I'm an iPhone guy. Even though my new iPhone 4 drops calls like Braylon Edwards drops passes, it wins out in design, features, apps, and ease of use. I've had an ongoing, friendly debate with my cousin about which phone is better, the Droid or the iPhone, and I have to admit, he makes some valid points.
But one criticism of Apple, its tight control over the Apps in its App Store, could also be one of its selling points. After all, there's no danger of typing "Jewish" into the App Store search, and getting a result like this:
Heil Droid?
As Joshua Topolsky writes on Engadget:
No one is going to tell you that you can't install a Nazi theme on your phone, but we're pretty sure that Google shouldn't make it so easy, and it shouldn't subject a large portion of its users to content that rightfully deserves to sit on the fringes, not in the center.
So don't buy the Droid, people. Google may not be profiting off this Hitler App, but they're providing a tool that helps the despicable people who would develop and purchase such an awful thing.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Human Rights Watch Is Just A Bunch Of Nazis
I've complained before about the organization, "Human Rights Watch." I never signed up to receive their literature in my mail, but somehow, after donating to John Kerry (Boy, was that a mistake), I got put on their mailing list. The majority of the stuff they send me compares Israel to apartheid-era South Africa, accuses the Jewish state of slaughtering Palestinians, and then asks me for money.
There are legitimate reasons to criticize Israel, and a definite imbalance between the power held by Jews and the considerably less power held by Israeli Arabs. However, the extreme tactics of divestment and anti-Israel boycotts ignore the complex problems of the region and seem to place the blame squarely on the Israeli government and its people. Anyone with a high-school level understanding of the Middle East knows its not that simple. Let me put it this way: Israel doesn't strap bombs to its citizens' chests and send them into packed Palestinian discos. They also don't randomly launch rockets into civilian city centers.
Instead of urging both sides to reach a compromise solution, Human Rights Watch seems determined to demonize and bring down Israel, or at the very least, dissolve it as a Jewish state. Now I finally know why.
A leading human rights group has suspended its senior military analyst following revelations that he is an avid collector of Nazi memorabilia.
The group, Human Rights Watch, had initially thrown its full support behind the analyst, Marc Garlasco, when the news of his hobby came out last week. On Monday night, the group shifted course and suspended him with pay, “pending an investigation,” said Carroll Bogert, the group’s associate director.
What is there to investigate??
Let's pretend for a moment that Marc Garlasco isn't a Nazi fan, that he is simply a fashionista who admires the stitching on the Swastika patches. Somewhere along the line, that Nazi uniform Garlasco lovingly caresses at night was worn by a man who killed Jews. And somewhere along the line, it was sold. Where did that money go? Very likely, at some point it went to a Nazi or Nazi sympathizer. Marc Garlasco, representative of a group that claims to be against genocide, SUPPORTED PROPONENTS OF THE WORST GENOCIDE MANKIND HAS EVER KNOWN.
Does that really need an investigation?
How could Human Rights Watch even have "initially thrown its full support" behind Garlasco? When you hear somebody's harboring Nazi memorabilia, is your first instinct, He's a good guy? I would hope not. The idea that somebody gets his rocks off purchasing Nazi merchandise and displaying it proudly sickens normal human beings. Apparently, not those at Human Rights Watch.
The blog-led investigation can be read here. He's actually a lot kinder to Garlasco than I would be. There's no excuse to be a part of a community that celebrates Nazis. He was "fascinated?" The kid in "Apt Pupil" was "fascinated" with Nazis too.
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
Stop The Madness
Stop Comparing The First Black President To Hitler, Please
Nazi Health Care Plan: Unless you're white, blonde haired, blue eyed and Christian, you're sent to a death camp, where you'll be told to take a shower. The shower will actually be toxic gas. You will be killed.
Obama's Health Care Plan: If you have health insurance, good for you. If you don't have health insurance, you'll be covered by the government's health insurance plan, which is good enough for most of the world's developed countries.
Now, these health care plans don't seem too similar. One involves Zyklon B and Nazi soldiers forcing emaciated Jews to dig trenches for their own soon-to-be-shot bodies. The other makes sure that if you get sick, you can be treated at a hospital and not worry about medical bills forcing you into bankruptcy. One aims to clear Europe of 10 million people... the other aims to provide free health care to 50 million people currently too poor to afford annual checkups. We're not exactly comparing apples to apples here, or even apples to oranges. This is more like apples to ostriches.
Yet, Obama's health care plan has resulted in this reaction:
Woman yells "Zeig Heil!" at Obama Heath Care supporter:
And this...
And this...
Courtesy of Glenn Beck
And this...
"This notion is fully in the spirit of the partisans of efficiency but came from a program instituted in Hitler's Germany called Aktion T-4. Under this program, elderly people with incurable diseases, young children who were critically disabled, and others who were deemed non-productive, were euthanized. This was the Nazi version of efficiency, a pitiless expulsion of the "unproductive" members of society in the most expeditious way possible."
And finally, this...
Look, I realize "liberals" got carried away too, when Bush was in charge. I'm pretty sure more than a few Nazi references were thrown towards the Patriot Act and Guantanamo Bay. But in those cases, we were talking about the government creating secret "camps" where people of a certain religion were being sent without trial to be tortured, and surveillance of citizens' lives without a warrant. The Nazi comparisons, however overblown, were at least apt.
But comparing a program designed to save millions of lower income or unemployed Americans from a lifetime of traumatic health issues to a program designed to slaughter innocent people? Comparing government provided health insurance to genocide? Painting a Hitler mustache on a poster of Obama? Yelling Zeig Heil, the Nazi salute (while apparently wearing an Israeli Defense Forces T-Shirt)!?! Have these people gone nuts?!?!?!
There are no death panels. And even if you horribly misinterpreted the end of life counseling provision in the bill, guess what? It's been erased. This is simple, people. If you have health insurance, great, you're good. Sit back and relax. If you don't, now you do. And it may not be perfect (those breast implants will still cost you), but its a damn sight better than what you have now. Which is nothing.
And if you're one of those people who worries about the pennies being taken from your paycheck, consider this. Those pennies are nothing compared to the billions the government already spends on healthcare (and already taxes you for)... money they have to spend because uninsured people never go to the doctor, so their minor ailments become major ones, and then their care ends up costing ten times more than what it would have. Most of the world's been having free health care for years, and they haven't collapsed. The for-profit system benefits huge insurance companies... and if you want to see how, just watch John Grisham's The Rainmaker for crying out loud. I'm not expecting you to watch Michael Moore's Sicko. Frankly, that guy freaks me out too.
So save the Nazi talk for Quentin Tarantino's Inglorious Basterds. And start getting on board Obama's plan to save you money and save 50 million people.
It should be said that, apparently, Allianz has apologized for their Nazi past and worked together with Jewish organizations to make amends.
Of course, according to their own website, it wasn't until 1997 that Allianz began addressing its past as a Nazi-supporting company. Coincidentally, that was the same year Allianz was sued for not paying the life insurance policies of Holocaust victims:
"After a lawsuit was filed in 1997, Allianz immediately responded by establishing a 24-hour, multilingual telephone helpline in the United States, Europe and Israel to enable potential claimants with life insurance policies, from the Holocaust-era, to have their inquiries answered. We have offered immediate payment for each legitimate claim of Holocaust victims or their heirs that was found to have been unsettled after the end of the war."
"Since 1997 Allianz has been intensively engaged in addressing its past between 1933 and 1945."
Interesting... you mean they didn't begin apologizing for their Nazi past until they were sued more than 50 years later?
If you've been reading this blog for a while, you probably know that I've recently gotten into playing Fantasy Baseball. And you've probably read all about my Jewish Fantasy Baseball team, which is scheduled to kick off its sophomore season later this month.
Well this year, I joined an AL-Only Fantasy Baseball league on CBS Sportsline. The draft was automated, so I could waste as little time as possible in setting my team up. The computer actually picked a nice team for me. A-Rod and David Ortiz on the same squad! Ian Kinsler, Jewish baseball player extraordinaire at second base! I was excited for the season to start.
Then I took a look at the other teams in the league. Most were innocuous, normal. Nick's Yankees, Mean Machine, Hamilton Havoc. But then I saw what one owner named his team. "Mein Kampf".
For those of you who don't know, that is the infamous title of Adolf Hitler's memoir and political manifesto. A book in which Hitler rationalized his hatred for the Jewish people and outlined his philosophy for the Nazi state. Neo-nazis and some Muslim extremists are known to treat the book like a bible for their causes.
And someone decided to choose that title for their fantasy baseball team's name.
To do something like that, I reasoned, someone has to be pretty fervent about their cause. A person who spreads their hate in a venue as frivolous as fantasy baseball most likely spreads their hate in other, more important areas of their life. A disturbed individual indeed.
Luckily for my Jewish baseball teammates, none of them were drafted by the Nazi squad.
What could I do? I figured CBS Sportsline wouldn't allow such an inappropriate team name to remain on their web site. So I sent them an email alerting them to the situation.
A few hours later, I checked back and "Mein Kampf" had been replaced by "INAPPROPRIATE". Big bold capital letters that will hopefully remind "Mein Kampf" that Hitler failed, and that most of the world today believes in tolerance, not hatred.
L'Chiam!!
I'd like to applaud CBS Sportsline on their swift reaction. I've always thought their fantasy leagues were better organized and provided more information than Yahoo! or others, and now I also know that they are committed to preserving the fun of the game for everyone. "Mein Kampf" may be able to spread his hate elsewhere, but he won't be able to ruin Fantasy Baseball. Not for this Jew.
I look forward to kicking his ass come April. On the Fantasy Baseball field. Ian Kinsler leading the way.
Just like Hitler, the Baseball Nazi will be defeated.
