Various scholars claim that it's hard to pinpoint the essential difference of Nazism and other types of Fascism. Surely it can't be that hard - Nazism was loud, but it was not subtle. Hitler emphasized simplicity and brevity in his message.
We can sum up Hitlers "Big Lie" in three words:
Liberals plan genocide.
The "liberal" part is plain - Hitler mentioned "liberals" hundreds of time in Mein Kampf and promised to ruthlessly suppress "liberals," including the "liberal press," intellectuals, trade unions, and of course, the Jews.
Hitler's charge against the Jews was that Jews planned to wipe out the Aaryan race, culture, and nation. Wiping out the Jews preemptively was merely self defense against genocidal liberals. Today, Hitler would claim the Jews were the real Nazis, or "Liberal Fascists." Pot.Kettle.Black.
Do you understand why Roger Ailles and Glenn Beck deny using the word "slaughtered?"
Nazism is a conspiracy theory with one message:
Liberals plan genocide
Which brings us to Glenn Beck's liberal conspiracy to destroy America, empower unions, "slaughter" dissenters, kill grandma, and destroy "white culture:"
Liberals plan genocide
And don't forget the rest of the conspiracy subculture, the militia members, and a fair number of the tea party crowd. They believe in the FEMA camps, the freight cars outfitted with shackles and guillotines (funny how no photos ever appear, where are they keeping those thousands of freight cars?), and mountains of family-sized coffins for burying the victims of the genocidal liberal conspiracy.
Come on now, say it with me:
Liberals plan genocide.
This is the mutation that makes Nazism a more virulent form of Fascism, and this is the "blood libel" that has been carefully cultivated in the American conspiracy subculture.
For those of you not taking notes, we can summarize in three words:
Liberals plan genocide.
The rhetorical trick used by people like Hitler apologist Jonah Goldberg (my little shoutout to Google there), is to claim that Hitler was a liberal because he paid lip service to populist causes, which will inevitably find some overlap with things liberals like.
It's very easy to claim that Jonah Goldberg is guilty of reductio ad absurdum claims along these lines:
Hitler had a mustache, Hitler was a Nazi, so anyone with a mustache is a Nazi
But really this missed the point and the insidious evil of what is happening. The real conceit of Hitler apologist Jonah Goldberg and Hitler apologist Pat Buchannan is that they focus on the Nazi's occasional attempt to sound conciliatory, as when Hitler claimed he did not want war in Europe. They deliberately choose to ignore the things the Nazis did. By this tactic of cherry picking false statements and then claiming they were true, they can say things like "Hitler was really a pacifist, as are many liberals, therefore Hitler was a liberal."
If Hitler were alive today, no doubt they would claim we were "disrespectful" for claiming he was a habitual liar, and the press would claim surely the truth was somewhere in the middle.
But here we see how Jonah Goldberg seems to feel Hitler was incapable of deception, thus every conciliatory noise he made was proof positive of his liberal tendencies, and that Hitler's every utterance was, for Goldberg, virtually the Word Of God.
Let's put this in a more current context - Massey Coal claims to be environmentally friendly despite their love of mountaintop removal. You can see some lovely greenwashing propaganda here:
http://ourtotalenvironment.com/
Massey Energy Hosts Arbor Day Celebration For Students
Friday, April 18, 2008
Charleston - Nearly 100 West Virginia students teamed up with Massey Energy Company Friday to celebrate Arbor Day by planting American chestnut seedlings on reclaimed land at the Black Castle mine in Boone County.
Jonah Goldberg would lump Massey coal in with Greenpeace and Sea Shepherds as "liberals" because they claimed they are environmentalists. And no doubt he will if someone at Massey cuts him a check to echo their PR.
And so we see how the right wing is using Jonah Goldberg to go right back to original Nazi propaganda for Beck to recycle:
*The right uses its fake intellectuals like Jonah Goldberg to cherry pick the Nazis most deceitful attempts to make themselves look good. And since the Nazis always promised violent repression, they have to dig for one phrase in a thousand.
*Jonah Goldberg then attempts to validate the Nazis original apologist propaganda to claim that the Nazis were really nothing special in terms of evil, in fact they were just like your neighbor with an Obama bumper sticker.
*This makes Jonah Goldberg a Nazi apologist.
*Then Glenn Beck gives it a fresh coat paint, sticking to the original themes of racial hatred and racial mongrelization that will put mulattoes in charge of the white folks, and he updates the conspiracy theories a little bit with FEMA, the Census, and ACORN.
But do not lose the thread, that Beck's claims go right back to Nazi propaganda. Not that it's similar in style to Nazi propaganda (it is, but that's a different story), but that they go back to Nazi propaganda and embrace it as factually true. Not only that, by claiming that their embrace of Nazi talking points have a rock solid intellectual basis, they also "prove" (through some transitive property of total bullshit) that these Nazi talking points have a rock solid intellectual basis.
Now we can go back to our original claim and update it for today:
Hitler: Liberals plan genocide.
Jonah Goldberg and Glenn Beck: OMG! OMG! OMG! Hitler was right!!!
In the world of Glenn Beck and Jonah Goldberg, Hitler is literally a prophet. Beck and Goldberg play John the Baptist for spomeone who has not yet arrived. The media machine has groomed a base of people who yearn for a personality cult and developed all tools to launch nonentities like Sarah Palin like skyrockets.
Somewhere a loser rants to an almost empty room, looking for the spark, trying to get the nod from the powers that be.
UPDATE
Thanks to KO for covering Beck and Ailles trying to deny Beck's use of the word "slaughter."