37 When a journalist asked whether Rammstein truly represented what most Americans might imagine as family values-particularly since Rammstein's songs are obsessively preoccupied with incest, a dubious family value at best-guitarist Kruspe-Bernstein explained that these were "just love songs from extreme angles." (Paul Gargano, "A Foreign Flair for Family Values," Metal Edge, January 1999.) 38 Further down in the thread, Kersten receives a dressing down from her fellow Rammstein fans. "Whoa . . . ," says Megan. "Maybe you should chill a bit about that Hitler c.r.a.p." See http://www.almostrammstein.com/nf/forums/view_thread.html?tid=118.

39 The "Hei-Hei-Hei" chorus in Rammstein's song "Heirate Mich" has a similarly agreeable resonance for these fans. See, for example, comments at the Stormfront White Nationalist Community, http://forum.stormfront.org/showthread.php?t=114116. Members of this community are of varying minds about Rammstein's fellow-kinship: "[I]n the interviews I've read with them," writes someone who calls himself "Panzershrek," "they try to distance themselves from any form of racialism, probably because i''s [sic] not good for record distribution deals with the Jew monopolised U.S music industry. Having said that I think they're a great band and even if they aren't racially aware the music certainly sounds like it is, there's something about their music that makes you want to stomp some heads!"

40 Neo-n.a.z.is frequently sport the Iron Cross as a surrogate for the n.a.z.i Iron Cross, which is banned in Germany. The n.a.z.i Iron Cross had a superimposed swastika. The Anti-Defamation League's catalogue of Nordic runes favored by neo-n.a.z.is as swastika surrogates may be found here: http://www.adl.org/hate_symbols/updates.asp.

41 The poll was conducted by researchers at the University of Bielefeld. The researchers found that 51 percent of Germans believed Israel's present-day treatment of the Palestinians to be equivalent to the n.a.z.i atrocities against European Jews during the Second World War; 68 percent believed that Israel was waging a "war of extermination" against the Palestinians; 82 percent were angered by Israel's policies toward the Palestinians; 62 percent were sick of "all this harping on" about German crimes against Jews; and 68 percent found it "annoying" that Germans today were still held to blame for n.a.z.i crimes. In a triumph of understatement, the German pollsters remarked that the findings "may be worrying." See Edgar Lefkovits, "Poll: Over 50% of Germans Equate IDF with n.a.z.i Army," Jerusalem Post, December 7, 2004.

42 Goebbels. See Joseph Goebbels, "Aus Gottes eigenem Land," Das eherne Herz (Munich: Zentralverlag der NSDAP, 1943), pp. 42127.

43 Goebbels. See ibid.

44 Goebbels. See ibid.

45 Goebbels. See Joseph Goebbels, "Was will eigentlich Amerika," Die Zeit ohne Beispiel (Munich: Zentralverlag der NSDAP., 1941), pp. 2430. #Rammstein. Paul Landers, interview in Berlin, December 20, 2004. ##Neither-it's a trick question. Julius Streicher, "What Is Americanism?" Der Sturmer, #23/1944.

46 Enshrined, but poorly applied, leaving the successor states riddled with internal divisions and border disputes, and permitting outraged nationalism to reach its pinnacle in postwar Germany.

47 I am aware that the Comintern was little more than an organ of Soviet foreign policy. Nonetheless, the ideological character of the Soviet Union was such that it felt its revolution universally suitable for export.

48 Note this interesting euphemism. Would American newspapers describe white men as being from an "ethnic American background"? Of course not. There is no such thing. This phrase suggests why immigrants have an easier time in America than they do in Britain. Johnny Walker Lindh was never described as the "ethnic American" Taliban.

Copyright 2006, 2007 by Claire Berlinski All rights reserved.