Who do you think you are kidding Mr Hitler?

I really don't see what people see in Ken Livingstone, the man strikes me as being the worst/best example of socialist thinking and should be unelectable by any standards, never mind my own. Even his jokes (assuming this is a joke) are crass and frankly unfunny, bit like Ben Elton, though without the charisma.
BBC.

London mayoral candidate Ken Livingstone has compared his battle to regain City Hall from Boris Johnson with the "great struggle between Churchill and Hitler".

Mr Livingstone's comments feature in Total Politics magazine.

Croydon Tory MP Gavin Barwell said: "Comparing rival politicians to Hitler is in incredibly poor taste."

But Mr Livingstone's aides said his comments were "light-hearted". City Hall declined to comment.

In comments, reported in the latest issue of the magazine, the former London Labour mayor said next year's mayoral race was "a simple choice between good and evil - I don't think it's been so clear since the great struggle between Churchill and Hitler."

'Burn forever'

"The people that don't vote for me will be weighed in the balance, come Judgment Day," he continued.

"The Archangel Gabriel will say 'You didn't vote for Ken Livingstone in 2012.

"Oh dear, burn forever. Your skin flayed for all eternity.'"

Mr Livingstone added he would "come round with a serious pitch nearer the time".

Ok once we get passed the absurdity of any politician actually making it into heaven, just what exactly was he thinking? The joke wasn't even that funny, there was bound to be some sort of reaction vs the Godwins Law effect, so I suspect Ken as usual knew exactly what he was doing, he's way too experienced a politician to be caught off guard this way.
Ken of course has form on various "blunders" of this type, the Jewish journalist he accused of being like a concentration camp guard being the most famous. He also claimed that "capitalism has killed more people than Hitler". But for sheer offensive idiocy it is hard to beat his comparison of the hardline Egyptian cleric Yusuf Qaradawi with  Pope John XXIII. He also claimed once that "what Britain did in Ireland was worse than what Hitler did to the Jews". Even John Prescott said: "I wouldn't trust him as far as I could bloody throw him."

So, I have to figure as ever that Ken is playing to some sort of audience, I know the hard left will have loved it as they consider anyone not of the hard left to be some sort of fascist, they've practically debased the term to the extent that a lot of people don't realise what an actual fascist is, simply regarding it as an insulting term for a racist. Still, comparing your opponents to Hitler or Nazi's though is a staple tactic of the left, the SWP and the UAF do it all the time, though a quick check will actually tell you just who the real fascists or Nazi's are their very tactics give them away. So all I can think of is that it was some sort of sop to the "Tory Cuts" campaign I suspect he's going to try and base his campaign on the back of and putting the thought of the Tories in some peoples minds to be the equivalent of some sort of titanic struggle with the powers of darkness.
Either that or he's just an utter dickhead.