JTA: The Global News Service of the Jewish People

Brian Baird: Wait—you want us to agree with you, in addition to taking your cash?

By Ron Kampeas · October 13, 2010

I wrote Monday in  Political Points about apparent tensions between J Street and  Rep. Donna Edwards (D-Md.), the first candidate the group backed, back in 2008. (She was elected in a special election that summer, before the generals.)

Edwards is set to appear Saturday night before New Policy, a political action committee that wants politicos to consider a one state option as a possible solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict. J Street has made it clear that unless she makes it clear she is for two states, she loses its backing.

Rep. Brian Baird (D-Wash.), who is retiring, is shocked, shocked that J Street would do such a thing. He spoke yesterday at  a New American Foundation event, just minutes after bumping into Edwards. Via Mondoweiiss:

Donna shared with me the following story. She's been asked to speak to a group that has a policy that supports the two-state solution in Israel and Palestine but that has also said,  that if two states doesn't work , maybe we look at the viability of the one state solution. So Donna's just been asked to go talk to them, and She then gets a flurry of emails saying, No you can't talk to those people and f you talk to those people, then we may not be able to support you any more. She then says, well wait a second, the other group in town, AIPAC, does that; what is J Street doing saying I can't talk to people. I may be speaking out of school here. This was a conversation in front of Starbucks. Literally ten minutes ago. But it is indicative of part of problem we face. It's a town that imposes Groupthink with a ferocity that  -- I think it was Irving Janis who wrote that book if I'm not mistaken -- could not have imagined, It imposes it through electorate actions, it imposes it through financial contributions, a host of ways that limit how we think. And I want to challenge that a little bit today.

As far as Edwards' reaction, this is, so far, hearsay. But here's the thing: J Street equals two states. That's the sine qua non of its existence, in the same way that Hadassah equals medical research in Israel; there's a bunch of stuff that comes with the package, but take that core element away, and we pack our bags and go home.

So, imagine that: A group tells a beneficiary, if you effectively trash our core issue, we will no longer support you, in cash andin word.

Saying that groups should cheerfully dole out cash to pols that deny what they stand for is weird enough, but amazingly enough, I've heard this before. What Baird's problem is with "electorate actions" -- that, I can only wonder at. Americans should vote against their interests?

Baird's "funny thing happened on the way here" story begins about five minutes in.

Incidentally, this confusion also afflicted Noam Neusner's otherwise sharp column on J Street in the most recent Forward. In a smart comparison with the Tea Party, Neusner argues (as have I and others) that J Street does itself no long-term good by running away from positions that it embraces but that are (currently) unpopular. But Neusner picks the wrong example: Marcy Winograd, who unsuccessfully challenged Rep. Jane Harman (D-Calif.) in the primaries, is a pronounced one-stater. Neusner calls her "holier than the pope" on J Street policies; Actually, Winograd's more like the Avignon Pope.