Zombies Ate My Neighbors

I'm really glad the Japanese are willing to permanently traumatize their children for my personal amusement.

"Accountable for them First"

The Forward has an interesting story about going-ons in Rockland County, New York, where an Orthodox-Jewish majority on the local school board is accused of short-changing public schools in favor of directing benefits to private Yeshivas (where their children attend). I blogged about a similar story (I don't think it's the same district, but the facts are eerily similar) last year, but the Forward gives a perhaps more cohesive look.

Rick Roll Win

The best I ever did in a college paper was cite to Pirates of the Caribbean as a thesis statement for what law is ("more like a set of guidelines than actual rules").

The Moderate JDL

Continuing his intense, but well-deserved, attack on the ADL, Jon Chait remarks on the occasion of the organization giving an award to Rupert Murdoch shortly after Abe Foxman complained about rising "polarization, rage, stridency and partisanship":

If you're interested in the general principle of tolerance and equality, then awarding Rupert Murdoch is preposterous. But if you define your values in a purely sectarian way, then a figure who advances an illiberal agenda that defines Jews as one of the "good" nationalities is right up your alley. Looks increasingly clear that Foxman has made his choice, and is defining the ADL's agenda not as the universalistic vision of the ADL's founders but as a moderate Jewish Defense League.

It's really sickening, watching Foxman mutate a once-indispensable member of the anti-bigotry coalition into this.

In Good Faith and Bad

David Hirsh is one of those folks who makes me despair of getting tenure, for he's always already said what I was planning to write on. His recent article, Accusations of malicious intent in debates about the Palestine-Israel conflict and about antisemitism The Livingstone Formulation, ‘playing the antisemitism card’ and contesting the boundaries of antiracist discourse, 1 Transversal 47 (2010) is just such a paper (though I'm sure I could have come up with a better title). The piece, which discusses deployments of the "Livingstone Formulation" (basically, that claims of anti-Semitism are bad-faith efforts to suppress legitimate criticism of Israel), is extremely well-done and well-put-together, and is a must-read for anyone who cares about accusations of "card-playing" in racist discourse of any stripe.

It's a Classic!

Sometimes I wonder if conservatives realize Black people have said things other than "I have a dream...."

Obviously unfair -- there are Clarence Thomas and Thomas Sowell to consider. Still, the power of the conveniently dead civil rights icon lives on -- as does the ease with which the right tends to ignore the substance of other aspects of Black political thought (including Dr. King's).

Orthodox Jews are not Evangelicals in Funny Hats

Yeshiva World has five tips on what not to do when trying to attract Orthodox Jewish votes. Paladino should have read rule #2:

2- Don’t bash gays. This is the major mistake that many politicians outside of Boro Park make. They think that Boro Parkers care about social issues. They’re wrong. Boro Parkers care about social-service issues not social issues. As far as they are concerned, violating shabbos, eating pork and gay marriage are in the same category – transgressions of Jewish law. But Boro Parkers aren’t trying to convert the world, they’re only trying to improve theirs.

That doesn't mean the Haredim support gay marriage, they just can distinguish between the spiritual and the secular. As one Lubavitcher put it with regards to Cuomo's gay marriage stance: "He's not running for Rabbi".

Should be required reading for conservative NY pols who still can't figure out why their red meat conservatism isn't getting them the Jewish vote.

The Reasonable Christian

While I had to put my two cents into the comments regarding the problematic use of "Judeo-Christian", Caroline Mala Corbin's post on Texas' recent (2007) addition of "under God" to its own state pledge is well worth reading.

The Fifth Circuit recently rejected an Establishment Clause challenge, relying on a "reasonable person" test to conclude that the Pledge remains primarily patriotic, rather than religious, in connotation. Professor Corbin adopts from feminist theory to argue that the court is implicitly adopting a "Judeo-Christian" [sic] standpoint in making this assessment of reasonability.

Israel Invites Chilean Miners To Visit

Savvy move by the Tourism Ministry.

The Problem with "Pro-Israel"

Walter Russell Mead has a fabulous post up entitled "The Problem with J Street", but which would be far better titled "The Problem with 'Pro-Israel'". Mead's basic thesis is that the entire premise underlying J Street is wrong. J Street exists to mobilize a pro-engagement, pro-peace, "anti-Likud" (though I find that phrase to be aggravating) American Jewish polity in hopes of affecting US policy towards Israel and, ultimately, foster peace between Israel and Palestine. The problem, Mead says, is that this fails to understand what's actually driving American mid-east policy. Hint: It's not the Jews:

J Street fundamentally misreads the politics of America’s Middle Eastern policies, and as a result it is essentially irrelevant to the real debates that will decide what America will do in the region. Globally, one of the most common (and idiotic) assumptions about American foreign policy is that “the Jews” control it. Virtually everyone in the Middle East, a deeply depressing number of Europeans (who cling to anti-Semitic myths about Jewish power and clannishness even while claiming to be completely free of prejudice), and even a handful of misguided Americans think that American gentiles are so weak and so foolish that a handful of clever, rich and unscrupulous Jews have led us around for decades with rings through our noses when it comes to the Middle East. The allegedly awesome mindbending power of Jews in the media and the allegedly irresistible power of Jewish money (through AIPAC and other organizations) bribed politicians and bamboozled the public. How else, these theorists of occult Jewish power ask, to explain America’s stubborn and stupid support of the Jewish state?

Everything I know about the history of American foreign policy, the state of American opinion, the nature of American ideology and theology, and the state of American politics tells me this is wrong. Support for the construction of a Jewish state in the Holy Land has been an important part of American Christian and political thought going back to colonial times. The ideas of Jewish exceptionalism and American exceptionalism have been bound together in the American mind for more than two hundred years. During the Cold War, Americans gradually got into the habit of considering Israel one of our most valuable and reliable allies. In recent years this longstanding association has been substantially strengthened by the widespread public belief that the same people who most hate Israel and want to bring it down are the bitter enemies of the United States and will stop at nothing to kill as many American civilians as they possibly can.

AIPAC’s power, which is real, is a bit like the power of the National Rifle Association. The NRA has a lot of influence over American gun legislation, and few politicians want to take it on. It spends plenty of money and mounts plenty of PR campaigns, but if large numbers of Americans didn’t care about gun rights, the NRA would be a much less important and relevant organization. The NRA mobilizes an existing public consensus, and it increases the impact of the public support of individual gun rights, but its power flows from the public’s belief that gun rights are good — and that the NRA is a reliable watchdog. Politicians quake in their boots and obey because they know that if the NRA labels them ‘anti-gun’, the voters will believe the NRA on an issue that matters to them — and in most races the politicians who cross the gun lobby will pay a heavy political price.

AIPAC’s power works the same way, but it needs to be stressed that the politicians who fear it aren’t thinking much about the Jewish votes it allegedly commands. Less than two percent of the US population is Jewish, and Jews aren’t exactly swing voters. Next to African-Americans, Jews are the most reliable (and most liberal) bloc of voters in the Democratic Party.

AIPAC’s political power ultimately comes from its ability to influence non-Jewish voters. If AIPAC and related groups call politicians anti-Israel, the tens of millions of non-Jewish voters who connect Israel’s security with American values and interests will believe them. (A recent poll found that 53% of voters were more likely to vote for a candidate who was ‘pro-Israel’.) AIPAC is powerful because it is the accredited watchdog on an issue the non-Jewish public cares about; if the dog barks, something is wrong.
[...]
Non-Jewish Americans aren’t listening to AIPAC because they are prepared to give “the Jews” whatever they want when it comes to Israel policy. Still less do they worry that defying AIPAC will bring down the awesome power of “the Jews” on their heads. They listen to AIPAC because they believe it is a reliable advocate for the approach to the issue they want American policy to take. A sturdy majority of non-Jewish Americans support Israel for reasons that have nothing, repeat nothing, to do with the generally more liberal and nuanced views of American Jews. Back in the 1920s, when most American Jews were still anti-Zionist, both houses of Congress unanimously supported the Balfour Declaration, the British statement that it would support the creation of a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine.

Generalizations are always tricky, but from where I stand Jews in the media are also, on balance, if anything perhaps a bit less likely to take hard-line pro-Likud positions than non-Jews. Yes, there is Commentary and a relative handful of highly visible Jewish conservative and neoconservative writers at places like The Weekly Standard. But William Kristol and John Podhoretz are not exactly typical figures among contemporary journalists who happen also to be American Jews. Roger Cohen, Joe Klein, and Tom Friedman are, for example, considerably more critical of Israel than, say, Bill O’Reilly, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity. David Remnick’s New Yorker doesn’t read much like a Likud PR outlet. The New York Review of Books stands, if anything, a bit to the left of J Street on Middle East issues.

The mainstream American Jewish journalistic establishment is firmly anti-Likud; the Jewish side of Hollywood is almost vituperatively anti-Likud; the predominantly liberal financiers of Wall Street — like George Soros — feel much the same way. To the extent that there is an American Jewish establishment, that establishment favors J Street style ideas. If the Jews of Hollywood, Wall Street and the mainstream media were as powerful and clannish as European anti-Semitic legend has it, Europe would actually like America’s Middle East policies much more than it does.

It can’t be repeated too often: the American Jewish community is not responsible for the popularity of hard line views among American non-Jews on Middle East issues. Individual Jews and predominantly Jewish organizations like AIPAC derive their influence over American foreign policy not from their Jewishness, but from the affinity of their policy agenda with the views and priorities of America’s non-Jews. When American Jews say things about the Middle East that resonate with the views of American non-Jews, they are influential. When, as in the case of the persistent agitation to free convicted spy Jonathan Pollard, Jewish conservative supporters of Israel deviate from the gentile consensus, that influence suddenly disappears. When, like the many liberal Jewish journalists and pundits who think hard line policies in the Middle East are bad for both Israel and the United States, they say things that American non-Jews don’t like — their views and their insights are largely cast aside. In none of these cases is the Jewish identity of the writers the key to the reception accorded their ideas.

J Street, in other words, is trying to mobilize a community that already agrees with it -- under the false presumption that largely Christian America cares what Jews think. I think Mead is correct at the shortcomings of the strategy, though I don't think the problem is with J Street so much as it is with the broader American populace which treats Jews so cynically and instrumentally. J Street remains important simply for expressive reasons -- if America wants to take a hawkish line on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, fine, but it shouldn't be allowed to hide behind the skirts of "the Jews" to do it. And, by the same token, I think Jews have a clear right to prevent a reformulation of "pro-Israel" that would act to exclude most Jews! It's hardly a knock on J Street that it thinks that Jewish opinions on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict should carry actual, as opposed to mythological, weight, in our political discourse.

As you might expect from the sustained block quote, Mead's entire article is spectacular, and (title notwithstanding) I recommend it without reservation.

Abbas Admits Peace Could Have Come Long Ago?

In the course of reiterating his flat rejection of ever recognizing Israel as a Jewish state (I really don't think this is a preparation for a counter-offer), PA head Mahmoud Abbas appeared to make a startling admission:

"If we showed flexibility on these issues the peace agreement would have been signed a long time ago," Abbas said.

It would be one thing if Abbas believed, as Mr. Ibish apparently does, that this "Jewish state" thing is just a distraction to delay final resolution of the conflict. But Mr. Abbas does not seem to believe this. Indeed, much the opposite -- he seems convinced that the conflict could have ended years ago had Palestinians been willing to compromise on points such as this, but apparently recognizing Israel as a Jewish state is such a grave affront, such a impregnable red-line, that contra Ibish, it is "worth continuing the conflict and the occupation to refuse to try to find a reasonable formula" for characterizing Israel's Jewish status.

More Unfortunate Typos

Rich Whitney, The Green Party candidate for governor of Illinois will show up on electronic ballots as "Rich Whitey". But not in every precinct, mind you. Just a few heavily Black ones in Chicago.

Poser

I've always felt like Rabbi Yehuda Levin -- the Orthodox Rabbi behind NY Republican gubernatorial candidate Carl Paldino's anti=gay remarks at a synagogue -- was part of a particularly obnoxious branch of Jews who seem to desperately want to be Christian. Sometimes, when we talk about "marginal figures" within a religious group, we mean those whose views are more extreme manifestations of the general norm. For example, there are preachers whose homophobia and hatred towards gays is so extreme that embarrasses Christians as a whole, but it's perfectly fair to say that anti-gay prejudice is mainstream in political Christianity. Levin, by contrast, doesn't even seem like an "extreme Jew", so much as a Republican operative/Jerry Falwell wannabe who likes to play dress up. I mean, look at this:

“I was in the middle of eating a kosher pastrami sandwich,” Rabbi Levin said. "While I was eating it, they come running and they say, ‘Paladino became gay!’ I said, ‘What?’ And then they showed me the statement. I almost choked on the kosher salami.”

Something about the way he's repeating "kosher" here seems awfully defensive -- like he himself feels the need to defend his Jewish bona fides. Which, in a way, he does -- since his views are so far out of the Jewish mainstream as to make him a laughable figure. Laughable, that is, if he weren't professionally devoted to tying the holy name to hatred of others.

UPDATE: Assuming I understand the meaning of "cooning" (unlikely), Ta-Nehisi Coates agrees.

Ethics are for Chumps Roundup

I just found out that Maryland doesn't require one to take the MPRE. Guess where I'm taking the bar?

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Interesting study out in the Journal of Social Issues on the conscious versus subconscious value people place upon their race (full text here, may be behind a pay-wall).

Howard Jacobson's "The Finkler Question" has won the Man Booker prize.

Mormon leader's comments on gays and lesbians spark an outcry. The church is responding with the usual pablum about how -- support for institutionalized discrimination notwithstanding -- they love and respect everyone, and it inspires the usual mix of bile and contempt in me.

Jon Chait is convinced a GOP-controlled Congress will attempt to impeach Barack Obama.

Harry Reid may finally be putting some space between himself and Sharron Angle.

Alex Knapp fisks the "education" Pam Geller (and, presumably, many others) have received about Islam.

Dropped Letter

Here's a correction you never want to write:

This blog post originally stated that one in three black men who have sex with me is HIV positive. In fact, the statistic applies to black men who have sex with men.

Ouch.

On the "Jewish State" Demand

The US has officially backed -- or at least expressed its sympathy -- for Bibi Netanyahu's demand that Palestinians recognize Israel as a Jewish state in exchange for a settlement freeze. Hussein Ibish, on the other hand, thinks that it demonstrates Netanyahu isn't serious about negotiations at all. What gives?

I think Ibish's position, though characteristically well-argued, is not quite right. The strongest argument against Netanyahu's request is that it exchanges something effectively permanent (recognition as a Jewish state) for something temporary (a settlement freeze of indeterminate duration). That's a fair point, but, as I think we'll see, it is something that could be worked around.

Ibish's other arguments, however, are unpersuasive. First, he claims that Israel's Jewish character was never a sticking point in Israel's negotiations with Egypt or Jordan. But that's primarily because Israel's Jewish character did not touch on any core claims of Jordanian or Egyptian nationalism. By contrast, it is a significant thread of the Palestinian national project that all of what is now Israel should really be Palestine -- "a Palestine next to a Palestine", as BDS founder Omar Barghouti described his ambition. The "greater Israel" project has the same ambition in reverse, which is why any permanent settlement has to be phrased as two states for two peoples. Otherwise it will have the feeling of but a temporary cease-fire in a larger conflict (which, in all honesty, is not particularly far off from Israel's relationship with Egypt and Jordan, whose civil society has always been furious that Israel yet breathes).

Second, he says that the "Jewish state" declaration is not merely symbolic, but has tangible impacts on the final resolution of concrete status items like refugees and Jerusalem. The latter is left essentially unargued, and the former is an area upon which everyone understood Palestinians will have to make significant concessions anyway. Palestinians demanding a total right of return is like Israel demanding to keep every settlement in the West Bank -- it's beyond a non-starter, it's a joke.

But the biggest problem is that Ibish's entire argument doesn't warrant what the PA actually did -- wholesale rejection of Netanyahu's gambit, accompanied by accusations of racism. What it warrants, as the US intimated, is a counter-offer. Ibish already concedes that President Bush's rendition of the "Jewish state" (that Israel is the homeland of the Jewish people). So why not say that? Or better yet: "We are open to recognizing Israel as the national homeland of the Jewish people as a product of final status negotiations." Then they don't even have to make the permanent-for-temporary-concession trade. But the PA didn't even look for something that, which indicates what many have long suspected: They're opposed to this sort of deal as a matter of kind, not degree.

PA Rejects Settlement Freeze Deal

The Jerusalem Post reports that both Saeb Erkat and Mahmoud Abbas have rejected an Israeli proposal which would have extended the settlement freeze in exchange for Palestinian recognition of Israel as the Jewish national home. Erkat called the proposal "racist" and an "Israeli game", while Abbas' spokesperson was slightly more measured, saying that "The topic of the Jewishness of the state is not connected at all to the issue [of the building freeze]."

My main concern is that talks continue, so I'm consequently unhappy at Palestinian rejection here. Obviously, the question of recognition is highly symbolic -- but it is only symbolic, and it hardly strikes me as an unfair trade for tangible concessions (which are also, to be sure, highly symbolic in addition to their concrete weight). On the other hand, I doubt that the ultimate resolution of the conflict is going to hinge on the precise words Palestinians use to characterize the Israeli state.

In an ideal world, we would say Israel should simply freeze settlement development because it is the right and intelligent thing to do. In an ideal world, the two states for two peoples formulation would not be controversial. Alas, it's not the ideal world. The one thing I can say is that Israel appears willing to talk without any preconditions -- it merely is saying that, if we are going to play the precondition "game", the path has to go both ways.

Sack Him Sack Him Sack Him!!!!

Every day that Avigdor Lieberman remains Foreign Minister is a day I'm embarrassed for Israel. Even aside from the basic point that he's little more than a fascist thug, his tenure as FM can basically be characterized as one diplomatic catastrophe after another. In a world where Israel is verging on becoming a pariah state, the last thing it needs is a wretched incompetent like Lieberman as its public face.

The Sunday Return Roundup

Jill's been out of town this week, which means we missed both Project Runway and Hell's Kitchen. Tonight will be epic.

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Tennessee Mosque opponents plan to argue that Islam is not a religion.

Pam Geller is, as Jeffrey Goldberg correctly adduces, a "vile, racist creature".

A Colorado woman is charged with destroying a controversial piece of art which she says demeaned Jesus.

Dana Milbank argues that Glenn Beck is the conspiracy-theorists go-to source for mainstream validation.

Jon Chait shoots down a ridiculous Christopher Hitchens post attributing the passage of a resolution condemning the Armenian genocide to the nefarious "Isreal Lobby". I'd also refer back to this post.

I find it quite outrageous the fury with which some Orthodox groups react to calling ordained (whoops, apparently that word is taboo too) female religious leaders "Rabbas".

What Type of Slur is "Racist"

Commenting on yet another "I am not a racist" non-sequitur, Ta-Nehisi Coates wants to know

what it means among white people to be considered a racist. I don't mean under the sanction of black people. I mean in places where there are no black people. It almost feels like, among whites, to be accused of being a racist is a class slur. Like racist is short for "inbred uncultured hick."

It's an interesting analogy, but I'm not sure it gets quite at what's going on. My views have evolved since I wrote this post, but it captures a very real dynamic. There's indignation about the possibility of being labeled a racist, but there is also terror. The proportions may vary, but both feelings are definitely there. Racism is America's original sin, and the term "racist" has become emblematic of a supreme evil. To be considered "racist" is to be a Nazi, a slave-owner, or a Klansman. It is to be a person who must be shunned in public society.

All of this is amplified by the fact that there is no generally accepted definition of racist in the public discourse. The sanctions of being successfully labeled "racist" are high, but there really is no way to determine in advance who will be burned by it. Michael Richards' career is ruined, but Ann Coulter survives more or less unscathed. There is a wanton and freakish quality about the whole discourse, and I do think most White people view the accusation of racism as akin to a bolt of lightening: powerful, random, unpredictable, and deadly. They do not know what causes the blow to rain down (except that saying anything -- and I do mean anything -- related to race makes it more likely), so they intone their "I am not a racist" incantation to the heavens in panicked hope that it will serve as a ward. It's main quality is totemic.

And being subjected to such uncertainty, in turn, breeds resentment. It's simultaneously self-sustaining and self-serving. Self-sustaining because the resentment renders true dialogue about what "racist" means impossible, maintaining its mystical quality and preventing any sort of enlightenment. Self-serving, because the entire cycle serves as a warrant for the hostile sentiment in the first place. The anger and rage that those people seem to hold power over me -- that they can end my career, sever my friendships, and expel me from the community with but a "casual" word -- burns with a righteous fury. At that point, railing against the entire idea of racism becomes effectively a subspecies of populist anti-authoritarianism.