Letters to the Editor
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Israeli flag lapel pins
You want to make Jews wear stars of David on their lapels? You fascist Nazi anti-semite!"
Ah, but not all the neocons are Jews. (Though, as we've learned, any criticism of them is labeled anti-semitism, so I guess that counts).
Right. When it's pointed out that neo-cons are predominantly Jewish, the standard neo-con response is to point to the exceptions, and then call the questioner an anti-semite.
But in this case, I have no doubt that they'd be happy to embrace their Jewish identity in order to, again, smear the questioner as an anti-semite.
p.s. I heard Obama refused to answer the boxers vs. briefs question because he was afraid to admit to wearing boxers instead of Israeli-made designer briefs. That's prima facie evidence of anti-semitism right there.
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I just lost a wad of money
Vegas booked Electro to show up by page 5. I took the under.
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Good, Israel needs more of that kind of danger
"He may consider himself Israel's friend. But he will be a dangerous friend ..."
Good. Israel needs more friends that are dangerous like Obama. The company she keeps these days represents in its syncophancy a danger of far greater magnitude.
These are the words of an addict. Addicts avoid, above all other things, anything that will force them to confront their real problems head on. Israel is addicted to what it calls "security," which is actually a complex and multifacted, but at its core willfully self-destructive, mindset whose origins and mass psychology could (and should, and inevitable will) be dissected for decades.
What people like that need, individually and as nations, are friends who are dangerous in just the way that Obama — and many increasingly vocal progressive American Jews — is.
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Anti-Semitism!
Smokestacks!
Camps!
Railroad cars!
Remember the Alamo!
Electro Robot
(You owe me one, Reilly)
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Another Example of the Stacked Media Deck
This is another example of an issue that a Democrat simply cannot win in the media, although Hillary has taken obvious steps to perhaps fight to a draw with McCain in unquestioning support for Likud policies. The media's unquestioning belief that any deviation from Likud/neoconservative policy is "anti-Israel", a proposition which should be absurd on its face, leaves democrats and liberals in a very difficult position. Like the issue of free trade, the media has been so completely co-opted by the rightwing, absolutist position that any deviation is certain to draw a furrowed brow from the Russerts of the media. Quite simply, any perceived reluctance to endorse a radical, militarist approach to middle east issues makes one presumptively "anti-Israel" in the minds of the media, requiring the kind of humiliating, ridiculous and ultimately self-defeating protestations of "support for Israel" that Obama is now required to issue ad nauseum.
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Well, it would be interesting...
I always find it curious that the actual words of our founding fathers are almost never used by"conservative" pundits and followers. I think they find the fact that reason and objectivity are at play in most of the comments of those who founded the country to be exceptionally disconcerting. I personally suspect that, while there would undoubtedly be a huge outcry on the part of the usual suspects when it comes to a more objective stance to Israel and it's conduct in the occupied territories, it would not, in the end, actually destroy anyone's political career if the storm could be waited out. As you, and so many others, have pointed out, support for the the pasts and continuing course of action has waned considerably and people seem to be ready for some new approaches to all of this.
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Pro-Israel?
The debate about Israel is always framed before it even starts. So, being pro-Israel always means agreeing with the hard-right on every political position. If you do not, then you are not pro-Israel. There can be no nuance.
Also, this equation always holds:
Criticism of Israeli policies = anti semite
(Notice how if you criticize the government in the U.S., then you are anti-American. )
Does every American Jew truly believe that sowing destruction in the Middle East is always in the best interest of Israel?
Doubtful. But we always hear only one side.
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EVERYONE'S "insuffiently devoted to Israel"!!!
Short of literally bowing down in perpetual slavish devotion to Abe Foxman and littering every single speech promising to nuke Iran, plus making several dozen visits to Auschwitz and the Whaling Wall, there's very little that Obama can do to prove he's not enuf of a creature of Israel. He's got that dangerous name and ethnic background, ya know.
Political candidates in the US can't do enuf to prove their their status as vassals to Israel. When Americans vote for mainstream candidates, they're voting for candidates who absolutely MUST be approved by Israel first. Otherwise they're booted out after one term, like Carter and Bush I.
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Danger, Will Rosenblum!
Warning! Warning! Anti-Semite approaching!
Thanks for coming off the bench, Baldie. But where's that darn Robot. You think his vitriol pack is running low on zionist rage?
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Where is Electro Troll?
Electro Robot must be getting lazy. All this anti-Semitism and terrorism-glorifying tripe from GG again, without any ER flames. Maybe he started on the Zoloft?
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Happy Birthday Israel!
U.S. Jews' Relationship With Israel Evolves
Education of Young Is but One Example
By Michelle Boorstein
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, May 11, 2008; Page A03
Growing up at Congregation Olam Tikvah, Michelle Pearlstein remembers how Israel was taught at religious school: "Black and white -- you can't trust anyone, and it was a united front in support of Israel." Today, Pearlstein, 35, is the Israel specialist at the Fairfax synagogue, where she teaches what is now the mainstream approach: "We call it 'Israel, warts and all.' "
The change in curriculum is but one manifestation of the changing relationship between American Jews and the Jewish state, even as the country celebrates its 60th birthday this week.
Multiple new polls show that younger American Jews feel less of a connection to Israel than older Jews. And while there is heated debate about some of the polls' methodologies and conclusions, most Jewish leaders are very concerned about the data. The leaders see them as a long-term byproduct of intermarriage, assimilation and controversial Israeli policies, including settlement expansion in the occupied territories...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/10/AR2008051002247.html
H/T Colonel Lang who had some comments:
...Let us hope that we Americans are coming to end of that kind of idea. I am not surprised that young Jewish Americans are not so gullible as to cower before the fears of their ancestors. They have looked around them and have seen that there is no need.
I congratulate the Israelis on the birthday of their country. I hope it prospers in justice and freedom for all.
http://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_semper_tyrannis/2008/05/israel-a-countr.html
And the assault on Obama from the other flank. He's an apostate Muslim!
Luttwak and Obama's "Apostasy"
Luttwak in the NYTimes:
"As the son of the Muslim father, Senator Obama was born a Muslim under Muslim law as it is universally understood. It makes no difference that, as Senator Obama has written, his father said he renounced his religion. Likewise, under Muslim law based on the Koran his mother’s Christian background is irrelevant.
Of course, as most Americans understand it, Senator Obama is not a Muslim. He chose to become a Christian, and indeed has written convincingly to explain how he arrived at his choice and how important his Christian faith is to him.
His conversion, however, was a crime in Muslim eyes; it is “irtidad” or “ridda,” usually translated from the Arabic as “apostasy,” but with connotations of rebellion and treason. Indeed, it is the worst of all crimes that a Muslim can commit, worse than murder (which the victim’s family may choose to forgive).
With few exceptions, the jurists of all Sunni and Shiite schools prescribe execution for all adults who leave the faith not under duress; the recommended punishment is beheading at the hands of a cleric, although in recent years there have been both stonings and hangings. (Some may point to cases in which lesser punishments were ordered — as with some Egyptian intellectuals who have been punished for writings that were construed as apostasy — but those were really instances of supposed heresy, not explicitly declared apostasy as in Senator Obama’s case.) "
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Edward Luttwak was allowed to publish the above quoted oped in the NY Times today. What do I think of it?
I think it is a poorly veiled attack on Obama's candidacy. I doubt if Luttwak was the originator of this attack. I have heard it before.
I will not argue the Islamic law point, but my comment would be - So What!
Are Americans to allow Luttwak and people like him to influence their choice of president on the basis of a denial of religious freedom by people who generally have no use for freedom of choice in anything?
This argument originated overseas. You can work out the point of origin for yourselves.
http://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_semper_tyrannis/2008/05/luttwak-and-oba.html