I’m defending his right to speak and not be implicated with Hitler and to a lesser extent, Donald Trump. It’s a lot of sideways allegations, in a rather sloppily put together article. Why does the headline mention Western Europe, when France is the only country actually in western Europe that is discussed? VW and several German companies that are active in the global marketplace to this day actively benefited from slave labor and that isn’t mentioned every time someone talks about Bosch.

So I find it acceptable that a word used by the Nazis, but is firmly grounded in pre-Nazi Germany philosophy, I find it acceptable that the word can be used by an Austrian politician today. Just because someone is making sideways, maybe they’ll stick, maybe they won’t, allegations about a political figure doesn’t mean they are true. Otherwise Obama and Clinton wouldn’t have political careers.

Mr. Hofer might be stridently culturally right wing, but that’s only to be expected. Stridently culturally left wing politicians have been selling out its citizenry in western, central, and northern Europe for decades now.

The most objectionable thing I could directly attribute to Mr. Hofer is that he posed with David Hasslehoff on his instagram account.

As to why I zeroed in on this — the author teaches at my alma mater, and I in general dislike using oblique associations and accusations in journalism.