Godwin Fail: MA State Rep compared lobbyist ID badges to concentration camp tattoos
A Massachusetts proposal that would require lobbyists in the statehouse to wear ID badges was met Wednesday with a comparison to Holocaust-era tattoos.
“The idea of the badge by lobbyists to me, I kind of find that revolting,” Democratic Rep. John Binienda, chairman of the House Rules Committee, told the Massachusetts State House News Service. “Hitler during the concentration camps tattooed all of the Jewish people so he would know who was Jew and who wasn’t and that’s something that I just don’t go along with.”
The lobbyist identification proposal is part of a set of Republican-sponsored ethics reforms meant to foster transparency and pare back outside influences on the state legislature following the recent conviction of former Massachusetts House Speaker Salvatore DiMasi on charges that he oversaw a scheme to steer two state contracts worth $17.5 million to a software firm in exchange for payments.
