Truthiness in Anti-Zionist Country: Henry Ford and Julius Evola

Since the discussions on Henry Ford continue to garner interest, I thought I'd add yet another post to the subject.  As I promised earlier, here's more on Mad Fishmonger's original comment:

I generally agree with you. However, I think Julius Evola, who couldn't really be defined as an anti-Semite (he had issues with Judaism but nothing he didn't express similar issues about with virtually every other group and institution), made a point when he said that although the Protocols are a certain fraud (their certainty had not been established when he wrote this, but he strongly allowed the likelihood), it isn't entire off base about what certain elements of Judaism wish to have happen, i.e. the world bowing before Israel. They literally speak a prayer every year at Jubilee, sung by top Israeli leaders, for all nations and races to grobble on their knees at the feet of Israel and the Almighty Chosen People. The very fact that they call themselves Chosen People, and often literally believe this is so, should be reasonable ground to be concerned about the agenda of many of their leaders.

Here's what Julius Evola had to say in his preface for the Italian edition of the Protocols:

Here, as rightly pointed out by Guénon, lies the decisive point, which puts the question of 'authenticity' into perspective : the fact is that no truly and seriously secret organisation, whatever its nature, leaves behind written 'documents'. It is only by inductive processes that the importance of texts such as the 'Protocols' can be determined. This means that the problem of their 'authenticity' is secondary to the far more serious and essential problem of their 'veracity', as was already emphasised by Giovani Preziosi when he published them for the first time seventeen years ago. The serious and positive conclusion of the whole controversy which has developed since is that, even if we assume that the 'Protocols' are not 'authentic' in the narrow sense, it comes to the same thing as if they were, for two capital and decisive reasons : 

1) because the facts show that they describe the real state of affairs truthfully ;
2) because their correspondence with the governing ideas of both traditional and modern Judaism is indisputable.

What Evola is saying here is that even if the Protocols are a crude forgery, they should still be taken as authentic.  In this he echoes another great American philosopher, political pundit Stephen Colbert, who has advocated a "truthiness" which is more concerned with gut feelings than elitist facts.  Except, of course, that Stephen Colbert is a satirist and Evola appears to be deadly serious here.

Mad Fishmonger claims that Evola "couldn't really be defined as an anti-Semite." Putting aside the simple fact that he wrote an introduction to the Protocols, let's take a look at some of his comments in that preface:

As the Berne trial provoked by the 'Protocols' was widely talked about, we shall describe it here, so that the reader knows where he stands and does not let himself be influenced by tendentious reportage. The Berne trial was really just a manoeuvre on the part of international Judaism, which attempted to use Swiss justice, or, to put it better, Swiss marxist 'justice', to obtain a sort of official legal determination of the non-authenticity of the document which so troubles Israel.

***** 

Here another decisive proof of the veracity of the 'Protocols' as Jewish document becomes apparent, namely, that to draw from that Law all its logical consequences on the plane of action means, precisely, to arrive more or less at what is essential in the 'Protocols' : International Judaism has striven to prove that the 'Protocols' are 'false', while always taking great care to avoid the question of whether that document, true or false, corresponds to the Jewish spirit. And it is precisely that question which we would like to examine now. Jewish Law is based on the radical distinction between the Jew and the non-Jew, which is presented more or less in the same terms as that between human and animal, or that between élite and slaves ; from this is derived the promise that the universal Reign of Israel will come sooner or later, and that all peoples will have to submit to the sceptre of Judah ; it is the duty of the Jew to see only violence and injustice in any law which is not his Law, to manifest a torment, and a baseness, wherever his power is less than absolute ; from this is derived a double morality which limits solidarity to the Jewish race, while approving every form of lying, trickery, and treachery, in the relations between Jews and non-Jews, thus making the latter into outlaws ; finally we find the sanctification of gold and interest as instruments of the power of the Jew, to whom, by divine promise, all the wealth of the earth must peculiarly belong, and who must 'devour' any people that the Lord will give to him.

Given this example, it would appear that Evola can indeed be defined as an anti-Semite.  In fact, it would require some truly heroic sleight of mind not to define him thusly.  This may not invalidate all his   work: Henry Ford built some fine cars and Richard Wagner composed some top-notch operas. But it certainly calls into question his judgment, and makes his pronouncements on Jews and Jewish conspiracies useless as anything but a study in psychopathology.