Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, the Georgia congresswoman who has made herself the face of Republican lunacy, was roundly flayed over the weekend for a TV appearance in which she equated a mask mandate on the House floor to the Holocaust.
The reproofs came from all along the political spectrum, Republicans and Democrats alike. But something was missing from most of the commentary.
That something is history.
To recap, Greene went on the conservative Real America’s Voice network show “The Water Cooler With David Brody” late last week to complain about the mask mandate imposed by Democratic Speaker Nancy Pelosi with violations punished by fines.
“You know, we can look back in a time in history where people were told to wear a gold star,” Greene said as Brody, a right-wing commentator, nodded in sage agreement. “And they were definitely treated like second-class citizens — so much so that they were put in trains and taken to gas chambers in Nazi Germany, and this is exactly the type of abuse that Nancy Pelosi is talking about.”
(Greene plainly was referring to the yellow stars that Jews in Nazi Germany were forced to wear.)
Greene is not alone in trying to depict social distancing imperatives as tantamount to Nazi policies.
You know, we can look back in a time in history where people were told to wear a gold star. And they were definitely treated like second-class citizens. … This is exactly the type of abuse that Nancy Pelosi is talking about.Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga.
A few weeks ago, speaking of the prospect of “vaccine passports” to verify that holders have been inoculated against COVID-19, Rep. Madison Cawthorn, R-N.C., another House extremist, told Fox News, “Proposals like these smack of 1940s Nazi Germany.”
Referring to anti-pandemic measures as the equivalent of Holocaust measures has become a theme in some conservative corners.
Former U.S. Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell issued a tweet showing a picture of a fictional Nazi officer from the film “Inglorious Basterds” accusing a family of hiding “unvaccinated people” under their floorboards. (Thanks to an appointment by ex-President Donald Trump, Grenell is a member of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council.)
Make no mistake: Equating mask mandates and vaccine passports to Nazi policies is a form of Holocaust denial, that thoroughly discredited dark corner of the human psyche.
The perpetrators don’t deny that the Holocaust happened; instead, they sap it of its power to shock the conscience by elevating anti-COVID policies to the same level, thereby diminishing the power of the Holocaust to shock the conscience of humankind.
The nonchalance of Greene’s evocation of the Holocaust, along with that of others who have invoked it to fight pandemic measures, suggests that the Holocaust is receding from public awareness. It’s a 75-year-old story, after all — who can bother thinking about such ancient history?
Apparently it’s been forgotten by the House Republican leadership, none of whom have responded to Greene’s words with anything but silence — not Minority Leader Keven McCarthy, not Minority Whip Steve Scalise, not the theatrically grouchy Elise Stefanik, who was recently elevated to the chair of the House Republican Conference.
