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Brand New Luxury Apartments
Very Close to Downtown with a View of the River
1, 2, 3, 4 BR Lofts & Flats
Controlled Access Community & Parking
Walk to Downtown & Campus
Now Leasing!
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ON 2 BEDROOMS!
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909 E. Broad Street, Athens, GA
(706) 227-6222
www.909broad.com
909broad@perennialproperties.net
YART SALE
\ ii i ■ ii ^
What’s that you ask?
An “Art Sale” at
“Yard Sale” Prices!
Bring in
all your
unused
art!
We are asking
for everyone
to go
through
your house
and from
Nov. 5 - Nov. 22
drop off all
your unused
art items as
a tax
deductible .
donation. -
Benefits
The Boys and Girls Club
of Jackson County
DROP OFF LOCATION
Don Byram Art
Commerce Crossing
Shopping Center
between 9 a.m. & 6 p.m.
For more information,
please call
706-336-8080.
THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN BRAINS AND BROUN
One of my all-time favorite New Yorker cartoons shows a
bedraggled corporate interviewer rationalizing his decision to
hire a rather goofy-looking applicant with "What the hell? We
can use an idiot." This cartoon came to mind when I learned
that Minnesota Representative Michele Bachmann had been
re-elected to Congress despite her call for an investigation
of "anti-American" (read "liberal") attitudes among her col
leagues! Though distressed by this outcome, I tried to console
myself by thinking that Bachmann's return made it at least
arguable that we here in Georgia's 10th District don't have the
biggest fool in America guarding our interests in Congress.
As it turns out, however, Republican Rep. Paul Broun appar
ently has a strong competitive streak and was not going to
see himself outdone by some mere pretender to idiocy like
Bachmann. Hence, he has made quite a spectacle of himself in
the last week or two by raising the prospect
that President-elect Obama plans to follow
the blueprint of one Adolf Hitler by estab
lishing his own personal military force, which
will then proceed to cram Marxism down our
gullets.
"That's exactly what Hitler did in Nazi
Germany and it's exactly what the Soviet
Union did," Broun said. "When he's propos
ing to have a national security force that's
answering to-him, that is as strong as the
U.S. military, he's showing me signs of being
Marxist."
Brounie, I hardly know where to begin,
unless it's to see about getting your UGA
degree revoked. Hitler was a right-winger,
not a lefty. He believed in and encouraged
competitive capitalism, not socialism, and
he absolutely despised what he called "the
Jewish doctrine of Marxism." While we're
at it, even the Soviet Union as we knew
it, at least, wasn't really Marxist. None of
this really matters, though, does it? Hitler,
Marxism, socialism—they all scare the hell
out of people. Too bad "Communist" sounds
so archaic these days, because you're obvi
ously itching to throw that in there too.
Then there's your suggestion—and that
of others as well—that the first thing Oby
will do after his storm troopers are up and
running is follow in Hitler's goosesteps by
taking away our blunderbusses so that he
can consolidate his power. (Before anyone
dismisses this classic expression of paranoia
as unworthy of serious attention, check out
reports of red-blooded Americans everywhere
rushing out in the wake of the election to
build up their arsenals of assault rifles, hand
guns and ammo.)
One thing's for sure, you know you're in
trouble when your congressman sounds like
a hate-radio dude. Driving through Alabama
last Thursday doing my traditional AM radio
search for a country oldies station, I tuned
into some weasel who announced excitedly
that he had found further "proof' that Obama was a Muslim.
It seems a "friend" of his had texted him from Indonesia to
report that people there were generally happy with Obama's
victory, and since, as everybody knows, Barack Obama was
briefly exposed to the teachings of Islam in an Indonesian
school before, so he says, converting to Christianity, and since,
as everybody knows, Indonesia's population is 85 percent
Muslim, and since, as everybody knows, anyone who converts
to Christianity is dead meat in the eyes of all faithful Muslims,
therefore, hence, and ipso fatso, Obama is clearly lying when
he says he converted 'cuz if he really had, Indonesian Muslims
would be mad as hell that he had just been elected President
of the United States. Well, I guess that settles that, doesn't it?
Look, Brounie, I'm not unappreciative of your substantial
entertainment value, but if Obama's victory proved anything
it was that words can have truly powerful consequences. Your
bunch threw 20 trillion megatons of this crap at Oby before
we voted, and it didn't stick or accomplish anything other
than eliciting shouts of "Kill him!" or "Take him out!" from the
like-minded loonies who hung on Governor Hatemonger's every
vapid and reckless utterance.
Since there's no longer any need to adrenalize your crew
for an election, and we know now that the Secret Service
reported a "sharp and disturbing increase in threats" to Oby
after Palin started to hang labels like "terrorist," "Marxist"
and "socialist" on him, are we left to conclude that you're fine
with democracy when it goes your way, but if it doesn't, you're
also not averse to goading some lunatic into using a bullet or
a bomb to achieve what you couldn't get done with a ballot?
Is democracy something that you're ready to force on others at
bayonet point but unwilling to accept when things don't work
out to your liking? It sure sounds that way when you warn us
to "remember that Adolf Hitler was elected in a democratic
Germany."
Congressman, your side did its best during this campaign to
stake a claim on what it meant to be a "real American" or to
truly have America's best interest at heart. If either of these
notions really means anything at all to you, the best thing
you can do is the heed the advice that Republican bumper
stickers were giving Democrats about four years ago this time:
"You lost. Get over it!" I admit that I have been mighty hard
on the President these past eight years, but the gracious and
hospitable spirit he and the First Missus showed the Obamas
on their first visit to the White House truly made me proud to
be an American. God knows, I never thought I'd suggest this
to anyone, but this is one case where you'd do well to emulate
ol' "W."
Jim Cobb
Jim Cobb is Spalding Distinguished Professor of History at UGA. This
bloviation is reprinted, with permission, from his blog at httpj'/cobblovi-
ate.com.
Congressman Paul Broun, Jr.. anti-Marxist
8 FLAGPOLE.COM • NOVEMBER 19, 2008