"Historical parallels should be drawn carefully; what’s happening in Clint, Tex., is not equivalent to what took place in Sobibor, Treblinka or Auschwitz. More apt, are the internment camps in Vichy France that housed refugees from occupied Europe in the 1940s, but that's no compliment: Refugees lived in unheated barracks and used open latrines, the contents of which blew about in rough weather. Typhus and dysentery were rampant. To the extent that refugees were fed, they got watery soups, served with a weak coffee substitute and hard brown bread. In warmer weather, bugs and vermin swarmed. The scale of those camps dwarfed our own detention centers. And many thousands of inmates were deported to Germany for extermination. But there were some striking similarities between the French camps and our own. Read more..."
At www.nytimes.com
