Reflections of a stormy petrel

President Obama never had a Polish friend, obviously. If he had, he would never have committed the gaffe of speaking of a "Polish" death camp in the context of Nazism. My friend bufo_viridis, the wisest and mildest of men, showed me long ago that there is no faster way to get a Pole mad - even one who has doubt about his country's victim mythology and no sympathy for extreme nationalism. And I can see what he means: it would be like calling the foibe where Tito's Yugoslav executioners disposed of the bodies of tens of thousands of Italians "Italian death caves". Not smart, Mr.President. And a word of warning: apologize without ifs or buts. Some of your supporters have shown a disposition to try and minimize the impact of your words or question their national significance. Don't. Just don't.

...some new and interesting evidence turned up.

In 1938, just as the persecution of Jews was moving into high gear, the Vatican not only came near breaking point with Italy about its new "racial laws" (and it was not the Vatican that blinked), it also bashed Catholic Poland for some similar bright ideas. And the man who did the bashing was the future Pope Pius XII - yeah, right, "Hitler's Pope" according to the vile propaganda of creatures best left unnamed.

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