From: buckmr@rpi.edu (Ron Buckmire)
Subject: No Compromise With Evil: Vote Democratic! (LA TIMES Op Ed 8-24-92)
Date: Sat, 05 Sep 92 20:40:29 EDT
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          (This is reprinted from the L.A.Times' Op-Ed page of 8/24/92:)



                        THERE CAN'T BE COMPROMISE WITH EVIL

                             By Menachem Z. Rosensaft

                  Pat Buchanan's influence at the GOP convention
                       is reason enough to vote for Clinton.

          On April 13, 1983, then-Vice President George Bush, speaking
          on the steps of the Capitol in Washington, told a gathering of
          thousands of survivors of the Nazi death camps that "the Holo-
          caust serves as a universal warning....  The Holocaust is no
          metaphor; it is truth."  Unfortunately, he does not seem to
          understand the significance of that truth.

          I am the son of two survivors of Auschwitz.  My grandparents,
          my 5 1/2-year-old brother and most of the members of my family
          were murdered during the Holocaust.  I was born in 1948 in the
          displaced persons camp of Bergen-Belsen, the site of the Nazi
          concentration camp of the same name.  My cradle stood only a
          few hundred yards from the mass graves in which Anne Frank
          and tens of thousands of European Jews lie buried anonymously.

          Last Monday, as Patrick J. Buchanan addressed the Republican
          National Convention, I remembered something else Bush had
          said on that spring day: "From the whispers of those lost in
          the Holocaust," he warned, "the world must not repeat the
          hate; we must remember instead to teach respect and dignity
          for every man, regardless of race, color or creed."

          For me, unlike George Bush, the Holocaust is not a historical
          phenomenon to be used in a speech and then forgotten.  As the
          son of Holocaust survivors, I know indifference to evil con-
          stitutes the greatest danger to a civilized society.  People
          who condone bigotry are guilty of it themselves.

          By allowing Buchanan to set the tone for the Republican con-
          vention and to playa role in his reelection campaign, Bush
          has given the lie to the lofty sentiments that he expressed in
          his 1983 speech to the survivors.  With Bush's consent, Buch-
          anan used the prime-time platform to spew forth his ideology
          of divisiveness and to engage in the crudest possible gay-
          bashing and anti-feminist rhetoric.

          Buchanan's message was clear: Hatred is now an acceptable
          sentiment in the Republican party, and promoting bigotry has
          become a legitimate political tool.  Whatever else he may
          teach, it is not "respect and dignity for every man."

          George Bush and the other leaders of the Republican Party do
          not appear concerned by the fact that Buchanan tried to foment
          popular anti-Semitism during the months before the Gulf War
          by accusing American Jews of "beating the drum" for a war in
          which American "kids with names like McAllister, Murphy, Gon-
          zalez and Leroy Brown" would die.  It also does not seem to
          matter to them that he has championed the cause of a succes-
          sion of Nazi war criminals; that he has argued that it would
          have been impossible for Jews to perish in the gas chambers
          of the Treblinka death camp; that he once called Adolf Hitler
          "an individual of great courage, a soldier's soldier...a
          political organizer of the first rank," and that he has
          referred to a "so-called Holocaust Survivor Syndrome," which
          he described as involving "group fantasies of martyrdom and
          heroics."

          Eight months ago, I called on the President to repudiate Buch-
          anan.  Instead, he and the Republican Party have now embraced
          and legitimized Buchanan and his views.

          Presumably, Bush approves of Buchanan's rhetoric and it will
          help him hold onto the White House.  He has certainly done
          nothing to dissociate himself from Buchanan's poison-monger-
          ing.  On the contrary, the entire country and, indeed, the
          world watching the convention, could see Bush's surrogates in
          the Houston Astrodome, including Barbara Bush and Vice Pres-
          ident Dan Quayle, applauding enthusiastically during Buchan-
          an's speech.

          Sixty years ago, German's conservative politicians made a pact
          with the devil.  They agreed to go to bed with Hitler and the
          Nazi party, thinking that this would enable them to remain in
          power.  They were convinced that they could control Hitler and
          that the Nazis were merely a fringe element of the German body
          politic that posed no real threat.  In short order, however,
          it was the storm troopers and their leaders--the "Hitler Brig-
          ade," as it were--who took over.

          George Bush must now bear the consequences of having welcomed
          Buchanan's support.  There can be no compromise with evil,
          with prejudice, with anti-Semitism, with homophobia, with
          anti-feminism.  Buchanan personifies all of these darker sides
          of the human persona.  He represents the very antithesis of
          decency and tolerance.  His ideological influence in the Re-
          publican Party, and his prominent place at the convention,
          should antagonize and alienate every American who rejects
          bigotry.                                                      00000000

- - - (End of quoted text) - - -
---
RON BUCKMIRE, 11 Colvin Circle, Troy, NY 12180-3735.  ``D.C. in 93!''
vox:(518)-276-8910 fax:(518)-276-6920 buckmr@rpi.edu buckmr@rpitsmts.bitnet
``Racist, sexist, anti-gay! Operation Rescue GO AWAY!'' --heard in Buffalo.