Rep. Alan Grayson (D-FL) recently made headlines by bluntly attacking conservatives for lacking a systematic health insurance reform plan. The following day, he returned to the House floor and called for an end to what he termed a "holocaust" caused by the failings of America's health care system.
While Grayson's language was certainly provocative, his passion and sense of urgency are understandable. A new study conducted by the Harvard Medical School estimates that 45,000 Americans die every year because of our system's flaws.
Despite such realities, Erick Erickson, editor of the leading conservative blog RedState, was incensed by Grayson's language. “The holocaust was real with a real meaning,” he wrote yesterday. “Roping it into the health care debate cheapens what it was all about.”
Which means that we should all look forward to Erickson's upcoming denunciations of the following conservative media figures:
- Rush Limbaugh, who has "compared Obama's health policies to the Nazis"; likened Obama to Hitler; claimed that the “Obama health care logo is damn close to a Nazi swastika logo”; and said the White House was embracing the tactics of the Hitler youth movement. He has also defended such rhetoric and dismissed the idea that it is politically harmful to the conservatives who employ it.
- Glenn Beck, who has connected health care reform proposals to the work of the Nazis and denounced those who criticize tea party protesters as purveyors of Nazi propaganda.
- G. Gordon Liddy, who uncritically read a column written by Pat Buchanan drawing a parallel between health care reform legislation and Nazi euthanasia.
- Pat Buchanan himself, who has gone out of his way time and again to defend Hitler.
- Sean Hannity, who didn't challenge a town hall protester who claimed on his show that “National Socialism is very much what we see in this administration.” The protester had also told Rep. Brian Baird that Nancy Pelosi should check her arm for a swastika, a statement which Limbaugh said left him "beaming with pride."
- Fox News' Gretchen Carlson, who uncritically interviewed that same protester.
- Michael Savage, who described the FCC's Mark Lloyd as a "Nazi czar."
- Tammy Bruce, who said that the White House appointed a “Nazi, fascist health czar.”
- Jim Quinn, who has repeatedly referred to White House regulatory czar Cass Sunstein as a Nazi.
- The National Review's Jonah Goldberg and Andrew Breitbart for ignoring the swastikas at tea party protests -- and The Washington Times for doing the same.