While sitting under yet another a CNN Airport Channel monitor the other day, I listened to Lou Dobbs on one of his rants against illegal immigrants, which surely everyone knows is code language for Mexicans. As I listened to him exploit xenophobia for ratings points and book sales, I thought about Hitler.
But I decided I would not cross the line drawn by Godwin's Law. Not going there.
As it turns out, Dobbs galloped right across that line, accusing advocates for illegal immigrants of employing propaganda techniques employed by Nazi Germany. Pot, meet kettle.
Meanwhile, an Indiana University research study finds propaganda techniques in the rants from Bill O'Reilly on the Fox channel: "The same techniques were used during the late 1930s to study another prominent voice in a war-era, Father Charles Coughlin. His sermons evolved into a darker message of anti-Semitism and fascism, and he became a defender of Hitler and Mussolini."
The study says O'Reilly uses name-calling more than once every seven seconds on the average, and also is a heavy user of other propaganda techniques such as glittering generalities, card stacking, bandwagon, plain-folks, transfer and testimonials.
None of this says anything good about human nature, or Dobbs, or O'Reilly, but it does suggest Godwin was right about more than discussion threads on Usenet.