Over the top?

Neil Clark, who usually writes for the Guardian, on his blog, mocks what he calls another commenter’s “over the top” Che Guevara analogy.

And the winner is……..by a distance- Simon Heffer in today’s Daily Telegraph.

“To wear a T-shirt with his (Che’s) image on it has also seemed to me like wearing one with a picture of Hitler on it: although there is more evidence for Che’s psychopathic tendencies even than of those of the Führer.”

Yes, Simon is comparing a man, who even if we accept the figures of his critics, was guilty of the summary execution of “hundreds” of former supporters of the Batista regime, with a man who started a world war in which 72 million people lost their lives.

Even if? Never mind that Che’s murders are well documented — is Clark making the repugnant implication that in the case of mass murder, numbers matter? If he’s not, he has no argument here.

By such reasoning, Stalin was less of a butcher than Mao because of his lower body count — and the two of them may qualify as not as bad as Pol Pot, who killed a bigger share of his population.

Finally, does anyone doubt that Che would have murdered thousands or millions if given the chance? It’s a good thing he wasn’t.