It’s time to get over it

Capital J

By Eric Fingerhut · November 12, 2008

The Jewish Press is telling its readers to get over their hysteria and paranoia about Barack Obama.

In a blog post last week and an article in the paper this week, the nationally distributed, Brooklyn-based Orthodox weekly's senior editor, Jason Maoz, takes some in the community to task for the "shamefully racist and abjectly ignorant comments posted by visitors to certain Orthodox websites." Maoz said he voted for John McCain and would again, but "one can be a conservative who's convinced beyond doubt that McCain would have made a better president than Obama and at the same time recognize and appreciate the transcendant nature of the election results and what they say about America."

Maoz goes on to say that the "election of a black man as president should make Jews feel more secure in America rather than less."

The paper also runs an unsigned editorial this week with similar sentiments, noting that Obama's appointments thus far "are firmly in the American political mainstream."