# Rumsfeld Godwinizes the Anti-War Debate **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 19, 2006, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992 "2006-03-19T12:38:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![vibrotronica](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/a9a28c/32.png) [@vibrotronica](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vibrotronica)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2006, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/21 "2006-03-19T17:26:50Z")
> [@Donald Rumsfeld](#): > > “Turning our backs on postwar Iraq today would be the modern equivalent of handing postwar Germany back to the Nazis,” Failing to resist the Bush regime is the modern equivelent of the average German not resisting the Nazi’s rise to power in 1933. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2006, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/22 "2006-03-19T17:51:16Z")
“Godwinizes”? Explain please. ---
**Author:** ![Silentgoldfish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@Silentgoldfish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Silentgoldfish)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2006, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/23 "2006-03-19T18:05:24Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > “Godwinizes”? Explain please. > **[Godwin's law](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin's_Law)** > > Godwin's law, short for Godwin's law (or rule) of Nazi analogies, is an Internet adage asserting that as an online discussion grows longer (regardless of topic or scope), the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Adolf Hitler approaches 1. In less mathematical terms, the longer the discussion, the more likely a Nazi comparison becomes, and with long enough discussions, it is a certainty. > Promulgated by the American attorney and author Mike Godwin in 1990, Godwin's law originally refer... ---
**Author:** ![lissener](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lissener/32/6139_2.png) [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2006, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/24 "2006-03-19T18:09:33Z")
> [@jjimm](#): > > I think we need to step back a bit and remember that the whole “no Nazi comparisons” thing is an internet geek prohibition not shared by the public at large. > > Comparing anything to Nazis is always fraught, since they are the nadir of recent evil, but in this case I can see where Rummy is coming from, even though I disagree with him, and even though the rest of his speech as reported appears to be full of shit. OK? Godwin’s law is a _joke_. It’s a convenient cliche used for making fun of convenient cliches. It’s not a “rule.” If a parallel with Nazis is relevant, thent it’s relevant. Now, Rummy’s full of shit, and his comparison is dishonest and self serving. But to declare he “lost the argument” because he mentions the Nazis is naive and self defeating. The fact is that real people, in the real world, will hear his comparison as valid, so like it or not it needs to be engaged with and refuted, and not just dismissed with a message board eyerolling smiley. ---
**Author:** ![kellner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c2a13f/32.png) [@kellner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kellner)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2006, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/25 "2006-03-19T18:35:07Z")
> [@jjimm](#): > > Comparing anything to Nazis is always fraught, since they are the nadir of recent evil, but in this case I can see where Rummy is coming from, even though I disagree with him, and even though the rest of his speech as reported appears to be full of shit. How is his comparison supposed to make any sense? It’s not like anyone expects Saddam to return. I’m probably reading too much into his statements, but a more reasonable analogy is a scenario where the western Allies abandon Germany after WWII and it falls into the Soviet influence sphere. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2006, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/26 "2006-03-19T20:25:38Z")
Yeah, pretty lame comparison. Maybe he should’ve compared the situation to Vietnam. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2006, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/27 "2006-03-19T20:33:16Z")
> [@vibrotronica](#): > > Failing to resist the Bush regime is the modern equivelent of the average German not resisting the Nazi’s rise to power in 1933. Oh come now. Just because both Hitler and Bush listen to former pilots, both of whom are wildly optimistic to the point of being completely divorced from reality, Bush and Hitler are very much alike. For example, Hitler could deliver a speech without stumbling through it like a brain-damaged drunk. Happy, **John**? You got to preemptively defend Dubya from the Meany Libruls. -Joe ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2006, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/28 "2006-03-19T20:40:34Z")
**NOT** alike. Damnmit. -Joe ---
**Author:** ![glee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b5a626/32.png) [@glee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/glee)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2006, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/29 "2006-03-19T20:59:47Z")
> [@Fear Itself](#): > > [Rumsfeld: leaving Iraq like giving Nazis Germany](http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060319/ts_nm/iraq_rumsfeld_dc) > > The admistration has lost the debate, as well as the hearts and minds of the American voter. What we are witnessing now is desperate flailing, saying anything to justify remaining in the middle of the Iraq Civil War. > > It won’t work. One could point out that the Republicans didn’t: - put Hitler in power - sell him weapons - stand idly by while he killed 50,000 of his countrymen, but invade when their oil supplies were threatened Of course this present administration relies on knee-jerk phrases like: ‘war on terror’, ‘support our troops’ and ‘war on terror’ :rolleyes: Sadly these worked at the last election. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2006, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/30 "2006-03-19T22:14:45Z")
> [@Merijeek](#): > > …Happy, **John**? You got to preemptively defend Dubya from the Meany Libruls… Now stop that! **John-boy** has responded to our patient tutelage about as well as can be expected, and better than some. Frankly, I am more concerned with his unfortunate habit of offering potentially dangerous wagers, I should hate to think of him offering to auction a kidney on E-Bay to cover his gambling debts, rather than to pay a predatory orthodontist. ---
**Author:** ![Frostillicus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Frostillicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frostillicus)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2006, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/31 "2006-03-19T23:55:17Z")
Originally posted by **Donald Rumsfeld** : "Leaving Iraq now would be like handing \*\*postwar \*\* Germany back to the Nazis, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said in a column published on Sunday, the third anniversary of the start of the Iraq war. “Turning our backs on \*\*postwar \*\* Iraq today would be the modern equivalent of handing **postwar** Germany back to the Nazis,” he wrote in an essay in The Washington Post. " Methinks that Mr. Rumsfeld doesn’t understand the meaning of the prefix “post”. ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2006, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/32 "2006-03-20T00:21:34Z")
> [@kellner](#): > > How is his comparison supposed to make any sense? It’s not like anyone expects Saddam to return. Yeah, he is full of it, but I think he means “Iraq was run by Bad People. And if we leave Iraq now, then a Bad People will take over again”. Without feeling the intellectual necessity to define his Bad People. Perhaps he’s trying to imply Ba’athists, or maybe he’s just spouting off. It is a statement with which I generally agree, even though the current occupiers alas only fall into the “least of myriad evils” in my opinion. > [@](#): > > I’m probably reading too much into his statements, but a more reasonable analogy is a scenario where the western Allies abandon Germany after WWII and it falls into the Soviet influence sphere. See, I agree that you are reading to much into the analogy. Of late I have detected a high degree of analogy-fascism on this board. If the shoe isn’t exactly the right size, and Cinderella has to leave the ball before she’s even met her prince. That’s like Pol Pot and Mussolini turning up drunk to your five-year-old daughter’s birthday party with only an AK47 and a baggie of coke. ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2006, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/33 "2006-03-20T00:54:27Z")
> [@kellner](#): > > How is his comparison supposed to make any sense? It’s not like anyone expects Saddam to return. I’m probably reading too much into his statements, but a more reasonable analogy is a scenario where the western Allies abandon Germany after WWII and it falls into the Soviet influence sphere. Would I be out of line to point out that the Allies did in fact leave a substantial part of Germany in the Soviet influence sphere? ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2006, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/34 "2006-03-20T01:20:46Z")
> [@David Simmons](#): > > Would I be out of line to point out that the Allies did in fact leave a substantial part of Germany in the Soviet influence sphere? Well, it all worked out OK in the end, so that’s what matters. No matter how. Long. It. Takes. Wow, another WW2 apt comparison to today’s fuckup! Woo! -Joe ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2006, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/35 "2006-03-20T01:29:06Z")
> [@Merijeek](#): > > Well, it all worked out OK in the end, so that’s what matters. No matter how. Long. It. Takes. > > Wow, another WW2 apt comparison to today’s fuckup! Woo! > > -Joe Very apt, considering that Iran will no doubt effectively take over large chunks of whatever is still standing when we leave. Even Republican ass-kisser David Brooks is writing that Rummy screwed the pooch. No wonder he’s getting nervous. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2006, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/36 "2006-03-20T01:35:40Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > Very apt, considering that Iran will no doubt effectively take over large chunks of whatever is still standing when we leave. Wanna bet? ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2006, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/37 "2006-03-20T02:35:10Z")
> [@Merijeek](#): > > Well, it all worked out OK in the end, so that’s what matters. No matter how. Long. It. Takes. > > Wow, another WW2 apt comparison to today’s fuckup! Woo! > > -Joe So letting the Soviets wear themselves out in eastern Europe for 40 years was part of the plan? Maybe we’ve got an equally devious plan for Iraq. I don’t see why we should expect Rummy to say anything other than that we must “stay the course.” The difficulty that I see with that is that there are good courses and bad courses. Which course are we on now? Anybody? ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2006, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/38 "2006-03-20T03:54:03Z")
> [@Frostillicus](#): > > Methinks that Mr. Rumsfeld doesn’t understand the meaning of the prefix “post”. No, I think he said what he meant: “Leaving Iraq now would be like turning postwar Germany back over to the Nazis after we defeated them.” This seems to imply that Saddam or the Baathists would take over again, which is eight kinds of ridiculous. Perhaps he means that the result would be _just as bad_ as letting that happen, but… Ow, my head. This is what I get for trying to understand Rummy’s mindset. ---
**Author:** ![Frostillicus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Frostillicus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frostillicus)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2006, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/39 "2006-03-20T04:17:07Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > No, I think he said what he meant: “Leaving Iraq now would be like turning postwar Germany back over to the Nazis after we defeated them.” This seems to imply that Saddam or the Baathists would take over again, which is eight kinds of ridiculous. Perhaps he means that the result would be _just as bad_ as letting that happen, but… > > Ow, my head. This is what I get for trying to understand Rummy’s mindset. I don’t object to Rummy’s use of postwar Germany. What I don’t quite understand is the use of the word “postwar” in reference to Iraq, since we are clearly still in the middle of a honest to goodness war. Or does Rummy not know that? ---
**Author:** ![pantom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/34f0e0/32.png) [@pantom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pantom)\ **Post date:** [March 20, 2006, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992/40 "2006-03-20T05:10:08Z")
No, he doesn’t. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rumsfeld-godwinizes-the-anti-war-debate/348992.md?page=3)