Hitler / Obama Comparisons: Is Barack Obama Like Adolf Hitler or The Nazis?

The Humble Libertarian ^ | 8/27/09

[FromLori]

Is Barack Obama like the Nazis or Adolf Hitler? Does even asking the question make you a right-wing nut or a partisan hack? Is it distasteful to mention Hitler or the Nazis to make a point? Let's take a sober look at the answers to these questions below:

Godwin's Law

Adolf Hitler seems to appear frequently in political debates. Reference to Hitler or Nazism is so commonplace that in 1990, U.S. attorney and author Mike Godwin coined an adage that has become well known on Internet discussion forums as Godwin's Law: "As a Usenet discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches 1."

Why does that seem to be the case? Because in a fierce political disagreement, there is at least one area of common ground that almost everyone will share: that Adolf Hitler was evil, unequivocally and without argument. Even self-professing moral relativists are hard pressed to maintain otherwise. Adolf Hitler was evil.

When two sides seem to disagree about everything else, that area of common ground can (if emotions don't flare as they often do) actually form a bridge of understanding and communication. People grasp for "the Hitler card" because they know their opponent will agree with the major premise that Hitler was evil. Then it's on to the minor premise, which takes the form of "...and x is just like what we agree made Hitler evil."

"Therefore x is also evil," the debater concludes.

Argumentum ad Hitlerum

The first thing to remember as we approach this issue is that it is a logical fallacy to assert that if Adolf Hitler did or believed x, then x must automatically be bad. It is an association fallacy referred to as "argumentum ad Hitlerum" in parody of the formal titles of other logical fallacies such as "argumentum ad hominem."

Just because Hitler was opposed to smoking tobacco, it does not follow that someone is evil or morally equivalent to Hitler if they abstain from tobacco use. Adolf Hitler did all kinds of things that other people do who are not morally equivalent to him. Hitler painted flowers. So did Georgia O'Keeffe. That does not make Georgia O'Keeffe a genocidal maniac by association.

But it is possible, logically sound, and perfectly fair in some cases to draw a deeper kind of comparison to Hitler. We can assert of someone (if we have the facts to substantiate our claim, of course) that they are morally or politically equivalent- or at least similar- to Hitler because their actions spring from the same ideology and/or tend to produce the same results.

In the case of U.S. President Barack Obama, we must determine whether comparisons of his policies to those of Adolf Hitler are the first kind of accusation (and therefore a fallacy) or the second kind of accusation; and if they are the second kind, then we must determine whether the the comparison is supported by the facts, or if it is a false comparison.

Obama/Hitler Comparisons

Conservatives can intuit (and some can explicitly understand and articulate) that Barack Obama's political program is similar in remarkable and chilling ways to that of Adolf Hitler's. Their argument does not commit the "argumentum ad Hitlerum" fallacy because their assertion is that President Obama's policies and worldview share the very characteristics by which we reckon Hitler as evil, not other irrelevant characteristics.

The actions of the Nazi regime, which are almost universally regarded as vile, were rooted in the ideologies and political programs of socialism, eugenics, and imperialism. Obama's ideology, associations, and governance of the United States thus far betray a fervent and unambiguous commitment to socialist nationalization and government direction of America's major industries, a eugenicist program of strict population control, and a continued policy of aggressive American imperialism and global dominance through force.

One Miami columnist disagreed with this assessment, and criticized what he considers a flippant attitude, which makes light of the Holocaust. He writes:

"I thought it would be good to make you sick, i.e., to spend a few minutes reminding some and teaching others what you invoke when you invoke the Nazi regime. For the record, then: It was Nazis who shoved sand down a boy's throat until he died, who tossed candies to Jewish children as they sank to their deaths in a sand pit, who threw babies from a hospital window and competed to see how many of those 'little Jews' could be caught on a bayonet, who injected a cement-like fluid into women's uteruses to see what would happen, who stomped a pregnant woman to death, who once snatched a woman's baby from her arms and, in the words of a witness, 'tore him as one would tear a rag.'"

America's Holocaust

So President Obama does not deserve a comparison to the Nazis because the Nazis perpetrated a genocide? Pardon me, sir- isn't Mr. Obama perpetuating a genocide!? He has been accurately described as "the most extreme pro-abortion candidate ever to seek the office of President of the United States. He is the most extreme pro-abortion member of the United States Senate. Indeed, he is the most extreme pro-abortion legislator ever to serve in either house of the United States Congress."

While there is not enough space in this essay to treat of abortion, let me explain briefly that I believe unequivocally, on the basis of uncontroversial scientific facts and a sound anthropological ontology, that a unique, whole, and individual human being is created at conception. For an exhaustive explanation and defense of this belief, let me refer you to my essay entitled: "The Abortion Debate: A Reasoned, Scientific, Pro-Life Argument."

The relentless propaganda to the contrary, dehumanizing and miscategorizing human fetuses, is reminiscent of and similar to the Nazi campaign of dehumanization to justify their brutal treatment of helpless minorities like the Jews. The experimentation carried out on stem cells extracted by destroying human embryos, is chillingly like the medical experimentation carried out by Nazi scientists on their victims.

Eugenics and the Obama Administration

Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Regime were also obsessed with eugenics. They actively worked towards assuming power over Germany's and eventually, the entire world's reproductive rights, with the goal of allowing only the most desirable human beings to reproduce. Obama's appointment of John Holdren as his Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (or more informally, "Science Czar") betrays his administration's eugenicist agenda.

As an anonymous Internet sleuth uncovered after John Holdren's appointment (HT: to Michelle Malkin):

"In a book Holdren co-authored in 1977, the man now firmly in control of science policy in this country wrote that: Women could be forced to abort their pregnancies, whether they wanted to or not; The population at large could be sterilized by infertility drugs intentionally put into the nation's drinking water or in food; Single mothers and teen mothers should have their babies seized from them against their will and given away to other couples to raise; People who 'contribute to social deterioration' (i.e. undesirables) 'can be required by law to exercise reproductive responsibility' -- in other words, be compelled to have abortions or be sterilized. A transnational 'Planetary Regime' should assume control of the global economy and also dictate the most intimate details of Americans' lives -- using an armed international police force."

You read all of that correctly. If you don't believe me, do the research for yourself. Go out there and find it, but do not write this off and ignore it. I know that what you just read seems too horrible to be true, but it is the truth. John Holdren is our nation's "Science Czar" and he did write these terrible things in his 1977 book, Ecoscience. How can a U.S. President possibly appoint such a person to an office in the White House if he feels about that person's views what any normal and not morally-deranged person would feel?

Socialism and The Obama Administration

In popular conception, "left-wing" politics taken to the extreme produces Stalin, while "right-wing" politics taken to the extreme produces Hitler. What a stupid contrivance! Why should two mass-murdering autocrats end up on opposite ends of a political spectrum? The general American public seems oblivious to the fact that the word "Nazi" is an abbreviation for the "National Socialist German Workers Party." (In German, the word "national" is pronounced nawt-zi-uh-nal.)

Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party were socialist. The horrors inherent in socialism have made themselves all too apparent at this point on the timeline, after a century of warfare and bloodshed unrivaled in human history- the handiwork of socialist ideology and its adherents. His socialism is part of what made Adolf Hitler so evil. There can be no argument that President Obama is likewise, a socialist.

President Obama's unprecedented assumption of powers to himself and his office is remarkably and frighteningly similar to Adolf Hitler's rise to power in Germany. Obama has already suspended habeas corpus by claiming the right of indefinite detainment of potential terrorists without charges. This occurred very shortly after his Department of Homeland Security issued two reports labeling supporters of Ron Paul, certain amendments of the Constitution, devolution of Federal power to the states, or Pro-Life beliefs as potential terrorists.

Conclusion

This is just one of a lengthy list of examples of such abuses- all straight out of the pages of history and Adolf Hitler's playbook. In just a few months as President, Obama has been prolific in his assault on liberty and assumption of boundless executive power. You might even call it a "blitzkrieg." There is simply not enough room to catalog these abuses and yet bring this essay to a timely close (it may be too late for that already!). If you have been paying attention, you know exactly the kind of things to which I refer.

In closing, here is a recap of the questions at the beginning of this essay with their respective answers in light of the information above: Is Barack Obama like the Nazis or Adolf Hitler? Strikingly so. Does even asking the question make you a right-wing nut or a partisan hack? Absolutely not. The evidence is incontrovertible. Is it distasteful to mention Hitler or the Nazis to make a point? Sometimes, but certainly not in this case.

[reg45]

Actually, 0bama is more like Josef Stain.

[John123]

Actually, I think Obama is more like Mussolini than Hitler... the Nazis were Fascists that embraced some bizarre racial nonsense...

Mussolini on the other hand made the trains run on time... but couldn't win any wars... Ah... never mind!

Obama is a legend in his own mind...

[SpaceBar]

Obama is more like Salvador Allende.

[onedoug]

Or Jim Jones.

[MNJohnnie]

Bravo, about time someone said it. 0 is a fascist following the basic fascist playbook. Concentrate power in few hands directly under control of the "great leader".

Excellent article.

[Chode]

i’m starting to believe that the Zer0 truly is Nyarlathotep...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyarlathotep

he is described as a “tall, swarthy man” who resembles an Egyptian pharaoh who wanders the earth, seemingly gathering legions of followers through his demonstrations of strange and seemingly magical instruments, the narrator of the story among them. These followers lose awareness of the world around them, and through the narrator’s increasingly unreliable accounts the reader gets a sense of the world’s utter collapse. The story ends with the narrator as part of an army of servants for Nyarlathotep.

[freebilly]

Fidel Obama....

[Chode]

the Zer0 is simply Jim Jones with a teleprompter...

[WKUHilltopper]

Yeah, more like Mussolini and a swirl of Lenin...

[Nachum]

Mussolini

[Redbob]

Odious as the comparison is, it would be foolish not to recognize that B. Hussein’s policies more closely resemble those of the National Socialists than those of Karl Marx.

[Dallas59]

The AC.

[GeronL]

Julius Caesar?

Barackulus, Partner of God, needs his temple built in Baracktopolis

[GeronL]

Benito seems pretty dim from the things I have read

[John123]

Benito seems pretty dim from the things I have read

There you go! Obama! doesn't seem to be the brightest light-bulb either...

[GregoTX]

“We are socialists, we are enemies of today’s capitalistic economic system for the exploitation of the economically weak, with its unfair salaries, with its unseemly evaluation of a human being according to wealth and property instead of responsibility and performance, and we are all determined to destroy this system under all conditions.” —Adolf Hitler

[unkus]

Evil + Evil = Evil.

[GeronL]

Benito Obama ... is there a lampost high enough?
// not a threat to the President since I am a puppydog, a kitten, a harmless little sugar glider who won’t hurt you but I will crawl to your head and jump off and pee on you and poop on you. But I’d never hurt anyone.

[GeronL]

Good quote.

[Markos33]

Obama like Hitler...well, white folks were Hitler's wet dream, but Obama hates them.

Obama may be more comparable to Mussolini, both are/were IL Douchebags.

[Migraine]

There is no comparison. Hitler had his schtick down. He knew what he “knew” and was able to enunciate it, even though what he knew was wrong. The old effer never resorted to a teleprompter. He just opened his mouth and his eyes glazed over and he was off on a gyro-gesticulated rant. He might have had the devil’s TV screen on his inner eyelids, but I wouldn’t know for sure.

baraq gets all wee-wee’d up whenever he is off the TOTUS. He knows what he “knows”, even though what he “knows” is false, and he is NOT able to enunciate it because it is also decidedly communist — so his little aphorisms are euphemisms, weakly disguised as pro-American.

Both Adolph and baraq have the same thing in mind; but the former was an evil genius who was given carte blanche to engineer his own society from scratch, out of some pretty serious ashes. baraq, on the other hand, despite having plainly stated he would LIKE to have re-engineered society from scratch, is a lily-livered little punk who thinks he knows something, but is really just a puppet of some OTHER, very powerful, national socialists.

[Migraine]

Obama may be more comparable to Mussolini

...right down to the arms-folded, chin-in-air, snooty smirk he does...

[sheik yerbouty]

Obama has his own racial manias as well. He has “The Wright Stuff” and Calypso Louie has proclaimed 0bama to be the Messiah..

[2harddrive]

To compare Mombassa Obama to Adolf Hitler is a diservice to Hitler.

[Salvation]

First They Came for the Jews

First they came for the Jews
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the Communists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left
to speak out for me.
Pastor Martin Niemöller

Community and individuality are not opposites. People cannot survive on their own. When the odds are stacked against you, you must rally with the oppressed and hated.

When a growing oppressive regime is taking hold, you must act, otherwise you will soon face your enemy alone and hopeless.

Strength of community is a strength as much as individualism, as long you are willing to face weaknesses in your own community. Ignoring slacking values will mean that you will be rallied against by those you oppress.

Niemöller affirms we must rally against unhealthy organized regimes. We must also stay vigilant with those that appear to be good natured, as all organisation attracts corruption. Niemöller also warns us that if it is you who are corrupt, then you will face a stronger combined force of foe!
Vexen Crabtree

[Wardenclyffe]

Obama may be more comparable to Mussolini

"...right down to the arms-folded, chin-in-air, snooty smirk he does..."

[MotorCityBuck]

Ja.

[PzLdr]

Obozo’s more like Mussolini [ hence, the sobriquet, “Il Douche”]. All bluster, no spine. And Hitler could do three hours WITHOUT a teleprompter.

[atomicweeder]

Obama is not like Hitler. Here are three facts to prove it:

- Hitler was a decorated war hero.
- Hitler loved his country.
- Hitler never apologized for Germany's past

[Tribune7]

I’d say Hitler, but I can see where some might think the Nazis.

[VRWCer]

bookmarking

[devolve]

Hussy Junior is the rabid rat in the woodpile


He is eating through the walls to attack your kids

[outhousepatrol]

“Benito Obama ... is there a lampost high enough.” Is there a sword sharp enough? Is there a rope strong enough? Is there a bomb with megaton enough? Is there a pit deep enough? Are there brass knuckles heavy enough? Is there voltage high enough?

ARE THERE PATRIOTS BRAVE ENOUGH! Oh yeah!

[Hoplite]

This thread is just what Hitler would have said.

[When do we get liberated?]

An interesting question. One that has yet to unfold.

More like Mussolini he was elected. Real, hard core communists never have to bow to the will of the majority. Hitler never won an election. Obama did.

Conclusion: Not a comparison as to their rise to power. While O’s ACORN buddies rent protest mobs, Brownshirts charged the stage and beat politicians at political rallies. Hitler was the thug, Obama is the con man.

The fact that after less than a year the Oministration has moved us to a command economy and used class warfare as a whip against the rich, Obama is a sprinter in this class. Wake up, the government controls much of the means of production in this country.
Conclusion :Overachiever Adolph would be proud

Any study of Hitler lends the reader to understand that he was a ruthless political opportunist. Even the America media would report it if Obama had Rahn Emanuel killed (Ernst Roem). Hitler knew how long to use someone and then stab them in the back. See Revererend Wright, Farakhan and the others under the bus.

Conclusion: Similar intent and outcome, greatly differing in violence level.

Once again Hitler was a thug. Obama is merely a politician, and a crafty one, that has a diametricly opposed world view than mine. May the best ideology win.

[AndyTheBear]

The millions of aborted babies in our country and the millions of slaughtered Jews in Nazi Germany were both slaughtered for one reason: They were not wanted. In both cases it seemed simply more economically and socially expedient to be rid of them. And by some odd twist of convience, both the leftist and the Nazi feel they were more advanced and forward thinking to not see them as really human.

[AndyTheBear]

Hitler never won an election.

Hmm, I have not researched it, but I had heard that he did.

[AndyTheBear]

OK, I did some research. And by golly you are right. Hitler seems to have lost all the elections badly, but he still managed to bully his way into being a dictator.

[devolve]

[savagesusie]

Actually, I think Obama is more like Mussolini than Hitler... the Nazis were Fascists that embraced some bizarre racial nonsense...

No, Obama, although he tries to hide it, has an extreme hatred for white people and Western Civilization. All of Rev. Wright's Marxist Liberation theology was swallowed, hook, line and sinker by O. (All about Black Power and destroy Whitey and his God.)

Also, O is a closet sexual deviant. He was deserted by his father, he hates DOMA, Don't Ask, Don't Tell, and was mentored by the sexual deviant, communist Frank Marshall Davis, whom O adored and latched onto as a role model during his vulnerable teenage years. He is amoral which is obvious with whom he associates, and he displays classic narcissistic qualities that are used to mask a sick, damaged soul.

Sexual Deviancy was extremely prevalent with Hitler and his Brownshirts..{Pink Swastika}..they had much in common with the homosexual serial killers: Dahmer, Gacy, Garvey, Kearney, Bruce Davis, Juan Corona, Owen and Henry Coril, Stephen Kraft, William Bonin, etc. who could mutilate and kill people and not bat an eye. Sexual perversion can twist the soul to such a degree that you give no value whatsoever to life.

O has also shown no regard for human life in his extreme votes to kill babies. His associates advocate for death panels...sterilizations, euthanasia, etc.

No, O has a lot in common with the Nazis and Hitler.

[Brugmansian]

Bankers, including some in America, were behind Mussolini so he is the more apt comparison.

[investigateworld]

Excellent post!

[Kevmo]

Obama is a National Socialist
Oct 27, 2008 ... : Kevmo| www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/2116981/posts

[Just mythoughts]

Whittaker Chambers for me describes the mindset of Bama, better than anything else I have ever read. He goes to the heart of the matter of a liberals ideology.

Bama half quoting the words of Cain last week as moral authority to ‘fix’ health care is more than a bit curious.

http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/hiss/chambersletter.html

[Bellflower]

I would not be surprised at all if BO becomes the anti Christ. He may someday make AH look small in comparison to the evil that Satan uses him to release, to destroy much of the earth and billions of it's people.

[Bellflower]

It was funny. Just as I was posting the previous comment I looked up at the Glen Beck show and heard Louis Farrakhan proclaiming,

“You are the instruments that God is going to use to bring about universal change, and that is why Barack has captured the youth. And he has involved young people in a political process that they didn't care anything about. That's a sign. When the Messiah speaks, the youth will hear, and the Messiah is absolutely speaking.”

[Bellflower]

Obama is a Trojan horse sent in by our enemies to destroy us.

[backhoe]

 

[SUSSA]