In 2017, then 21-year-old Madison Cawthorn told his Instagram buddies: “The vacation house of the Führer. Seeing the Eagles Nest has been on my bucket list for a while, it did not disappoint. Strange to hear so many laughs and share such a good time with my brother where only 79 years ago a supreme evil shared laughs and good times with compatriots.”
Now he is congressional candidate Cawthorn. Perhaps his immature enthusiasms and apparent idolatry should not be held against him. Probably there is also no reason to question the name of his SPQR Holdings or some of the other critiques in the Jezebel magazine article about his alleged use of white nationalist tropes. That may be speculative overreach.
But his visit to Berchtesgaden and his comments there raise troubling questions that he has failed to answer. And now that he has been criticized, he defensively uses the Trumpian projection blame game to silence critics. The comic book language (“supreme evil”) suggests a teenage misunderstanding of the Holocaust. The “supreme evil” sharing “laughs and good times with compatriots” suggests an admiration for the perpetrators of the Holocaust and the attempted conquest of Europe, which he should now be very eager to explicitly and vigorously deplore.
On his “bucket list” trip, did Cawthorn visit any concentration camp to try to even minimally comprehend the Nazi industrial project to murder all of the Jews of Europe as well as millions more people they considered inferior? Has Cawthorn visited the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., about eight hours from here? How has he educated himself about neo-Nazi organizations now destructively active in our country, sometimes with links to white nationalist militias? Does he even understand that there is an active domestic terrorism threat from such groups, or does he think that is “fake news”?
It is good that Cawthorn understands that the Nazi regime might have considered him inferior and worthy of extermination because of his disability or for other reasons. Yet his indiscriminate opposition to all government makes one wonder whether he supports the bipartisan Americans with Disabilities Act, spearheaded by a Republican president, George H.W. Bush. And one wonders whether Cawthorn told Trump, when he had the opportunity last month, that he objects to how Trump mocks people with disabilities.
Sadly, Cawthorn clearly has never considered how his white privilege lets him make believe that white America paid its debt to Black America because 600,000 people (Black as well as white) died during the Civil War, a war that the slave states initiated in order to preserve white rights to own Black souls. He somehow has no awareness of the subsequent organized destruction of African Americans’ hard-won freedoms by the KKK and ex-Confederate politicians and mobs when they forced the end of the Reconstruction era.
He must not know the phrase “Jim Crow,” nor the systematic use of lynching to intimidate both African Americans and their white allies (not just in the South). He must not recognize that lynching as a policy anticipated many Nazi tactics in the lead-up to the Holocaust. He must not know that the civil rights movement was no cakewalk to victory and that the civil rights acts of the 1960s have not automatically removed all remnants of the systematic disenfranchisement — political, economic and sociological — of Black Americans that had endured for four centuries up to and beyond the 1960s. Reasonable people can argue about a program of reparations, but instead of engaging a very difficult issue, Cawthorn has chosen to vilify the very notion that there is still something to repair in our nation’s four centuries of destructive dealings with people just because of the color of their skin.
I wish Cawthorn well as he grapples with the complexities of life in the United States, for all citizens and residents whether they are like or unlike him. He would do well to drop the sloganeering and whining claims of victimization and focus instead on resolving problems in our community, region, state and nation as a whole.
— Paul Weichselbaum
Hendersonville
Editor’s note: Weichselbaum reports that he is volunteering for Moe Davis’ campaign.
In addition, Xpress contacted Madison Cawthorn’s campaign with a summary of the letter writer’s points and received the following response from spokesman John Hart: “Madison Cawthorn has consistently and unequivocally denounced racism in all its forms. The notion that he would celebrate a regime that would have had him — a man in a wheelchair — exterminated is absurd.
“He understands that millions of Americans still face racial injustice and that the work of making our imperfect union more perfect is far from complete. The Jim Crow era was largely managed by Southern Democrats who betrayed our founding principles. Madison wants to undo the Democrats’ legacy of racial injustice and mismanagement by creating a future of opportunity, equality and prosperity for all people. As he said in his convention speech, he wants to help America realize MLK’s dream in which we can be judged by the content of our character, not the color of our skin.”
“Madison Cawthorn has consistently and unequivocally denounced racism in all its forms.”
Yes, and Donald Trump deplores the people flying his flag yelling “White Power!” in Elon on Saturday. (wink)
https://www.newsobserver.com/news/state/north-carolina/article245889465.html
Yeesh!
The level of mind-reading here would make Sylvia Browne green with envy.
(To boot, there are more strawmen lined up in those eight paragraphs than a scarecrow convention!)
I admit. I don’t know much about Mr. Cawthorn…
But one might be forgiven, Mr. Weichselbaum, for mistaking you for his dearly dedicated biographer. After all, you seem to have explored every nook, cranny, and recess of the man’s mind.
Indeed, you really must have journeyed down into the depths of his darkest shadows to understand him and his private motivations so incredibly intimately.
If that were the case, of course, I’d admire your devotion.
And yet… I find it unlikely.
I’ve smelled this pot of stew before. It’s been on simmer for years now and has done very little more than sow discord, distrust, and division into every level of our political process, from D.C. to Main Street.
Indeed, the incessant efforts to paint any garden variety conservative opinion (or symbol!) (or policy!) (or person!) (or utterance!) as a Nazi white-supremacist “dog whistle” has done very little than prove many of you have very little interest in actual policy and ideas…
And much more interest in raggish tabloid-style ruminations, wild assumptions, and suburban soccer mom “Guess Who Likes Hitler This Week?” neighborhood watch gossip.
Like I said, I don’t know much about Cawthorn.
And now, having read your piece, I likely know even less.
Guess I should go see for myself, huh?
Nobody knows much about Cawthorn. He has a resume you could fit on a postcard and still leave room for the address. Everything he’s told voters about himself has been embellished or obfuscated. In that context, it’s hardly a surprise that people might want to work out what the deal is with him.
The Hitler holiday is weird. (You have to admit it’s weird. When Americans his age visit Germany, their bucket list usually includes the remnants of the Berlin Wall and Oktoberfest.) It’s a side issue. What matters is that he’s a lightweight who is already looking beyond the district for national celebrity. Look at the yard signs that have been slapped up on every corner this past week: it’s a headshot and a flag, like he’s an especially patriotic realtor. His entire candidacy is identity politics.
So let’s judge him by the content of his character. It’s an empty box.
Thanks for that.
Identity politics does appear to be the flavor of the week.
Here’s to hoping the madness subsides and we can get back to… gasp!… policies, ideas, data, and results.
I’ve long held my breath in hopes that cooler heads may prevail.
Unfortunately, last I checked, I’m looking a little blue.
Identity politics? Meaning that “if the policy is good enough for straight, white Christian men and their womenfolk then by God it is good enough for the rest of you” And so the people whining about the loss of white heritage or that white people feel left behind ISN’T identity politics? “Christians” should be allowed to ignore laws and be allowed to discriminate against people based solely on their identity (gay couple wanting a wedding cake), but I’ll bet you’d scream bloody murder if we were allowed to refuse service to a Christian on the basis of our deeply held personal beliefs. Be careful what you wish for.
So much mind reading here!
See my first post.
Whoever you’re arguing with inside your mind, it ain’t me, bud.
It’s not mind reading. It is simple reading of your posts and making logical assumptions about you based on others of your ilk.
madison is going to be the first groyper elected to congress lol. I’m still baffled why working class republican voters would elect a trust fund baby who’s never had a job over a veteran.
because democrackkk policies and agendae are EVIL. … our biggest EVIL we fight daily in America, takeover by the EVIL people. if you are still a democrackkk then you support EVIL. FACT.
“As he said in his convention speech, he wants to help America realize MLK’s dream in which we can be judged by the content of our character, not the color of our skin.”
How ANYONE can take this little toady seriously is beyond comprehension.
He’s in a wheelchair because of his own stupidity.
This type of dimwit is exactly the type of person that American families, schools, churches, and businesses, spawn.
So, maybe it’s not the politicians who suck, it’s the PEOPLE who suck.
I guess it is a good thing we are letting the Russians pick our leaders, eh?
Yes. Russian youth his age are highly educated.
The article is a real stretch. I have studied the Nazi movement and would find trips to those locations fascinating too; however, I do not in any way support what Hitler did or was about.
That said, Cawthorn’s candidacy is a very sad comment on our society…..no experience….at anything. Not saying he’s a bad person…..just no life or career experience except being handicapped. We can do better than that.
BTW, Moe Davis is an excellent candidate. Just happens to be a Democrat in a largely Republican rural mountain district. Can people/voters look beyond party and vote for the best candidate?? I hope so.
Why is Moe Davis tweeting in such a manner? Is this good for his candidacy? Does this distinguish him favorably over Cawthorne? https://avlwatchdog.org/tweet-storm-candidate-attacks-with-expletives-vulgarity/
Moe certainly believes the angry tweets make him more palatable…they do NOT.
At least Mr. Cawthorn’s tokenism has evolved to focus on himself, and now doesn’t rely so much on his “biracial girlfriend” argument.