“Some of us have strong opinions and are often misunderstood. My analogy was extreme – but it was to make a point. I was simply trying to explain how stupid it seemed to me – how ludicrous that pairing was. They’re polar opposites and it made no sense.- Williams

Anybody with a shred on Intellectual honesty would admit he wasn’t really comparing Obama to Hitler. He was referring to the meeting between the president and the SOTH as being a farce.

I don’t see why the the statement had to be “clarified”. It’s easy to see Obama as “the enemy” without any reference to Hitler.

For them to pull the Iconic opening to Monday night football because Jr expressed a negative assessment of the presidents meeting with the speaker of the house is clearly an act of a bunch of quivering squids.

Jr.’s analogy was spot on. Don’t doubt a country boy’s acumen for calling it as he sees it.

There were absolutely no consequences for anyone comparing the Shrub to Hitler…

Your question as phrased, Frank, pretty narrowly asks about ad homineum attacks, which pretty much answers itself. Hitler was an individual, you can only call an individual “Hitler”. It’s personal, and just more trash politics.

But I continue to believe that it’s intellectually valid to compare a person or group’s chosen strategies, tactics, and beliefs, with those of the German National Socialists, and any other historical political figures or groups. There’s no more objective reason to be outraged by a comparison to the political tactics of Nazis than a comparison to Imperial Romans or the medieval Medicis. (Yeah, lots of subjective emotional reaons, of course, but it’s rational discourse I’m after here, not gut-purging.)

To say that somebody has taken a page from Joseph Goebbels is usually just an observation of everyday fact. Hell, watch 15 minutes of commercial TV and you’ll see half a dozen homages to The Master of Propaganda. And we all know the Big Lie lives la vida loco during every campaign season. Outrage over that comparison strikes me as a smokescreen to obscure guilt…in fact, as a fine example of the Big Lie itself.

Bowser presented an example of the kind of analysis that I think is legitimate. The history of the Nazis’ rise to power is almost completely characterized by ruthless dirty tricks and dogged attempts to destroy democracy from within, aided and abetted by a complacent population. If we’re forbidden from examining present-day political tactics for signs of the same sort of attacks on the system, aren’t we just asking for the same sort of trouble?

Maybe the Emperor is fully dressed, but we have to be free to take a look and make sure. Bowser may be wrong, but as soon as he can’t ask his questions, he’s proven right.

So on the broader question of whether it’s legitimate to compare the actions of people today with the actions of the Nazis of the past, yes, I think it is. It has to be, lest history repeat itself.

But when it comes to name-calling, I call Hank Williams Jr. an asshole for calling anybody “Hitler”.

Hitler was genuinely popular with the German people, much like Churchill and Roosevelt were with English and American.

His ruthlessness trumped all the other qualities of the man, but he shared some with many other people.

Arf