Newt Gingrich Bastardizes History
Monday, December 12, 2011 at 03:39PM
As so often is the case with someone more interested than proving he’s the smartest person in the room than with using his facts in the right manner, Newt Gingrich (heretofore known at The Eft) abused history with his comments last week about Palestinians not deserving a state because they were part of the Ottoman Empire until its demise at the end of World Ward I.
Historically, The Eft of course is correct. The Ottoman Empire, long known as “the sick man of Europe”, was a vast domain which included not merely large tracts of land in the Middle East but in Eastern Europe as well.
As the far more astute Elliot Abrams pointed out in response to The Eft’s ill-advised foray into history, if you use the Ottoman Empire as the basis for what should and should not be a state today, then Iran, Iraq, Syria, Jordan and other Middle Eastern States would not exist today. Nor would Israel for that matter. The Ottoman occupied what is currently Israel just as surely as they occupied what would be Palestine.
However, it doesn’t stop there. World War I brought about the demise of the Ottoman Empire, but also of another sick man of Europe, the Austro-Hungarian Empire in Middle and Eastern Europe, what we used to refer to in Western Civilization as “the lands between”, presumably between Western Europe and Mother Russia.
By The Eft’s logic, nations like the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Serbia, Bosnia, Croatia, Slovenia (all the former Yugoslav states) wouldn’t exist today because they were part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, just like the Palestinians were part of the Ottoman Empire.
But we can carry The Eft’s tortured logic even one step farther. Until the Iron Chancellor, Otto von Bismarck used a series of wars (against Denmark, Austria-Hungary, and France) to unify dozens of German states under the control of Prussia in the 1870s, there was no Germany.
So too with Italy at approximately the same time.
Is the Eft suggesting that we break of modern Germany and return to a series of patchwork states?
Is the Eft suggesting that Italy be torn asunder in favor of a rebirth of the Papal States, the Kingdom of Sicily and Sardinia, etc?
Of course not.
In Eftian logic, only the Palestinians are to suffer by being denied recognition because they were part of an empire which outlived its historical purpose.
Not only was Mitt Romney correct Saturday night noting that the Eft was not being helpful to the state of Israel, the Eft he was clearly being needlessly provocative for one simple reason.
He needed to prove the improvable, that he’s the smartest person in the room (he’s really not all that smart, except in his own mind), that he, unlike others, knows history.
The Eft flaunting his little knowledge of history is a scary prospect. It reminds me of a friend of mine who knew a little German. While we were in Berlin together, rather than ask directions in English (most Germans we contacted spoke very good English) and getting precise answers, this friend insisted upon employing his broken German and getting responses neither of us could understand.
A little knowledge is a dangerous thing, either in the hands of an American tourist asking directions or of an egomaniac like The Eft who would denigrate an entire people because of his misreading of history.
This man should never be allowed to come anywhere near the Oval Office. It’s not just America that will suffer if he does, but the entire civilized world.
Reader Comments (3)
– C. dog begs for more
If Newt prevails I'm worried my choices in the general election will boil down to a bombastic serial adulterer or a Marxist. Which do I select as a role model for my grandkids?
None-of-the-above; always a good choice in dire Catch-22 situations.
– C. dog