Jim Jones’ joke
I was a little surprised the national security adviser led with a Jewish joke at last week's Washington Institute for Near East Policy event -- but in the way you'd be surprised if, say, Nancy Pelosi repeated a Bill Cosby routine from his 70s albums (the Fat Albert stuff, maybe). As in: Not offensive, but it just sounds better Jewish.
Now it's making waves, and Abe Foxman is weighing in (against), but so is Rob Satloff, WINEP's director (for). Jim Jones himself has apologized:
I wish that I had not made this off-the-cuff joke at the top of my remarks, and I apologize to anyone who was offended by it. It also distracted from the larger message I carried that day: that the United States commitment to Israel's security is sacrosanct.
A couple of people told me afterwards that they were kind of offended, but the joke also got big laughs in a pretty much all-Jewish crowd.
Anyway, here's the joke. You decide.
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That’s a good joke, which most of us had already heard. Whoever is offended by it needs to get a life!
I heard this joke months ago from a Jewish friend. I don’t see why it’s any less funny coming from a non-Jewish mouth. My fellow Jews who have made a big deal out of this joke are twisted. General Jones has nothing to apologize for other than for having a sense of humor in a politically correct crazy world.
That joke was really funny. Humor is great. People should not be so serious about everything. PC has ruined a lot of things.
I heard this joke years ago in Russia but with completely different characters. It is funny and appropriate when told for proper audience. No one complains when N word spoken by blacks.
So let me get this straight. A Taliban Terrorist curses and defames a Jew, who is polite and civilized. The Jew then sticks it but good to the Terrorist, in a polite and civilized way. And this is somehow anti-Semitic? Maybe not the right time and place for the joke. But anti-Semitic? I don’t think so.
So let me see...it is OK to perpetuate the image of a a Jew as a deceitful, money hungry being. I was under the impression that it was this 2000 year old characterization of the Jew that brought the Jewish people to the brink of the abyss. I suggest all those that did not have relatives going up in smoke in the Shoah may find this degradation funny, All others take this signal that Jews can be put down again, from high levels of government; without any repercussions as a dead serious omen.
It’s a funny joke about a sincere, polite Jewish merchant who outsmarts a crass and crude Taliban. Perhaps it’s the Taliban who should be upset.
Mr. Maltzman is wrong. He misses the point of the joke. The intent of the punchline of this story is NOT that the Jew is “polite and civilized.” The intent is to show the Jew as cheap and deceitful—a centuries-old anti-Semitic theme. (This joke, by the way, in one version or another, is almost that old too.)
Mr. Smolinisky is right. When a non-Jewish, high-ranking Army officer, speaking as a representative of the President of the United States, tells a joke like this to a mostly-Jewish audience at a banquet sponsored by a Middle East think tank… well, call it what you will. I say “anti-Semitism” by any other name…
Next question: Where is the reprimand from the Commander-in-Chief?
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paul jeser
04/26/10 08:00 PM
Must be a slow news day. The joke is not ‘bad’ - actually, it is pretty funny. Can’t believe you, Abe and others are spending time on it…