Can Jared Kushner Be Barred From a White House Position?

Writing in The Forward, Akiva Shapiro suggests that the anti-Nepotism law which purports to bar Jared Kushner from a White House position is an unconstitutional impingement on the executive's appointment power. Is he right? I actually think the argument has significant legs,* but I do have some questions.

Shapiro contends that "[b]y design, the President must have the freedom to use whatever measures he sees fit in making any and all nominations and appointments." He cites Hamilton in Federalist 76 as saying that the President has the sole discretion in determining who should be nominated for an office, and contends that the Constitution's explicit limit on appointing a sitting Senator or Representative to an executive office also implicitly denies that there are any other limits on who the Executive can nominate.

This is well and good as far as it goes, and I find it persuasive in the case of Senate-confirmable appointments (where the appropriate check on the President's appointment power is the Senate's authority to vote yay or nay on the nomination). But Kushner's position does not demand Senate confirmation. Indeed, what makes this a difficult legal question is that, unlike appointing someone to a cabinet position, a role like Kushner's is not explicitly envisioned in the Constitution (thus making it difficult to glean what the constitutional rule is).

To clarify, let's go to the constitutional text: Article II, Section 2.

[The President] shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur; and he shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, and all other Officers of the United States, whose Appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by Law: but the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments.

Kushner's prospective role as a political advisor is not (for reasons not worth getting into) an "Officer of the United States," and so does not need Senate confirmation. If he is an inferior officer, then Congress can decide who gets to appoint him -- the President, the courts, or the heads of departments. Here, of course, it is the President who gets to appoint his chief advisors. But in this context can Congress impose restrictions on who can be appointed?

Possibly. In United States v. Perkins, the Court considered whether Congress could impose restrictions on the removal of an inferior officer whose appointment went through the head of a department. Distinguishing the case of a Senate-confirmable appointee, the Court wrote:

We have no doubt that when Congress, by law, vests the appointment of inferior officers in the heads of Departments it may limit and restrict the power of removal as it deems best for the public interest. The constitutional authority in Congress to thus vest the appointment implies authority to limit, restrict, and regulate the removal by such laws as Congress may enact in relation to the officers so appointed.

The head of a Department has no constitutional prerogative of appointment to offices independently of the legislation of Congress, and by such legislation he must be governed, not only in making appointments but in all that is incident thereto.

116 U.S. 483, 485 (1886) (emphasis added).

On the one hand, Perkins is very different from the present case: It is a removal, not an appointments case, and it is departmental rather than an executive appointment. But the italicized language suggests that where an actor has "no constitutional prerogative of appointment" -- that is, where it is up to Congress to decide who gets to make an appointment -- then Congress has the authority to set the conditions upon which the appointment is made. If Kushner is an inferior officer, then, and subject to congressional rules regarding who gets to make the appointment, he may consequently be subject to congressional rules regarding who is allowed to receive the appointment as well.

This, in turn, assumes that Kushner is even an "inferior officer". Inferior officers, the Supreme Court has observed, are those "whose work is directed and supervised at some level by others who were appointed by Presidential nomination with the advice and consent of the Senate." Edmond v. United States, 520 U.S. 651, 663 (1997). A purely political advisor doesn't seem to fit this mold either; there is no Senate-confirmable officer he serves under. And if Kushner wouldn't be a principal or an inferior officer, then there aren't any constitutional rules speaking to his appointment one way or another. This goes to the larger point that the modern executive branch qua branch, with its wide network of aides and advisors, really isn't contemplated in the Constitution at all.

So the question is, for those government officials whose appointment process is not spelled out in the Constitution, is it permissible for Congress to impose certain rules prohibiting nepotism or favoritism? In normal circumstances, I think the answer is yes, but I'm in agreement that the particular case of a close presidential advisor may warrant special attention. The existence of these sorts of advisors is thought to be intrinsic to the functioning of the Presidency as an institution, and it stands to reason that there at least the President must have absolute discretion in deciding who he will and won't receive advice from (this is similar logic to how we get the concept of "executive privilege", which is also unwritten in the Constitution). Under this view, it actually matters a great deal that Kushner won't be receiving a salary: it is one thing to guard against relatives receiving payouts from the public fisc, it's quite another to say that the President is forbidden from getting advice from someone just because he's a relative. Arguably, what matters most in the analysis here is what perks Kushner gets by virtue of his formal White House title that go above and beyond his pre-existing ability to advice the President at the pleasure of the President.

One final observation is worth making, then. Last week I observed that there is, in fact, very little law or regulation that requires good conduct out of our politician -- much less than one might expect. Much of what we take for granted as basic norms political behavior -- including, perhaps, not turning the executive branch into an arm of one's private or familial business -- are just that: norms. They exist because they are accepted to exist and because we don't tolerate departure from them. Which means that when someone tries to test those norms -- not releasing their taxes, indefinitely refusing to confirm a judge, appointing relatives to high-level governmental positions -- they don't enforce themselves. It's up to us to do it.

On this note, it is worth emphasizing just how dangerous the collapse of GOP commitment to nonpartisan constitutional, ethical, and ideological principles witnessed over the past eight years and now culminating in their utter capitulation to Trump is. Oversight doesn't happen unless the overseers decide to make it happen. Congressional checks don't happen unless Congress decides to act as a check. Democratic accountability doesn't happen unless the demos decides to hold people accountable. When these things don't happen, there is very little that formal law and rule can do to prop up what we let down. I get the sense that some people feel comfortable pushing the envelope around our political norms because they believe that nothing truly bad will happen; if things go too far someone will step in and self-correct. This just isn't true, and in many ways the election of Trump is proof of that. People let the conspiratorial conservative id rampage about unchecked because they assumed that it wouldn't really lead to anything too terrible -- surely, it wouldn't actually yield a President Trump. Well it did, because there's no deux ex machina to save us from what we've already proven we're politically willing to tolerate.

* In fact, I think it's all moot because I suspect Shapiro is correct in his prediction that no plaintiff exists with standing who could challenge Kushner's appointment.

Undocumental

I just want to warmly welcome to the blogosphere Undocumental, written by my friend Joel Sati. Joel is an undocumented immigrant from Kenya (he's open about this and it is a central theme of his writing and activism, hence why I share it), residing in America since age 9.

As it happens, Joel also went to high school only a few miles away from me in Montgomery County, Maryland. He graduated from Montgomery College (he attended after finding out -- in the midst of senior year college applications -- that he was undocumented and therefore many of the higher education options available to his classmates were closed to him) and the City College of New York. Joel is currently a PhD student in Jurisprudence and Social Policy here at UC-Berkeley, which is where we met, and I am privileged to call him a friend and colleague.

Welcome!

Booker!

Cory Booker is very likely to be a top-tier Democratic candidate for President in 2020. This comes with scrutiny and questions, as it should. And so it is perhaps unsurprising that Booker has gotten a lot of recent attention for, on the one hand, his testimony against Jeff Sessions and, on the other hand, his vote against allowing the importation of prescription drugs from Canada.

On the latter point, I've found the defenses I've read so far of Booker's vote relatively limp. That said, I think the best take has come from (of all people) Erik Loomis:

Cory Booker has a reasonably high chance of being the Democratic nominee in 2020. There are good reasons for this. He gave a great speech at the DNC that really rallied everyone who heard it against hate. Given the amount of hate that is coming, this is a good thing. His testifying against Jeff Sessions was excellent. He is charismatic and has a great chance of reviving the Obama coalition. That charisma and leadership potential is absolutely crucial for whoever the nominee is going to be. 

At the same time, the nominee is almost certainly to be someone who can speak to some sort of economic populism. Maybe that can be Cory Booker. But he has a lot to answer for. His embrace of charter schools and the inherent anti-unionism involved in them made him a heck of a lot of enemies. So have his close ties to Wall Street. And now we have him voting against allowing the importation of prescription drugs from overseas. All of these are real problems for him and should make us ask him very hard questions. I get that he is from New Jersey. He is also basically untouchable in that state. He can defy Wall Street and the Big Pharma companies based in New Jersey to run for the presidency. He needs to if he indeed is going to do that. Unfortunately, he does not seem to understand that. And thus he is going to be rightfully criticized from the left.

So it strikes me as entirely right that liberals should be putting pressure on Booker to adopt better positions on economic matters. Maybe they'll be successful, maybe they won't. Most likely, we'll see some tack to the left but less than many in the base would have liked -- which is the nature of the beast.

What I will predict is that, even if Booker does perform admirably between now and 2020, there is a cadre of "progressives" for whom it will never be enough -- his past positions make him an inherent nonstarter. They will say that Booker is only pandering, that he isn't a true believer -- not understanding that the point of political action is to get politicians to decide that your position is one worth pandering to. The difference between liberal and conservative politicians isn't that the former come preloaded with the dream progressive agenda. The difference is that liberal politicians are susceptible to liberal political pressure in a way conservatives aren't. Whatever else he is, Cory Booker is a liberal in this respect -- he can be influenced from the left.

Quote of the Day: Bernard Williams on Unadorned Hatred

In one of those statements that is obvious on reflection but which I hadn't really thought of until it was pointed out to me, Bernard Williams argues that virtually no one really argues that people should be treated differently or worse "simply" or "solely" because of their race (or sex, or other like identities):

This point is in fact conceded by those who practice such things as colour discrimination. Few can be found who will explain their practice merely by saying, 'But they're black: and it is my moral principle to treat black men differently from others'. If any reasons are given at all, they will be reasons that seek to correlate the fact of blackness with certain other considerations which are at least candidates for relevance to the question of how a man should be treated: such as insensitivity, brute stupidity, ineducable irresponsibility, etc. Now these reasons are very often rationalizations, and the correlations claimed are either not really believed, or quite irrationally believed, by those who claim them. But this is a different point; the argument concerns what counts as a moral reason, and the rationalizer broadly agrees with others about what counts as such -- the trouble with him is that his reasons are dictated by his politics, and not conversely. The Nazis' 'anthropologists' who tried to construct theories of Aryanism were paying, in very poor coin, the homage of irrationality to reason.

Bernard Williams, "The Idea of Equality," in P. Laslett & W.G. Runciman (eds.), Philosophy, Politics, and Society (Oxford: Blackwell 1962), 112-17.

That last line, about paying "the homage of irrationality to reason", is what earns the quote a place on the blog. But the whole argument matters. Again, virtually all assertions of hate against a particular outgroup are dressed up in this sort of garb -- albeit some wearing more layers than others. Recall the "bombing a synagogue isn't antisemitic if its based on dislike for Israel" case. They don't hate Jews, the argument goes, they hate alleged bad conduct done by Jews. But this is utterly ordinary as a case of antisemitism.  People who hate Jews do so, they say, because Jews are greedy, or bloodthirsty, or conniving, or murderers. It virtually never unadorned, and so the fact of adornment itself doesn't falsify the hypothesis that the attitude is discriminatory.

Rate That Apology, Part 6: Ira Madison III

During the Jeff Sessions confirmation hearing, MTV journalist Ira Madison III posted a tweet captioning a picture of Sessions holding his Asian-American granddaughter. The tweet has now been deleted, but it read:

Sessions, sir, kindly return this Asian baby to the Toys "R" Us store you stole her from.

After deleting the tweet, Madison posted the following "explanation" on Medium:

Hello. Yesterday saw the confirmation hearing of Jeff Sessions. As he was called to testify, Sessions placed his Asian American granddaughter on his lap. I made a joke alluding to the irony of a 70 year old career politician placing his post-millennial, multi-racial granddaughter on his lap to shield himself from criticism of his long standing record. My work is satirical and my words on my Twitter account have never represented MTV’s personal mission statement. But what was intended to be a provocative joke about Sessions’ record put his family in the crossfire and for that I am sorry. 

I am also sorry my joke unnecessarily distracted from the more serious matter at hand. I — and many many other Americans — genuinely believe that Jeff Sessions’ deeply troubling past on issues relating to race and immigration are disqualifying and look forward to holding him and other potential members of Donald Trump’s administration accountable for their actions. Sessions has already been rejected once by the United States Senate for his unfortunate racist comments, behaviors, and views, including praising a 1924 Immigration Law intended to end “acceptance of all races.” He was rebuked by Republicans and Democrats alike in the 1980s, unfortunately, he’s before us again. 

Going forward, we cannot be distracted from Sessions’ history, the histories of many of the men and women Trump wishes to appoint to his administration, or the online rhetoric designed to shut down debate and intimidate and terrify with violent threats and fear of doxxing. This is indicative of life on the internet for many endangered and marginalized groups right now and we must be vigilant. My writing, in part, will always be devoted to justice and I look forward to seeking it out wherever I can in the next four years and beyond.

Alas, this is not going to enter my annals of good apologies. One of the cardinal sins in a bad apology is when the author gets "on a soapbox about how [they're] really right about the core issue and just happened to express [themselves] poorly." That's definitely at work here -- a 2:1 ratio of "soapbox" paragraphs to "apology" paragraphs (and that's being generous in labeling the entire first paragraph as an "apology").

Moreover, the apology paragraph -- really more of a sentence -- is blurry and evasive. Sure, there's something intrinsically tacky about dragging a toddler into a political "joke" in this manner, and I guess that it is encompassed by talking about "put[ting] his family in the crossfire." But there's also a racialized element to the joke that can't be ignored and which this apology attempts to shunt aside. To characterize the joke as targeting "the irony of a 70 year old career politician placing his post-millennial, multi-racial granddaughter on his lap" beggars belief. Anyone with a pulse reading this joke saw it as a crude dismissal of multi-racial families among stereotypically conservative communities: "there's no way Jeff Sessions really has an Asian granddaughter, lol -- she must be a prop!" An apology which does not acknowledge and atone for that cadence, isn't one.

Grade: 3/10

It's Impossible to be Antisemitic, Part 2245

A German court today upheld a lower court ruling that firebombing a synagogue is not necessarily antisemitic, if it is done as a protest of Israeli policies. I alluded to the lower court decision two years ago, and I am blown away  at just how common this line of reasoning is:

Silly Jews think vandalizing synagogues is antiSem MT @zefrog Sounds too much like you cant criticise Israel because it's anti-Semitic(2/2)

— David Schraub (@schraubd) August 30, 2014

In any event, just as it's now impossible for anything to be racist, it's also impossible for anything to be antisemitic.

It's Impossible To Be Racist, Part 2244

Alabama Representative Mo Brooks (R), on what's driving opposition to the Sessions appointment and support for the Voting Rights Act:

"It's really about political power and racial division and what I've referred to on occasion as the 'war on whites,’” he added. “They are trying to motivate the African-American vote to vote-bloc for Democrats by using every 'Republican is a racist' tool that they can envision, even if they have to lie about it."

Perhaps we can compromise, and agree that while not "every" Republican is a racist, the ones who talk about a "war on whites" certainly are?

The End of Scandal Norms

I haven't been paying super close attention to the story that Russia has some damning info on Trump that it's holding over his head. Maybe they do. Maybe they don't. This sort of raw intelligence is always -- at best -- hit or miss. But even if it is true that they've got it, I'm skeptical that it matters.

Let's say that this info is out there. Maybe it's Trump watching Russian prostitutes piss on the bed the Obamas slept in. Or maybe it's something else. Doesn't matter. And let's say it leaks. Here's the sequence of events:

• Media reports on the news breathlessly, insists that Trump's administration can never survive a scandal of this magnitude.
• Democrats seize on the news, demand hearings, resignations, hearings, and more hearings.
• A few Republicans issue murmurs about "inappropriate behavior." More than a few denounce the leak as Russian interference (now it's a problem) and suddenly demand we focus on that.
• Somebody -- probably in the National Review -- writes a "clever" column on how leftists are hypocritical because they oppose revenge porn. Mary Anne Franks gets more citations from conservative columnists than she ever dreamed nightmared.
• Republican congressional leaders do nothing. Media starts asking "are they really going to do nothing?"
• Republican congressional leaders continue to do nothing. Eventually the storm dies down.
• Scene.

This has been the great, terrible discovery of Mitch McConnell and the 21st century GOP: nobody can force them to do anything.

I first noticed this with former Bush AG Alberto Gonzales, who nearly rode out a seemingly-infinite array of scandals. And when he finally did resign, it was impossible to figure out why. There was no legal obligation to do so. Normally, we chalk up that sort of behavior to "norms" -- but the norms had already been shredded. Gonzales already demonstrated that the sorts of "norms" which would "normally" compel a resignation could be ignored more or less indefinitely. For whatever reason, he just didn't ride the train to the end.

It was Mitch McConnell who decided to take that train all the way to the terminus. You can't make a filibuster-proof majority mandatory for every bill? Why not? You can't just refuse to even hold hearings on a Supreme Court nominee for a year? Watch him! Other politicians caught on to the act. Remember Scott Desjarlais, the pro-life Republican from Tennessee who, as a doctor, had slept with several patients(!) and was caught on tape pressuring his mistress(!!) to have an abortion(!!!)? Everyone assumed he just had to resign. You know where he is now? Still in Congress.

Turns out, you don't have to do much of anything if you don't want to. There is an extraordinarily narrow range of levers through which one can be compelled to act in Washington: impeachments, being voted out of office, mandatory court orders ... it's not all that large, and it doesn't cover all that much. Much of what we take for granted our government will do is not legally compelled, but is based on politicians following established patterns of political culture. Among those patterns is that a major scandal will lead to an investigation and some measure of accountability. But nobody forces Congress to launch an investigation, and nobody forces administration officials to resign or even acknowledge scandals reported in the media.

If they ignore it long enough, the storm will eventually pass. And that is what will happen if Russia does have something on Trump and it does eventually leak. The media will convince itself that something has to happen. And then nothing will.

How AIPAC Works (and Doesn't)

This is a really great, in-depth piece by Armin Rosen on how AIPAC exercises influence in Washington -- and the limits of said influence. While many people think of AIPAC as this towering, 900 lbs monster which makes and destroys political careers, the organization actually has a very different mode of operation. It builds relationships. It makes sure that, whoever is in office of whichever party, they have a route to that person's office so that they can make their concerns known.

While this has been obviously effective, Rosen contends that the Iran Deal case shows the limits of the strategy. Because AIPAC is exceptionally cautious about building and maintaining relationships, it cannot and does not threaten any serious consequences for Congresspersons who flout their will. Representatives were willing to buck AIPAC because they knew AIPAC wasn't going to cut them loose for the apostasy. And that, in turn, has made certain other (generally rightward) forces on the "pro-Israel" community think that AIPAC's lost its edge. What good is it being the proverbially unstoppable "Israel Lobby" if you get stopped on the one issue you actually throw your entire weight behind?

There's a degree to which that's true, though I think Rosen understates the benefits of AIPAC's relationship model even in the wake of the Iran Deal. It's almost certainly true that AIPAC's model is ill-suited to a drawn out fight where a powerful political figure, like the President, digs in his heels and directly contravenes a core AIPAC policy objective. But there will inevitably be very few cases like that, because when it comes to foreign policy -- even Israel-related foreign policy -- it will not be that often that major political figures will have independent preferences strong enough to prompt such a knockdown fight. Where AIPAC's model shines is in greasing the path for the mundane, everyday bits of legislation and funding that only a very few people care about. In those circumstances, relationships and access rule the roost, and AIPAC works very, very well.

I'd also be curious as to Rosen's view on another of my hypothesis: that regarding the degree to which Jewish groups are comfortable publicly feuding with Democratic versus Republican politicians on Israel. Rosen observes that most of AIPAC's staff are Democrats (unsurprising -- it is a predominantly Jewish group, after all), and my argument has been that Jewish groups are willing to argue with Democratic politicians because they have the essential confidence that such arguments won't break the relationship entirely. They're "in the family", so to speak. Friends fight, but that doesn't mean they don't cease being friends. By contrast, there seems to be an implicit concern that any non-trivial attack on GOP policy initiatives by a Jewish group will see a swift and brutal excommunication by the Republicans. For a relationship-focused group like AIPAC, this is a harrowing proposition. Simply put, if the name of the game for AIPAC is relationships, then preserving Republican relationships requires a lot more hand-holding and obsequiousness compared to their more resilient Democratic counterparts (who can handle a tough period like the Iran negotiations and still come back to the table on matters of shared interest later on).

Jewish Community Centers Nationwide Hit With Bomb Threats

In what appears to be a coordinated pattern, numerous Jewish Community Centers around the country were hit with bomb threats today. One of the affected centers was the JCC in Rockville, Maryland, which hosted my synagogue for many years until we were able to build our own space.

Fortunately, all of the threats appear at this point to be unfounded. But still, these things didn't happen until something changed in our political culture, and it's no mystery what that "something" is. The rise of Donald Trump's brand of rabid right-wing resentment threatens Jews a huge range of Americans of diverse backgrounds and heritages. There should be no illusion anymore that Jews will somehow be immune from the wave that's coming.

Out/In: The 2017 Inauguration Edition

Inauguration day is approaching, or as Jill Stein would put it, a day in which nothing important will change in American politics is approaching. Jill (my Jill) and I will be having our own mini-counterinauguration celebration, as our (Muslim) friend's (immigrant) fiancé is returning to the US that same day. Muslims, immigrants, Jews, women -- I feel like there's some symbolism here.

In any event, new beginnings, awful as they are, are also time to experiment. And so I present to you a Debate Link first: An "Out/In" list for the 2017 inauguration!

Out Barack Obama Michelle Obama's speeches Emails! #NeverTrump #JillNotHill "When Putin rears his ugly head......" Brexit Clinton/Sanders Two state solution America won the Cold War Deficit hawks Drain the swamp American exceptionalism "Assange is a hero/traitor!" Wonkism Social science Amateur hackers Professional civil service Abuse of executive power Hope New anti-Semitism Susan Collins Merrick Garland CIA Heartland values Federalism "Trigger warning" College is about encountering challenging ideas A wall Mexico will pay for Neoliberal Obamacare Disney World "Obama forgot Syria!" Oversight Fist bumps Fuck you, 2016!

In Donald Trump Michelle Obama's speeches Intel "Whatever you want, Trump!" By any means necessary "When Putin bats his baby blues......" Calexit Perez/Ellison Bi-national curious "Russia at the buzzer!" Tax cuts Wetlands protection American caudillo "Assange is a traitor/hero!" Populism Gut instinct Professional hacks One dollar salaries Strong leadership Fear Old & new anti-Semitism Ben Sasse Judge Dredd KGB Whitelash Preemption "Don't normalize" College is about left-wing indoctrination A wall taxpayers will pay for Ressentiment Affordable Care Act (Under)Sea World Forgetting Syria Overlook Tiny hands Please don't hurt me, 2017!

Whether you're in or you're out, best of luck this 2017!

Reclaiming Unilateral Action

A recurrent theme in my recent writing on Israel and Zionism has been the fundamentally reactive character of many "pro-Israel" voices. They can only speak in what others are or aren't doing. Ask them why Israel doesn't do X -- withdraw from settlements, say -- they speak solely in terms of the badness of someone else's Y. The UN is biased. The Palestinians incite. The Saudis behead people. It's not that these things are wrong -- far from it. But they have completely supplanted any sense of Zionist-Jewish agency -- a sad development in a movement that was supposed about Jewish self-determination.

I am pleased, therefore, to see at least some move in the rhetoric of the pro-Israel left that explicitly adopts this frame. I already flagged T'ruah's statement that "Zionism, ultimately, is about taking our future in our own hands, rather than waiting for someone else to determine our future." The Israel Policy Forum has a post on David Friedman declaring him a symptom of a larger disease: "the personified distillation of the view that Israel need not seize its own destiny and should not seize its own destiny, and that everything in the end will be fine because the status quo can reign forever." A prestigious Israeli think tank, cynical about the prospects of a negotiated settlement, has just come out with a proposal for a unilateral two-state solution.

Now to be clear, I do not prefer unilateralism as against a negotiated solution to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict. Many of the people who consider the Gaza withdrawal a disaster (I don't, but I concede I'm in a minority) lay the blame on its unilateral character. An agreement is obviously better than an imposed solution, by anyone. But with -- for all manner of reasons -- negotiations a dim prospect for the near future, I do favor Israel taking the steps it can take over Israel lying back and doing nothing indefinitely.

.... Can You Imagine a Class Just for MEN?

The University of Wisconsin-Madison is offering a workshop for male students to discuss issues of masculinity in American culture and their own lives. Wisconsin Republicans are unhappy about it. This comes on the heels of Wisconsin Republicans also being unhappy about a UW class on Whiteness. Clearly, we're moving out of the "college is about challenging young minds with uncomfortable ideas, not coddling them with safe spaces" phase of the GOP/academia cycle, and into the "it's outrageous for colleges to offer these ideas that I find outrageous" portion.

But I'm actually even more perplexed that this class is triggering the reaction. After all, isn't the ur-conservative retort to all these ethnic studies classes and "safe spaces" something like "can you imagine if someone proposed something like this for men/heterosexuals/whites"? And then Wisconsin goes and does exactly that, and the right still goes through the roof!

"Perplexed" is obviously the wrong word here, since that implies I thought there was any coherent ideology undergirding GOP objections, but it's still worth noting.

The GOP Congress IS the Swamp

The House GOP caucus has beaten a hasty retreat from its proposal to gut their independent ethics oversight body, thanks to a firestorm of calls from angry constituents. A good example of what angry constituents can still accomplish. But also a good opportunity to start imposing a narrative on 2017.

As far as I'm concerned, the second Trump is inaugurated is the second that the DNC and affiliated organizations should start cutting ads hammering Republicans on ethics. Over and over and over again. Drain they swamp? They are the swamp! And the more quickly that narrative is established, the harder it will be for congressional Republicans to wriggle free of it come 2018. Take this script:

Entrenched corruption in Washington. Politicians in the pocket of Wall Street billionaires. Foreign states interfering in American elections. Unprecedented conflicts of interest. 

And the first thing [John Doe] did in 2017? He voted to "gut" Congress' independent ethics watchdog.

Drain the swamp? John Doe IS the swamp.

No credit for having second thoughts. Run it until they bleed.

Welcome to the Future Roundup

Back from a wonderful New Year's celebration in Boston, Massachusetts. And a New Year is always a good time to clean off excess browser tabs. Here are some links that have been cluttering up mine.

* * *

It's rare that I say this, but this Nation piece trying to explain the psychology of (many) Trump voters by comparing them to the bikers Hunter S. Thompson followed is really good (and generally coheres with my sense that much of pro-Trump sentiment is more the product of ressentiment than any cohesive political ideology -- which does not make it any less dangerous,.

The BBC on those who study the spread of ignorance.

If it seems like right-wingers are deliberately trying to sabotage Israel as a bipartisan issue -- you're right. Not to toot my own horn, but perhaps worth reading in conjunction with this piece I published in Tablet.

Politico argues that "Trump Could Be Israel's Worst Nightmare." The argument is a little more complicated can that -- it's really that Trump is Netanyahu's worst nightmare by emboldening his right flank (the Naftali Bennett's of the world), though that in turn would be disastrous for Israel as Bennett's policy platform rests on an array of delusions like "nobody will care if Israel annexes the West Bank but doesn't give the Palestinians who live their full citizenship" and "China will replace the US as Israel's patron".

Jonathan Bronitsky -- he who wonders why more Jews aren't wetting themselves over the absorption of Syrian refugees, like he is -- also thinks that Jews are spending way too much time fretting about the alt-right:"a vague, fringe phenomenon that barely constitutes a 'movement'". Who's the real enemy that the Jews should be fighting? "Themselves." Let me put it this way: I won't say Bronitsky is a self-hating Jew, I'll just say that he's another person whom I sincerely hope he's never called anyone else a self-hating Jew.

Next Year in ... Boston?

Off to the final leg of our holiday travels: Cambridge, Massachusetts, for an annual New Year's Celebration with some of my best college buddies. Since this is 2016, we need to catch a 6:15 AM (4:15 AM Pacific) airport shuttle to travel hundreds of miles away from where we went to college (Owatonna is just a hop, skip, and jump away from Carleton). But so it goes.

Quite possible this is my sign-off for the year. Soon 2016's reign of terror will close, and 2017 can bring in a new reign of terror all its own. In any event, I hope everyone's celebrations are fun and safe, and if I don't write again, see you on the flipside!

In the future, when skyscrapers yield to spacescrapers that reach out into the heavens, there will be no 2016th floor.

— David Schraub (@schraubd) December 29, 2016

The Sickness Debilitating Zionism

I've noticed how, when asked to defend Bibi's record or Israeli settlements, conservative Zionist voices immediately -- almost instinctively -- pivot to complaining about the actions or inactions of someone else. Obama did this. Iran did that. Hamas did this. The UN did that.

On this note, there is a passage in T'ruah's analysis of the UN Security Council resolution on Israeli settlements that deserves highlighting:

Much of the Israeli and Jewish communal response to the UNSC resolution, as well as to all tokhecha [rebukes/corrections] regarding settlement growth, has emphasized the failure of Palestinians to accept past agreements, or focused on terror as the primary obstacle to peace. While there is certainly reason to find fault with both sides—as the UNSC resolution does—Zionism, ultimately, is about taking our future in our own hands, rather than waiting for someone else to determine our future. This means both accepting responsibility for the misguided and dangerous policy of settlement expansion, and taking it upon ourselves to do what is necessary to bring about peace.

If I could endorse this 1,000 times, I would. This could not be more right. And that it needs to be said at all identifies a sickness that is crippling the Zionist vision.

My specialty is anti-discrimination law, and so I'm well aware of the importance of comparator analysis. One common way of establishing discrimination is to demonstrate that similarly situated A and B are nonetheless being treated differently. Tell me that the UN -- that much of the world -- treats Israel unfairly, and I'll tell you "you're 100% right". It does. Absolutely it does. The comparative analysis of looking to how other countries behave or what other politicians say and do can completely warrant that assertion.

But the point of Zionism was not to enable Jews to be able to declare how unfairly we're treated. It was not even to make it so that Jews would cease to be unfairly treated. The point of Zionism was to put Jews in control of Jewish choices. It is a far closer cousin to Black Power and other nationalist conceptions of minority liberation than it is to more classically liberal civil rights models. The point of Zionism is self-determination. And a self-determining ideology comes with responsibility for what the self determines; it no longer is primarily about what others determine for us. The revolution that was Zionism was that Jews generate our own future, regardless of how the surrounding world feels about us. When putative Zionists focus on what others are or are not doing, what others say or are not saying, they abdicate the very core of the Zionist mission.

And here is the sickness: For too many Jews, Zionism has ceased to be about taking our future in our own hands. This self-determining vision is beginning to wither. I've complained bitterly about those "Zionists" who refuse to act until the world writes them a permission slip. For these people, the metric of Zionism has become what other people or other countries do or don't do. It has become a pathetic shadow of itself: a reactive, rather than self-generating, ideology. Their Zionism focuses on what we can't do rather than what we can. It talks not of Israeli action but of Arab rejection. "If you will it, it is no dream" is replaced by "no partner for peace."

Take the settlements. Persons opposed to a settlement freeze often argue that Palestinians won't come to the negotiating table just because there is a halt to settlement growth. They say that evacuating the settlements won't bring peace. They say that the international community doesn't really care about settlements at all; it's a figleaf for more general anti-Israeli antipathy. They say that other countries engage in similar behavior and are not chastised for it.

Maybe they're right. It's not implausible. But none of these constitute a self-determined reason to continue the settlement project. They're all based on what others (supposedly) will say or do, or won't say or won't do. We won't act on the settlements until someone else says or does the right thing. Our decisions are in their hands.

Put another way, one could fully agree that reversing settlement growth will not cause Palestinians to come to the negotiating table, will not bring about a peace agreement, will not result in any diminution of anti-Israel sentiment internationally, and still observe that Israel is fully capable of doing it. However, outside of the nationalist-right, which endorses the settlements for their own sake, the discussion barely even purports to glance that way. Among those Jews who are not themselves affirmatively pro-settlement, Jewish autonomous choice has become virtually irrelevant to the conversation. The operative variables are entirely what non-Jews will or won't say, do or don't do.

I talk to these Jews, and they are dismissive -- perplexed, even -- towards the idea that Jews should act even in absence of cookies from gentiles. Say Israel should withdraw from the settlements, and they'll talk of Gaza, of Lebanon, of Cyprus, of Tibet, of Western Sahara, of Ukraine, of Iran -- someone else, somewhere else, something else. Agree with all of these examples, and say Israel should do it anyway, and they'll stare blankly. They cannot see a self-generative Zionism outside of the fringes of the extreme right (which, say what you will about it, tends not to care much about what the rest of the world thinks). The idea that we should do these things for self seems not to occur to them.  They are paralyzed, awaiting a gentile seal of approval even as they bitterly grouse that the seal will never come. They have abandoned the core insight of Zionism itself, regressing to a world in which the most important measurement of the Jew was the gentile.

It is a sickness that is eating away at the heart of the Zionist dream. And somehow, it must be cured.

New Year's Resolutions: 2017

It's New Year's Resolutions time, the longest-running feature of this by now truly ancient relic of the internet (twelve years is positively decrepit for a blog). Of course, first we assess our performance on last year's resolutions:

Met: 1 (95% positive, though I actually can't remember), 2, 3, 4, 5, 9, 10 (I really think I've improved here), 11 (ditto), 13, 14, 15 (this is going back on the list, though)

Missed: 8, 12 (a few, but not enough)

Pick 'em: 6 (What's "major"? What's "political thought"?), 7 (What's "regularly"?),

Actually, a pretty successful year on a personal level. Almost enough to make up for the impending collapse of human civilization. Almost. Anyway, onwards to 2017!

(1) Survive. Seems like a good opener. (Met)

(2) Thrive. Always good to have a stretch goal. (Borderline, but we'll say Met)

(3) Get over 1,000 followers on Twitter. (Met)

(4) Have an article accepted in a peer-reviewed journal. (Met -- see here)

(5) Publish at least one article each in Tablet and Ha'aretz. (Met)

(6) Publish in a new popular (non-academic venue) -- aka, expand beyond Tablet or Ha'aretz. (Met -- JTA and Forward)

(7) Continue to coordinate with significant Jewish communal groups. (Pick 'em -- depends on how you count "regularly prodding ADL reps to tackle the Jewish hard-right")

(8) Do a Vegas trip with friends. (Met)

(9) Add a non-trivial amount of vegetables to my diet. (Met(!))

(10) Finish my Ph.D. subfield exams and coursework. (Met)

(11) Read an important work in the history of political thought that was not assigned in a formal or informal class. (Met)

(12) Visit a part of America or the world I have not yet been to before. (Met)

(13) Get a clearer idea of what's causing/how to prevent my kidney stones. (Missed -- but the kidney stone is gone!)

(14) Go to the dentist. (Met)

(15) Regularly do some form of stretching, yoga, or physical therapy designed to address my ludicrously tight muscles. (Missed)

Could 2017 be worse than 2016? Probably! But here's to doing our level best!

Rogue One Bullet Thoughts

I saw Rogue One yesterday afternoon, a film that has been dividing my friends between "very good" and "not good at all." I think it was actually quite good. A very different, darker vibe than any other Star Wars movie, but it did its job well. Below are scattered thoughts -- some spoilers.

• As a prequel, this is clearly far superior than Episodes I through III. That's not too high a bar, of course, but it's good to get out of the way.
• The most important question for any Star Wars movie -- but particularly one titled "Rogue One" -- is whether Wedge Antilles was in it. And the answer appears to be yes ... sort of. Those weak in the force might think that the reference to "Captain Antilles" heard in the movie is a callout, but obviously that's the (no relation) Antilles who captained the Tantive IV (the rebel corvette captured by Darth Vader at the start of A New Hope). But reportedly there was an audio-only cameo by the actor who voiced Wedge in the first movie. Though (I'm embarrassed to admit this) I don't know what the line was.
• A lot of people complained that the characters in Rogue One were not sufficiently fleshed out such that we came to care about them. I get that criticism, but in a weird way I think that was sort of effective. This was a movie about pretty everyday people fighting for the rebellion. Nobody was the mythical child of destiny, or even particularly special, and so (with the semi-exception of the lead) nobody had some grandiose backstory or sweeping character arc. The movie didn't give the sense that the particular characters it focused on were cosmically more important than the "NPC" characters that surrounded them, and I found that a surprisingly impactful choice -- particularly in a movie where everyone is basically doomed at the end.
• On that same note, many "war" movies treat all "NPC" soldiers as basically robots. They die immediately in one hit (unlike speaking characters, who survive long enough to be cradled and get a few haltering last words). They never care about their fellows being killed or maimed around them. One thing I like about Rogue One is that it was at least better on that score, and that reinforced the fundamental "equality" between the main characters and the extras.
• This is a grim, grim movie. More or less everyone dies at the end. That makes sense given where A New Hope picks up -- the Rebel Alliance is in dire straits there, so something must have happened to devastate its fleet and (more directly) explain why none of these people are seen in the following movies -- but tonally it is very different even from The Empire Strikes Back (the other "dark" movie).
• Forest Whitaker's performance as Saw Gerrera (who, for the entire movie, I thought was "Sol Guerrera") was bone-achingly bad.
• Oh, one more: With the addition of "mountains" and "tropical atoll", has the Star Wars franchise now covered all major topographies? There's desert (Tatooine), tundra (Hoth), forest (Endor), swamp (Dagobah) ... have we done "rolling prairie"? Is Naboo a prairie? I'm trying my best not to remember.

Legal Ramifications of UNSC Resolution 2334

Over at the Lawfare Blog, Elena Chachko has a good rundown of the legal (not political) ramifications of the just-passed UN Security Resolution on Israeli settlements. Chachko, a former clerk for Chief Justice Grunis on the Israeli Supreme Court, contends that the resolution carries few, but not no, major legal consequences. For the most part, it does not alter but does "revitalize" (to use Chachko's term) the international legal case against the settlements.

It's not a long piece, but I'd nonetheless recommend reading the whole thing to get a complete picture that cuts through a lot of the political sturm und drang. And if this does not exhaust your thirst for international legal analysis related to the settlements, you might enjoy this exchange between Eugene Kontorovich and Yael Ronen and Yuval Shany on the international legal validity of Israel's proposed "settlement regulation" bill, which would authorize the (compensated) expropriation of Palestinian land in order to retroactively legalize thousands of unauthorized settlement homes in the West Bank.

Last Call

At the end of November, I noted that one group which was really going to have it rough -- from a cognitive dissonance point of view, anyway -- over the next four years is that of Trump-critical conservatives. These are the guys who have some awareness of the outrageous danger that Donald Trump poses to our democratic system of governance, but really, really want to insist that this makes him no different from equally-dangerous-threat-to-the-republic Barack Obama. Having Obama to blame as the True Evil was the one thing that kept them sane. He was the one thing that kept them "conservatives". Donald Trump may be a problem, but Barack Obama!

It is for this reason that the last month or so of conservative commentary on Obama -- reaching its apex with the UN abstention vote on Israeli settlements -- has reached a fevered pitch. Like drunks who just heard "last call", conservatives are imbibing their favorite tonic with a desperate ferocity, knowing that it will soon disappear. In a month, right-wingers won't have Obama as their foil. They won't be able to wave their hands, throw up some pixie dust, and say "look over there!" They'll have to confront their demon face-to-face. Or -- perhaps more likely -- they'll have to bend the knee to it.

It is no accident that virtually the entirety of conservative response to Trump so far has been an extended riff on "I know you are but what am I?" Each and every sin Trump represents gets projected back onto the Democratic Party, the better to deny responsibility for what was happening in their own house. Harder and harder they clutch at denial: The mainstream media is the real feeder of fake news! Russia is the real force for good in the Middle East! Minorities are the real racists! Scientists are the ones really in denial on climate change!

The evolution of "fake news" is a great example. It is a problem when completely fabricated nonsense ("The Pope endorses Trump!") storms through social media. It undermines public trust and it shreds the informational fabric necessary for people to make informed decisions. But conservatives, desperate to insist that the problem isn't their own, are scrambling to apply the term to any liberal opinion they dislike. One might not agree with the assessment that the Iran Deal checked Iran's nuclear ambitions. One might have cogent arguments against it. But a story that reports that claim is not "fake news", it's a contrary evaluative appraisal. It doesn't fit, and it's embarrassing to see my conservative friends turn into the saddest of post-modernist parodies trying to make it fit. But the point of applying it isn't because it fits, it's to neutralize the terrible reality that there is a problem, and it is not in fact a symmetrical one.

So in all likelihood, other institutions (or the myth of Obama's "legacy") will take Obama's place as the conservative bugaboo which justifies their failure to hold their own movement to account. But nobody will fulfill that role better than Obama while in office. The conservative image of Barack Obama -- radical, terrorist-sympathizing, un-American, hyperpartisan, dictatorial, White-blaming -- was utterly divorced from reality. Indeed, it many ways it was what created Donald Trump. Tell your base that the opposition is radical, terrorist-sympathizing, un-American, hyperpartisan, dictatorial, and racist, and they will start believing you. And they'll do without your oh-so-subtle pseudo-intellectual pivot that seeks to ground it outside the fever swamp. Each time putatively reasonable conservatives engage in the myth, they further abdicate their responsibility to cure the disease ravaging their own political movement.

But there is a reason why the myth is so tempting. In its distortion it unified Republicans and quelled internal dissonance, albeit at a terrible cost. If Obama was this terrible, horrible, destructive, cataclysmic creature, then it wasn't really that terrible if Republicans created their own version of the "same". The constructed image of Obama warranted the failure of Republicans to confront their demons, because it allowed them to swallow every partisan's favorite intoxicant: The other side's worse.

Soon, Obama will be gone, and with him, the right's favorite palliative. But for one more month, they can still live in the idyllic harmony of the last eight years, where their actions had no consequences and their fantasies needed no foundations. I honestly can barely blame them for their carousing.

So drink up, my conservative friends. It's last call. In the morning, reality hits. And I hear its hangover's a bitch.

Happy Holidays from Outside the Bubble

Greetings from Owatonna, Minnesota, where I am celebrating Christmas with my girlfriend's family. Of course, for many of you this post is a sheer impossibility, as we all know that liberals (especially Berkeley liberals) never venture and in fact are incapable of surviving outside of our "bubble", and Steele County went for Trump 58/33.

Yet here I am, alive, safe, sound, and perfectly content. It's almost like that narrative was ridiculous on its face (admittedly, the incredible mashed potatoes that were served with dinner tonight are certainly doing their fair share to help with the "content" part, though perhaps not the "alive" part).

Hope everyone is having a lovely holiday season, and best wishes that 2017 somehow is at least slightly better from the flaming trainwreck that has been 2016.

I Abstain

Last week, outgoing UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon recognized his organization's profound bias against Israel, noting that (among other things) it does no service to the Palestinian people it claims to act on behalf of. There's nothing really new about that acknowledgement -- Kofi Annan said the same thing -- but it nonetheless is gratifying to hear.

This morning the UN rejected a resolution imposing an arms embargo on South Sudan. But it passed a resolution condemning Israeli settlements in the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) as violations of international law and "a major obstacle to the achievement of the two-State solution and a just, lasting and comprehensive peace." The resolution also contained a parallel condemnation of "all acts of violence against civilians, including acts of terror, as well as all acts of provocation, incitement and destruction."

The resolution was passed after the US, a Security Council member with veto rights, elected to abstain. And, as is the case in any UN resolution on Israel, there is less than ideal language (particularly around Jerusalem). Moreover, precisely because the UN is such an obviously biased body when it comes to Israel, my default instinct is that any time the UN steps in it will cause more harm than good. The statement from the Israel Policy Forum in opposition to the resolution makes sense to me.

So I should be upset. But I just can't bring myself to be angry. I read the usual suspects falling over themselves in histrionic rage -- Mort Klein ranting that "Obama’s anti-Semitism runs so deep that he also apparently needed to drive one more knife into Israel’s back," Netanyahu saying he "colluded against Israel", David French fulminating against the supposed "50 years of foreign policy" undone by a single abstention -- and I just can't do it. I can't.

The ADL -- which murmurs empty platitudes about the President's right to implement policy when picking avowedly anti-two-stater David Friedman for Ambassador -- suddenly is "incredibly disappointed" that the Obama administration followed consistent American policy in opposition to the settlements? The JFNA -- which (and this was forwarded to me by an AIPAC-attending friend of mine) "has not said ONE THING about Islamophobia and anti-Semitism from Trump and his appointees" -- sure found its voice on this one.

The abstention was the first (and last) of Obama's tenure on an Israel related resolution -- by allowing just one of these resolutions to pass the security council, Obama has by a huge margin the most pro-Israel voting record of any post-'67 American President (by comparison, George W. Bush allowed six such resolutions to pass, and Ronald Reagan permitted a whopping 21). Ambassador Power's abstention vote came while fully and publicly acknowledging the UN's fundamental and discrediting bias towards Israel.

Will this resolution do any good? I doubt it. It's empty words from a body whose words deservedly carry little credit. Still, much of international diplomacy is the art of using empty words to send messages. Maybe the message here is that breathless hysterics about Obama selling Israel out! over and over and over again won't carry the day forever. Certainly that's a message I can get behind, regardless of whether anyone pays attention to the substance of the resolution.

I just can't take seriously anymore people who simultaneously decry America's policy towards Syria as being naught but words, while breathlessly characterizing one -- one -- abstention on a UN resolution that is consistent with longstanding American policy towards Israel as an act of "aggression". One would think that those "mere words" would pale in comparison to $38 billion in aid America will be giving Israel thanks to Obama's leadership. The UN is not the only entity whose words carry little credit these days. I've completely lost whatever confidence I had in mainline Jewish groups to maintain a sense of proportion and principle when it comes to defending a secure, democratic, Jewish state of Israel.

The UN resolution won't accomplish anything. Perhaps its only tangible impact is that it is felt as a rebuke by the Israeli government. Given their behavior over the past eight years towards the Obama administration and the American Jewish community writ large, I can't even be mad about that. You're not getting everything you want, all the time, from your "friends"? Welcome to the club.

So I abstain on this fight. Why shouldn't I? If I believe -- and I do -- that the settlements are "a" (not "the") obstacle to peace, and I believe -- and I do -- that Israeli settlement on territories in the West Bank should be contingent on a final, negotiated status agreement with the Palestinians, and I believe -- and I do -- that part of any remotely plausible peace plan means that not everyone will get to live on the precise acre of land that they wish, why should I muster up any outrage on this resolution? Because its verbiage isn't perfect? When is it ever? Because the UN is biased? Of course it is, but so what? Because the Netanyahu administration is trying its level best to negotiate a two-state solution and this throws a wrench in their delicate plans? Don't make me laugh. Because the Palestinians aren't trying their level best to negotiate a two-state solution? Of course they're not, but again, why is that relevant (what kind of Zionism is it that uses Palestinians as its metric)? Because I owe a duty of loyalty to my fellow Jews who do find the resolution problematic and worrisome, even if I personally am able to shrug it off?

That last one is the only one that makes sense. Or made sense, at least. But right now, that argument is a cruel mockery. When groups like the ADL and the JFNA and all their colleagues show they aren't willing to fight for their principles at home, why should I back them up just to pacify yet another right-wing temper tantrum? That, really, is what's driving me right now. Mainline Jewish groups have taken for granted that people like me -- solid, pro-Israel liberals -- will back them to the hilt when they feel the need to soothe their right flank, even at the expense of pursuing some of our own policy objectives in defense of a democratic Jewish Israel. But when it's Jewish liberals who need backing and the right which is asked to make sacrifices, suddenly those groups are nowhere to be found.

This one-sided bargain will not stand forever. I'm pro-Israel for my own sake -- I don't need to be treated nicely by the AJC or ADL to defend the necessity and justifiability of a democratic homeland for the Jewish people, and the fact that ZOA's mad at the UN does not mean that the UN is even remotely useful as an agent for peace. But that's not what's at stake here; I can and will make all those points without anybody giving me a cookie for them. What's at stake in this fight is intercommunal consensus -- backing our fellow Jews even when we don't have the exact same priors as they do. Such a commitment only works if it works both ways. Otherwise, I feel entirely justified saying that I'm done going to bat for bodies that I now know won't have my back when I need it. Solidarity is a two-way street.

Ellison Continues To Impress on Jewish Engagement

Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN), one of two leading candidates to become the new DNC chair (the other being former Secretary of Labor Tom Perez), has faced concerns about prior associations with anti-Semitic groups -- specifically the Nation of Islam.

He's also done, in my view, a very good job responding to them -- certainly, he's been far more impressive than certain Jewish organizations I could name which treated him as a make-up call for Steve Bannon. I was extremely pleased to see the group I'm a part of, Third Narrative, issue a strong statement defending Ellison on this front. And the letter Ellison just wrote to a group of Conservative Rabbis only reaffirms my sense that he'd be an excellent friend and ally to Jewish Democrats as DNC chair:

Ellison, beginning his three-page letter to the Rabbinical Assembly with a quote from Pirkei Avot, Jewish ethical teachings – “The one who learns, learns from everyone” – expressed regrets, as he has several times since launching his bid to lead the DNC, for his association years ago with the anti-Semitic Nation of Islam.

“At the time, I did not grasp [Louis] Farrakhan’s anti-Semitism,” he wrote, referring to the movement’s leader.

“It was difficult for me to see that the struggle for equality for African Americans could be subverted into hatred of others, specifically anti-Semitism,” Ellison wrote. “I focused on Farrakhan speaking to concerns of Black men. When I became aware that he made hateful statements about other groups, including the Jewish community with whom I was so close, I knew that I must reject his teachings. And I rejected them completely.”

[...] 

Ellison, who has routinely voted for defense assistance to Israel, also for the first time regretted his exceptional vote against additional missile defense assistance for Israel during the 2014 war between Israel and Hamas.

“In my mind, confident that the Iron Dome funding that I have always strongly supported would pass, I cast a vote reflecting my commitment to restoring calm and quiet at a moment of violence,” he said, referring to the anti-missile system Israel used to deflect Hamas rockets. “My voice was not being heard and I felt in the moment that casting my vote was a vital way to amplify my message. It was the wrong way to speak out and it was the wrong way to vote. I regret it deeply.”

Ellison, who first publicly rejected the anti-Israel Boycott, Divest and Sanctions movement in a statement last month to JTA, says in the letter that he has “fought” BDS with Jewish allies.

“Together we have fought against BDS and continuous attempts to delegitimize Israel in Minnesota, in the United States, and around the world,” he said. “I have said time and time again that BDS does not help anyone advance the goal of a two-state solution.”

Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress, also recalls his years of combating Holocaust denial, including among Muslims.

Good for him -- and in particular, good for him on the Iron Dome portion (which has been one of the last remaining sticking points for many of my Jewish friends).

I should say that, my warm feelings towards Ellison aside, I remain undecided between him and Perez (who's been doing outreach of his own to the Jewish community). On the one hand, Perez comes more from my "wing" of progressivism (wonkish rather than populist). On the other hand, I think it's fair to say that my wing had its people in place this election and we lost. On the other other hand ... well, this would be its own post.

But this is all overshadowed by my main priority: the ever-futile effort to prevent a choice between two great progressive options becoming a hysterical battle wherein each side considers the other traitors to the party (it was such fun in 2016 and 2008!). Both Perez and Ellison would make excellent DNC chairs. Simple as that. But on the subject of the Jews and in the context of being a great DNC chair, one of Rep. Ellison's greatest strengths will be the genuine and sincere friendship he's extended to the Jewish people and his commitment to the preservation of a secure, democratic state in Israel that exists in peace with a Palestinian neighbor.

What's Going On in Lancaster?

My social media was ablaze today with reports that a Jewish family had "fled" their home in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania over false reports by Fox and Breitbart that they were responsible for the canceling of a school Christmas play. Local news also reports their children had been harassed by classmates due to the report. But the ADL investigated and said that the family had simply left on a previously scheduled vacation, and that the claims that they "fled" are a panic-inducing fiction. What's going on?

Unfortunately, the original local story is behind a paywall so I can't read it. My suspicion is that the real story is something like the following:

1. The children experienced some harassment over the false reports that their family was responsible for canceling the play (this part of the original reporting does not appear to be in dispute, though the ADL does not address it).
2. The family had a previously-scheduled vacation, and expressed some sentiment to the effect of it being nice to have some time away to allow things to cool down.
3. Overzealous journalists took #2 and elevated/amplified it until it became the overblown claim that the family had "fled" town.

Of course, that's speculation on my part. Without access to the original story or more robust follow-up reporting, we won't know.

I'm So Tolerant, I Continue To Read Things Which Confirm My Worst Instincts About My Adversaries!

The Hill presents a poll showing that, after losing this election, Democrats are more likely to "unfriend" someone due to their political posts than Republicans. Several thoughts on this:

• What counts as "politics"? For example, if someone makes an unfriending decision because someone posts something nakedly anti-Semitic, is that decision "political"?

• I've never unfriended someone because of their political posts. I have thought about it. But typically, when I do, my conscious mind gives me a sober lecture on the importance of not isolating myself from competing points of view and listening even when it's difficult. But there's another part of me that secretly wonders if the real reason I do it is to confirm all of my worst instincts about what Republicans are really like. Put simply, the people I think about unfriending are not my lucid Republican friends. They are histrionic trolls of the worst order. Making sure the seven daily posts about how Barack Obama is about to implement his Secret Muslim Plan (just you wait) or how Hillary Clinton's emails are the greatest treason our nation has seen since the Civil War stay on my Facebook feed doesn't "challenge" me in any reasonable respect, it just reaffirms my instinct that the opposing side has been taken over by lunatics. For all the "if only we talked, we'd see how much we really have in common", well -- not always.

• I wonder how much work "Democrat" versus "losing this election" is doing. I've always been a proponent of "listen to your adversaries, take seriously challenging points of view" (my Intro to American Politics students got that lecture so often they probably can recite it from memory). But I'll confess it was an easier instinct when I assumed my side was going to come out on top, and listening was a beneficent gift I'd bestow on the electoral losers. At Berkeley, to urge one to listen to conservatives is to urge someone to listen to an utterly powerless minority. It's easy to do because they present no immediate threat. Power doesn't require one to listen to others (obviously), but it does make it easier to do so magnanimously. Marginalization often does force one to listen to others (obviously), but the compulsion tends to make it happen without much good cheer.

In related news, an interesting study finds that much of the biased partisan divergence in factual assessments of the world dissipates if you give people a small monetary incentive to be honest (whether that means "giving the true answer" or "admitting you don't know the true answer"). It's an intriguing add-on to the well-known phenomenon whereby partisans will interpret facts to suit their own agenda (so liberals will say that the economy faltered in conservative administrations regardless of whether it did, conservatives will do so for liberal administrations). The study suggests that persons are doing this not because they "actually" labor under these mistaken beliefs, but simply as a rooting mechanism for their preferred team.

Supporting David Friedman Sells Out Young Zionist Jews

Berkeley is not the easiest place to be a Zionist Jew. To be sure, it is not the cataclysmic warzone it's sometimes portrayed as. Still, it's not exactly home turf. Being referred to as a Nazi due to one's position on Israel is not an everyday occurrence, but it's not a hypothetical concern either. A two-state solution respecting both Jewish and Palestinian self-determination rights is probably the median position, but it is not one you can take for granted.

Jews at Berkeley, and at other campuses around the country, have listened to many exhortations by our communal leaders about our need to stand strong in such climates. And we have, under difficult circumstances. Anyone paying attention to campus politics now knows the awkward position Jewish students are in, how concerns about Israel are often wedges that freeze Jews out of our own academic communities, how standing firm on principle regarding anti-Semitism puts us at odds with otherwise allied groups.

While we acted, our communal representatives promised that they had our backs. Referring to a Jew as a Nazi is intolerable anti-Semitism -- there can be little more horrifying, for a Jew, than being compared to a Nazi or Nazi collaborator. The two-state solution is a boundary that demarcates friend from foe. It may be hard, it may be awkward, but we were told that these were lines that could not be crossed. Ultimately, they expected us to police those lines. And we did our part, to the best of our ability.

And then David Friedman was nominated as Ambassador to Israel.

David Friedman, an avowed opponent of a two-state solution. David Friedman, who referred to large swath of American Jewry as "far worse than Kapos". David Friedman, who called the oldest American Jewish civil rights organization "morons" for standing up to clear anti-Semitic rhetoric in the presidential campaign. David Friedman, who enlisted the Holocaust to deflect attention from boasts of sexual assault. David Friedman, who -- in word and in deed -- seems to detest most of the Jews in his own country -- especially the young liberal Jews who inhabit our college campuses.

Now it was time for those communal representatives to have our backs. Now it was time for them to enforce those lines on our behalf. Now it was time for them to show courage in perilous waters, and say that this is the line, and David Friedman crossed it.

And suddenly, these representative groups clammed up.

Well, not all of them. Aside from the usual right-wing suspects, the World Jewish Congress endorsed Friedman today. The WJC's motto is "All Jews are responsible for one another." We now know the seriousness with which it takes that commitment. The bare minimum of being responsible for other Jews is to have their back when they're condemned as Nazi collaborators. If the WJC isn't willing to do that, it can forget about any talk about "responsibility".

As for other mainstream organizations, so far many of the main players have maintained, at best, a studious silence. AIPAC hasn't said a word. The AJC's statement was mush. The ADL has nothing on its page (Jonathan Greenblatt was on MSNBC tonight to talk on the nomination, but it doesn't look like he came out against).

I've talked a bit with folks on the inside of these organizations. They're not happy. But they stress the difficult position these organizations are in. Donor pressure. A need to appear even-handed. The importance of working with the new administration.

I get it. It's hard. But it was hard for us too, and we held the line. Because, we were told, this was the line the Jewish community had drawn.

And today, when adhering to those lines gets difficult for Jewish organizations, they had the opportunity to stand strong too.

When they fail to do so, it's worse than a disgrace to their stated principles. It's worse than a failure of political courage. It sells out the Jewish community they claim to protect. It abdicates their responsibility to the Jewish community to be our ally and shield regardless of political creed or partisan ideology. Millions of Jews now know that if they are tarred as Kapos or worse, the WJC will not have their backs. Indeed, it might proudly join hands with their slanderer. We are left wondering where the AJC or the ADL will be. Until proven otherwise, we cannot count on them anymore.

This is betrayal. And it is those of us in places like Berkeley, who have bravely fought on behalf of a Jewish and democratic Israel in an inhospitable climate, that will suffer the most from this act of deep, profound cowardice. The principles we fought for -- which we , relying on the representations of these communal bodies, declared were representative of American Jewry -- have been pulled out from under us. And for what? For access? For donor satisfaction? It is disgraceful.

I honestly don't know if these groups realize the peril they are in. They hear about angry Jewish millennials and think of the IfNotNow sorts, the JVP types, and conclude it's all a loud fringe. I am not IfNotNow and I'm certainly not JVP. I'm a committed Zionist in my politics and deeply institutionalist in my orientation. But in talking to other Jews like me -- proudly Zionist, proudly pro-Israel, connected to the inside baseball of Jewish life and aware of the realities of political machination -- there is a growing sense of rage at their supposed representatives that is on the cusp of bubbling over. They see that political capital is never spent on our behalf, that principles we're expected to cleave to on pain of exile are waived without hesitation when the right flouts them.

This cannot stand forever. It cannot indefinitely be the case that Jewish communal policy is set by a quarter of the Jewish community which openly holds two-thirds of us in contempt. And it cannot indefinitely be the case that Jewish communal representatives refrain from backing the American Jewish majority for fear of alienating that right-wing fringe. David Friedman puts that in stark relief -- backing him means selling us out. Policy disagreement can be mended, but this sort of betrayal -- finding out that it's actually a-okay to call us Nazi collaborators -- will not heal easily.

David Friedman does not represent a hard case. David Friedman represents the straightforward application of the principles mainline Jewish groups have long espoused, now to a right-wing provocateur. Simple as that.

For those groups which fail to rise to the challenge, it isn't going to matter at the end of the day whether they were lying about their professed principles or were simply too fearful to enforce them. We need Jewish organizations that are representative of American Jews. If the old guard can't do it, then the old guard will cease being relevant.

UPDATE: Here's the link to Greenblatt's segment on Friedman last night. It's, if anything, worse than I anticipated.

Things People Blame the Jews For, Volume XXXIII: Psychology

Dylann Roof, the White Supremacist terrorist who was just convicted of murdering nine at a Black church in Charleston, South Carolina, now faces sentencing. He could receive the death penalty. One thing he will not do in his penalty phase is call a mental health expert or otherwise present mental health evidence. Why not? Glad you asked:

Roof, 22, who is acting as his own attorney during the penalty phase of the trial, said in a handwritten note to the court that he “will not be calling mental health experts or presenting mental health evidence.”

While the note did not specify the reason, his journal, filed with racist and anti-Semitic rants, which was introduced as evidence during the trial, says he considers psychology a “Jewish invention.”

“It is a Jewish invention and does nothing but invent diseases and tell people they have problems when they don’t,” Roof wrote, according to reports including from the Associated Press.

Actually, this one I feel like has a pretty long pedigree -- dating back to Freud. I suppose I hadn't realized it was still a "thing". But if the conspiracy means that Roof is more likely to receive the punishment he deserves, I suppose I can let him maintain his delusions idiosyncratic appraisal of social scientific development for a little while longer.

Republicans? Self-Regulate? What a Daft Idea!

There's an emergent pattern I'm seeing among many Republicans who by all rights should know the risks of a Trump administration, responding to Democrats expressing concerns over the radical first moves of the Trump administration. It goes like this:

Democrat: "Look at this terrible policy Trump is proposing/terrible nominee Trump has put forward/terrible advisor Trump has installed!"

Republican: "Haha! Bet you wish Reid hadn't abolished the filibuster/Obama hadn't expanded executive power/Clinton hadn't focused on social issues that cost you rust belt seats, don't you?"

Now, we can debate the merits of any of these things. For example, call me crazy but I continue to think that the Senate should generally run on the uncontroversial practice of majoritarian rule. In a democracy, the ultimate check against bad laws should be the people voting in good, civically-spirited legislators. Institutional barriers are important, but no set of norms can create good laws from bad actors. By and large, policies are going to reflect the character of the persons writing the policies -- that's baked into the democratic cake. If 52 GOP Senators mindlessly march in partisan lockstep to rubberstamp the entirety of the Trump agenda, the problem isn't majoritarianism, the problem is that the GOP lacks any principles beyond blind party loyalty.

And that gets to what's really striking about this line of argument: It takes for granted that our choices are either "an empowered Democratic Party" or "Trump gone wild." The idea that Republicans might exercise any meaningful oversight in the Trump administration is too fanciful to even be acknowledged. Again, I'm not sure these people realize exactly who they're insulting here.

Once more, I think this is related to the infantilization of the American right. Right now, it is an article of faith that Republicans simply will serve as the unmediated channels of the right-wing id. The job of Democrats is to act as the Republicans' babysitters -- to guard them from the consequences of their own tantrums. When Democrats are not sufficiently empowered to do that, the problem isn't that Republicans are incapable of self-regulation, it's that Democrats allowed themselves to lose the necessary influence to keep the GOP in check.

From a Democratic vantage point, this perspective makes sense -- our job is to win seats, and when we don't do that, we're doing something wrong. From an external observer's view (especially a Republican's view), it evinces an abdication of personal responsibility and civic duty on behalf of the GOP that should by all rights be shocking.

Would I be happier if the Democratic Party had enough seats in Congress to serve as a robust check on the Trump administration on their own? Obviously! But the thing is, 48 Democratic Senators would do a fine job constraining Trump's excesses if even 4 Republican colleagues joined them. The fact that this possibility doesn't occur to anyone -- even to persons who purported to be on the "Never Trump" train -- is proof of just how far the rot inside the GOP has spread.