Harry Belafonte and Woody Allen Compare Bush/Israel to Nazis

[Dover]

Holocaust Institute Criticizes Harry Belafonte and Woody Allen for Comparing Bush & Israel to Nazis

PHILADELPHIA, Aug. 8 /U.S. Newswire/ -- A leading Holocaust Studies institute is urging entertainers Harry Belafonte, Woody Allen, and Dick Gregory to retract their recent statements comparing the Bush administration, Israelis, and black conservatives to Nazis.

Belafonte even claimed that there were "a lot of Jews high up in the hierarchy of (Adolf Hitler's) Third Reich."

"Some entertainers simply don't know much about history," said Dr. Rafael Medoff, director of The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies, a research and education institute focusing on America's response to the Holocaust. "The fact is that there were no Jews in Hitler's hierarchy, the policies of America and Israel are not similar to those of Hitler, and African-American conservatives are not comparable to Nazis."

The Wyman Institute is urging the three entertainers to publicly retract their "inaccurate and hurtful" remarks about Hitler and the Holocaust. Dr. Medoff said: "Such analogies pollute public discourse, by trivializing the brutal horrors committed by the Nazis. Hitler was a maniacal dictator whose regime systematically annihilated six million Jews, and launched a world war that caused the deaths of more than forty million people. How can any reasonable person put Hitler and the Nazis in the same sentence as American or Israeli leaders, or black conservatives?"..cont'd

http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=51465

Woody Allen's actual statement:

""As a filmmaker, I'm not interested in 9/11, it's too small, history overwhelms it," the legendary filmmaker told Pagesix.Com.

"The history of the world is like: he kills me, I kill him, only with different cosmetics and different castings.

"So in 2001, some fanatics killed some Americans, and now some Americans are killing some Iraqis. And in my childhood, some Nazis killed Jews. And now, some Jewish people and some Palestinians are killing each other.

"Political questions, if you go back thousands of years, are ephemeral, not important. History is the same thing over and over again."

[sniffa]

1. they must retract!!

bush is worse. :eyes:

[nodehopper]

33. oh please

that is the problem with someone Godwin-ing an argument, follow-ups like this one

[sniffa]

37. oh pLease

aLways have to have some dickhead on here.

[Chovexani]

42. Tell me about it

People screaming "Godwin!" irritate me to no end. It stopped being clever and/or original years ago.

[Melodybe]

34. If the swastika fits, least we forget that Prescott Bush made millions

off the slave labor in Auschwitz.

Does anyone have that link to the Guardian's story on it from before the election?

[plasticsundance]

38. Melodybe ... here it is

How Bush's grandfather helped Hitler's rise to power

Rumours of a link between the US first family and the Nazi war machine have circulated for decades. Now the Guardian can reveal how repercussions of events that culminated in action under the Trading with the Enemy Act are still being felt by today's president

Here's another one that I am checking out to see how good it might be. Can't vouch for the site ... yet:

“Bush - Nazi Dealings Continued Until 1951” - Federal Documents

Bush's partners in the secret web of Thyssen-controlled ventures included former New York Governor W. Averell Harriman and his younger brother, E. Roland Harriman. Their quarter-century of Nazi financial transactions, from 1924-1951, were conducted by the New York private banking firm, Brown Brothers Harriman.

The White House did not return phone calls seeking comment.

Although the additional seizures under the Trading with the Enemy Act did not take place until after the war, documents from The National Archives and Library of Congress confirm that Bush and his partners continued their Nazi dealings unabated. These activities included a financial relationship with the German city of Hanover and several industrial concerns. They went undetected by investigators until after World War Two.

At the same time Bush and the Harrimans were profiting from their Nazi partnerships, W. Averell Harriman was serving as President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's personal emissary to the United Kingdom during the toughest years of the war. On October 28, 1942, the same day two key Bush-Harriman-run businesses were being seized by the U.S. government, Harriman was meeting in London with Field Marshall Smuts to discuss the war effort.

[Eloriel]

39. I don't know if the Guardian story is in here or not --

Nazi Hydra in America
http://www.spiritone.com/~gdy52150/noon.html

Newsweek : Bush made his fortune off Killing Jews in Nazi Germany!
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=186838&mesg_id=186838

Blood Money -- Nazi Gold (has several different links to stories/articles)
http://jagor.srce.hr/~mprofaca/nazigold.html


Ian Fraser's blog Nov 1, 2004
Election BOOM Day and Rambling History
http://blogspot.mg.co.za/?q=node/101

Banks’ Nazi Connections Exposed by Rob Gowland
http://www.copi.com/articles/nazibank.html

Trade With the Third Reich
Annotated bibliography of 50 books
http://www.archives.gov/research_room/holocaust_era_assets/bibliographies/trade_with_third_reich.html
Banking http://www.archives.gov/research_room/holocaust_era_assets/bibliographies/banking.html
(at Holocaust Era Assets, NARA -- main Assets page at http://www.archives.gov/research_room/holocaust_era_assets/bibliographies/banking.html )

The War Years: Part 5: Corporate Traitors
http://home.columbus.rr.com/lfairban/Pages/History.htm

Gold Fillings, Auschwitz & George Bush
http://www.spiritone.com/~gdy52150/bushies.htm

Chapter - II - The Hitler Project
Bush Property Seized--Trading with the Enemy (Tarpley)
http://home.columbus.rr.com/lfairban/Pages/History.htm


Poppy Bush: WWII Hero? Or like father like son?
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x2323909

BIS: THe World Central Bank
http://www.bilderberg.org/bis.htm

excerpts from the book Blowback: America's recruitment of Nazis,
and its disastrous effect on our domestic and foreign policy
by Christopher Simpson, Collier / Macmillan, 1988
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Fascism/Brunner_B_CS.html

HOTO: Nixon and Prescott Bush



Documents linking Prescott Bush to Nazi-era enterprises
(many good links)
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x3773867#3776117

Old Nazi Networks in U.S. (National Republican Heritage Group, etc., -- Russ Bellant's work)
http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/academic/political-science/fascism/bellant/bellant.pt1

Nazi GOP by Carla Binion
http://www.bartcop.com/nazigop.htm

Documents linking Prescott Bush to Nazi-era enterprises
(many good links)
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x3773867#3776117

[malaise]

61. hahahhahhaha

good one. Keep it up guys.

[autorank]

2. Damn, I've got it. "The John Wayne Gacey Story" starring Michael Jackson

and Directed by Woody Allen.

They're idiots. Our behavior is dreadful and our funding of Sharon, named by his own nation as complicit in a slaughter of innocents, is simply outrageous. I'd love to see us leave Iraq and cut off Sharon at the same time. But to use the Nazi term, not right right and it discredits the criticism.

[htuttle]

3. Please donate to the "Fund for the Analogy Impaired"

Some people are unable to understand anything but literal meanings. To the Analogy Impaired, the world is a confusing cacaphony of apparently untrue comparisons, as nothing is *really* very much like anything else.

Through research, we can put an end to this terrible syndrome. Please give generously to the Fund for the Analogy Impaired.

This message sponsored by the Metaphor Foundation.

[KoKo]

6. A good one! the "analogy impaired."

:D

[The Stranger]

24. "Analogy is a Terrible Thing to Waste"

How's that for a motto?

[htuttle]

25. Oh, that's very good

I'll use that as the tag line from now on.

[K-W]

4. Correcting inaccuracies is one thing, but

just because the Nazi's committed these atrocities doesnt mean they werent real people in history. We can and should use that history to analyze the present. We owe that much to those who died.

[the other one]

5. The nazi analogy is the quik root to irrelevence for EVERYONE!

Even if the analogy is apt (in the case of hmhm) it is the fastest way to turn off the largest number of people.

[K-W]

12. If your goal is to educate people, not just be popular,

you dont neccessarily care if you get the largest audience, especially if doing so means buying into the kind of niave "it cant happen here" bullsht that makes this country so very vulnerable to a criminal government.

[SemperEadem]

17. you mean route?

a root is what a plant uses to gain nutrients from the soil and water. A route is a path to a destination.

[guruoo]

41. Then don't...

use it in a campaign platform.

[Seeking Serenity]

7. I think Woody and Harry forgot

the first rule of political argument:

The first person to mention Hitler or the Nazis loses.

[Mairead]

10. I think you over-value and under-understand a certain quip

Which was that the longer an argument endures, the more likely it becomes that one of the participants will bring up the Nazis.

[Seeking Serenity]

Aware of that maxim

Also aware that once someone compares his opponent to Hitler or the Nazis, reasoned discourse tends to grind to a halt as the other side stops listening.

The first one to raise the spectre of Hitler loses.

(edited to correct typos)

[K-W]

15. Why doesnt the guy who's emotions cloud his thinking lose? EOM

[Mairead]

23. "Tends to grind to a halt" is a symptom of someone's failing.

And your claim that the person loses who raises the spectre of Naziism is agreed mostly among people who themselves have a regretably Nazi-like desire to shut down uncomfortable discourse.

[TankLV]

54. Ding! Ding! DIng!

You go to the head of the class!

[guruoo]

43. Which is exactly the kind of thinking...

that enabled the Nazis to
rise to power in the first place.

[K-W]

13. The first rule of arguments where logic and reason are abandoned

and replaced by a stupid set of rules that serve only to corrupt discourse.

[TankLV]

52. But those who refuse to see the similarities DIE!

That is MORE worrisome to me and many others!

And BTW, that crap - about the first one to mention Hitler/Nazi's - is just that - crap.

Just because you repeat that repuke talking point doesn't make it anyh truer.

[Larkspur]

8. True Jews were not part of Hitler's hierarchy and that was a bad analogy

but there were some Jews in concentration camps called the Capos that did collude with Nazi soldiers in the camps. Some of those Capos, according to Victor Frankl, were more brutal than the Nazi soldiers guarding the camps.

Bellafonte should retract his statement that Jews were part of Hitler's hierarchy, but he can still compare what Bush and Israel are doing to fasism in general.

It is appropriate to compare Bush and Israel, especially Ariel Sharon and the Likkudites, to fascists in general. Facism is not just a Nazi phenomenom. Suharto of Indonesia and Pinochet of Chile were practicing fascists as well as Hitler and Mussolini.

[TankLV]

55. Really? There were NO Jewish persons that became supporters

and members of the Nazi party?

That's not what I have learned!

[Larkspur]

62. Capos were not members of the Nazi Party. They were prisoners

in the concentration camps, who were either crimminals in the pre-World War II world, had crimminal instincts, or were trying to get better treatment from the Nazis by becoming prisoner-captains of their barracks. The Capos would have been doomed to die in the gas chambers along with other Jews, if the Allies had lost the war.

Victor Frankl talks about Capo psychology in his book, "Man's Search for Meaning." His book was about his experiences in the concentration camps and what he and various prisoners he met did to survive.

[peacetalksforall]

9. Entertainers are not readers or students, therefore, they can't know

much about history, therefore, they cannot be published, sing, write poetry, give speeches, work for the UN or other organizations, unless it is in the realm of emotions, comedy, or mundane things. So sayeth Dr. Medoff if you read between his lines -

"Some entertainers simply don't know much about history," said Dr. Rafael Medoff, director of The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies."

A knowledge of history is essential to having political opinions? Did someone slip through the cracks?

[Seeking Serenity]

11. No, but . . .

"A knowledge of history is essential to having political opinions?"

No, but it it very helpful in making apt and persuasive historical analogies and in preventing you from sounding like an idiot, thus taking away from your otherwise valid political opinion.

[peacetalksforall]

22. I agree with your statement, but I was being cynical in the assumption

that these people and entertainers in general are deficient in their knowledge of history - leading up to our George and his knowledge of history. George is a history twister, not a history student and everything else appears to be muddled except for who owned what oil well or baseball player.

My cynicism is showing. Entertainers have degrees. Entertainers may even have more involvement in history through their profession than the couch people who watch and listen to them.

I just saw as it all as a typical put down of concerned citizens.

[rinsd]

30. Well at least he qualified it with the "some"....

...because Belafonte was wrong about Jews involved in the 3rd Reich.

Any allies(ie: the head of the SA who was homosexual) that were undesirable got theirs during the night of long knives.

[Adrian Luca]

14. Here's what Woody Allen Really said...

"Earlier this summer, comedian and filmmaker Woody Allen said in an interview with the German magazine Der Spiegel: "The history of the world is like: he kills me, I kill him. Only with different cosmetics and different castings: so in 2001 some fanatics killed some Americans, and now some Americans are killing some Iraqis. And in my childhood, some Nazis killed Jews. And now, some Jewish people and some Palestinians are killing each other." (Der Spiegel, June 20, 2005)

It's great fun watching people like you convince yourselves you're buying a pig in a sack, even though the sack is wet, squishy and smells like bullshit.

Maybe you should take a look in the sack next time, before you fork over the cash?

[K-W]

16. Thanks for posting it. Woody said nothing in the least bit wrong. nt

[xchrom]

19. indeed.

[progressivebydesign]

58. Sounds like Woody has a good grasp on history. n/t

[kskiska]

18. Even the Germans compare * to Nazis

I think they know a Nazi when they see one.

[bpilgrim]

20. Bush is NOT a NAZI!!! so, STOP say'n that!!!

They're evil FASCISTS bastards

psst... pass the word :evilgrin:

peace

[goforit]

28. LOL!!!...well, yes they are.

[Javaman]

21. Was Clinton ever compared to a nazi? I think not...

I find it truly amazing how often it appears, almost every other day, that moron* or one of his goons are compared to hitler or the nazi's. Kind of an interesting statement, isn't it?

Colossal failure*

[TankLV]

56. Maybe that's because he wasn't - and nobody saw even a hint of that in him

But maybe - just maybe - the moniker is apt for bunkerboy and the repuke party because there are more than a couple tidbits of valid comparisons? Maybe?

But to go and actually look for yourself would be traumatic for some, so one can hardly be blamed if they refuse to confront and comprehend the awful truth.

[wli]

26. maybe Bushler's tactic is this

Imitate the Nazis to the tee (which AFAICT he's doing) then smear anyone who dares mention this fact as making an unfair comparison that makes light of the original suffering/etc.

[Eloriel]

47. Absolutely. It's a form of self-innoculation.

They rushed to compare Saddam to Hitler for the same reason, IMO. They (Bush administration) go absolutely ape-shit over anything remotely close to the mark. Remember the German poitician who was forced to RESIGN because she simply said that one of the tactics of the Bush administration was also used by Hitler? And she didn't even NAME Hitler in her comment, either.

[goforit]

27. This just shows that Hitler practices can inflict any society.

Not one society is excluded from the infectious evil entity.

We are all susceptible.

Hats off to Belafonte/Allen/Grgory.

[loudsue]

29. If it looks like Hitler, and smells like Hitler, kills millions like

Hitler, struts like Hitler, rules all branches of government with threats and intimidation like Hitler, and demands loyalty like Hitler, then, it's prolly got something in common with Hitler.

It's pretty easy to make the analogy.

"But he's not like Hitler, so stop saying that!" just doesn't quite get it.

:kick::kick::kick:

[cliss]

31. Ah, yes....Harry Belafonte.

Harry's last name means "Beautiful Fountain". That's a nice, poetic summary of the man. He certainly has been a fountain of opinions.

He's been a constant thorn in Washington's side. He emerges now and then with statements like "Colin Bowel is Bush's Servant". He made huge news a few years ago, by saying that Colon was serving his master well, and he got to move into the Master's mansion because of it.

Yikes. I read that when he heard this, Colon smiled but said nothing. I'm sure when Bowel went home, though, he was pissed.

[jobycom]

32. I call on Rafael Medoff to retract his statements defending Bush's

genocide against Muslims. By pretending there are no similarities between Bush and Hitler, Dr. Medoff is trivializing the plights of oppressed people everywhere, and making the next path to multi-million genocide much easier.

Medoff owes the world an apology, for requiring Bush to have slaughtered more people before we can compare him to Hitler. Quit defending homicidal maniacs, Dr. Medoff, or your Holocaust institute will have competition.

[bvar22]

40. Good Response, jobycom.

Should be mailed to Medoff!!

[nodehopper]

35. fascism is not the same as nazism

There are disturbing similarities between Bush's administration, especially in their handling of propaganda and their agenda for civil liberties and fascism as an ideology and practice. Nazism is a particular ideology pivoting around eugenics, Aryan supremacy and old Wagner operas that, during the third reich, dovetailed with the political platform of fascism in Germany.

One can make a solid historical argument that conditions for fascism are being fulfilled under Bush. The neocons and fundies, creepy as they are, have no similarities to Nazis that aren't conjecture.

[K-W]

36. Your post is a bit contradictory.

You argue that the Bush administration could be facist and then you claim there are no similarities between them and the Nazi's.

Gee, could the fact that both were facist be a similarity?

Could it be that Nazi's are by far and away the best known facists in history, and thus if you wanted to point out the facist tendencies of the Bush administration to people you might refer to the historical example that everyone knows about?

[Eloriel]

48. Not to mention the FACT that the Bush admin is following what

is often referred to here as "Hitler's playbook" step by step. Let's see, aren't we up to the late 1930s by now?

[guruoo]

45. There are plenty of similarties...

between the rise of the Third
Reich, and the rise of the neo-fascist
movement in America.

[Name removed]

44. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Zhade]

46. That's silly, b*s* isn't Hitler.

Yet.

[ekelly]

49. Similarly....

Hitler wasn't "Hitler" yet either....when he got ELECTED.

[Zhade]

60. There ya go.

People keep comparing the early b*s* to the later Hitler - of COURSE the analogy is flawed, not enough time has passed to truly see the resemblances.

[TankLV]

50. Give him enought time, and he will be there.

The problem is, all the apologists are comparing the END of Hitler's Germany, etc. to the BEGINNING of bunkerboy.

But if you compare the two in the context of the stage they are in their "development", then bunkerboy and his brand of nazi fascist criminal are following the script almost day for day.

Give it enough time, if you want to. But I'm not willing to let it get that worse before we yell at the top of our lungs how bunkerboy anbd the repuke party IS JUST LIKE THE NAZIS!

WAKE UP AMERICA, BEFORE IT IS INDEED TOO LATE!

[bvar22]

51. bush* is NOT Hitler, so stop saying that!

Hitler was a charismatic speaker and a published writer whose works are still required reading in most of the World!

At best, bush* is a pathetic little Hitler wannabee!
:patriot:

[ekelly]

53. Well........

All murderers can't be EXACTLY alike.


(can't find my sarcasm pic)

[ElectroPrincess]

57. Yes but ...

Yes I concur with you = "At best bush* is a pathetic little Hitler wannabee."

WITH one hell-of-va media machine (all major USA networks) and propaganda artists working to "remake the message" in the Chimperor's best-case scenario image.

I get chills throughout my body and the hairs stick up on the back side of my neck EVERY TIME some highly intelligent Bush-Bot from the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) appears on C-SPAN'S Washington Journal. I'm constantly exclaiming to my coffee buddy or directly to the screen, "Damn, they're GOOD!" (and dangerous)

No, it's the national TV (and AM Radio) news media that's polluted toward the right wing. The propaganda (Republican Noise Machine) is what is truly our "Democratic Republic's" enemy. Bush is merely a figurehead for those who cherish the growth of Multi-National Corporations above all else.

[fbahrami]

59. Clarification on Woody Allen's words

Not that I have a problem with the comparison, but as a Woody Allen fan I was surprised at the directness of the quote.

Anyway here's what I found on the web:

http://www.usabroad.org/2004/09/woody_allen_on_.html

\http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/spiegel/0,1518,361905,00.html

[despairing optimist]

63. Seminal book on GWB administration: The Rise and Fall of the Turd Reich

Ad slogan: It floats! It floats!