Jeff Hurvitz: Curb your hyperbole

Several weeks ago, President Trump invited HBO’s Bill Maher to be a guest of his at the White House. A frequent critic of the POTUS, Maher still accepted the invitation and met with him. On his subsequent program, he shared his thoughts on the occasion, and said he was surprised at the positive vibes he received and that Trump had a private side that belied his public persona.

In the monologue that Friday, he shared his views, while stating his continued opposition to Trump’s behavior as chief executive. That wasn’t enough for many Trump detractors. He was called a sellout for having such a meeting. One such opponent took it a step too far.

Larry David was the co-creator of what is arguably the best sitcom ever to appear on TV, “Seinfeld.” In one memorable episode, a character who was a gifted but hostile purveyor of soup was called the Soup Nazi. That was funny. But last week, David answered Maher’s White House interaction with an op-ed piece in the New York Times that created a fictional visit by him to Adolf Hitler in 1939. It showed a human side to the horrible dictator and was meant to mock Maher’s visit with Trump. It was not funny, but merely another example of extreme hyperbole.

As a former Republican, I find much to disagree with when it comes to our President. While he may be guilty of executive overreach, much poor decision making, and seems to threaten our standing both domestically and internationally with unfiltered statements, he does not reach the lowest of bars established by the German dictator. Hopefully, there will never be another Hitler. And I believe it to be highly disrespectful to the memory of six million of my bloodline who were exterminated in the death camps during World War II.

My first knowledge of the Holocaust occurred as a ten-year-old, when a headline in the morning Philadelphia Inquirer described how Israel’s Mossad agents had captured the Nazi leader Adolf Eichmann. That was in 1960. It was shocking to realize that a different outcome in the war might have meant I was never born. Since then, it is all too often when one hears the word Nazi used to describe any extremist in any given area of life. And with the possible exception of the Seinfeld episode, it is wrong.

Maher has shifted over the years from a consummate liberal to more of a moderate. He has blasted both sides of the political spectrum with equal determination. That doesn’t seem to sit well, these days, as each extreme loves to exhibit outright hatred for those with opposing viewpoints. That is un-American. Perhaps that is why citizens such as I are moving more and more into the political affiliation of “independent.” That group comprises many free thinkers whose allegiance to political figures is more on a case-by-case basis, and not an extreme philosophy.

What Maher did was engage in dialogue with someone with whom he often disagrees. It seems civility ruled the session. Our country needs more of that. And it also needs to stop using extreme labels which do nothing but end possible constructive interactions.

Jeff Hurvitz (jrhurvitz@aol.com) is a freelance writer and native Philadelphian.