'Joe the Plumber' under fire after tying the Holocaust to gun control

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Telegraph

'Joe the Plumber' under fire after tying the Holocaust to gun control

A Republican candidate dubbed "Joe the Plumber" came under fire on Wednesday for tying the Holocaust and the Armenian genocide to gun control in a campaign video for an Ohio congressional seat.

7:17AM BST 21 Jun 2012

Samuel Wurzelbacher became a hit among conservatives after confronting President Barack Obama on the campaign trail in 2008.

The video shows Wurzelbacher loading up a shotgun and pulverising fruits and vegetables while a voice over intones: "In 1911, Turkey established gun control. From 1915 to 1917 1.5 million Armenians, unable to defend themselves, were exterminated.

"In 1939 Germany established gun control. From 1939 to 1945 six million Jews and seven million others, unable to defend themselves, were exterminated," the voice continues.

The video is just the latest in a rising number of offensive incidents in which the Holocaust is invoked for political gain, said Deborah Lauter, director of civil rights at Anti-Defamation League, a prominent Jewish group.

Read more: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/us-election/9345826/Joe-the-Plumber-under-fire-after-tying-the-Holocaust-to-gun-control.html

---

[center]

"Joe the Republican"[/center]

[sakabatou]

1. Joe the asshat

[LynneSin]

41. Joe the Douchebag

[frylock]

56. sam the joe

[CreekDog]

2. So have DUers

to be fair, however, I don't think any DUers that did that are liberals.

[clang1]

10. So have DUers to be fair, however, I don't think any DUers that did that are liberals.

Really? Pathetic.

[CreekDog]

11. just look in the GD thread

you'll see.

plainly. it is sad.

[jwirr]

37. Did what? Link gun control to the extermination of 10 million people in WWII or use this in a

political sense?

[nxylas]

3. OK, so prove him wrong

So far, the reaction seems to have been "you can't say that". He needs to be challenged on his facts, if they are wrong. Otherwise his defenders will just say "He spoke a true truth and now the libruls want to censor him".

[Lars77]

4. Gun control is not what Hitler is mostly famous for.

[clang1]

5. re: OK, so prove him wrong

Canada and England (especially Canada), most of Europe, parts of Asia. We need registration and harmonized gun control laws across the country IMO.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_Canada I would suppose these numbers can also be gotten from Statistics Canada.

Violent crime, suicide and accidents in Canada

Gun control laws are often enacted to control injury and death with target areas broadly classified as violent crime, suicide, and accidental injury. Statistics are used to demonstrate the need for new legislation, or highlight the successes and failures of existing legislation.

The year following the introduction of firearms licensing in Canada (1977), saw a significant decline in murder involving firearms, relative to other mechanisms.[30] From 1977 to 2003 Canada firearm homicide has declined from 1.15 to 0.5 per 100,000, while other mechanisms declined less significantly (1.85 to 1.23 per 100,000).[31][30] To date, no study has explored the relationship between the choice of weapons for murder, the changing legal climate, and cultural attitudes. Currently, shooting and stabbing represent the two most common mechanisms for homicide in Canada, each accounting for approximately 30% of murders.[32]

Overall suicide in Canada peaked in 1978 at 14.5 per 100,000,[33] declining by 22% (11.3 per 100,000) in 2004.[34][35] During this same time period, firearm suicides declined by 55% (1287 individuals to a low of 568) [36] while the number of non-firearm suicides increased by 52% (2,046 in 1977 to 3,116 in 2003).[citation needed] In response to the 2001 registration requirements, some psychiatric doctors have argued that the legislation is not as effective as treatment in the prevention of suicide, given alternate mechanisms are available for suicide. [37]

Accidental death, of any kind, is rare claiming 27.9 people per 100,000 in 2000. Of these, firearms accidents account for 0.3% (0.1 per 100,000), ranking below the 37% for transportation (10.2 per 100,000), 28% for unspecified (7.7 per 100,000), 18% for falls (5.1 per 100,000), and 11% for poisoning (3.1 per 100,000). [38]


I would not mind to see a National Gun Ownership ID, a mandatory National level program, the states maybe even individually administer it in some form TBD. Gun problem is solved.

[louis-t]

45. Canada had a ridiculously low murder rate in the '70s.

July, 1976, London Ontario recorded it's first murder of that year. I was in London, a city of 220,000 at the time. It was on the front page of every newspaper and the lead story on every newscast for weeks. As I recall, they ended the year with 3 or 4. I believe Detroit had over 300 murders that year.

[reACTIONary]

9. Prove him Wrong? It's his responsibility to prove himself right...

The assertion that is being made is that gun control somehow caused or allowed the genocide to occur. This assertion requires some pretty significant substantiation, and a mere "Post hoc ergo propter hoc" observation doesn't cut the mustard. In fact, it is one of the more simplistic and abused logical fallacies.

The Armenian genocide took place in the context of WWI. The Armenians were a part of the Ottoman empire. The Ottoman's were allied with Germany against (among others) the Russians. The Russians promised the Armenians independence if they would stand against the Ottomans. This situation lead to the forced relocation of the Armenians and the mass deaths.

The idea that "gun control" was in anyway a cause of this situation or that its absence would have prevented it is ideological nonsense. Merely a fantasy of "rugged individualism".

[nxylas]

51. That might be true if he was writing a doctoral thesis

In the context of politics, however, the old adage that "a lie can travel round the world three times while the truth is still putting its boots on" applies. I've seen the Hitler gun control meme quoted enough times (along with its cousin, "if everyone at Columbine had been armed, the shootings would never have happened&quot to want to see it firmly knocked on the head.

[clang1]

13. As stated

HE needs to prove his case, not the other way around. How does this man even have a platform to spread this nonsense. Sheesh.

[ET Awful]

14. Easy enough to do -

The fact is that Hitler rose to power because the Weimar Republic was not able to confiscate the guns of Hitler and his party.

The first gun related legislation passed after Hitler took power actually relaxed controls on private ownership of firearms.

The Firearms Policy Journal (January 1997) writes:

"The Nazi Party did not ride to power confiscating guns. They rode to power on the inability of the Weimar Republic to confiscate their guns. They did not consolidate their power confiscating guns either. There is no historical evidence that Nazis ever went door to door in Germany confiscating guns. The Germans had a fetish about paperwork and documented everything. These searches and confiscations would have been carefully recorded. If the documents are there, let them be presented as evidence."

(From the excellent essay discussing the right-wing meme of calling Hitler a leftist which can be found at the link below):

http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/L-hitler.htm

[Diclotican]

19. ET Awful

ET Awful

In Norway - under the occupying by Germany (1940-1945) they was very interesting in confiscating the guns - but it was because of the fact Norway was in War with Norway but they hit aground, as most Norwegians was using their guns (old rifles for the most part) to hunt animals, rather than to shoot humans.. And it all was somewhat of a comic as germans was trying to get the weapons - and they who had them was rather digging them down behind the barn, rather than give them to the germans... And even today some of them are being discovered as the generation who was hiding them, is dying off, one by one, and the weapons is discovered, in the attics or where else they was hided...

The right wings who claim Hitler was a leftist, is way out in the woods.. Everything point to the fact that Hitler WAS a righty, and supported the conservatives, rather than the socialists... And even the "25 party points" who was canonized as "eternal" was never really used, after Hitler got into office in 1933.. Many of them either outright lie - or have no clue what the Nazis was about...

Diclotican

[ET Awful]

28. Of course, there's a large difference between what Hitler did in Germany and what he did

in occupied countries. If you're going to use occupied nations as an example, the US is as guilty of confiscating arms in occupied countries as Germany was. For example: http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2008/12/earlier-this-we/

As to right-wingers, they usually resort to saying that since the Nazi party were "National Socialists", then by extension they must be socialist. The level of ignorance displayed by those who can't quite understand that Hitler held communism and socialism in contempt because the considered them to be tools of the Jews he hated.

[Diclotican]

33. ET Awful

ET Awful

True - but then US was just one of many occupiers who had to get controll over Germany after WW2.. And the confication of all the weapons who was floating around after the breakdown of Whermact was paramount to get the peace on a solid footing.. And it worked even though it between 1945-48 was a few times different groups of leftovers from the old regime wanted, and shoot sivilians who worked with the US, UK or Frence forces - or who hoped to destabilize the situation so mutch, that some of the old guard could rise up to the shallenge... It dosen't worked - mostly becouse most germans was not willing to make push for another war.. WW2 was devestating enough...

Many right wingers do not care for - or have no clue about the history - and some of them claim that since Hitler used the Sosialism in his party name, he must be a closet communist, or a soscialist... Who is bullshit and a wrongfull idea who are not supported by facts. If they had been like some of the right wingers - then why explain the fact, that some of the first to get arrested was indeed communists - and sosialist - even sosial-democratic... And that most party's from the left from the right was desolved, and the values taken by NSDAP...

And yes - the idea that socialists was the tool of the Jews was something they belived in... And many of the neo-nazisms still belive in... And many on the right have a dark, murky idea about jews and sosialism... That be in US or in the Europe...

Diclotican

[clang1]

32. re: ET Awful

I enjoy reading such stories as your first paragraph. Thanks

[Diclotican]

47. clang1

clang1

Thank you

Diclotican

[jwirr]

39. Thank you. This is a part of WWII history that I have never known. I read this post hoping to learn

what really happened.

[SwissTony]

24. The UK and Australia both have strong gun control

Dunblane, Hoddle Street and Port Arthur happened when the gun control was not so strong.

Since then...

[Dr_Scholl]

60. Did you forget about this?

[url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cumbria_shootings[/url]

[SwissTony]

65. I did. I stand corrected. nt.

[yurbud]

48. so Jews were well treated before Hitler supposedly enacted this law?

There were no pogroms in Eastern Europe and Russia?

Jews in Western Europe were organized into deadly militias of pre-Israeli commandos?

If dictators needed gun control to control their people, how come every Achmed and his brother had an AK-47 in Iraq?

And if people needed guns to overthrow dictators, how did the Soviet Union, East Germany, and most of the Eastern block dictatorships fall with few if any shots fired, even though their governments had the overwhelming advantage in firepower?

Sometimes you have to wonder if the right is cynically manipulating people or they have just watched too many damn Steven Seagal movies and thought they were documentaries.

[clang1]

68. +1000 n/t

[DisgustipatedinCA]

66. About 1% of Germany was Jewish. There were as many SA stormtroopers as there were Jews

Assuming all Jewish men, women, and children were heavily armed and shot better than Jason Bourne, and had tighter communication and planning than Seal Team 6, well they might have gotten somewhere, at least for a little while. But a world like that only exists in the deluded fantasies of NRA gunstrokers and brain dead fucks like JtheP. Thanks for your scholarly question.

[Nevernose]

67. Germany continuously deregulated firearm ownership

From 1928 to 1938. The gun laws in those years made it easier to get guns for most people. That's the simple fact, and the whole "the Nazis banned gun ownership" thing might as well be one of the Grimm Brothers' fairy tales: it's make believe, bullshit dreamed up by NRA employees who want your money, people who desperately want to alter history so that fascists are really liberals and conservatives actually value "personal liberty," and paranoid fantasists who are convinced that they can stave off government stormtroopers with their M-16 knock-offs.

[DrDan]

6. "No one in the video said gun control CAUSED genocide,"

wonder if he is posting in the gungeon . . . .

[clang1]

7. Don't insult peoples intelligence please

Then what's the dufus talking about in the video huh

"While reasonable people can disagree about gun control policies, invoking the Holocaust as a political tool and suggesting that the Nazi regime's systematic and brutal murder of six million Jews and millions of others was the result of gun control is deeply offensive."

[pacalo]

8. The more I learn about these reichwing nutbags, the less I feel good about being an American.

This is no longer the country I had such faith in; all my life, pre-Bush, I believed that this country's beliefs were righteous, high-standard, & of goodness. Please tell me these abnormal people aren't in the majority.

When SCOTUS appointed an ex-CIA director's spoiled loser of a son to the White House, this country jumped the shark. The entire 8 years of the endless pestering of Bill Clinton's presidency was just the warm-up in dividing this country. Bush gave us division on steroids. Look at where we are.

And how embarassing is it that this came from a UK publication.

[clang1]

12. The Nazi and other comparison are not just about gun control

nor are the ideological distortions merely related to gun control. Just why is it these little fascist bastards like this, and others like him, always evoke comparisons to NAZI, for what is responsible social policy? Whether it be gun control or anything else they disagree with while they plod along on their own authoritarian agendas. The GOP does it all the time. It's pretty damn offensive and more...

[SkatmanRoth]

15. Wrzelbacher bringing up the issue of gun control shows his campaign is in trouble

Gun control is a loosing issue for Democrats. If Joe the Plumber has to resort to the "They are coming for our guns" canard, he is admitting he has no issues to base his congressional campaign on.

Poor guy, he is running a 1994 election bid in 2012. When he looses, he will stand there in stunned amazement.

[clang1]

16. Well, That's one way of looking at it I guess n/t

[louis-t]

46. Or 'loses'. That is the weirdest, most prolific typing affectation I have ever seen.

[SkatmanRoth]

57. So DU has a spell checker, not a grammar checker

I just made one of my signature noises with my mouth.

[louis-t]

69. It's a very common goof. I've never figured out why.

Love the Skatman handle.

[daaron]

17. Refute Plumber Joe? Take him seriously and take the bait? I wonder -->

if the SWAT team knocked Plumber Joe's door down with one of those battering rams they like to use (envisioning Blues Brothers "hup hup hup" here) would he come out of his room blasting? How many of the weapons in his collection could he use at once? How exactly does having a weapons stash help when the police state takes one down with overwhelming force? It doesn't.

The myth of the 2nd Amendment is that We The People could use it to overthrow tyranny. In the context of 1939 Germany, this myth (mis)applied amounts to guerrilla warfare and an organized resistance to Nazi power, when they came kicking down doors. Or just knocking on them - what would Plumber Joe do if he answered his door, and it was merely a couple FBI agents coming to take him away? Run to his weapons stash? Or would he have already fled to the hills with a knife between his teeth?

[clang1]

20. Police forces in this country are better armed than the militarys of some countries

Something is wrong with that along with the rest of the GUN mess here.

[daaron]

21. Ayup. The 2nd Amendment is the least of our Constitutional rights -->

but somebody was and is making a killing off of all this killing.

Has anyone seen my well-regulated militia around here? I usually keep it under my pillow for home defense.

[clang1]

22. re: Ayup. The 2nd Amendment is the least of our Constitutional rights -->

Last edited Thu Jun 21, 2012, 07:32 AM - Edit history (2)

re: 'somebody was and is making a killing off of all this killing'

Yep.

[clang1]

18. Something needs to be done about this issue

In Chicago, There was a fairly recent weekend were some 50, FIFTY, people were shot. One weekend. The madness of this patchwork quilt of laws we have is insane. Banning guns in one place and then selling them 100 miles down the road is insane. When does the madness stop? When does someone have the political balls to actually do something. I am sick of it. Sick of the violence in this society and never any real solutions from anyone on a political and legislative level and its damn old.

[wordpix]

34. same thing in DC, groups of people shot due to an alleged taking of a bracelet during a party

One person gets upset at something like this and then without really knowing who took what or who did what to whom, there are mass killings of innocent people.

[PavePusher]

61. How odd that those places not banning firearms....

do not have the same murder rates that Chicago or DC do. Yes?

[clang1]

64. Yes n/t

[quaker bill]

23. Just as if

the guns homeowners might have obtained and kept would actually have been a threat to the Third Reich. Redneck fantasy.

The only thing such guns might have done was allowed the owners to die sooner.

[clang1]

25. re The only thing such guns might have done was allowed the owners to die sooner.

+1. what is really sick about all this is that the gun nuts support those that helped militarize our civilian police forces and that would also like to see US soldiers policing our streets. Their fantasies are twisted ones. I thought this sort of shit is what they don't want and why they want their guns to begin with! To fight oppression!!! It's all mad (this brings darker thoughts to mind, but I'm not going there). Oppression=anyone not rightwing to these people is what it is. Everything else they are blind to.

[graham4anything]

26. What a bunch of anti-semetic crap

as a Jew, I have heard this bullcrap for decades.

It is 100% anti-semetic, and worse, what the idiots (usually Ron Paul fans and libertarians) are saying is, Jews would have turned into cold blooded killing Nazi's and liberals into conservatives.

what a joke.

Joe the Plumber(who actually isn't Joe or a Plumber) should be ashamed of himself.
(but then the teabaggers never are ashamed of anything they say or do. They are the type that go to a fancy restaurant
and try to trip the waiter, or pour all the sugar into the drinks and blow milk out of their nose).

and they think if they repeat it often enough, it is true.

One needs to audit the NRA and then remind people the 2nd amendment did nowhere refer to today's guns and an individual like Zimmerman going around and stalking people and shooting them to death in cold blood and saying it is legal.

And audit every single gun seller in America (who are the ones who would sell a gun to OBL just to make a buck.)

[Woody Woodpecker]

27. Joe just lost a lot of people - truthfully

I think he should just quit right here and concede the election to his opponent without even trying.

[Rambis]

29. Ask a whackjob a question and you get a whackjob answer

waste of skin this one!

[onehandle]

30. Gun culture at work. nt

[Remmah2]

35. For every hook there is a fish.

Sometimes you catch carp.

[Javaman]

31. joe confused his ass with his brain again. nt

[Remmah2]

36. Here's what some Jews think about the Armenian genocide.

http://jpfo.org/articles-assd/armenian-genocide.htm

For the record, I have several professional friends who are JFPO members and first generation survivers of the European holocaust. They think the NRA is a steaming pile of crap.

[CJCRANE]

38. Okay...so it took the combined military might of America, Britain, Russia

and hundreds of other countries to defeat the Nazis...

But if only the European Jews had some guns* it would've been okay.


*Although I'm sure they did have some guns, such as hunting rifles.

[CJCRANE]

42. It's not common sense. It took the combined might of America, Britain, Russia and the allies

to defeat the Nazis.

Implying that all the Jews needed was a few civilian weapons to defend themselves is ludicrous.

[jade3000]

58. And the U.S. is not Nazi Germany

I'm no U.S. nationalist or anything, but I will say that our government in domestic affairs is nowhere near as insane as Nazi Germany was. Restrictions on gun rights and running gas chambers are 2 entirely different things. As folks have said above, giving the Jews more gun rights would not have helped in the face of the well-oiled, crazy social killing machine they were facing.

[clang1]

62. They make these outrageous comparisons deliberately.

They make these outrageous statements deliberately.

The Nazi and other comparison are not just about gun control




nor are the ideological distortions (of history) merely related to gun control. Just why is it these little fascist bastards like this, and others like him, always evoke comparisons to NAZI, for what is responsible social policy? Whether it be gun control or anything else they disagree with while they plod along on their own authoritarian agendas. The GOP does it all the time. It's pretty damn offensive and more...

[clang1]

43. re: Joe the plumber

Ooooh god... Not even gonna go there. Bullshit. Nothing he said is 'common sense'.

[truthisfreedom]

44. Joe the Bummer.

Jeeze, this guy is irritating.

[Evasporque]

54. Joe the Dumber....nt

[Tippy]

49. The Plumber who has never cleaned a drain of fixed a toilet......Joe the jerk....

[Auntie Bush]

50. Drop dead asshole is all I have to say.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

52. Let's give Joe (or Sam) some props for this ...

at least Joe/Sam is not denying the holocaust, or the Armenian genocide.

Plus, he looks a little bit like Peter Boyle.

[Evasporque]

53. Joe the Moron....nt

[Tommy_Carcetti]

55. What did those fruits and vegetables ever do to Ol' JoeySam the Unlicensed Plumber to deserve that?

Were they socialists?

And why is the guy from "Pawn Stars" running for Congress?

[spanone]

59. nobody wants your fucking gun, asshole....

[freshwest]

63. Who's writing his script? ALEC, the NRA, Glenn Beck or all three? What an arse.

The Dunning-Kruger effect

Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge. ~Charles Darwin