[Marek Jan] Chodakiewicz, who describes himself as “a Christian conservative of Polish ancestry,” has written favorably about Francisco Franco, the late anti-Communist dictator known for his brutal suppression of the Spanish left. He is an admirer of the late shah of Iran, Reza Pahlavi, an autocratic leader who criticized American Jews for “controlling” U.S. media and finance. He sees gay rights as a threat to society, has linked President Barack Obama to communists and domestic terrorists, and is a voluble critic of what he sees as Western “political correctness.”

But it is Poles’ killing of Jews during and after the war, and Poland’s image as a result, that commands much of Chodakiewicz’s attention… “The guy is an ideologist of the radical right,” says Jan T. Gross, a Princeton University history professor and the Polish-born author of two acclaimed books about the Poles’ murder of Jews during and after World War II — books that sparked a political firestorm in Poland because they suggested a high level of Catholic anti-Semitism. “I don’t have any doubts that he’s anti-Semitic.”

University of Toronto Polish history professor Piotr Wróbel is less blunt. Chodakiewicz, he says, “has spent almost 30 years in the states — he would never use a phrase or adjective that would clearly identify him as an anti-Semite.” But, he adds, “There is no doubt whatsoever that he doesn’t like the Jews.”

Charming.