One can still hear this Arendtian shame about ethnicity these days. So parochial! One can hear the echo of Arendt's fear of being judged as "merely Jewish" in some, not all, of those Jews so eager to dissociate themselves from the parochial concerns of other Jews for Israel. The desire for universalist approval makes them so disdainful of any "ethnic" fellow feeling. After all, to such unfettered spirits, it's so banal.

Hmmm, somebody's got a helluva matza on their shoulder. I guess if you think Palestinians have the same rights as other human beings, you're just a step or two away from Holocaust denial and brownshirting. So, evil is not banal because Eichman was a real motherfucker. Makes perfect sense. Call Karl Rove and Scooter Libby and tell them they're off the hook. They are as banal as they come, so they must therefore not be evil.

With anti-anti-semites like these, who needs Nazis?

Guess it's a version of the "Only a True Scotsman" fallacy. Except it's a Jew instead of a Scotsman, and the porridge is actually pro-Israeli propaganda mixed with a victim complex.

I dunno, I think this could all be a Reductio ad Hitlerum applied to a phrase about Nazis.

Hitler was just so darn evil (I bet he evily twirled his moustache so thoroughly only that visible nub was left) that even adjectives associated with him or the Nazis must also be evil. Thus the phrase "the banality of evil" is horrible.

Yeah, well you know who else liked to accuse people of using the Reducio Ad Hitlerum? Hitler.

*applause*

Yeah, well paper cuts never killed anybody. <link>