1. House Dems Are ‘Communists’
With Herman Cain and Sarah Palin standing behind him, the right-wing provocateur came out in full force at a town-hall event on Tuesday, claiming he’d “heard” up to 80 House Democrats were communists. While he declined to name names, he taunted the president to challenge his claim. “I really wish that standing here before you was Allen West and President Obama. We could have a simple discussion. But that ain’t ever gonna happen,” he said. When an audience member asked, “Why not?” he replied in a mocking tone, “Cuz he was too scared!” Responding to the comment, Congressional Progressive Caucus member Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-OR) pointed out that the last member of Congress to accuse his colleagues of being communists, former Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham (R-CA), is now in prison for corruption charges. “Mr. West is in really very extraordinary company here,” he joked. West’s campaign manager rushed to do damage control, saying the congressman’s remarks were taken out of context.
2. Congressional Dems Should ‘Get the Hell Out’
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Speaking at a Florida GOP dinner in January, West had some choice words for Democrats in Congress trying to gain ground in the state before the November election. “Take your message of equality of achievement…You can take it to Europe, you can take it to the bottom of the sea, you can take it to the North Pole, but get the hell out of the United States of America.” Though he called out Obama, Harry Reid, and Nancy Pelosi by name at the dinner, vowing to stop Obama from “destroy[ing]” the country, West defended his comments by saying they were directed not at congressional Democrats but at their “message.”
3. Nazi Leader Would ‘Be Very Proud’ of Democrats
In December, West came out with this outlandish statement: “If Joseph Goebbels was around, he’d be very proud of the Democrat party, because they have an incredible propaganda machine.” The National Jewish Democratic Council asked West to “apologize sincerely and immediately,” while the Anti-Defamation League wrote a letter to the congressman saying his “Holocaust analogies” are “offensive” and “trivialize real historical events.” West blamed reporters for twisting his words.
4. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz Is ‘Not a Lady’
West gained a lot of female fans last July when he sent Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL) a hectoring email. Responding to a perceived affront from Wasserman Schultz during a House meeting, West called his colleague “vile, unprofessional, and despicable,”, before concluding, “You have proven repeatedly that you are not a Lady, therefore, shall not be afforded due respect from me!” We’re not exactly sure why he capitalized the “l” in “Lady,” but EMILY’s List went particularly wild with this one, demanding that West apologize for his “sexist tirade.”
5. Dems Have Called Me ‘Uncle Tom, a Sell-Out Oreo’
Appearing on Fox News to defend his message to Wasserman Schultz, West tried to justify his remarks by saying he had been a victim of racial discrimination from Democrats. “I have been called Uncle Tom, a sell-out Oreo…we continually allow liberals to do whatever they want and attack conservatives, but all of a sudden when a conservative stands up and says enough then people all want to sit back, especially liberals, and play victim.” Furthermore, Schultz had been attacking him “for quite some time.” For the record, Wasserman Schultz never referred to West as “Uncle Tom” in the House meeting that set off their feud.
6. ‘We Are Not Going to Have Our Men Become Subservient’
Speaking at a conservative women’s conference in April 2011, West lectured that liberal women “have been neutering American men and bringing us to the point of this incredible weakness.” He then called on conservative women “to let them know that we are not going to have our men become subservient.” Finally, he lowered the boom with this non sequitur: “Because if you don’t, then the debt will continue to grow…deficits will continue to grow.”
7. Women Should Raise ‘Spartan’ Men
At the same conference, West encouraged women to take notes from their female Spartan ancestors who “made the Spartan men strong” by allowing their sons to go to war at a young age. The implication: this is the model example conservative women need to set. He bolstered his reference with a not-so-subtle metaphor: “We need you to come in and lock shields, and strengthen up the men who are going to fight for you” in the face of these “these Planned Parenthood women, the Code Pink women…”
8. ‘Barack Hussein Obama’ a ‘Low-Level Socialist Agitator’
Not one to curtail his anti-Obama sentiments, West got particularly keyed up at the president’s opposition to a House-approved GOP budget plan to privatize Medicare. “I am sick and tired of this class warfare, this Marxist demagogic rhetoric that is coming from the president of the United States,” he said on Fox News. “Barack Hussein Obama” is nothing more than a “low-level socialist agitator.”
9. Obama Supporters a ‘Threat to the Gene Pool’
Speaking of fascist rhetoric, West concluded a rambling blog post slamming the Obama administration with this rather disturbing admission: “I must confess, when I see anyone with an Obama 2012 bumper sticker, I recognize them as a threat to the gene pool.”
10. ‘I’m Here as a Modern-Day Harriet Tubman’
If West thinks his oft-used historical references strengthen his arguments—well, we’ll let you decide on that one. Apparently Obama is the slave-driving leader of a “21st-century plantation” wherein “the Democrat Party has forever taken the black vote for granted.” So where does West fit into this racial equation? “I’m here as the modern-day Harriet Tubman, to kind of lead people on the Underground Railroad, away from that plantation into a sense of sensibility.”
11. Religious Coexistence Would ‘Give Away Our Country’
When West was campaigning to be the Tea Party candidate for Florida’s 22nd District in 2010, he took aim at religious coexistence during a public forum, slamming the popular “Coexist” bumper stickers that display symbols of Christianity, Judaism, Islam, and other religions. Those purple bumper stickers really push his buttons. “And the reason why I get upset, and every time I see one of those bumper stickers, I look at the person inside that is driving. Because that person represents something that would give away our country. Would give away who we are, our rights and freedoms and liberties…” Naturally, this rant led to a verbal assault against Islam, which West often refers to as the American enemy.
12. ‘We Should Be Censoring American News Agencies’
When Julian Assange’s whistle-blowing WikiLeaks website began leaking diplomatic U.S. cables, West said the media was partially to blame and that the government “should be censoring the American news agencies which enabled him to do this.” Moreover, the media that “supported [Assange] and applaud[ed]” WikiLeaks also should be censored.
13. Tea Party Is Like ‘The Blob’
Allen West may be a Tea Party darling, but that hasn’t stopped him from making occasionally unflattering remarks about the movement. “When you look at the Tea Party, it’s much like Steve McQueen’s movie The Blob,” he said on CNN in February when asked about the movement’s failure to coalesce around one Republican candidate for president. “They’re kind of different from each state to each state. There really is no centralized organization or structure to it, so each organization in its respective state or even North Florida to South Florida can differ.”
