does not quote the conservatives who also did. He is right to note that fascist party programs contained active social welfare policies to be implemented through a corporatist state, so there were indeed overlaps with Progressives and with New Dealers. But so, too, were there overlaps with the world's Social Democrats and Christian Democrats, as well as with the British Conservative Party from Harold Macmillan in the 1930s to Prime Minister Ted Heath in the 1970s, and even with the Eisenhower and Nixon administrations. Are they all to earn the f-word?

The only thing these links prove is that fascism contained elements that were in the mainstream of 20th-century politics. Following Goldberg's logic, I could rewrite and berate American liberals not for being closet fascists but for being closet conservatives or closet Christian Democrats. But that would puzzle Americans, not shock them. Shock, it seems, sells books.berate American liberals for links with conservatives etc...."

By the way, what sort of appeasement is Buchanan advocating toward Russia in the wake of their invasion of Georgia? Certainly South Ossetia and Abkhazia are parallels to Danzig, aren't they? (Or does he only advocate appeasement of dictatorships that also seek the destruction of Jews?)

The Fascist bargain to business is as follows: We (the government) will allow you to stay in business, prosper, and will even suppress competition to you in exchange for a piece of the wages you pay your workers, and a piece of your net profits. If you do that, you will be a good "corporate citizen".

re: #60 yochanan

My take is that both lots are more comfortable with people who don't like us (Islamists, for instance) than they are with people who do (Israel).

I'm accustomed to expecting this sort of doublethink from the "progressives", due to their apparent discomfort with the basic values of the Western Enlightenment (concrete vs. subjective, provable fact vs. mysticism, etc.), but finding it in the group that previously defended such values is, to me, extremely worrisome.

On the plus side, if the two groups ever present a "united front" to the rest of us, we may be surprised at how small a percentage of our peoples they really are.

And I suspect that it will be the MSM who will be the most surprised of all, when the nuclei of the "vast right-wing conspiracy" and the "legions of the progressive future" turn out to be only slightly larger than the total populations of their own newsrooms plus the Ivy League journalism schools most of them came from in the first place.

/just a thought I've entertained from time to to time

cheers

eon

I hasten to add Coughlin is clearly no liberal from the Wiki entry.
Nor have I read Goldberg - but the review has a ring of some truth.

In time, Buchanan will write a book detailing how over 4000 Jews were told in advance of the 9-11 attacks.

re: #53 yochanan

Yochanan, the Silver Shirts were formed by William Dudley Pelley, who blended Christianity, New Age Mysticism and Fascism. Different group then Coughlin's but still sympathetic to Fascism. I would compare his group more with the Germanen Orden and Thule Society then to the Catholic clerical fascist groups like Father Coughlin's.

My first exposure to The National Review and William F. Buckley, Jr. was a special report Buckley did about anti-Semitism almost 20 years ago. Pat Buchanan and Joe Sobran got called out, by name, big time.

It wasn't until Buckley's passing that I found out, he had specifically targeted all forms of racism as anathema to conservatism.

So I guess that makes me a Buckleyite.

re: #82 victor_yugo

So I guess that makes me a Buckleyite.

I've been called a Troglodyte, does that count?

re: #74 ebed_melech

First- "liberal" and "conservative" have very different meanings in europe. During the rise of fascism, a conservative was more bourgeoisie, where as a liberal was more free markets and democracy. Fascism found space between. When the system failed to take care of the people, fascists moved in- like they did in the Po valley. Where the system did take care of the people, fascists failed- like the blue shirts in France.

The main problem with that critique is that Goldberg does discuss right wing fascism and makes the case that we're all a bit fascist. I think the main problem this person is having with the book is that it hit too close to home.

re: #82 victor_yugo

As someone who knew Mr. Buckley, I can vouch for your assertions.

#74,

Goldberg provides more than quotes that progressives "flirted" with fascist ideas. The term "Liberal Fascism" came from a liberal intellectual, H.G. Wells, who approved the term.

Goldberg provides quotes from FDR indicating that the New Deal was based on European fascism and communism. He also has quotes from Hitler and Mussolini's officials indicating that they saw the similarities between their programs and FDR's.

Goldberg makes an excellent case that America was a fascist country during World War I. Wilson shut down over 300 publications for criticizing the war effort. People were arrested for critizing the war in the privacy of their homes.

During the New Deal a dry cleaner was jailed for charging 35 cents for cleaning a suit when the government wanted him to charge 40 cents. Poultry dealers were prosecuted for letting customers pick the chickens they purchased.

The subtitle of the book is the untold story of the American left, so it's natural that Goldberg doesn't spend a lot of time on conservatives. He does criticize Bush's compassionate conservatism and McCain-Feingold. Goldberg makes an excellent and depressing case that we're now living under a smiley face fascism (i.e., without the vicious aspects).

Saw this series a few days ago. Terrific stuff.

Everything Pat Buchanan writes can be boiled down to the JOOOOOOOS and his hatred thereof.

re: #69 paradox42

Have you ever heard of Eric Hoffer? He basically said the same thing in his book, The True Believer.

His theory is that the Communist and the Nazi are natural allies and what attracts someone to the fringe is a deficiency in themselves. Which fringe they move to is purely circumstantial, they go to whatever ism is most available to them.

No, I never have, but I'm going to look that book up and read it. Thanks for the tip.

Have you ever heard of Richard Hofstader(1915-1971)? He made substantially the same argument in an essay, "The Paranoid Style in American Politics", in 1965. Hofstader held that people look for conspiracies amongst those they oppose to justify their own desire to employ "extreme measures" to achieve their own goals. Hofstader, by the way, was a lifelong socialist and opponent of capitalism, who nevertheless became disenchanted with Communism following the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, and toward the end of his life was equally disappointed by what he referred to as the "mindless nihilism" of the Vietnam War era "New Left". (I don't share his politics, but I agree with his assessments of those who did. I do sometimes wonder, though- if he opposed captalism but concluded that socialism was also a failure based on its track record, just what social system did he think would actually work?)

The same mindset can be observed in "UFO believers", as described by Martin S. Kottmeyer in his work on the psychology of same. He refers to the "status-inconsistency syndrome", in which people believe that they deserve to be more powerful and/or influential than they actually are. The usual result is that they conclude that they are being conspired against, and seek to avenge themselves upon their "tormentors".

I believe that any resemblance between Kottmeyer's hypothesis and some of the loopier elements on both sides (whom I prefer not to name) is more than just coincidental.

/but that's just me.

cheers

eon

#76,

That's what Goldberg says about liberals today. It looks like you read his book.

re: #90 eon

Never heard of Hofstader, I'll have to check it out.

re: #69 paradox42

Have you ever heard of Eric Hoffer?

Hoffer was brilliant. If you ever see a book called Between the Devil and the Dragon -- a collection of Hoffer's works -- get it. (I believe it's out of print.) It includes his most famous essays.

Wow! thanks Charles I thoroughly enjoyed that discussion.

re: #90 eon

Have you ever heard of Richard Hofstader(1915-1971)? He made substantially the same argument in an essay, "The Paranoid Style in American Politics", in 1965.

Lefties also refer to Hofstader's opus quite a bit, using it as a critique of "know-nothing" rightists and conservatives. Thomas Frank (he of the execrable What's the Matter with Kansas? fame) quotes Hofstader a lot.

#79,

Coughlin initially supported the New Deal. He later advocated nationalizing "necessities," a guaranteed annual wage, and conscripting wealth. This is very left wing. Even Obama doesn't go that far.

re: #96 LesLein

#79,

Coughlin initially supported the New Deal. He later advocated nationalizing "necessities," a guaranteed annual wage, and conscripting wealth. This is very left wing. Even Obama doesn't go that far.

Coughlin was a man of the Left, not -- as historical revisionist liberals claim -- a conservative. The points you make are accurate. Coughlin's critiques of the New Deal were made from the left, basically saying it wasn't thoroughly socialistic enough.

If Pat Buchanan had his way we'd still be playing patty cake with Saddam, Oil for Food would still be padding the pockets of UN thugs, and Osama bin Laden would be an anchorman on al Jiz.

re: #98 Mich-again

If Pat Buchanan had his way we'd still be playing patty cake with Saddam, Oil for Food would still be padding the pockets of UN thugs, and Osama bin Laden would be an anchorman on al Jiz.

he's not now?

re: #99 sattv4u2

he's not now?

I think he's been promoted to field correspondent from Hell.

re: #93 StinkHammer

Hoffer was brilliant. If you ever see a book called Between the Devil and the Dragon -- a collection of Hoffer's works -- get it. (I believe it's out of print.) It includes his most famous essays.

That book and several other Hoffer works are available at Alibris.

buchanan has tried to go over the facts of ww2 w/ a fine tooth comb to recast the scenario in a way that blames everyone but hitler.
i get the feeling he would like to just come out and lavish praise on hitler but he knows that won't be acceptable.
so he tries to soften his image and present him as a victim of circumstances.
buchanan is a weasel. a manipulative creep.

To back up what I said earlier about Woodrow Wilson, see a recent post from Jonah Goldberg's blog.

[Link: liberalfascism.nationalreview.com...]

The photo at this link is from Bethlehem Steel's magazine. It shows a man being hung in effigy. His crime was not buying war bonds.

[Link: www.bapl.org...]

Buchanan represents the absolute worst in American politics. It shames me that he is able to identify himself as "conservative"; and we need to do everything we can to expel him from any identification with our side of the argument.

Hey Pat? If you're reading this: WE STAND WITH THE JEWS, MOTHERF**KER.

If there is anything in earth's entire history that does not need defending it is the Allies role against Nazism.

re: #55 eon

I've said for years that political thought is circular, not linear....Kucinich is 11 PM, and Ron Paul is 1 AM, if you will.

re: #24 sattv4u2

Re. Hannity, stupid is as stupid does.

re: #85 ploome hineni

37 loveguru

how misguided and petty

It is indeed amazing how most religious cults start by praising the omnipotence of their god and without taking a breath or blinking an eye go full bore into a argument that the divine one can't get the job done against evil (which he would have had to create in the first place) without the army of believers engaging in proxy wars on his behalf. There are truly peaceful religions, like the Baha'is, but the Roman Catholic Cult as well as the inheritors of Martin Luther's rebellion do not fall in this category even if they have been tamed down somewhat in recent times and seem angelic when compared ti Islamic barbarism.

re: #24 sattv4u2

yes. I've never understood Hannitys infatuation with Buchanan

Maybe because they're both Irish? : )

re: #95 StinkHammer

Lefties also refer to Hofstader's opus quite a bit, using it as a critique of "know-nothing" rightists and conservatives. Thomas Frank (he of the execrable What's the Matter with Kansas? fame) quotes Hofstader a lot.

Try The Dark Side of the Left: Illiberal Egalitarianism in America by Richard J. Ellis. It exposes and explains why the "liberal" pursuit of equality of condition (versus truly Liberal equality of opportunity) leads to rigid, often violent, illiberal policies and positions on the Left.

I got partway through part 4 and am pausing to post this partial review. I'll try not to give Buchanan "two minutes hate" although he deserves that and more.

Parts 1-2 (and 3) are neocon red meat. Buchanan lies and distracts, everyone else has to clean up his mess. Buchanan seems to be right that Churchill was a belligerent, authoritarian drunk who had been a fascist sympathiser earlier. But, although this isn't brought up, it was cool to be fascist in the 1920s. c.f., Jonah Goldberg. The panel does bring up that there's a difference between making excuses for Mussolini in 1923 and making excuses for Hitler in 1938. Duh.

Ultimately the panel's question hinges on whether (a) Hitler was rational, and (b) Chamberlain + Churchill could have known the answer to (a) as of January 1939. It turns out (a) has an objective answer, which Buchanan didn't tell us. There exist Nazi files that show that Hitler was dying and that his staff knew it. Subjectively it seems clear to most of us that Hitler acted consistently in a Chaotic Evil fashion all his life; this would have become more and more clear through the 1930s. Even to Chamberlain, on whose watch the whole Poland thing went down.

(I will risk my posting privileges by pointing out that I did leaf through Buchanan's book, and that not all of it was awful. One part I got stuck into reading was the part about how Poland reacted to Hitler's initial, diplomatic forays into Danzig. That part was okay. If Buchanan had reduced his whole book down to a descriptive piece of fluff about Józef Beck's follies in some popular historical mag, we might even be seeing a favourable review in here heralded by the Avian Oinker.)

Part 4 looks to be good: Rush Limbaugh versus Niall Ferguson. I have a copy of "War Of The World", also sorta revisionist, but better than Buchanan's. It's about the best book on the 1910-1960 era as exists. I'm looking forward to that topic.

Also, Hitchens cracks that "Limbaugh has never found my g spot". Lulz. As ever, I'll take what he's drinking.

re: #109 Bob in Breckenridge

Maybe because they're both Irish? : )

Both Irish, both Catholic. Hannity reveres Ronald Reagan, Buchanan worked for Reagan. But I don't regard Hannity as the ideological clone of Buchanan: as others have pointed out, Hannity is squarely pro-Israel. I just doubt that Hannity would ever call Buchanan to task for the latter's anti-Semitic views -- not because he shares them at all, but because he wouldn't want to embarrass or discredit someone closely associated with Reagan.

Excellent post. Interesting and informative.

re: #19 Charles

Pat Buchanan is anything but dumb. He's a crafty paleocon racist, who knows exactly what he's doing and who he's appealing to with these kinds of disgusting books. After being pretty much discredited in the 90s by both right and left, he's now weaseled his way back into acceptance, and is all over the mainstream media making conservatives look like Neanderthal racist throwbacks. The man is despicable.

There are now a sizable proportion of anti-McCain (and anti-Romney, anti-Bush) conservatives, currently locked out of the Republican party leadership. Buchanan is not appealing to the Republican establishment; he is appealing to the Republican primary voter - the ones who voted Huckabee or Paul.

Buchanan wants to see this lot get control of a few state party apparati, which might nab him some governor's mansions and a bloc in Congress. Indiana, the mountain West, and a few Southern states are vulnerable to this attack.

Fox is enabling him, I suspect for the ratings. Among the TV demographic, conservatives are more pro-Buchanan than pro-Bush.

Not sure how the Republicans should handle this, other than to continue to marginalise Buchananites. It'd help if the Republicans were stronger against resentments-pandering such as Intelligent Design; it would make it easier for Fox to draw the distinction between Republicans and Buchananites...

Just finished all five parts of the show. Marvelous. I once had a long talk with Hitch at UCLA after a lecture. (We had a connection -- He is an admirer of Kineally, who learned of "Schindler's List" from my dad.)

I found him to be everything you see on camera.

Thx for that Charles !

Absolutely brilliant and on the spot. Having passed through German history classes I can only say that Buchanan's idea of the British being able to avoid or even avert WWII is ridiculous. Buchanan totally blends out the mindset Hitler and Himmler* had.

Nazi ideology was an ideology that would treat every concession or appeasement as a sign of weakness and a signal for further advancement.

Just like Communism which was contained effectively and collapsed**
Just like Saddams Baathist ideology.***
Just like Islam.

*Understanding what Himmler was all about is very conclusive within the context Buchanan makes his (false) case.

**This is why moon bats think that communism wasn't all that bad even though more people died through the hands of Communism than through Nazism.

*** And George W. actually justly only finished what his father left unfinished. History will be kind to W. in that regard I think.

I was introduced to VDH's wonderful writing through LGF. I'm in the process of getting all his books.

Speaking of books, any plans for another Saturday Night Book thread? It had a lot of good recommendations.

#117 mossley: I just started "The Forgotten Man" by Amity Shlaes. Got the idea from buzzsawmonkey.

I finally had the time to watch this series, and it was educational. However it also reminds me of why I voted for Clinton and it was as much as anything because the Republicans had Pat Buchanan as a major speaker at their convention.

That was a long time ago, it seems now, but he, Buchanan, is obviously trying to improve his retirement, soon hopefully and permanently, by suckering the same people he always has.

In this video series there is one quote that best sums up Buchanan's logic, and those who support him, and it seems as relevant to the "left" as it does to morons like Buchanan:

"They weren't perfect, therefore they weren't good."

one of the best vedio links i have seen bravo charles johnson.

re: #109 Bob in Breckenridge

Maybe because they're both Irish? : )

Bingo.

My favorite line from the movies is from "Lawrence of Arabia:" "He's not perfect."

No one is perfect. Buchanan is fatally flawed, a moron.

Both Hanson and Hitchens are very acceptable yet not perfect!

re: #37 loveguru

That is a matter of intense controversy, There are many who found the Pope's silence during the Holocaust shocking. There were German clergymen who new that the Holocaust was happening and reported it to the pope who did not raise the issue publicly. Some years after the war a commission was set up to investigate the actions of the church during the Holocaust and the church refused to grant full access to its archives.

re: #37 loveguru

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/anti-s emitism/pius.html

As soon as he was appointed Pope, Pacelli did speak out against the 1938 Italian racial laws that dealt with mixed marriages and children of mixed marriages.(3) However, he issued no such condemnation of Kristallnacht (the night of broken glass) which occurred in November 1938, and which recent evidence shows he was informed of by Berlin's papal nuncio. As the security of the Jewish population became more precarious, Pius XII did intervene the month he was elected Pope, March 1939, and obtained 3,000 visas to enter Brazil for European Jews who had been baptized and converted to Catholicism. Two-thirds of these were later revoked, however, because of "improper conduct," probably meaning that the Jews started practicing Judaism once in Brazil. At that time, the Pope did nothing to save practicing Jews.(4)

contd...

"Throughout the Holocaust, Pius XII was consistently besieged with pleas for help on behalf of the Jews.

In the spring of 1940, the Chief Rabbi of Palestine, Isaac Herzog, asked the papal Secretary of State, Cardinal Luigi Maglione to intercede to keep Jews in Spain from being deported to Germany. He later made a similar request for Jews in Lithuania. The papacy did nothing.(5)

Within the Pope's own church, Cardinal Theodor Innitzer of Vienna told Pius XII about Jewish deportations in 1941. In 1942, the Slovakian charge d'affaires, a position under the supervision of the Pope, reported to Rome that Slovakian Jews were being systematically deported and sent to death camps.(6)

In October 1941, the Assistant Chief of the U.S. delegation to the Vatican, Harold Tittman, asked the Pope to condemn the atrocities. The response came that the Holy See wanted to remain "neutral," and that condemning the atrocities would have a negative influence on Catholics in German-held lands.(7)

In late August 1942, after more than 200,000 Ukrainian Jews had been killed, Ukrainian Metropolitan Andrej Septyckyj wrote a long letter to the Pope, referring to the German government as a regime of terror and corruption, more diabolical than that of the Bolsheviks. The Pope replied by quoting verses from Psalms and advising Septyckyj to "bear adversity with serene patience."(8)

On September 18, 1942, Monsignor Giovanni Battista Montini, the future Pope Paul VI, wrote, "The massacres of the Jews reach frightening proportions and forms."(9) Yet, that same month when Myron Taylor, U.S. representative to the Vatican, warned the Pope that his silence was endangering his moral prestige, the Secretary of State responded on the Pope's behalf that it was impossible to verify rumors about crimes committed against the Jews.(10)

Wladislaw Raczkiewicz, president of the Polish government-in-exile, appealed to the Pope in January 1943 to publicly denounce Nazi violence. Bishop Preysing of Berlin did the same, at least twice. Pius XII refused.(11)

"The Pope did act behind the scenes on occasion. During the German occupation of Hungary in March 1944, he, along with the papal nuncio in Budapest, Angelo Rotta, advised the Hungarian government to be moderate in its plans concerning the treatment of the Jews. Pius XII protested against the deportation of Jews and, when his protests were not heeded, he cabled again and again.(23) The Pope's demands, combined with similar protests from the King of Sweden, the International Red Cross, Britain and the United States contributed to the decision by the Hungarian regent, Admiral Miklos Horthy, to cease deportations on July 8, 1944.(24)

..... I think he was hedging his bets and the reason they will not open their archives is because there must be thousands of letters from clergy men in Nazi territory telling him about the horrors and asking him to do something.

Continued....

The International Catholic-Jewish Historical Commission (ICJHC), a group comprised of three Jewish and three Catholic scholars, was appointed in 1999 by the Holy See's Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews. In October of 2000, the group of scholars finished their review of the Vatican's archives, and submitted their preliminary findings to the Comission's then-President, Cardinal Edward I Cassidy. Their report, entitled "The Vatican and the Holocaust," laid to rest several of the conventional defenses of Pope Pius XII.

The often-espoused view that the Pontiff was unaware of the seriousness of the situation of European Jewry during the war was definitively found to be inaccurate. Numerous documents demonstrated that the Pope was well-informed about the full extent of the Nazi's anti-Semitic practices. A letter from Konrad von Preysing, Bishop of Berlin, that proved that the Pope was aware of the situation as early as January of 1941, particularly caught the attention of the commission. In that letter, Preysing confirms that "Your Holiness is certainly informed about the situation of the Jews in Germany and the neighboring countries. I wish to mention that I have been asked both from the Catholic and Protestant side if the Holy See could not do something on this subject...in favor of these unfortunates." The letter, which was a direct appeal to the Pope himself, without intermediaries, provoked no response. In 1942, an even more compelling eyewitness account of the mass-murder of Jews in Lwow was sent to the Pope by an archbishop; this, too, garnered no response.

The commission also revealed several documents that cast a negative light on the claim that the Vatican did all it could to facilitate emigration of the Jews out of Europe. Internal notes meant only for Vatican representatives revealed the opposition of Vatican officials to Jewish emigration from Europe to Palestine. "The Holy See has never approved of the project of making Palestine a Jewish home...[because] Palestine is by now holier for Catholics than for Jews." Some Catholic higher-ups violated this position of the Vatican by helping Jews to immigrate when they were able to; most did not.

Similarly, the attempts of Jews to escape from Europe to South America were sometimes thwarted by the Vatican. Vatican representatives in Bolivia and Chile wrote to the pontiff regarding the "invasive" and "cynically exploitative" character of the Jewish immigrants, who were already engaged in "dishonest dealings, violence, immorality, and even disrespect for religion." The commission concluded that these accounts probably biased Pius against aiding more Jews in immigrating away from Nazi Europe.

The claim that the Vatican needed to remain neutral in the war has also been refuted in recent months. In January of 2001, a document recently declassified by the U.S. National Archives was discovered by the World Jewish Congress. The document was a report in which Monsignor Giovanni Battista Montini, Pope Pius XII's secretary of state, detailed and denounced several abuses committed by the Soviet Army against German inhabitants of the Soviet Union. The report was widely viewed as demonstrating that the Vatican had no compunctions about speaking out against atrocities, even when doing so would violate neutrality.

The preliminary report released by the IJCHC also asked the Vatican for access to non-published archival documents to more fully investigate the Pope's role in the Holocaust. This request was refused by the Vatican, which allowed them access only to documents from before 1923. As a result, the Commission suspended its study in July 2001, without issuing a final report. Dr. Michael Marrus, one of the three Jewish panelists and a professor of history at the University of Toronto, expained that the commission "ran up against a brick wall.... It would have been really halpful to have had support from the Holy See on this issue."(29)
......

The defence of the Pope is found here in the same site

The vindication of Pius XII has been established principally by Jewish writers and from Israeli archives. It is now established that the Pope supervised a rescue network which saved 860,000 Jewish lives - more than all the international agencies put together.

a lot new occured in night out here...

True i accept Pope did very less .... but there is one more side never documented ...

The Myth of Hitlers pope

P.S. it was pope, due to whom Roosevelt won elections.... especially i light of the fact that Democrats and their anti-Semitic pastor was highly sold in US during those days by Media...

There are reports of active collaboration here between the church and the Croatian ally of the Nazis, Ante Pavlic

re: #130 Westward Ho

True .. my point is not to say that Church never collaborated with Nazis... but i m saying pope pius was not the one...

I think Pat Buchanan and Jimmy Carter should get together and suck down a few Billy Beers and see if the can't figure out how to rewrite history, come up with more unbelievable statements and maybe do a remake of Dumb and Dumber.