the University Concourse Volume V, Issue 8 May 4, 2000 Table of Contents

Send this article to a friend

The Weimar Republicans

Were it not for hope in God, the chilling parallels between the Elian events and events in Germany in the 1930s would be enough to make the soul sink. There is the media campaign to make an ethnic minority appear despicable--to make the general public believe them capable of anything, to make us agree that unprecedented, illicit, government-ordered use of armed force is "appropriate" when dealing with such people. There is the impatient desire of the majority to sweep the issue under the rug, to put it behind us and move on, to ignore its implications, to deny that there are large principles and literal lives at stake. And then there are what a recent caller to the Rush Limbaugh show termed "the Weimar Republicans" (e.g. Jeb and George Bush) who, keeping a finger in the political winds, are lying low, issuing harmless "statements," and waiting cravenly for the issue to pass out of the headlines before too many people notice their non-leadership.

Who can rally behind a presidential candidate who won't stand for principle even at a moment like this?