On Civility and Restrained Political Rhetoric Obama is a Hypocrite

Last week I wrote my first ever positive post about Barack Obama. It wasn't hard. As an open-minded person, I have no problem giving credit is due. But, on the other hand, I also have no problem pointing out that saying the right thing is good, but then contradicting in your actions the ideals expressed in your words is utter hypocrisy.

Niles Gardner points out in his post today in the Daily Telegraph that the: "Democratic Congressman’s comparison of Republicans with Nazis is met with deafening silence from President Obama and America's liberal elites." He writes:

In what has to be a leading candidate for the most inflammatory, ignorant and downright offensive political statement of the year, Congressman Steve Cohen (D-TN) compared Republican opposition to President Obama’s health care reforms to the tactics of Adolf Hitler’s henchman Joseph Goebbels and the genocidal regime in Nazi Germany. In a deeply insensitive and tasteless manner he also invoked the Holocaust to hammer home his point, in a speech to an almost empty House of Representatives on Tuesday evening, comments which have already drawn a sharp rebuke from the National Jewish Democratic Council. The video of the Congressman’s bizarre rant can be viewed here. CBS News Political Hotsheet has transcribed some of his remarks :

“They don’t like the truth so they summarily dismiss it. They say it’s a government takeover of health care, a big lie just like [Nazi propagandist Joseph] Goebbels. You say it enough, you repeat the lie, you repeat the lie, you repeat the lie, and eventually, people believe it. Like blood libel. That’s the same kind of thing.”

… “The Germans said enough about the Jews and the people believed it and you had the Holocaust. You tell a lie over and over again. And we’ve heard it on this floor: Government takeover of health care.”

Gardner is reasonable and correct to say:

A week ago in Tucson President Obama urged a more civil public debate in the United States. He should now put his rhetoric into action by condemning and distancing himself from the extreme remarks made by one his own supporters.

Thomas Lifson at American Thinker has an update:

Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn) is refusing to apologize for his words on the House floor likening GOP opponents of ObamaCare to Goebbels, and invoking the Holocaust. So far, neither Robert Gibbs nor President Obama has commented on this obvious slap in the face to the President's call for civility. This would seem to be an obvious opportunity for the President to triangulate and win over independents - a Sistah Souljah moment. But is he willing to antagonize an ObamaCare supporter?

Meanwhile, even liberal Jewish groups that support Obama are condemning Cohen's words. JTA reports:

"The National Jewish Democratic Council criticizes the comments of Representative Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.), which compared Republicans to the Nazis and unfortunately reintroduced the Holocaust into the health care debate," said the umbrella body for Jewish Democrats. "As we have said repeatedly, invoking the Holocaust to make a political point is never acceptable -- on either side of the aisle."

J Street, a liberal pro-Israel group that endorsed Cohen in the last election, also called on Cohen to apologize.

"J Street strongly opposes the use of Holocaust imagery and Nazi metaphors in American political debate," the group said in a statement. "We have spoken out strongly in the past when it was used by those who we oppose politically, and we also ask our friends to refrain from using such language. We call on Congressman Cohen to apologize for these remarks, and urge him and all American political leaders to refrain from the use of such imagery in the future."

My guess is that his minions are carefully studying the polling.

So I guess there is no reason to take Obama's speech, which gave him a bump in the polls, very seriously. We already knew that for most Democratic politicians and activists and their minions in the biased, liberal media, all this talk of "toning down the rhetoric" and "civility" was just cynical, partisan posturing. Now, however, we have evidence (as if more was actually required) that the president of the United States is so extremely partisan that even his good speeches are to be taken with a grain of salt. In short, he is not only a divisive and partisan politician, he is also a hypocrite.

Conservatives and Republicans would be perfectly justified from now on in just tuning out all that Democratic, liberal noise about "blah, blah, civility, blah, blah, rhetoric, blah, blah." It is not worth listening to, let alone taking seriously.