Nazi-sympathizing police officer receives the first of many slaps on the hand.

[PetrusMonsFormicarum]

It reads like a headline from The Onion, but it is sadly true.

Portland police panel finds Capt. Mark Kruger brought "discredit and disgrace" upon the city by erecting a memorial to Nazi soldiers
Maxine Bernstein, The Oregonian

For years, past police chiefs and city attorneys have vigorously fended off critics who called Portland police Capt. Mark Kruger a "Nazi sympathizer." They said he was simply a history buff who collected military memorabilia and had belonged to a World War II reenactment club.

But now, a Portland commander and a Portland Police Performance Review Board have found Kruger brought "discredit and disgrace upon the Bureau and the City," by building a public tribute to five Nazi-era German soldiers at a city park while employed by the police bureau.

http://www.oregonlive.com/portland/index.ssf/2010/10/portland_police_panel_finds_ca.html


The correlation between this man's hobby and his chosen profession illustrate a dangerous obsession. We all may have some gruesome, passing interest in the rise of Hitler's Reich or some other atrocity committed by humans on humans, but most of us watch a documentary, scratch our melons for a while and think about it, and MOVE ON. This person, whose job involves direct contact with innumerable types that fall under his personal category as enemies (this is Portland after all) has obviously studied his plaqued heroes and their own descriptions of the horrors they constructed. If Kruger is making idols of these Nazi sociopaths and Milgrom Experiment flunkees, he has reached a place close to religious fervor, and we all know where that leads.

The fact that he has continued to maintain a claim that he is merely a history buff and a collector of WWII memorabilia is disingenuous.

Expect more disingenuous statements from City Hall in the weeks to come.