Bart,

here's a letter I wrote to mediawhores about the same Conason article

Horse,

I am a big admirer of Joe Conason. I think of him as a journalistic superhero.  I must take exception however to some of his points
about Prescot Bush' support of and profit from the Nazi war machine and death camps. Particularly annoying is Joe's misinformed
moral equivalency argument regarding Joseph Kennedy and Henry Ford.  There are some relevant and important distinctions to be made.

Anti-Semitism was not at all uncommon in America in the late 1930s. While I find hate indefensible, I don't think some German-American,
pro-Nazi groups that existed at the time were considered too far from the norm. There are plenty of bad things to say about Joseph Kennedy.
Anti-Semitic? Sure. Nazi appeaser? Sure looks like it. Nazi?  I don't think so.

Kennedy was a Catholic. Nazi's don't like Catholics. I think the feeling is mutual. The idea of Joe Kennedy being a Nazi is inherently ridiculous.
Aside from his own personal views, as ambassador, Kennedy was serving his country.  He strongly believed that the Nazi war machine was
unstoppable. That supplying our European allies would ultimately mean handing over aid to the Nazi war machine. That whatever we sent
was bound to wind up in Nazi hands. As far as I know, Joe Kennedy never made a dime by being an appeaser. We can say a lot of things
about Henry Ford as well. Once again, I don't know that Henry Ford profited from promoting Hitler. Neither of them stands accused of
trading with the enemy, unlike Prescott.

Prescott Bush continued to profit from supporting Hitler after Pearl Harbor and after Germany had declared war on us. He continued to
make big money from slave labor at Auschwitz. He was rightly found to be in violation of  the Trading With the Enemy Act.

I agree with Conason that this should not be overblown. The descendants of Henry Ford seem to be capable, intelligent, patriotic Americans.
I think most of us love the Kennedys. I tried to love W and give him the benefit of the doubt. Regretfully, he has earned my contempt.
His father as well. Right down the line, these men have proven to be war profiteers. War mongerers. Our VP, apparently pretty tight
with the Bush', was trading with Sadaam Hussein, in defiance ot UN sanctions.

It is information that we need. Prescott Bush is held up as a role model. He is the cornerstone of the Bush family political dynasty.
He mentored his son.  George H.W. Bush mentored our current president. I would rather have this knowledge than not.
Bringing this family history into the light of day is not a smear.  It's the truth, Joe.

WhirlingDervich

 Note:  I'm bundling my column from yesterday with this one on the chance Joe has time to reply.

 I disagree with my good friend Joe Conason.

 In his last column, Joe wrote:

"In America, the sins of the fathers are not held against the children, nor should they be.
  Although the Bushes have too often lowered themselves into the gutter for political gain,
  that doesn’t give license to libels against them."

 Out of respect for him, I didn't want to step on his column, but consider this:

 Didn't Bush the smarter ask the State Department to investigate Clinton's mom?
 The way I remember it (Danger, Will Robinson!) she went to Europe or somewhere and Bush had the State
 Department check her passport to see if she slipped some super-secret missle launch codes to her Russian comrades.
 Bill caught them, called them on it and shamed Bush down another 2-3 points in the polls.

"The sins of the fathers are not held against the children, nor should they be," Joe said.

 Maybe not, but why has Ted Kennedy been made the goat by talk radio for more than a decade because
 of the sins of his father?  You can't turn on an AM radio and not hear Joe, Jack and Bobby Kennedy pounded
 again and again.  They use that shit against us, but we shouldn't fire back?

 That's where I disagree with Joe.
 Joe's maybe a better man than I, maybe a bigger man, as Clinton proved to be,
 but why should we silently endure the Kennedy attacks and say, "We're better than that?"

 In my opinion, that's the Mondale/Dukakis formula for certain failure.
 Clinton didn't take any crap in 1992 or 1996 and look what happened.

 Add to that, John, Bobby, Teddy and Bill always worked for the little guy who had nothing.
 Civil rights, minimum wage, health care and raising money for battered women's shelters, stuff like that.

 Meanwhile, President Pinhead is working his heart out to give Bill Gates another tax cut, being sure GE gets
 another $5 billion dollar tax rebate, between f-ing rounds of golf and month-long vacations in Crawford, Texas.

 Whereas Clinton never sent a man into battle who didn't come home, Bush's American soldier death list
 surpasses the number of men he had killed as governor of Texas.

 We're the honest, disadvantaged, aggrieved party and we can't afford to give the GOP any points on decency grounds
 since they'd never give us any, not even to little Chelsea Clinton who was f-ing twelve when Rush verbally assaulted her.

 Why should we give them ANY consideration for decency's sake when they're fighting for the super-rich,
  BIG tobacco, trillion dollar corporations, the BIG-ass polluters and the everybody-needs-more-guns NRA?

 If we take the high road and lose, we get more of what Bush has given us.  If we use the same tactics
 they use against us, maybe America will get lucky enough to trade President Murderer for another Clinton.

  back to  bartcop.com