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Racism Is The Root Of Anti-Obama Paranoia Among Jews
By Jeffrey Goldberg / October 20, 2008
[Note: This post is part of an ongoing dialogue between Jeffrey Goldberg of the Atlantic and Shmuel Rosner of Slate on the need for U.S. national candidates to stop invoking the Jewish state every chance they get. Rosner's first letter, to which the following is a reply, can be read here.]
Dear Shmuel, Happy New Year, first of all. It’s nice to read you again; the Ha’aretz site is a barren place without you. And you seem even more blunt than usual; I suppose this has to do with your return to Israel. Your re-aliyah will inevitably re-sharpen your edges. I’m of two minds about even having this dialogue, because I do tend to think, as you do, that Israel is mentioned far too often in presidential debates. On the other hand, who doesn’t like to be the center of attention? We Jews have gotten used to this over the past 3,000 years or so.
Let me wrestle with two of your points. You write of Israelis, "The constant need for the husband to say how much he loves the bride does not mean the bride is lovable but rather that she lacks self-confidence." I think you’re a bit too harsh on your countrymen. It’s natural, and inevitable, that Israelis would worry about the possibly-shifting feelings of their great benefactor. Jewish history, if nothing else, makes this natural, though I don’t think this behavior is unusual at all for any country that is essentially a client state. This insecurity does have unpleasant manifestations, of course – loyalty tests, for one thing, and a weakness for victimology.
The Yad Vashem-to-Sderot Express, which all foreign dignitaries are forced to ride upon their arrival in Israel – "Look what they did to us!" meets "Look what they’re doing to us!" – is a particularly unpleasant manifestation of this. Just ask Barack Obama, who would have probably enjoyed a visit to brash, positive modern Israel. But to your main question: I think that most Jews who oppose the rise of Obama are opposing him for reasons other than Israel.
Yes, there are actual, ideologically-Republican Jews out there; and yes, I suppose there are Jews, primarily in Flatbush, who believe that John McCain will defend the Jewish claim to Greater Jerusalem (which is a terribly important cause when you live in Brooklyn, apparently) with greater fervor than would Barack Obama. But in my own experience, I would have to say that simple racism motivates much of the anti-Obama anxiety in corners of the Jewish community. I don’t know what else explains it.
His positions on most matters related to Israel are indistinguishable from those of AIPAC. This anti-Obama feeling is, of course, disappointing, but not altogether astonishing. A black president with a strange name elicits the same fears among Jews in New York and Florida that it does among Protestants in West Virginia. That said, I assume there are fence-sitters out there who are comforted to learn that Obama doesn’t actually hate Jews (and is, in fact, very nearly surrounded by Jews) so it does seem useful for Obama, and his surrogates, to remind Jews that he is a something of a Zionist fellow-traveler. In fact, this latest Jesse Jackson episode provides a good opening for the delivery of just such a message.
We’ll get to McCain later, I hope. For now, I’m curious to hear you on what Israeli government officials actually think of Obama. Do they really believe that he is in some way hostile to their interests?
Best, Jeff
To read Shmuel Rosner’s first letter, click here.
RELATED: Rosner’s original piece, "Enough About Israel, Already," for Slate, and Goldberg’s post at the Atlantic.
Shmuel Rosner’s blog is here.
Rosner’s response to this letter will follow shortly.
POST A COMMENT
There is racism alright.
There is the BHO Jr, who chose to imagine his marxist grandparents as racist and hate his white heritage. There is his choosen chuch TUCC which is more Foucault and Black Panther than Christian.
 And then there are the race-pandering neo-Marxists who wish to call anyone who disagrees with a black man racist.
And while I am at it, in what way is Goldberg Jewish? Will no Beit Din excommunicate self-hating followers of foreign religions like communism?
Now Obama is saying the Constitution has a flaw, an economic flaw.This is an old Commie idea, going back to the 1930′s; it fingers the 14th Amendment as "The Capitalism Amendment". Well, yeah! You SHOULD get to keep your stuff! You know, your property. What’s yours. "No unreasonable search and seizure", says the holy 14th. NO SEIZURE.
His Orthodox Commie training IS showing, to those who know the music and the lyrics. Which is not everybody. The 1930′s were a long time ago. But my sharp ear caught the reference. He is very thoroughly, deeply trained. No Sixties Liberal, he. I could be impressed if he weren’t so wrong. It’s really Alinsky running. This will not be good for YOU. YOU are going to be giving up your protections. Argentina has already nationalized pensions. Simply taken the money. For their own good, of course.
You hope-change people do not know what fire you are playing with. I respect your ideals but you are buying the same nonsense the Russians did in 1917 and they are not doing very well today. Command economies and command societies don’t work well, OK? The Founding Fathers were right. No kings.
You would prefer a mumbling careerist who doesn’t think before he speaks to a smart girl who is ready to eat a moose raw? Maybe it’s a hard choice. But are you sure?
She needs some experience, but she learns fast, and she is a compelling leader.
She seems to live in the real world. Not a rainbow-flavored stratosphere of the mind, where troubles melt like lemon drops, away above the chimney tops.
I don’t hanker after female leadership. But the Republican ticket is minimally acceptable and the Democrat one is for people who believe in the tooth fairy, and I don’t.
Many American supporters of Israel want a President who will bomb Iran. I don’t think you’d find as much support for the idea in Israel.Â
which candidate is more likely to bomb iran, mccain or obama? obviously mccain. one can argue that mccain won’t bomb iran, that bombing iran is unwise, but in fact many supporters of israel want an american president who will spit in ahmadinejad’s face and not talk softly to him. to accuse them of racism rather than admit the fact that there is at the very least a stylistic difference regarding something relevant to israel is ignorant.
Anon, the notion that Obama is at a greater risk because he’s an apostate was floated by one op-ed columnist in the NY Times and then thoroughly rebutted. Â
 Of course, there will always be people who try to kill the president and that’s why we have a secret service and a huge security apparatus surrounding him at all times. It’s also why we have a vice-president. If, God forbid, something should happen to a President Obama, I have little fear of a Biden administration. The same cannot be said for a Palin administration.
–Z
Americans elect highly atypical people as President! Clinton was an Arkansan, and a Rhodes Scholar. Most of us are neither. Carter was a governor, and a peanut farmer. Ditto. The first Bush was a fighter pilot. Are you? Bush II was a more typical dude, a bad boy who straightened out and married an unpretentious woman who does her own makeup.
Obama is like Chinese food in a Jewish neighborhood. Seems exotic, but really very close to home and familiar: chicken soup with wontons instead of kneidlach. So exotic. You can feel you ate a strange cuisine even though, let’s face it, you didn’t. You can pat yourself on the back as just so, so liberal.
But there’s no need for all that. Martin Luther King said to judge people on their merits and Obama doesn’t have the age, or the resume, to sit in the big chair. NOBODY can point to anything he every really made happen.
He’s just so handsome. Well, this isn’t a beauty contest.
Nope, no support for the slanderous lies.
But plenty for the facts. The Limbaugh thing was all over the Intrawebs and YouTube. The xenophobia and "He’s a Muslim", "He’s a terrorist", "His middle name is HUSSEIN" and so on are so well-established from the candidates’ speeches, supporters and local GOP officials as to need no more defense than "The Sun rose in the East today".
You have any evidence to back up these slanderous lies?
Yes, there are more than enough people on this site who will gladly eat up your lies and not ask questions.
Enough to win an election and then complain that they were lied to.
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