*Updated to include Joe Biden’s Friday comparison of Senators Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley to Nazi Joseph Goebbels.

Another tempest is brewing in the Land of the Lost, formerly known as the Land of Lincoln. It all began when, in a speech to Moms for America, newly elected U.S. Representative Mary Miller quoted Hitler’s infamous assertion from Mein Kampf about the indoctrination of children. Miller said,

If we win a few elections, we’re still going to be losing unless we win the hearts and minds of our children. This is the battle. Hitler was right on one thing. He said, “Whoever has the youth has the future.”

The political world came unhinged.

In a D.C. minute, Illinois’ foolish Democrats (I know, I know, redundant) U.S. Senator Tammy Duckworth and U.S. Representative Jan Schakowsky—both on the wrong side of, well, everything—with unsheathed claws, pounced, calling for Miller’s resignation.

I forget, did Duckworth and Schakowsky call for the resignation of colleague Jim Clyburn when he first compared Donald Trump to Hitler in March 2019? Did they call for Clyburn’s resignation in March 2020 when for the second time he compared President Trump to Hitler and then for good measure compared Trump supporters to Germans under Hitler’s reign, saying this:

I used to wonder: How did the people of Germany allow Hitler to exist? But with each passing day, I’m beginning to understand how.

*Have Duckworth and Schakowsky yet called for unifier Joe Biden to resign as president for his despicable comparison on Friday, January 8 of Senators Ted Cruz and Josh Hawley to Hitler’s propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels?

Did Duckworth and Schakowsky call for the resignation of Michigan Democrat, U.S. Representative Brenda Lawrence when in September 2020, she compared Trump to Hitler and his supporters to supporters of Hitler?

Did Duckworth and Schakowsky call for the resignation of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez when she called border detention facilities that Obama used to separate children from parents “concentration camps”?

In February 2020, did Duckworth and Schakowsky urge the firing of the history teacher in a government-subsidized school in Maryland “who showed a picture of Trump above pictures of a Nazi swastika and a flag of the Soviet Union” with captions that said ‘wants to round up a group of people and build a giant wall’ and ‘oh, THAT is why it sounds so familiar!’”

Lynn Sweet, longtime writer for the lying leftist rag the Chicago Sun-Times oddly and falsely described Miller’s comment as “praise of Hitler,” when all decent, fair, non-bigots understood Miller’s comment as criticism of Hitler and anyone else who seeks to inculcate children with evil ideas, as all tyrants do.

With his chest puffed up with the air of the self-righteous, busy beaver U.S. Representative from Illinois, Adam Kinzinger—a self-identifying Republican who is always eager to condemn conservatives—jumped aboard the smite Miller bandwagon, saying, “I outright condemn this garbage.” Yeah, that took courage.

Setting aside Godwin’s over-used law, I think it’s time for the faux-outrage from politicians about comparisons to Hitler or Nazism to stop. Both sides use such comparisons. Some comparisons are more apt than others. For example, the comparison of the Democrat view that defective humans are legitimate targets for government-sanctioned extermination to the Nazi view of “life unworthy of life” seems apt.

I’m climbing in bed with a strange fellow for a moment, the very liberal Michael Hiltzik, writer for the LA Times who in a July 2019 commentary challenged the leaders of the U.S. Holocaust Museum’s “unequivocal rejection” of any and all “efforts to create analogies between the Holocaust and other events, whether historical or contemporary.”

While I disagree with Hiltzik’s apparent motive—that is, his desire for “progressives” to be free to compare Trump to Hitler—I agree with the view that the use of Holocaust analogies is not intrinsically sinful or off-limits.

Hiltzik explains his dissent from the Holocaust Museum’s absolute prohibition of the use of Holocaust analogies:

[T]he Holocaust Museum’s view of its mission as communicating the “history” of the Holocaust seems crabbed and narrow. Its real mission is to communicate the lesson that, unique as the Holocaust was in scale, the evil that brought it about lurks in the psyche of humans in groups, and may not be visible from the outset.

He goes on to cite Yale Holocaust historian Timothy Snyder who argues,

A monopoly on historical interpretation, claimed by a single institution, is a mark of authoritarianism … one of the dangers of placing a taboo on analogies … ensures that we never learn what we need to know.

Doesn’t that reflect the oft-cited view of philosopher George Santayana who famously warned, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”? Don’t we teach the evil events in history in part so that we recognize the shadows of those past events in current events? When we recognize those shadows—those contours—are we not to speak of them?

Don’t be naïve or gullible. Politicians don’t really take offense at the use of Nazi analogies. Political animals without principles—particularly animals who don’t believe in objective moral truth or the source of such truth—lack even a grounding for moral outrage. Like everything else within their grasp, their faux-outrage is a political tool for influencing people and winning power. Faux-outrage—fauxrage—emanates from whichever political side is being gored by the analogy.

Don’t fall for it. Don’t be intimidated by it. It’s a tall tale told by idiots, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

Freshman Rep. Mary Miller, a Christian, mother of seven, grandmother of 17, and farmer, under withering and indefensible attacks from around the country and next to no support from colleagues, has issued a gracious and humble apology for an alleged sin she did not commit:

Earlier this week, I spoke to a group of mothers about the importance of faith and guarding our youth from destructive influences. I sincerely apologize for any harm my words caused and regret using a reference to one of the most evil dictators in history to illustrate the dangers that outside influences can have on our youth. This dark history should never be repeated and parents should be proactive to instill what is good, true, right, and noble into their children’s hearts and minds. While some are trying to intentionally twist my words to mean something antithetical to my beliefs, let me be clear: I’m passionately pro-Israel and I will always be a strong advocate and ally of the Jewish community. I’ve been in discussion with Jewish leaders across the country and am grateful to them for their kindness and forthrightness.

Oh, btw, Hitler—the evil monster—was right on one thing: Whoever has the youth, has the future. As Christians seek to train up their children in the way they should go, they would do well to remember that supremely evil men understand the long-term effects of indoctrinating children. Hitler was not the first, nor will he be the last evil monster to pursue our youth. There are other monsters prowling around, seeking whom they will devour.

Listen to this article read by Laurie: 

https://staging.illinoisfamily.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/MaryMiller.mp3

IFI depends on the support of Christians like you.

Written by Dr. Everett Piper

The stories have become so commonplace that they’ve almost lost their shock value.

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio singles out churches and synagogues, threatening to seize their property and shut them down “permanently” if they dare defy his orders.

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot, (working through her city’s director of public health), declares a Romanian church a “public nuisance.” “We will shut you down, we will cite you, and if we need to, we will arrest you, and we will take you to jail,” she tells this small group of former Soviet bloc Christians who refuse to bow to her power.

Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas issues a stay-at-home “order” that includes a “request” that all churches which choose to exercise their First Amendment rights must provide a “record of attendees” to the city and to the state.

Andy Beshear, Kentucky’s governor, warns that any state residents attending any church services will be “forced” to self-quarantine for 14 days.

Vanita, Oklahoma, Mayor Chuck Hoskin issues a municipal order saying that anyone engaging in any church activity inside or outside, will be subject to a $500 fine and 30 days in jail.

Police in Lakewood, New Jersey, arrest 15 congregants of a local synagogue for attending an Orthodox Jewish funeral.

New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy responds by saying that any knowledge of the religious freedom guaranteed to these Jews by the Bill of Rights is “above his pay grade.”

Mayor after mayor and governor after governor across America have declared churches to be “non-essential” and ordered them closed under penalty of law. And yet, those who’ve haranged us for decades about the “separation of church and state” now sit in sleepy silence.

Why?

George Santayana once said, “Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” With this as context, perhaps a bit of a history lesson is in order.

In 1791, James Madison wrote the First Amendment:

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”

Madison, thus, argued that it is an “essential” right of every church and not that of a “king.”

Madison’s premise was very easy to understand. No government official should ever presume to define the matters of the church. No politician or unelected bureaucrat ever has the power to “establish”, dictate, contradict or contravene religious belief or practice. This is not the government’s business. It is the church’s and the church’s alone. It is not the prerogative of our Congress or the courts to tell the church what to do or not to do.

Eleven years later, Thomas Jefferson found it necessary to reassure a small group of nervous Baptists in Danbury, Connecticut, that they did not have to fear any government intrusion into the affairs of their denomination’s polity or practice.

“I contemplate with sovereign reverence that … [the] legislature should ‘make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,’ thus building a wall of separation between Church and State.”

It is from Jefferson’s assurance of non-intrusion that we get our present language of separation of church and state.

Read in context, the words of Jefferson and Madison are crystal clear. In America, unlike any other nation, the church is protected from the government. There is a “wall” that provides that protection, and it serves as a fortress, not a prison. It is built to guard the church, not to confine it. This wall is no more intended to restrain religion than the walls around your personal home are intended to restrain you. As a house has a door whereby you come and go, likewise, our Constitution has a door whereby the church is always free to enter society as it chooses, but also to lock that door and keep the government out when it sees fit.

The key here is that the church holds the key, not your power-hungry governor, or your strutting little local mayor. The door is locked from the inside, not the outside. The wall is built for your benefit, not theirs.

John F. Kennedy once said that “in times of turbulence … it is more true than ever that knowledge is power.”

The COVID-19 turbulence has exposed the radical ignorance of the left. They know nothing of our history and care little for your freedom.

Remember this in November.

You have knowledge. You have power. You hold the key. It’s time to use it.

Dr. Everett Piper, former president of Oklahoma Wesleyan University, is a columnist for The Washington Times and author of “Not A Day Care: The Devastating Consequences of Abandoning Truth” (Regnery 2017).

This article was originally published at The Washington Times.