MoveOn, Hitler and Bush: Hooo, boy!

[elucidator]

Suprised no one has entered this yet. “To boldly go where nobody in his right mind…”

BACKSTORY: If you dont already know… MoveOn, the internet “grass roots” organization, had a contest for participants to produce anti-Bush campaign ads. The ads were posted at thier site, and participants voted thier favorites. Amongst the also-rans were some god-awful drivel that didn’t make the cut, ads comparing Bush to Hitler, that got what they deserved: squat.

Next thing you know, Drudge is screaming himself hoarse over the “Hitler Ads” and the RNC is right behind, pissing and moaning over dissing Our Leader…

THE 2004 CAMPAIGN: ADVERTISING; Bush-Hitler Ads Draw Criticism (Published 2004)

"It sounded like a fun way to expand participation in this year’s presidential election, at least for those opposed to re-electing President Bush. The left-leaning Internet group MoveOn.org sponsored a contest, “Bush in 30 Seconds,” inviting people to submit television advertisements about Mr. Bush, with the best to be determined by a vote of visitors to the site.

But two of more than 1,500 submissions have outraged Republicans and leading Jewish groups for comparing Mr. Bush, in profile and policy, to Hitler.

“This is the worst and most vile form of political hate speech,” Ed Gillespie, chairman of the Republican National Committee, said in one of several statements he issued. He urged the nine Democrats running for president to repudiate the advertisements.

Wes Boyd, a MoveOn.org founder, fired back, saying Republicans were “deliberately and maliciously” misleading the public by asserting that MoveOn.org had sponsored the advertisements. “None of these was our ad,” Mr. Boyd said in a statement. “Nor did their appearance constitute endorsement or sponsorship by MoveOn.org Voter Fund.”

On Monday, MoveOn.org said more than 100,000 visitors to the site had selected 15 finalists, none of them the Hitler advertisements. A panel of celebrities and political experts has been asked to pick a winner, which will be televised."

Note, please: MoveOn did not fund the ads, did not promote them, has no intention of any further connection to them. Point of fact, the ads were soundly rejected by the MoveOn folks, and represent only 2 out of 1,500!

Now, I don’t as yet see any place where you can view the actual ads, but one guy wrote in to Buzzflash

http://www.buzzflash.com/contributors/04/01/con04003.html

that he suspects his ad was one of the two. He gives the copy of that ad, you can make your own judgement.

I got two bits says Pubbie pundits will be talking about ads comparing GeeDub to Hitler every chance they get. Of course, it ain’t so.

(Your correspondent from the Conservative Wing of the Extreme Left urges you to MoveOn.org to see the winning ads. They are dynamite! Fuckin’ brilliant!.. Well, not all of you. Some of my more dearly beloved opposition would be ill-advised, I don’t want to be responsible for cerebral hemmorages amongst the Usual Suspects…)

GO! http://moveon.org/

[Homebrew]

Actully, the RNC has (or had) a copy at http://www.rnc.org/moveon-h2.mov

[elucidator]

Link doesn’t seem to connect, Homey. And, if so, one really has to wonder where the RNC got a copy. Can you save the download when you view the ad at MoveOn?

Nope, wait, now its working. Bit of a stretch, to my eye, saying this ad directly compares Bush to Hitler. Mostly, I just think its pretty weak in comparison to the winners.

And where’s the other one?

[Matchka]

I’ve suggested in the past that GWB has behaved like a fascist dictator, but only as a self-interested on, not malevolent and genocidal.

What I love is how the extreme minority of participants in the contest are being dragged out as a tool for the GOP to discredit MoveOn with the same old argument: “If you don’t renounce this (questionably) vile organization, then you subscribe to the most despicable element that also supports it.” And they try to suck the potential DEM Nominees into accepting their black/white assertion. Makes me crazy. Their paranoid intolerance almost gives credibility to the nutballs who are at the root of the whole squable!

[Cheesesteak]

*Originally posted by elucidator *
**Note, please: MoveOn did not fund the ads, did not promote them, has no intention of any further connection to them. Point of fact, the ads were soundly rejected by the MoveOn folks, and represent only 2 out of 1,500! **

Perhaps they did not pay for the production, but they did pay to host them on a website. They may not have promoted those clips individually, but they did promote the contest. I just looked them up and found this

There are some legal limits on what you can do (see below), and we’re not going to post anything that would be inappropriate for television, but other than that what you put in your ads is up to you (live action, animation, personal rant, whatever!).

Therefore, I assume MoveOn was more than able to keep these ads off their website, if they chose to do so, which they didn’t. To claim they are not responsible for the content of the ads is ridiculous, they watched every single one to ensure it was legal and appropriate for their site, and decided these ones were.

I’m not saying it was wrong to put them up, or that the RNC isn’t just a bunch of crybabies, but MoveOn accepted these submissions and posted them on their website. They knew that they were responsible for content, per this other quote from their rules

As an issue advocacy organization, Moveon.org Voter Fund must avoid disseminating communications that expressly advocates the election or defeat of any candidate. Submitted ads may praise or criticize an elected official for his or her policies or positions on issues, but avoid exhorting the listener or viewer to vote for or against any candidate or making any reference to a future election in which the candidate is running or to any individual’s candididacy.

They admitted that they were responsible for the content of the ads, and that they had the ability to not post any ads they didn’t feel were appropriate. Now they’re acting like they had no control over anything. Pathetic.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

*Originally posted by elucidator *
**Nope, wait, now its working. Bit of a stretch, to my eye, saying this ad directly compares Bush to Hitler. **

Are you shitting me? The commercial that fades from a picture of Hitler (“What were war crimes in 1945…”) to a picture of Bush ("…is foreign policy today") while people chant Sieg Heils in the background, you’re saying this is not a direct comparison of Bush to Hitler?

Without a prominent Equals sign, I can’t imagine a more direct comparison being made.

That said, it IS a stretch to hold MoveOn accountable for the ad; indeed, we see from it that the most activist section of the Democratic party renounces such comparisons.

Daniel

[rjung]

*Originally posted by elucidator *
“This is the worst and most vile form of political hate speech,” Ed Gillespie, chairman of the Republican National Committee

Wow, that’s gotta be the pot-kettle-black statement of the week, at least. Or has Mr. Gillespie forgotten the stuff the RNC was throwing around from 1992-2000?

[cheddarsnax]

Proper response: Agree to denounce this type of ad as soon as Bush and Gillespie denounce this trash: “[Dean’s tactics] are the techniques employed by Hitler’s Brownshirts. Had Goebbels enjoyed access to the internet, he would have used the same swarm tactics as Dean’s Flannelshirts.”

[eli_the_fanatic]

Of course Bush is nothing like Hitler. For one thing, Hitler could legitimately call himself a veteran of the armed forces. For another, Hitler managed to write a whole book all by himself without a ghost writer.

[Homebrew]

Or attacks on Max Cleland

Cleland, 60, is still livid over a now-infamous TV commercial that Republican challenger Saxby Chambliss ran against him. It opened with pictures of Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein, then attacked Cleland for voting against President Bush’s Homeland Security bill. It didn’t mention that Cleland supported a Democratic bill that wasn’t radically different.

[furt]

*Originally posted by Matchka *
**What I love is how the extreme minority of participants in the contest are being dragged out as a tool for the GOP to discredit MoveOn with the same old argument: “If you don’t renounce this (questionably) vile organization, then you subscribe to the most despicable element that also supports it.” And they try to suck the potential DEM Nominees into accepting their black/white assertion. **

Should it go without saying that Lieberman or Gephardt wouldn’t say/think this? Maybe. But the fact of the matter is that the game is played both ways: Pubbies are routinely obligated to renounce their ties to far-right groups and causes or else pay a political price. And that’s not a bad thing.

Part of many centrists’ frustration with the Democratic Party is that they have not excised or distanced themselves from the idiot wing of their party as clearly as the Pubs have (Pat Buchanan, David Duke, Pat Robertson). I’ve pulled plenty of levers for Democrats in the past (hell, I voted for Dukakis), but I can’t see myself doing it again for a candidate who tacitly accepts the support of the hate-America anti-capitalist nutbars without calling them for what they are. And Moveon.org is as good a place as any to start.

[Trinopus]

Actually, Rudolf Hess did some ghostwriting for Hitler for Mein Kampf.

Trinopus

[eli_the_fanatic]

"the hate-America anti-capitalist nutbars "

This is exactly the same kind of crap as calling Bush Hitler, of course, but it’s much more acceptable to use hyperbole to smear the left.

[Cheesesteak]

I’d rather have someone call me a nutbar than compare me to the guy that arranged the murder of millions of innocent people. That’s just me, I guess, since they are exactly the same. :rolleyes:

[Squink]

God, Godwin, what’s the difference? It’s all politics as usual.

[mhendo]

*Originally posted by Cheesesteak *
**Perhaps they did not pay for the production, but they did pay to host them on a website. They may not have promoted those clips individually, but they did promote the contest. I just looked them up and found this Therefore, I assume MoveOn was more than able to keep these ads off their website, if they chose to do so, which they didn’t. To claim they are not responsible for the content of the ads is ridiculous, they watched every single one to ensure it was legal and appropriate for their site, and decided these ones were.

I’m not saying it was wrong to put them up, or that the RNC isn’t just a bunch of crybabies, but MoveOn accepted these submissions and posted them on their website. They knew that they were responsible for content, per this other quote from their rules They admitted that they were responsible for the content of the ads, and that they had the ability to not post any ads they didn’t feel were appropriate. Now they’re acting like they had no control over anything. Pathetic. **

No, being responsible for hosting the ads that were entered in their contest is NOT the same as being responsible for the content of those ads. Also, if you pulled your head out of your ass for five seconds and actually read MoveOn’s announcement about the ads, you would see that they do not try to avoid responsibility for putting the ads on the website. In fact, they expressly take responsibility for this, and regret that it happened.

From here:

None of these was our ad, nor did their appearance constitute endorsement or sponsorship by MoveOn.org Voter Fund. They will not appear on TV. We do not support the sentiment expressed in the two Hitler submissions. They were voted down by our members and the public, who reviewed the ads and submitted nearly 3 million critiques in the process of choosing the 15 finalist entries.

We agree that the two ads in question were in poor taste and deeply regret that they slipped through our screening process. In the future, if we publish or broadcast raw material, we will create a more effective filtering system.

How the fuck is that “acting like they had no control over anything”?

The main point about this whole issue, one which is made by MoveOn and which, if i’m not mistaken, is the point that elucidator was trying to make, is the disingenuousness of the RNC’s approach to the ads.

The RNC statement about the ads, which can be found here, is a masterpiece of obfuscation. Firstly, nowhere does it mention that the ads appearing on MoveOn’s site were just two among well over a thousand, that not a single one of all those ads was produced by the organization itself, and that they were entries in a contest that was open to the general public. In fact, the word “contest” is not even mentioned in the RNC piece, leading anyone reading it to assume that MoveOn was the creator of any ad that appeared on its website.

Further, saying that the ads in question “are anything but appropriate for television,” as the RNC does, implies strongly that MoveOn as an organization was not only thinking about broadcasting the ads on TV, but had actually decided to do so. The RNC also accuses MoveOn of “deeming them [the ads] appropriate for television.” This is just a flat out lie; i’m not sure whether Bush’s behaviour is rubbing off on the RNC, or vice versa. Also, what the RNC must have known–because it’s been public knowledge since the time of their press release–is that the final fifteen ads up for consideration in the MoveOn competition have been selected, and neither of the ads in question were among the finalists.

Finally, MoveOn sent out an email today which also demonstrates the RNC’s hypocrisy on this issue.

Yesterday, the New York Post ran a long opinion column focusing exclusively on how much Presidential Candidate Howard Dean resembles Hitler, even calling him “Herr Howie.” Of course, the RNC hasn’t issued a condemnation of that. When close RNC ally Grover Norquist repeatedly compared taxing the wealthy with the Holocaust in an interview on NPR, the RNC was muted. And in 2002, the RNC and its allies were silent when supporters of President Bush actually aired TV ads morphing the face of Senator Max Cleland, a triple amputee as a result of wounds sustained in Vietnam, into Osama bin Laden.

On preview, i see that cheddarsna and homebrew have addressed a couple of these issues of RNC double-standards.

And furt, it’s good to see that idiocy masking itself as centerism is still alive and well.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

*Originally posted by mhendo *
**And furt, it’s good to see that idiocy masking itself as centerism is still alive and well. **

What? No it’s not. It’s fucking depressing is what it is.

Daniel

[mhendo]

*Originally posted by Left Hand of Dorkness *
** What? No it’s not. It’s fucking depressing is what it is.

Daniel **

True; i guess i shoulda used the rolleyes smiley to adequately convey my irony, but i feel it’s an overused emoticon on these boards.

[Left_Hand_of_Dorkness]

(I got what you were saying, but I’d just used the confused smiley for the first time and was enjoying its subtle display of emotion and bewilderment. FTR, I didn’t mind furt’s comment nearly as much as you did)

Daniel

[dropzone]

Part of the problem is that Hitler gave all Fascists a bad name. Had we only Mussolini and Franco to compare Bush with…

d&r