Hitler Does The Darndest Things...

Gratuituous Hitler Cuteness: A Liddle Kitler

Those of you who have hung in with me since my days of posting about Death Row Brides and Commie Fags (actually a brand of cigarettes), will recognize my perpetual fascination with Hitler and the jerks who love him. Since then, I've become acquainted with Godwin's Law, to wit:

Formulated by Godwin way back in 1990...the law states that: As an online discussion continues, the probability of a reference or comparison to Hitler or to Nazis approaches 1. For those of us who have forgotten our math course segment on probabilities, that means somebody is sure to call somebody a Nazi. (italic emphasis all mine. AW.) By RICK CASEY, HOUSTON CHRONICLE, Aug. 13, 2009, 8:51PM

I'm so glad I found out about this, since it's something I intuitively suspected. When your opponent has bankrupted himself of awful names and accusations to hurl at you, he plays the Nazi card. Also the Marxist card, I notice.

Not in my day, however.

In those halcyon Woodstockian tie-dye-wearing days, you were more likely to be called A capitalist war mongering tool! by one side and a Commie faggot lesbo peace creep! by the other. We let the Nazi-stuff be, since, uh, we still knew a few things about Nazis. Like: the commies actually hated Nazis and, uh, slaughtered a bunch of them during that great Band o' Brothers war known as II. Also, some of us had dads who had fought in II and, uh, liberated the death camps. Those guys tended to be strangely quiet during Nazi discussions.

But here we all are, post-history, post-manners, post-rationality, with flesh-eating viruses, dead spots in the ocean, plastic-bag islands, loose nukes, and now dumb-asses without any filters on their brains. I can visualize them in their kitchens, a nourishing 14 lb. bag of pizza-flavored Cheetos at their elbows, hunched over their Walgreen's poster board, tongues clutched between their gappy teeth, holding a Magic Marker like a bread knife and inscribing: The Goverment Wans to kil Old Peeple & Obamma Iz a Natsi.

There's another theory around, promulgated on Daily Kos from time to time, that using the word Nazi is a substitution for the rightly-loathed N-word. And I entertained that notion for a while, except that I think our native fructose-bloated rabble are staunch enough to use the word Nigger! Nigger! Nigger! Nigger! Nigger! without shame or fear. Remember, I grew up in the 60's South,and discovered that lynch-loving Kluckers don't have a lot of inhibitions that way. Nope. Our very own white-trash mob figured out that the very word "Nazi" would, maybe, bring us latte-guzzling, tree-kissing, recycling types to our knees and then...Game Over.

This is what puzzles me, because those fact-free groups who turn out holding pix of Obama wearing a Hitler 'stache, are the very ones who would dearly love them some Nazi's. You know: Nazi-party politics, where you kill everyone you disagree with, wear great looking scary uniforms, and make the trains run on time, until the world gets sick of it. Then Dear Cowardly Leader kills himself and his sweet patootie in a bunker, is set on fire in a ditch, and the Allies march in to see for themselves what the Four Horsemen have wrought.

Can't see why right-wing nutjobs wouldn't love a little go-round with that.

They all seem to come from the same special basement.

Kluck 'em...

Kluckers

During the 1950's, in Burke, Virginia, school was dismissed on certain days so the kids could watch the Klan, along with the Daughters of The White Camellia parade down the middle of town. It was a big parade too. My mother taught school there and would tell us about it at dinner, her eyes the size of saucers. She knew that the parents of her students were Klansmen, although she didn't know how many. She lasted a year at that job as I recall, and often cried. But Burke was then known as a steamy little backwater, one where Southern-style barbarism was in full flower.

I've thought of this during the past few days, after reading about various Republican shenanigans during the debate on Obama's stimulus package. Thing is, there aren't many moderate Republicans in Congress any more, so we're down to the nut-jobs who survived the '06 elections, weren't indicted or jailed, and didn't retire to spend that vaunted time with their families. These bottom of the barrel Republicans have done nothing but obstruct critical legislation that's desperately needed to tackle this financial morass. To add on bitter insult, they are proposing cuts to childhood nutrition programs, Head Start, and food stamps among other programs, most of them benefiting women and children. That the Republicans have focused on such policies bespeaks a nasty contempt for our societal welfare.

So why is anyone still listening to them? Somewhere along the line, probably due to the Jerry Springer show, we decided that it was only fair "to listen to the other side". Except these guys aren't "the other side". They're extremists and their sell-by date was up in 1963. I propose that they be treated the way we'd treat any extremist hate group. Or used to treat them, I hasten to say. Now thugs, Nazis, racists, and David Duke can all be pretty sure of a spot on the nightly news, should they desire it.

Back in the day, Klansmen marched openly in the streets, sometimes holding the hands of their little Klanettes. Racists babbled about mud people and niggers; murders were not unknown. Thugs showed up at schools with ax handles to prevent six year old black kids from enrolling. And while attitudes are not quite as, um, blatant as they once were, I can't see that much has changed. The same hatred, cruelty, and callous disregard are in full flower among certain savages.

What has changed is the media's notional perception that fringe groups represent any sort of normalcy.

They do not. The lunatics among us are atavistic left-overs from a bygone age. They deserve only our studied indifference, our silence, and our revulsion.

These scrapings from the GOP barrel should be ignored by decent people, just as decent people once ignored the Klan.

So I say, Kluck 'em. It's time to pass the whole damned package now.

Dumb-asses will be pondered...

They're baaaack

The New York Times today has devoted a whole article to the ill-starred Campbell family, whom I myself accused of being pussy Nazis. I stand corrected. Thanks to the Gray Lady's sterling reportage, it seems that Heath Campbell, the daddy of the brood, is not so much a Nazi as he is terminally stupid. And the bad thing about real dumb-butts is that they make smart people stupid. People like me, for instance.

When I discovered one of the kiddos was named Honszlynn Hinler Jeannie, I thought this was the name of a famous Nazi, or infamous Nazi, I didn't know about. Turns out, Heath claims that this is the correct way to spell Heinrich Himmler, and he is not only wrong, but flat-out wrong, and I feel like a dumb-ass, which is what dumb-asses like: the propagation of more dumb-asses.

Their landlord, a Mr. Lippincott, who shares the two family home where the Campbells live, says that awhile back Heath was into Confederate stuff and then switched over to the Nazi thing purely for stylistic reasons. According to the Times, Mr. Campbell is now into swastikas, which decorate the apartment and are etched in skull decals on his car. Mr. Campbell, a collector of German combat knives, also wears Nazi-era boots and likes to click his heels together.

Since Mr. Campbell sought out a local paper to complain that ShopRite wouldn't decorate a birthday cake for his son, now Adolph Hitler, but formerly Antonio Adolph Hitler, blogs and newspaper websites have reported incendiary information. There's Mr. Campbell’s previous marriage, which produced a few comments from his former mother-in-law, who wrote that her daughter wouldn't let him name one of their children Satan. A wise move on her part. Others wrote in saying that the act of naming kiddos after Hitler and Himmler constituted abuse.

Daddy Heath wouldn't be the first. My mother, observing that my male cousins named Ashley had to slug their way through grade school, said naming a boy Ashley was like naming him Percy or Vivien. Having known a Marine named Percy, I concur. Nonetheless, people keep on saddling their offspring with godawful names. Look at the Morning Star Redwings, Dawnlight Dancers, and American Star Wanderings and other goofy names my generation inflicted on their kids...commune kids who probably grew up to be cost accountants, as an act of bitter protest. However, one of my checkout ladies at Albertsons was named Quivoria, and another was Rotunda, and they seemed fine. Some things can be can be transcended and we ought to remember that.

Mr. Campbell broke down when his kids were removed from his home. The local chief of police remarked, “He loves his kids...his kids to him are his future. As he told me, his kids are forever; wives aren’t.” A remark that has a plain, if benighted, eloquence all its own.

Face it. The guy's simply pig-ignorant, although with befuddled aspirations. However, as far as I'm concerned, there are still unanswered questions, like: how come we only have this one photo, so far? And who are these two women? Today, a friend of mine asked me, "Who are these two lesbians with little Hitler?" And yeah, there's that overtone. I put it down to bad reporting.

When questioned, Heath Campbell is clear enough.

And I guess that's the problem.