POLAND"S HATE MARCH

HATE ON THE MARCH IN POLAND:

It seemed like an echo of a more sinister time on Saturday, when 60,000 far-right nationalists from Poland and all over Europe-

Marched through Warsaw with red flares and racist signs like : ''White Europe of brotherly nations''  and ''Clean Blood''.

Poland's Foreign Ministry condemned racist, xenophobic and anti-Semitic remarks at the event, but the more salient point was the ministry's defense of the demonstration as an outpouring of patriotism.

The only people arrested were some pro-democracy counterprotestors.

Even more troubling for Americans, and perhaps for the world, was that the words from an old Polish nationalist song that were the march's slogan :

''We want God'' -were cited by President Trump to huge applause on his visit to Warsaw in July.

Neo-fascist and white-supremacist groups have become more visible and assertive in Europe and the  United States as a sense of alienation in a globalized world has taken hold, and as-

Middle Eastern and North African refugees have flooded Europe. But these extremists appear to feel energized and legitimized by populist political leaders.

The right-wing ruling party in Poland, Law and Justice, has wantonly assailed the courts and the news media while railing against immigrants, Islam, the European Union and Liberals.

These far-right passions have little basis in reality. Poland's economy has made great strides since Communism's fall, and unemployment is at a record low, 5.3 percent.

As for threats to Polish identity, the country of 38 million has taken a total 1,474 asylum-seekers this year  -18 of them from Syria, the rest mostly from Russia or Ukraine.

The ugly nationalism sweeping through the Western world, and especially Central Europe, may be a passing phase in a difficult world and confusing world.

It can be countered by common sense, as France showed in the resounding defeat of the far right last spring.

But the disgusting slogans in display in Warsaw and the  fictions and paranoia behind them must be relentlessly exposed for what they are and condemned, and-

The right wing, populist governments that condone them must be censured, not embraced.

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