Last week, the Los Angeles City Council voted to boycott the State of Arizona in protest of their recently passed immigration law, SB 1070, which targets illegal immigrants. Regardless of what one might think of the law, I was particularly troubled by the public statements of Council Members Janice Hahn and Paul Koretz in which they equated Arizona with Nazi Germany. Perhaps I’m a bit sensitive on this subject since some members of my family were victims of the Nazi regime and died in the concentration camps.

My objection to the use of this type of hyperbole is that when public officials (and private citizens) begin equating everything they might object to with the atrocities of the Holocaust, it minimizes the slaughter of 12 million people. Paul Koretz, who also lost family members in the Holocaust, should be particularly conscious of the dangers of this type of grandstanding.  However, during last week’s council meeting, this is what he said in regard to Arizona’s new laws (including two measures relating to public education):

“If this was being proposed at the Federal level, I would think we were absolutely at the beginning of what went on in Nazi Germany.  It’s not much different.  Fortunately it’s a State, but this State needs to be stung in every possible way until they stop this behavior.  We can’t let this advance any further, this is absolutely dangerous.”

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