search
David E. Weisberg

Dumbest statement by Jewish politician in 2022 (so far)

Ladies and gentlemen, we have a winner!  The award for dumbest statement made by a Jewish politician in 2022 (so far) goes to Nikki Fried.  Ms. Fried is Florida’s current Commissioner of Agriculture, a declared Democratic candidate for Governor of the State, and also a proud Jew.

She asserted, in a publicly-broadcast podcast, that Republican incumbent Governor Ron DeSantis, “[i]nstead of listening and trying to govern with the people, he is trying to govern over the people, and, you know, that, I’m sorry, I’m a student of history, too. I saw the rise of Hitler.”

When directly asked whether she was comparing DeSantis to Hitler, she said: “[I]n a lot of ways, yes . . . I have studied Hitler and how he got to power, you know, wanting his own militia.” The podcast host pointed out that many other States have the kind of voluntary paramilitary force DeSantis has proposed for Florida, and Fried further elaborated on the comparison:

“Absolutely, but the reason why this governor wants it is different than the other states that have been utilizing it for emergency purposes.  This governor is doing it for the sole purposes of power and doing so to make fear and to instill that, to blame people for what is happening in their lives, blaming certain parts of our society and culture, and that’s exactly what Hitler did to the Jews back during World War II.”

Dear Reader, I couldn’t make this stuff up if I devoted a lifetime to it, and I don’t think you could, either.

Here we have a person who has won state-wide office in Florida, who has apparently credible ambitions to become the governor of that State, and who is proudly Jewish to boot, and that person announces to the world that Ron DeSantis, the man she would likely be running against in the gubernatorial election, is a lot like Hitler.  That doesn’t in any way devalue or cheapen the significance of the murder of six million persons in a Holocaust inspired, directed and perpetrated by Hitler and his henchmen, does it?

I don’t live in Florida, so I won’t be voting there.  Nevertheless, it is clear to me that anyone—Jew, Gentile, atheist, agnostic—who casts a ballot in favor of Ms. Nikki Fried for any office in the State of Florida is probably as feeble-minded as Ms. Fried has shown herself to be.  It’s still very early in 2022, but anyone who wants to take that award away from Nikki Fried has his or her work cut out in advance.  Good luck.

About the Author
David E. Weisberg is a semi-retired attorney and a member of the N.Y. Bar; he also has a Ph.D. in Philosophy from The University of Michigan (1971). He now lives in Cary, NC. His scholarly papers on U.S. constitutional law can be read on the Social Science Research Network at: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/cf_dev/AbsByAuth.cfm?per_id=2523973