Published on November 14, 2024 3:20 AM GMT
― Well, that’s it then. This is certainly a night for the history books.
― I never thought I would see the day: The Republicans have essentially nominated Adolf Hitler to be their presidential candidate.
― Let's not mince words: the Republicans have literally nominated Adolf Hitler to be their presidential candidate.
― People will be talking about this for a long time to come.
― The cheers are reverberating in the hall, but I’m also hearing some boos down on the floor. Do you think the “Never Hitler” Republicans will be a factor?
― I think they’ll be there throughout the campaign, but if history is any guide, they won't make much difference all things said and done. It’s good positioning if the campaign fails and you want to say you knew it all along, and it’ll get you on the talk shows for sure, but it isn’t likely to change the momentum this late in the game.
― And talk about momentum! A few months ago you would have been laughed at if you’d suggested the Republicans would actually nominate Adolf Hitler.
― Well, obviously it was a mistake to write him off. He’s got a track record of persistence, a sort of dogged never-give-up style that’s a big part of his appeal and that also helped him outlast his opponents.
― Any talk of a running mate yet?
― I've heard Joe Lieberman’s name being floated a lot, but he’s getting a little long in the tooth. He would add some gravitas and centrist respectability to the ticket, and...
― And do something about the Jewish problem.
― Yeah, the Jewish problem. That’s something Hitler’s going to have a hard time getting around. I’ve talked to some Republican Jewish leaders and none of them told me Hitler was their first choice. That said, they tell me that privately Hitler has had some surprisingly positive things to say about Israel, so they may end up holding their noses and thinking party first.
― It goes to show that there’s more to Hitler than the two-dimensional figure of fanatical hate people may think they know. But the Jewish problem is just the beginning of his negatives. Image-wise, you have to think this campaign has quite a hole to dig itself out of.
― True. I can’t think of a single candidate in this or any race who has been subjected to a longer and more persistent negative media campaign, one that extends back decades. And we can’t forget that the United States was once at war with him. But on the other hand, there’s not much left for opposition research to uncover, is there? All of his negatives are out there. He can really say “here I am, warts and all” in a way that other candidates can’t. You can be pretty confident there won't be any last-minute gotchas. Any #metoo fräuleins would have come forward long ago. There’s a feeling that voters are going to quickly lose interest in holocaust-this, world-war-that. They think of that stuff as old news—their grandfathers’ issues maybe—while Hitler is speaking to their concerns here and now.
― But speaking in German, right?
― Yeah, as you can see from his speech to the crowd behind me, he’s as animated as ever, and knows how to hold a crowd, but I doubt there’s one person in fifty here tonight who knows what he’s saying, and that’s bound to limit the effectiveness of the famous Hitlerian charm-blitzkrieg.
― Other than the rest of the Republican field, who are the big losers tonight?
― Well Jews are certainly feeling nervous, as we’ve said. And moderate Republicans are going to feel ever more marginalized. But I think the real losers tonight are the Democrats.
― How so?
― They haven't shown that they have a candidate who can go toe to toe with the Führer on the issues that seem to be important to the marginal voter. One of Hitler’s strengths is his appeal to the working class, and there’s very little that Democrats can do in response—in terms of walking back their rhetoric on racial equality for instance—that can make comparative inroads on the Republican base.
― They could try to take the patriotic high road, right? There’s a lot of built in anti-Hitler sentiment to draw on: old movies, History Channel...
― Well that brings up another point of how much that stuff will fall under campaign finance regulation. It’s been a win-some/lose-some night for the History Channel, that’s for sure. But with a broader brush, the problem is that if you paint your party as being the one against murdering racial minorities and degenerates, nuking the slavs, and invading neighboring countries, to the average working class stiff it sounds like your whole platform is about some other people you’re planning not to victimize, and Joe Pipefitter thinks to himself “what about me? who’s talking about my concerns?” And that’s where Hitler really shines.
― He’s dead. And he wasn’t born in the United States. Doesn’t this raise Constitutional concerns?
― On the one hand, yes it certainly does. We’ve talked to constitutional scholars this week and they’re pretty unanimous that a dead person who has never been a United States citizen is more or less out-of-the-running from a legal standpoint. But Hitler has never been one to let constitutional niceties get in the way of his political ambition, and so far he’s shrugged off these concerns as hair-splitting. As we’ve seen tonight, the Republican base seems to agree, and it remains to be seen whether the judicial system would be willing to lean on a never-used, cobweb-covered constitutional provision to overturn a popular democratic mandate, or whether they would succeed if they tried. If Hitler says to the Supreme Court, “you and what army?”...
― Or however you say that in German.
― Yes, or the German equivalent, whatever that is. Well, what does the Supreme Court say next?
― Do any of them even speak German?
― Well, that's neither here nor there, and there are still a lot of bridges to cross between now and then.
― But his being dead, though?
― Tell that to the candidates he defeated! If you want to sum up the lesson of this election cycle, it's this: You can kill Hitler, but don’t count him out.
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