Friday, October 28, 2005

American Thinker: Ward Churchill denies "Hitler quote"

From the American Thinker...

Ward Churchill is denying to the Denver Post having made remarks at an address at DePaul University, which we reported on yesterday.

Churchill, speaking Thursday night at a Denver forum on academic freedom, said he was misquoted in two articles in The American Thinker, which said Churchill told De- Paul University students that “Hitler exterminated the wrong people.”

“It’s not something I said,” Churchill told about 80 students. They’re “not the brightest bulbs in the world and not the most honest.” [snip]

In the DePaul speech, Chicago attorney Chaya Gil writes about hearing Churchill tell students that Hitler should have exterminated “your American grandparents instead of the Jews.” Jonathan Cohen, a math professor at DePaul, makes a similar reference in another article for The American Thinker. Neither could be reached for comment Thursday.

Churchill said that he was telling the students about the hateful e-mail he received since the controversy broke about his 9/11 statements.

Churchill said he quoted one e-mail that said American Indians should have been exterminated instead of Jews and another that said Churchill’s grandparents should have been sterilized. He said American Thinker writers misquoted him.

UPDATE 10:55 AM:

From the comments: Listening to the audio, it does sound as though he was misquoted. He seems to be reading a piece of email he allegedly received. If he did indeed receive that email, it is unfortunate. I am not inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt here though. If he wants to play the victim he’ll have to prove it.

UPDATE 11:15AM: After listening to this tape about a dozen times, Churchill, when he did say "Hitler killed the wrong people" he was quoting from an e-mail. The e-mailer, according to Ward, then said "sterilaztion should've begun with your grandmother."

UPDATE: 11:25 AM: Listen here with Quicktime. It confirms my 11:15 AM update. The words were said, but the context was totally wrong.

No comments: