by P. David Gardner
Anyone who's been on the Internet and its many forums for any length of time knows that once you whip the Nazi references out from the lint-filled bottom of your pockets, it's all over.
This fact was amply demonstrated on Saturday when 2016 Presidential contender Mike Huckabee, desperate for poll numbers, apparently decided to stop at nothing in his quickly souring bid for even a mere blip on the media radar.
Speaking to Breitbart News, favored mouthpiece of out-of-touch conservatives seeking a soft response to their outrageous viewpoints, Huckabee said, "This president's foreign policy is the most feckless in American history. It is so naive that he would trust the Iranians. By doing so, he will take the Israelis and march them to the door of the oven."
Doubling down, Huckabee added, "This is the most idiotic thing, this Iran deal. It should be rejected by both Democrats and Republicans in Congress and by the American people. I read the whole deal. We gave away the whole store. It's got to be stopped."
Apparently he didn't real the "whole deal" or he would have seen much more than he's alluding to in his statement.
Response by angered Democrats came swiftly and quite predictably.
Debbie Wasserman Schultz, chair of the Democratic National Committee, said "Cavalier analogies to the Holocaust are unacceptable. Mike Huckabee must apologize to the Jewish community and to the American people for this grossly irresponsible statement."
The Anti-Defamation League referred to his Holocaust reference as "completely out of line and unacceptable."
MSNBC's Morning Joe co-host Mika Brzezinski said, "If you've been to Auschwitz, if you've been to Birkenau, if you've been to any of these places where people were killed and you see the piles of glasses, the piles of hair, the piles of shoes and the piles of clothes ... And every bit of their humanity that had to be stripped away, handed over as they went and burned to their deaths among other things, it's really not a good comment to say."
2016 Presidential contender Hillary Clinton had a few choice words to say as well.
"Comments like these are offensive, and they have no place in our political dialogue," she said. "I am disappointed and I am really offended personally. I know Governor Huckabee. I have a cordial relationship with him. But I find this kind of inflammatory rhetoric totally unacceptable. One can disagree with the particulars of the agreement to put a lid on the nuclear weapons program of Iran – and that is fair game. But this steps over the line, and it should be repudiated by every person of good faith and concern about the necessity to keep our political dialogue on the facts and within suitable bounds."
Twitter and other social media outlets went practically afire Sunday with responses from hundreds of people who took Huckabee to task for his off-the-cuff and irresponsible Holocaust reference.
President Obama himself on Monday responded appropriately, saying that "When you get rhetoric like this, maybe it gets attention, and maybe it's an effort to push Mr. Trump out of the headlines, but it's not the kind of leadership that's needed for America right now."
Huckabee, for his part, stands firm in his views, and has not backed down nor apologized for his outrageous statement.
"I wish the president would say that it's ridiculous to make a nuclear deal with a government that holds Americans hostage, sponsors terror, funds attacks on Israel, and who openly and repeatedly promises to destroy both Israel and the United States," Huckabee said on MSNBC's Morning Joe program. "That is ridiculous. And dangerous."
Personally, I find Huckabee and many other Republican candidates ridiculous and dangerous. With their generous use of irresponsible rhetoric, they not only bring out the very worst in American politics, they anger the world, which views them as unstable and unsuitable for the highest office in the United States. And makes us all look like utter fools.
