JTA: The Global News Service of the Jewish People

RJC not giving up Coleman fight

By Eric Fingerhut · January 5, 2009

Al Franken may have been declared the winner of the U.S. Senate seat in Minnesota Monday, but the Republican Jewish Coalition is not giving up the fight for Norm Coleman.

Echoing the statements of party leaders, RJC executive director Matt Brooks told JTA Monday that his organization will back the legal efforts of Norm Coleman until the election is "resolved in a fair and equiable way."

"There are so many irregularities and so many inconsistencies" in the vote count, said Brooks.

The RJC has been raising money for Coleman since the recount began two months ago.

Coleman "is part of our family," said Brooks, noting that the Minnesota Republican was a member of the RJC before he was even elected to the Senate.

The Republican is expected to file a lawsuit on Tuesday challenging the results. His campaign claims that 150 ballots from Democratic-leaning areas were counted twice, more than 650 absentee ballots were improperly rejected and another 130 ballots were included in the count even though they were lost after the election.

Senate Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid called the election "over" and reportedly wants to try to seat Franken this week, even before the result is officially certified by the Minnesota secretary of state and governor.

0 Comments | Share This

Saperstein: Kagan is “quintessential” Obama appointment

By Eric Fingerhut · January 5, 2009

Elena Kagan is the "quintessential Barack Obama appointment," says Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism director Rabbi David Saperstein.

"She's intellectually brilliant, and politically gifted at finding common ground and finding consensus," said Saperstein of the Jewish woman picked by the president-elect to be his solicitor general.

Kagan, dean of the Harvard Law School, would be the first female to serve in the job if confirmed by the Senate. The solicitor general represents the U.S. government at the Supreme Court, arguing cases before the court and filing briefs stating the government's position when the government is not a direct party to the case. The solicitor general position is often seen as a stepping stone to a future Supreme Court nomination.

Saperstein dealt with Kagan when she was a lawyer and policy adviser in the Clinton White House, and said she "really knows the Jewish community well" and "really knows First Amendment issues well" -- which is significant because the faith-based inititative and other religion issues are likely to be "in play" over the next few years.

"I'm glad he's drawing people who really know the issue so well," Saperstein said.

0 Comments | Share This

Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right

By Ron Kampeas · January 5, 2009

One of the nice things about this job (tracking policy) is uncovering open-mindedness, finding out that officials, talking heads, politicos, don't necessarily fit into a slot, that they're willing to think an issue through and be counter-intuitive. Not every hawk is bloodthirsty - few are, in fact; and bleeding heart doves are as rare as dodos.

It bears mentioning, though, when the clowns on both sides insist on putting on the makeup and doing their little dance. And Gaza is bringing them out of their little car in droves.

I spoke below of Michael Goldfarb, the McCain campaign spokesman, who thinks killing children is one way to get a point across. I'd love for this to be a pay-for-play scheme, to know that some band of liberal bloggers are back-dealing him free pizza, comfy pajamas, coffee mugs from the "300" set - I don't know, what else do bloggers love? - to make an easy target of a decline-of-empire Nelson Muntz. But no, he seems sincere:

But to wipe out a man's entire family, it's hard to imagine that doesn't give his colleagues at least a moment's pause.

Yes! Yes it does give pause! Yes.

And on the left, we have Trevor Mostyn, the Guardian's obituarist who practically eroticizes the life of professional Jew-killer, Nizar Rayan:

A big, bearded man, usually surrounded by balaclava-clad fighters, he was hated by Israelis. Yet on the streets of Gaza, where economic and social misery has boosted Hamas's reputation during the past five years, he was something of a hero. He was famed for fighting alongside his men and being seen with them publicly. And he was not merely a fighter. He was highly regarded as an Islamic academic.

Big. Bearded. Mmmmmm.  Over at Goldbfarb's Weekly Standard, Mary Katharine Ham appropriately makes minced meat of the obit, as does Yaacov Lozowick, who seems to be an affable enough Guardian obsessive.

Elsewhere on his blog, Lozowick does a good job picking apart Juan Cole's already ubiquitous account of the events leading up to this conflict. Here's Cole's reductive account of decades of Israeli agonizing over how to make peace and with whom:

Israel's political tradition seeks expansion if possible; if not possible, it seeks a balance of power with its enemies. If that is not possible, it seeks to be held harmless from its avowed foes. If that is not possible, it is willing to wage total war to punish the enemy population until it accepts at least a cold peace. (I mean by "total war" war on the civilian population in which the guerrilla group is embedded, as for instance dropping a million cluster bombs on the farms of south Lebanon in 2006 or half-starving Gazan children in 2007-2008, methods illegal in international law but routinely deployed by Israeli leaders and defended by most Zionists everywhere.) Where necessary, Israel is willing to give up territorial expansion to get the cold peace.

Say what? My brain froze at the first sentence: Israelis have debated expansionism since the 1950s and its opponents have at times prevailed (he knows this because he quotes Moshe Sharett, a dove who only became prime minister, after all.) And "expansionism" is in itself reductive: Does it embrace only the Yitzhak Shamirs, who indeed made an ideology of acquiring territory? Or the Moshe Dayans and Yigal Allons, who sought what they believed were survivable borders? Or the Yitzhak Rabins, who were never invested in permanently holding occupied lands, and who turned on it with a vengeance?

What drives me even crazier about this is that Cole (rightly) resists cheap narratives when it comes to Arabs, to Iranians, to Muslims and to Palestinians in particular. So why does he reduce Israel's "political tradition" to a role Larry Hagman might have played?

But I won't count him among the clowns; he has valuable insights into issues where he can actually claim expertise, and even this post is not without value: His conclusion, about the futility of wishing away the Palestinians, is worth reading, and so is his four point outline of "the new repertoires of struggle against Israel."

Meantime, back to substance, Andrew Sullivan at the Atlantic and Noah Pollak at Commentary are having a bracing debate on "proportionality." Sullivan bases his arguments on the Catechism, which he admits might not fly in Israel.

0 Comments | Share This

Political tidbits: Rahm’s rabbi, Franken’s victory, Richardson’s investigation

By Eric Fingerhut · January 5, 2009

• "He's good enough, he's smart enough, and, gosh darn it, he's a U.S. senator?" That's how the Washington Post begins its piece reporting that Al Franken is likely to be named the winner of the U.S. Senate race in Minnesota today. But he's unlikely to take a seat in the Capitol this week:

Although Franken trailed Coleman on election night, the Democrat -- thanks in part to the ace work of election lawyer Marc Elias -- has gained steadily ever since. A hand recount of the nearly 3 million ballots cast turned the race into a dead heat, and the recent counting of 933 wrongly rejected absentee ballots (don't ask) yielded a 225-vote edge for Franken heading into today's meeting of the state Canvassing Board, in which a winner -- presumably Franken -- will be named.

So, why won't Franken be a senator later today? Because of pending legal challenges that the incumbent's campaign thinks can sway the outcome -- the most important of which, dealing with the inclusion of 654 allegedly wrongly rejected absentee ballots (from largely pro-Coleman territory), will be decided by the Minnesota Supreme Court.

• The Associated Press interviews Obama chief of staff Rahm Emanuel's rabbi, Asher Lopatin, about how his congregant juggles his religious and political responsibilities -- and his famed temper:

Q: Are the stories true about his temper?

A: I haven’t seen any of that in the synagogue, that’s all I can say! Rahm is very self-aware — he’s aware of his image; he’s aware of all the stories about him. But when he comes to synagogue, he comes to pray; he comes to be with his family. He’s not in synagogue to talk politics. We don’t call him Rahmbo here!

• The Philadelphia Jewish Voice has details on the inauguration weekend debut of the Jewish Grassroots Action Network, an outgrowth of a "Jews for Obama" group:

A promising new organization, the Jewish Grassroots Action Network (JGAN) will be launched at a series of events in Washington, DC from 1/16-1/20. In collaboration with several DC area synagogues, JGAN will be hosting a multi-denominational Shabbaton, a Grassroots Workshop, and a Celebratory Dinner.

• The chairman of the board of the Yavneh Hebrew Academy in Los Angeles is at the center of the federal investigation that derailed Bill Richardson's nomination as secretary of commerce. David Rubin's firm, CDR Holdings, is being looked at for possible "pay-to-play" dealings in its acquisition of a New Mexico government contract. Rubin, reported the Associated Press last month, has given "millions of dollars to political and Jewish causes over the years."

0 Comments | Share This

Guts and Gutlessness*

By Ron Kampeas · January 4, 2009

Salon's blogger, Glenn Greenwald, asked a question last week about what he believes to be excessive U.S. acquiescence on Israel's behalf, and repeated it in a major paper; you'd think he'd be interested in posting answers to it (Andrew Sullivan has delivered a couple, mine is below) but I guess not.

Kind of gutless.

So I called up his site today, expecting to sneer - and this time I couldn't help agreeing. He takes to task Michael Goldfarb, Marty Peretz and Glenn Reynolds for dismissing Palestinian civilian lives as expendable.

With Goldfarb, he's rock-solid. Peretz, I think, is slippery enough that I'm not so sure. Reynolds tries to ooze his way out of it by implying that he meant Hamas, not the Palestinians, but the corrolary to "Israelis" is "Palestinians," not Hamas. ("Israel's government" or "the Israeli army" would have been a corrolary to Hamas.)

But that's nitpicking. Greenwald's broader point is correct - no one does Israel any good by diminishing the meaning of the death of a child. No one.

This is not just academic, it's not a nod to kumbaya politics, it's not a solemn recognition of Jefferson's dictum. Become a parent, and intuitively, you know that all children are equally innocent, all children, all children. All children. And you know that the loss of each child is catastrophic and unimaginable and that it must be resisted, and when it happens, it must never be cauterized, it must be allowed to fester. (And please, no discussion of age limits - this conflict has killed 4-year olds.)

And maybe on this point I'm a little tougher even than Greenwald, because I won't give a pass to reflexive declarations of "regrettability," I want every one of these deaths examined and answered for.

There is innocence until guilt is proven, yes. But I really want the hard questions answered and I don't think I'm alone.

And consider this: The refusal to allow the death of a child to go unexplained, to let it shimmer into meaninglessness, the embrace of the festering wound, is what gave us strength enough to be redeemed in statehood.

We excise that at our peril: We lose our moral strength and become gutless in ways that make Greenwald's ellisions seem paltry.

*Apologies to Jane Austen

0 Comments | Share This

Where Gaza and politics meet

By Ron Kampeas · January 4, 2009

Andrew Sullivan compiles replies to Glenn Greenwald's query about whether any issue aside from Israel occasions a gap between a party's leadership and its voters (I posted my reply below.)

Sullivan gets a lot of flack for changing his mind, but, I dunno, that sounds like something we could use a lot more of. Here he is, analyzing the genesis of the end of the Gaza cease-fire.

Speaking of the difficulties of changing one's mind, Chris Kelly points out here that President Bush, battering Hamas for spending its reserves on guns, not butter, appears to have shifted his views on arms build-ups vs. infrastructure. Or maybe it's situational.

0 Comments | Share This

Six seconds-UPDATED

By Ron Kampeas · January 2, 2009

Andrew Sullivan and Glenn Greenwald, both referring to a poll showing that Americans are divided over Israel's Gaza action and that Democrats oppose it, ask if any other issue suffers a similar disconnect, or as Greenwald puts it:

Is there any other significant issue in American political life, besides Israel, where (a) citizens split almost evenly in their views, yet (b) the leaders of both parties adopt identical lockstep positions which leave half of the citizenry with no real voice?  More notably still, is there any other position, besides Israel, where (a) a party's voters overwhelmingly embrace one position (Israel should not have attacked Gaza) but (b) that party's leadership unanimously embraces the exact opposite position (Israel was absolutely right to attack Gaza and the U.S. must support Israel unequivocally)?  Does that happen with any other issue?.

It took me seconds - I'll say six seconds, I like the alliteration - to come up with two:

-Guns;

-The Cuba embargo;

I'd be happy to add more, from commenters. Geez, I just remembered Al Gore's performance on Elian Gonzalez in 2000. Please. So, six minutes, unless you want to file that under the Cuba embargo.

Also, this by no means means I'm buying into Greenwald's thesis about support for Israel. He neglects to mention that:

*The poll shows much greater sympathy for Israel; 55 percent blame the Palestinians, while 13 percent blame Israel;

*I can't find the breakdowns for those who are closely tracking the conflict;

*The questions may be misleading: "Should Israel have taken military action against the Palestinians or should it have tried to find a diplomatic solution?" Israel tried to extend the ceasefire.

*Greenwald's parenthetical conflation - "(Israel should not have attacked Gaza)" is also misleading: "should have tried to find a diplomatic solution"  is not inconsistent with ultimately attacking Gaza after such a quest has failed.

My point is that, even if one were able to prove that the Democrats were ignoring their rank and file on the Israel issue, it is by no means sui generis. I'd like to see more polling for instance on where Republicans are on stem cell research; where Democrats are on the Wall Street bailout; where Republicans are on free trade, etc. etc. etc.

Hey that's three more. Okay, six in twelve minutes. And counting.

This is a political culture in which well-organized interests get a disproportionate voice. It has been since it's inception. This was Mark Twain's advice to the Jews in 1898 - 1898!

In politics, organize your strength, band together, and deliver the casting vote where you can, and, where you can't, compel as good terms as possible.

Twain was not inventing the wheel: He was recommending a practice already instilled into the American polity:

In America, as early as 1854, the ignorant Irish hod-carrier, who had a spirit of his own and a way of exposing it to the weather, made it apparent to all that he must be politically reckoned with; yet fifteen years before that we hardly knew what an Irishman looked like.

I let the kids watch Casablanca recently and explained the lines that made us (me and my wife) laugh: One of the best, of course, is Claude Rains being "shocked, shocked" to find out about gambling at Rick's.

That's what this smacks of; Greenwald, a civil libertarian (and G-d love him for that) spearheaded an effort to unseat Democrats and Republicans who backed the revised FISA Act; at least one poll* shows the Act had widespread support. Whaddya know - Greenwald knows all about interest politicking! But he's "shocked" to learn it happens with Israel.

Wait- that's seven issues! Okay, I'll stop now.

*Yes, even at first glance, this poll's questions seems skewed; same with the Rasmussen, as I pointed out. But if anything, the FISA poll's numbers are even more impressive.

UPDATE: In an e-mail, Glenn Greenwald, fairly, points out that I am asserting support for gun control and opposition to the Cuba embargo without showing data proving that these positions indeed have majority support and are undermined particularly by parties acting contrary to the inidications their voters show in polls.

My point was that interest politicking is so self-evident that one could blink and come up with issues other than Israel where an interest group has greater influence than the majority's inclinations. I imagine this is because the group is attached to its positions with an intensity that does not spur the majority to keep it out of party politics. This is not always the case: Segregationists, for instance, were once a Democratic Party interest group; by the 1960s-70s, the Democratic majority felt strongly enough about the issue that it drove the "Dixiecrats" out.

In any case, Greenwald challenged me specifically on guns, so with a little research behind me (and a reminder to myself to breeeaaaaathe next time) here it is:

This compilation of polls over the last four years shows overall majority support for stricter gun control. It also shows strong majorities in both parties (scroll to the bottom) backing an extension to the assault weapon ban. (It lapsed in 2004; Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.),  now the majority leader, voted against renewal.)

This Harris poll from 2004 shows a similar majority in favor of stricter gun control and a huge majority of Democrats (71 percent to 11 percent) favoring stricter controls.

But it's not happening per this Politico story after the Virginia Tech shootings, quoting a number of pro-control Democrats who say the Party - and Congress - are held captive by the gun lobby.

Here's Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-Fla.):

"We are captives, the majority here, of the NRA. To hell with the NRA! What about the society? I don't get it."

More recently, the House Democratic leadership would not whip 85 pro-gun members, and a measure that would have added restrictions to gun ownership in DC failed.

The same is true of Republicans and the assault weapon ban; the compilation of polls above noted 72 percent backing among Republicans for extending the bans. Two bills attempted this session to revive the ban. Both remain stuck in committee; I'm not sure why, but my point is that one, HR1022, had 67 cosponsors, virtually all Democrats, another, watered-down version, HR6257, had five Republican co-sponsors, three of them Northeastern moderates. (Five co-sponsors is pathetic; 67 is barely respectable.)

Interestingly, the two conservative Republicans backing the extension are Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.) and Rep. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.); both represent strongly Jewish districts. Jews favor gun control. Perhaps, more than a century after Twain's advice, they are making their preferences known to their elected representatives.

0 Comments | Share This

And it’s only Jan. 2….

By Ron Kampeas · January 2, 2009

This has to qualify for best email subject line of 2009 (so far), straight from the California governor's Los Angeles office:

"Governor Schwarzenegger Issues Statement on Violence in Gaza and Around the World"

Wait, didn't he kick a** on Mars in that Total Recall movie? What about Mars, then, huh? Huh?

Just asking.

0 Comments | Share This

More on Gaza and dilemmas and blogging

By Ron Kampeas · January 2, 2009

Andrew Sullivan, here, suffered from the same writer's block afflicting those of us who know this conflict a little too well, and then overcame it with panache here.

JINSA's Shoshan Bryen offers a defense of Israel's return fire as proportional, here.

And why is this in Election Central? I'd like to say it's because of the clear impact the conflict will have on the transition, drone, drone, drone, but really, it's because on my original post I clicked the wrong selection on the drop-down menu.

0 Comments | Share This

Republicans back Gaza strikes more than Dems, notes RJC

By Eric Fingerhut · January 2, 2009

The Republican Jewish Coalition is pointing out a new poll which shows Republicans are significantly more supportive of Israel's decision to take military action in the Gaza Strip than are Democrats.

A Rasmussen Reports survey found that 62 percent of those identifying as Republicans backed Israel's decision to strike Hamas targets Gaza, while just 31 percent of Democrats felt the same. Fifty-five percent of Democrats felt Israel should have "tried to find a diplomatic solution," compared to 27 percent of Republicans.

The survey was taken of 1,000 people on December 30 and has a margin of error of plus or minus three percentage points.

Here's the RJC's executive director, Matt Brooks:

The latest Rasmussen poll highlights the continuing deep division between rank-and-file Democrats and Republicans regarding support for Israel's right to defend herself. As Israel takes military action to defend herself from the continuous assault of rockets and mortars coming from Hamas-controlled Gaza, that divide is especially note-worthy....

While we are pleased that many Democratic congressional leaders have offered their unqualified support of Israel, the fact that an overwhelming majority of Democrats at the grassroots level oppose Israel's self-defensive action is troubling and a cause for concern in the Jewish community.

We hope that going forward, pro-Israel Democratic congressional leaders and advocacy groups such as the National Jewish Democratic Council will redouble their efforts to educate grassroots Democrats and build greater support for Israel's right of self-defense.

The RJC's full statement, in which it cites some polling data from the 2006 Lebanon War to bolster its argument, can be read here.

1 Comment | Share This