Last night I was listening to Fresh Air on the drive home and heard one of the most grotesquely tailored propaganda flings by American’s for Tax Reform president Grover Norquist. He avoided using the word Estate, and simply referred to the “Death” tax over and over. Then he likened the estate tax to the holocaust, including the government “removing the gold from your teeth” when you die. The host, Teri Gross, confronted him on the comparison, but Mr. Norquist stood by his example, then continued by likening the tax to apartheid. When the government selects a small group of people (say, multi-millionaires) to target for something like an estate tax, you’re basically committing ethnocide….
I had to laugh, but then I got scared because this guy has been very important in formulating many of the country’s economic policies. Sure, I make absurd references like this when I drink too much, but they’re always meant to be inflammatory and, well, absurd. This guy is serious about these comparisons. He manages to balance out the Nazi references with some communist references when he likens the estate tax to the ideologies and practices of East Germany in the 1950s. At least we’re getting a full spectrum of bullshit.
If you’d like to taste for yourself, Listen here.