It’s one thing for a national cable network to feature a Nazi sympathizer as a political analyst, and refuse to answer questions about it. It’s another for that network to actively promote that person’s apologies for Hitler.
But that’s what MSNBC is doing.
We told you yesterday about Pat Buchanan’s column, marking the 70th anniversary of the Nazi invasion of Poland, in which he argued that Hitler didn’t really want war. We also told you that MSNBC wouldn’t answer questions about its use of Buchanan as a frequent commentator.
But it turns out the network actually has Buchanan’s revisionist column up on its own site, marked “commentary” — as if this were a piece about, say, health-care reform, or Sonia Sotomayor.
That’s right. Supposedly liberal MSNBC now has a column on its site that argues, essentially, that Hitler was a man of peace — a point of view usually relegated to the fringiest of neo-Nazi newsletters.
Hard to know what more to say.
Late Update: MSNBC has now taken down the column — after Media Matters and a Jewish organization had joined us in raising concerns. We’ve asked MSNBC for comment and will keep you posted.
Late Late Update: An MSNBC spokeswoman responds:
An editorial decision was made to remove the column from msnbc.com. Pat is a contributor to MSNBC, his syndicated column does not speak for the network or represent the views of MSNBC.
Good to know MSNBC doesn’t think Hitler wanted peace, I guess. The spokeswoman didn’t respond to our question about MSNBC’s decision to continue having Buchanan on.