Republicans are currently in the unusual position of hating the U.S. military. Last week, General Mark Milley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, came under fire after refusing to condemn the latest GOP scare tactic, Critical Race Theory, which teaches that, well, the U.S. has had a checkered history (and present) when it comes to how it’s treated non-whites. One thing Milley said really outraged them: That he had read the works of Mao, Marx, and Lenin in order to educate himself, but “that doesn’t make me a Communist.” On Monday’s Fox & Friends, co-host Brian Kilmeade became the latest to take him down…by claiming he’d been made to read Mein Kampf in school.
Brian Kilmeade claims he read Mein Kampf in school pic.twitter.com/E1kf62Oxrq
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) June 28, 2021
“I thought general Miley totally missed the point last week,” Kilmeade told guest, Texas representative Dan Crenshaw. “He says ‘Oh I read Mao, I read Stalin’ that has nothing to do with it.” He then dropped an unexpected bombshell. “We read Mein Kampf in school, no one thought we were Nazis, that is part of the curriculum, you find out about other things and other insurgencies, we get it, that has nothing to do with Critical Race Theory.”
It was a curious comment for a number of reasons. One: Was Massapequa High School on Long Island really making its young students read Adolf Hitler’s memoir-cum-manifesto? Two: Wasn’t he making basically the same point that Milley was — that reading works we may not agree with enriches our understanding of the world?
But there was really little to do but make jokes.
Little known fact: Brian Kilmeade attended elementary school in Berlin in 1942.
— REFrankel (@REFrankel) June 28, 2021
Some thought this admission explained a lot.
I am so proud that my school district didn't make us read Mein Kampf in school like Brian Kilmeade's school did.
Maybe that's why he is so screwed up. https://t.co/zJFxgXARGE
— Russell Foster A New Texas (@RussellFosterTX) June 28, 2021
Some questioned the claim’s veracity.
my dad went to school with brian kilmeade and he did NOT read mein kampf…so that sounds like something brian kilmeade did in his free time for fun https://t.co/XLqHogP5VJ
— paige from before (@pudgymonalisa) June 28, 2021
https://twitter.com/travisakers/status/1409504204960546824
https://twitter.com/steveweddle/status/1409540616485163011
https://twitter.com/ankylozilla/status/1409514745972117504
Others questioned why Kilmeade thinks it’s okay to read Hitler but not accounts of America’s racist past.
According to Kilmeade, reading Nazi propaganda is fine, but reading about historical systemic racism is bad.
They're terrified of the truth.
— Victor Stoddard (@VicStoddard) June 28, 2021
And others were drawn to Crenshaw’s “WTF” reaction.
Watch Dan Crenshaw's face when Kilmeade said he read Mein Kampf in school https://t.co/tv2RMN6Nj8
— Justin Baragona (@justinbaragona) June 28, 2021