Brad DeLong's Grasping Reality

AS: "I'm sure that if Salam thought about it for a moment, he'd realize that the government pressuring BP to pay for the damage it caused out of its own pocket is not exactly "similar" to the ethnic cleansing of Native Americans or the The Opium Wars, both of which involved the coercive use of military force and large numbers of human casualties. Nor is it like the religious violence in India that followed the Godhra train burning in 2002, during which hundreds were killed. You might as well just write "you know who else loved shakedowns? Hitler!" The quality of argument is the same, and employing a more obscure historical reference (this shakedown is just like the siege of Ma`arat al-Numan! Harrrumph!) doesn't actually change that or obscure it in any way."