Identity, Justice, Politics

Holocaust Museum Post Mortem

1 USHolocaust MemorialMuseum

What to make of the news that a neo-Nazi gunman killed a security guard at the US Holocaust Museum in Washington DC? Rabbi Marvin Hier says it shows “that the cancer of hatred, bigotry and anti-Semitism is alive and well in America.” According to President Obama, it means “we must remain vigilant against anti-Semitism and prejudice in all its forms.”
I don’t know, I’m not sure that we really needed this particularly horrid act to remind us that hatred and prejudice exist in our country. But it does seem to offer an important sign that for all of our angst about international terrorism, we’d do well to recognize that it’s alive and well in our own backyard.
And it seems to be working. The New York Times reported today that the late Dr. George Tiller’s Witchita abortion clinic has now closed permanently…

15 thoughts on “Holocaust Museum Post Mortem

  1. It’s two converging trends.
    One is the surge in domestic right-wing terrorism now that there is a Democrat in the White House. Remember that we did see the similar trend during the Clinton administration. I certainly remember one day in ’94 when two family planning clinics in my neighborhood and the people inside where shot up by a fundamentalist Catholic gunman.
    The other trend is the reintroduction of anti-Semitic and anti-Judaic tropes into public discourse, which is not exclusive to the right, as we can see in Gary Trudeau’s recent contribution to inter-faith dialogue.
    That’s what I make of it.

  2. It is truly a tragedy that the late Dr.Tiller’s clinic in Wichita has closed following his passing, which I believe leaves just one such late term clinic for woman in dire straits who really have no alternative to this service. The shutting of its doors shows the pro-life terrorists that their actions DO lead to their desired result…funny I think I’ve seen that situation occur elsewhere…*cough The Middle East *cough
    The balagan at the Holocaust museum is beyond reprehensible, but hopefully the one positive in the aftermath will be that it opens people’s eyes to the hatred, anti-semitism, homophobia, racism, etc that still thrive in this country, and what we need to DO about it so that America can REALLY be the land of the free.

  3. These last weeks have proven to be difficult and harrowing reminders that while, nationally, the US incidence of hate crime has declined since 2001 (see: http://www.newsy.com/videos/is_hate_on_the_rise) any incident of the sort cuts deeply into the fragile feeling of hope many Americans are experiencing these days when considering the dream of tolerance. Oh, and the Washington Post has an excellent piece about the guard who was murdered ( http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/10/AR2009061003884.html ).

  4. The number of deaths caused by illegal aliens in the US far outnumbers any “surge” (yeah right) by right-wing terrorism.
    That said, maybe Jews should put their support behind border enforcement. In these volatile economic times it would be much appreciated.

  5. fm-
    that is far from substantiation, that is circumstantial evidence by definition. substantiation would be a non-biased, fact-based providing of raw data that things are the way you say they are. Instead of just finding a weblink to a local news item. I bet you I could find a dozen drunk driving deaths caused by legal, American-born morons, too.

  6. Justin
    “I bet you I could find a dozen drunk driving deaths caused by legal, American-born morons, too.”
    Hey, there is domestic terrorism in the united states too (two deaths this year alone!). Let’s call off the hunt on bin Laden.
    Seriously, this is the quality of thinking on this site?

  7. oy vey, fm, what to do with you… I don’t even know where to begin. you are making huge statements which are also pretty racist damning “illegals” as murderers in greater numbers than “legals.” I’m saying that’s stupid. And your response is to make some flimsy association between Islamo-fascist global terrorism and American born domestic terrorists? I think you’ve shown the internet your quality of thinking…

  8. Murder by illegal aliens can be prevented. Why? Because they are in the country illegally and if you deport them back to their own country they can no longer do any harm. Death at the hands of illegal aliens is a preventable evil.
    By contrast there is no such recourse with citizens who murder. Knowing that death and suffering could have been prevented if only the authorities were doing their routine jobs is the cause of much of the anger directed at illegal aliens.
    But I guess in your egalitarian mind all murders are equally unpreventable. Especially if you don’t try.

  9. FM-
    I still find your argument insufficient.
    Are you saying there is no way to prevent citizens from murdering other citizens??? because that’s the contrast you’ve given.
    I was under the impression that we were trying to stop all murder…but you seem to blow off citizens who take lives.. on what basis? because they are citizens????
    There are things we can do to prevent them from also hurting others. Justin gave the example of American drunk drivers. Are you saying we can’t try to stop people from getting behind the wheel and smashing their car into another? you talk about trying in one case but aren’t particularly vexed to find solutions in another. The idea is that the quality of a person’s character or choices isn’t attached to his country’s name. Good and bad people live on every continent and country. It’s slightly heartbreaking you seem willing to overlook this.
    I, personally, am appalled when i see u.s. citizens ruining the lives of others through their reckless behavior. just as i am appalled when world citizens do the same. but that’s my egalitarian mind thinking again…btw, since when was that a bad thing?

  10. Trista
    You have completely missed my point.
    Releasing an illegal immigrant after he’s been arrested because he lives in a sanctuary city and who afterwards goes on to kill people in a drunk driving accident. That’s what I was talking about. It could have been prevented easily by say the immigration enforcers doing their job.
    And, no you can’t prevent murder by citizens. You can only create deterrence by punishing the perps afterwards. We don’t live in a “minority report” world.

  11. fm-
    deterrents such as prison and death penalty have been proven ineffective across the board. Trista brings up a great point. You are making gross claims about people who happen to have been born in another country and make their way to this country not utilizing the incredibly corrupt system of legal immigration. The fact is that there are murderers in the world, and our immigration policies as they stand, and those that seek to make them even more stringent, will never prevent that. A person not from this country who is released from prison is no different than a citizen of this country released from prison. That is all. You belittle “egalitarian thinkers,” but I’m pretty sure that this nation was founded on egalitarian principles, was it not? This is a nation of immigrants. My ancestors were immigrants, your ancestors were probably immigrants. Is illegal immigration always wrong, no matter what? Jews moving to Palestine in the late 19th-early 20th centuries were illegal immigrants, were they not? It still sounds to me like you’re just being racist and hateful.

  12. “This is a nation of immigrants.”
    and always will be… seems to be the subtext of this statement. Enough is enough. America is a settled country.

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