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Bachmann: 'I Agree' That Use Of Holocaust Images At Capitol Tea Party 'Wholly Inappropriate'
Eric Kleefeld | November 12, 2009, 11:03AM
Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN)
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Rep. Michele Bachmann's (R-MN) is now distancing herself from the use of Holocaust imagery at last week's Capitol Tea Party, which she had organized and promoted, after a Jewish Democratic Congressman called on her to apologize for leading the event and not denouncing the offending posters.
"Sadly, some individuals chose to marginalize tragic events in human history, such as the Holocaust, by invoking imagery and labels which have no purpose in a policy debate about health care," Bachmann said in a statement. "These regrettable actions negatively shift the focus of the current discussion on this issue. The American people deserve an open and honest debate to ensure the best possible solution to our health care problems, and I agree that these unfortunate instances are wholly inappropriate."
Rep. Steve Israel (D-NY) had said in a YouTube last week: ""I can't believe that Congresswoman Bachmann would stand where she stood, and see those images, and not have the common decency to say, 'I disagree with the use of those images.' I think that she owes the memory of those who perished in the Holocaust an apology. She owes us all an apology. And I'm waiting. We're all waiting."
(Via Dump Bachmann)
Late Update: Rep. Israel has released this statement, responding to Bachmann: "It shouldn't have taken peer pressure, media inquiries or national outrage to get Rep. Bachmann to take a stand in defense of Holocaust victims."
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KenZ
November 12, 2009 11:13 AM
She's sorry that this issue is distracting voters from an "open and honest" debate about death panels, the socialist/fascist Democrat take over of America, and President Obama's birth place.
Shame has no place in her world so someone from the GOP side clearly called on her to apologize. It would not surprise me if the intent is to get Joe Lieberman to side with the GOP on a healthcare filibuster.
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Justin H
November 12, 2009 11:39 AM
Woah, Michele Bachmann isn't a holocaust denier? It's hard to keep her particular veins of crazy straight.
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mans_best_friend
November 12, 2009 11:41 AM
Sow the wind, reap the whirlwind.
A graduate of Regent University ought to be familiar with that.
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The Commenter Formerly Known as NCSteve
November 12, 2009 11:44 AM
Oh God. She is running for president. Or at least for the #2 spot with DeMint.
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dustbunny44
November 12, 2009 2:41 PM in reply to The Commenter Formerly Known as NCSteve
I think that someone with $ or other perks, and with respect for the holocaust, has convinced her that she should find another metaphor. If so, they have not bothered to (or could not) educate her as to why.
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mmanion
November 12, 2009 12:08 PM
Doe it always take her a week or so to recognize inappropriate? Isn't that some form of pervasive developmental delay or something? Since it's unlikely she actually feels this way about it and she has been unmoved by requests to be more reasonable from her fellow congresspeople in the past, wonder what prompted this?
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CT Voter
November 12, 2009 12:27 PM in reply to mmanion
See the comment immediately above yours. . .
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Cal Gal
November 12, 2009 12:13 PM
The old saying is that even a stopped clock is right twice a day. I guess that La Michelle proved even one that runs backwards will occasionally, coincidentally, hit the correct minute.
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Nebton
November 12, 2009 12:45 PM in reply to Cal Gal
<pedantic>
Actually, a clock running backwards will (on average, at least) be correct more than twice a day (assuming a 12-hour clock).
</pedantic>
So, I think it's more accurate to describe her clock as semi-randomly* jumping around.
And, yes, I'm a lot of fun at parties. Why do you ask? ;)
*<pedantic>
Semi-randomly instead of fully randomly because if it were fully random it would still be, on average, correct twice a day. So, her "clock" has the curious behavior of being skewed against randomness.
</pedantic>
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voreason
November 12, 2009 12:13 PM
Perhaps the anti-psychotic medication kicked in at last? (If only for a moment)
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Bill E Pilgrim
November 12, 2009 12:13 PM
These people who I encouraged by saying that health care reform involved creating terrifying "death panels" of some unspecified sort have clearly gone too far by believing me.
That's the ticket, Michelle.
“I find it interesting that it was back in the 1970s that the swine flu broke out then under another Democrat president Jimmy Carter,” said Bachmann. “And I’m not blaming this on President Obama, I just think it’s an interesting coincidence. -Michelle Bachmann (swine flu broke out under Gerald Ford)
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dswx
November 12, 2009 12:19 PM
Of course what is also interesting is that Eric Cantor, Minority Whip and conservative Jew, has not said a thing about any of the Health Care/Holocaust comparisons by his Republican minions...while he sits as an honorary member on the Board of the Virginia (no, not the National) Holocaust Museum. Which is also a strong indictment of the silence from Virginia Holocaust Museum leaders IMHO.
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CT Voter
November 12, 2009 12:25 PM in reply to dswx
Cantor did say something.
Was it strong enough? No. But at least it didn't take him a week to figure it out.
LINK
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dswx
November 12, 2009 12:56 PM in reply to CT Voter
Thanks for posting that; I stand corrected. However, Cantor was quite silent throughout August when all the Hitler comparison were being made across the country by the ignorant tea-baggers.
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CT Voter
November 12, 2009 1:23 PM in reply to dswx
Oh, he's a turd, no doubt. And he probably only responded because he was goaded into it.
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navamske
November 12, 2009 7:38 PM in reply to CT Voter
And he pretty specifically said he objected to the Holocaust imagery not because it's intrinsically offensive but because "it's not helpful." A real Profile in Courage.
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davcbr
November 12, 2009 1:00 PM in reply to CT Voter
It took an interview to do it. Somebody had to ASK him.
Otherwise silence.
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CT Voter
November 12, 2009 1:26 PM in reply to davcbr
No argument there.
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JadeZ
November 12, 2009 12:23 PM
doesnt sound like an apology to me.
sounds like she was saying others made the mistake that she didnt think was a mistake but now realizes they made the mistake after it was brought to their attention.
these crazies are hard to keep up with!
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agio
November 12, 2009 12:25 PM
And it only took Bachmann a week to figure out that images of stacked corpses is not the best way of fostering an "open and honest debate".
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CT Voter
November 12, 2009 12:28 PM in reply to agio
She's crazy, and not the brightest bulb in the pack.
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WaitWut?
November 12, 2009 12:27 PM
I can't wait until the inevitable mud wrestling match between her and Palin. I bet there will be biting.
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Cal Gal
November 12, 2009 12:43 PM in reply to WaitWut?
I'd pay for view that!
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Riesz Fischer
November 12, 2009 1:22 PM in reply to WaitWut?
Sarah would eat her lunch.
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The Commenter Formerly Known as NCSteve
November 12, 2009 2:35 PM in reply to Riesz Fischer
I don't know about that. Sarah's a poseur.
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Nancy Irving
November 12, 2009 12:36 PM
Considering the kinds of things Bachmann typically comes out with, this is a significant improvement, for which she should be praised.
She has recognized that there are or ought to be limits in public discourse. I'm encouraged by this.
Let's give her a little credit--if only a little.
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mans_best_friend
November 12, 2009 1:12 PM in reply to Nancy Irving
She didn't recognize squat. She was pressured by others. She wouldn't have recognized it herself in a million years.
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garp
November 12, 2009 12:48 PM
Ok. She gets two brownie points for the apologies, but three demerits for the time it took her to be say something, and likely under pressure.
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davewtf
November 12, 2009 2:39 PM in reply to garp
Nice use of the Unitarian Universalist chalice, Garp, but be careful, as it automatically signals that you are of above average intelligence. :-)
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Morbo
November 12, 2009 1:05 PM
What's a few million dead Jews' memory when there's partisan political gain to be made?
When will someone ask this fake-pious bitch "Who would Jesus deny? Which of the 44,000 Americans who will die without healthcare this year does your Lord and Savior support letting die because it's 'too expensive'?"
It's time to quit pandering to hypocrites.
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jeffgee
November 12, 2009 1:29 PM
She got her sugar rush from it, so now she can safely complain blandly about it, like a parent scolding a child for using a dirty word.
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kash79
November 12, 2009 1:52 PM
I'm sure she knows about the holocaust about as much she knows about rocket science, or US economy, or Healthcare or the constitution or..
It is hilarious to even think this woman has any historical perspective, so please don't blame her for her mistakes.
Ironically, she can sing every note of "God bless America"
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monet768
November 12, 2009 2:01 PM
SICK DIRTY BITCH....SHE'S AS STUPID IF NOT MORE THAN CARRIE PREJEAN
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monet768
November 12, 2009 2:03 PM
SICK DIRTY BITCH....SHE'S AS STUPID IF NOT MORE THAN CARRIE PREJEAN
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readytoblowagasket
November 12, 2009 2:25 PM
TPM = Teabagger Points Memo.
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artappraiser
November 12, 2009 3:37 PM in reply to readytoblowagasket
I think you're being unfair. After all, right next to this story being headlined on the front page is s link to a barn burner of world import, Inside the Klein v. Kirchick Blow Up. Remember when TPM wasted time on covering stories like Peter Galbraith standing to make $100 million on a Iraqi Kurdish oil deal? Be thankful they leave that sort of thing to Norwegian muckrakers now and focus reporters' time on what's really important.
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readytoblowagasket
November 12, 2009 3:46 PM in reply to artappraiser
I don't appreciate being lectured to be "thankful" for an organization that doesn't do any legitimate reporting anymore. But thanks for your opinion, artappraiser!
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artappraiser
November 12, 2009 4:41 PM in reply to readytoblowagasket
Geez gasket I thought for sure you would be one to know I was being highly supportive of your comment with sarcasm. (Less sarcastic proof here.) Now you've got me wondering if management would cluelessly take my comment as kudos. It was not promising that management chose not to address that post to which I link when it was at the top of the list with 37 recommends. (About ready to give up on this place--for the umpteenth time, of course--it just doesn't feel quite right supporting this kind of coverage as a user.)
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readytoblowagasket
November 12, 2009 5:11 PM in reply to artappraiser
I'm sorry, aa, I didn't mean to be so humorless that I misread you. Most of the time I can read your tone accurately. You happened to catch me right after I'd read the 7th utterly vapid comment by Josh Marshall on the front page (which apparently has been "redesigned"—using the term loosely—to fit as much total garbage in tiny type as possible) and at least the 5th moronic TPM staff-written piece (numbers approximate, of course, there are many I haven't read), and I am quite depressed over it. Not your fault, however. All I can think is Do these people get paid? How the fuck does Josh hold an audience?
Anyway, please accept my sincere apologies offered with a smidgen of self-deprecation.
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readytoblowagasket
November 12, 2009 5:14 PM in reply to readytoblowagasket
ARRRGGGH!!!!
A smidgen of self-deprecation!
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artappraiser
November 12, 2009 6:00 PM in reply to readytoblowagasket
It's clearly become a site about Beltway and American political celebrity, eh? Even the muckraker stuff lately is mainly along the narrative of celebrities laid low from their pedestal. I actually feel sorry for the young reporters, desperately grateful to have a paying job, I have this vision of them doing mea culpas in a few years just like all the media did after the Paula Jones/Monica Lewinsky saga, i.e., "forgive us, we knew not what we were doing, we thought we were fighting on one ideological side or another, but we were just being distracted by trolls." The teabaggers, the Limbaugh's, the Bachman's, just like with Hillary's "vast right wing conspiracy," it's not about changing a single mind or vote, it's simply about distracting the country from what's going on and thereby keeping change of any kind from happening. The reactors enable the circus. Juvenal is as relevant as ever, we seem to be doomed to repeat it over and and over every couple of years:
Already long ago, from when we sold our vote to no man, the People have abdicated our duties; for the People who once upon a time handed out military command, high civil office, legions — everything, now restrains itself and anxiously hopes for just two things: bread and circuses. Except most of them aren't even getting any bread, only circuses.
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readytoblowagasket
November 12, 2009 6:49 PM in reply to artappraiser
Thanks for the great comment, aa. Yes, TPM actively enables the distraction. And that's a deliberate decision.
Meanwhile, if Josh is trying to compete with HuffPo for market share of celebrity cachet, he'll fail. He can't hold a candle to Arianna in that department. The TPM front page now looks like HuffPo. It's a design disaster. Which is bizarre, since Arianna launched her site after Josh had already made his mark. Now she's leading, and he's following. No curating of content.
After the election I noticed a big change here, which I now recognize as a dumbing-down of the TPM-generated content. That's always a deliberate business decision. Usually corporations do it out of greed to grow huge. Here, however, it's insulting to the electorate, insulting to the faithful readers who constituted Josh's original audience and sent him money to stay afloat in the early days.
There's a term for that, in any case: it's called selling out. TPM is the "progressive" FOX.
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Hidden Oak
November 12, 2009 2:49 PM
How is this any different than Fox using fake footage to inflate the numbers of this gathering of morons? It's right out of the playbook. Float the lies and smears out there and if you get called on it THEN issue a non-apology apology.
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sunkawakan
November 12, 2009 3:32 PM
From House Ethics Manual, page 91:
"A separate rule (House Rule 24, clause 1 to 3) generally prohibits Members and staff from accepting private subsidy for official House business, including events sponsored by a Member,
committee or leadership office, a caucus, or any other House office."
Isn't this what Bachmann did by accepting "help" or "subsidy" from Freedomworks, etc. in bussing in the attendees?
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EndTheEcho
November 12, 2009 10:02 PM
"open and honest debate" is what we want, it is not anything she is capable of being a part of.
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