JTA: The Global News Service of the Jewish People

Secretary of State Kerry?

By Eric Fingerhut · October 27, 2008

Who might be Secretary of State in a potential Barack Obama administration? Former U.S. Ambassador to Israel Martin Indyk, making his debut as a surrogate for Obama last Thursday night in Richmond, said he’d bet on Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.). In response to a question from the audience, Indyk admitted he wasn’t in Obama’s “inner circle” and thus didn’t have any inside information – but “if you really pushed me,” he said the Washington rumor mill led him to think it would be the 2004 Democratic nominee. Indyk’s entire speech, which concludes with a song from Mandy Patinkin, can be heard here. The secretary of state discussion happens about one hour and 14 minutes into the tape.

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Obama surrogates courting Jewish vote

By Eric Fingerhut · October 23, 2008

Polls show Barack Obama is ahead in Virginia, and the Obama campaign is working to ensure a victory by spending some time courting the Jewish vote with two well-known surrogates.

Former U.S. Ambassador to Israel, and onetime Hillary Clinton supporter, Martin Indyk will be making his first public appearance on behalf of the Democratic nominee tonight at the Weinstein Jewish Community Center in Richmond for a program entitled “A Discussion about Senator Barack Obama, the Middle East and Israel.”

Then, on Tuesday, October 28, a similar program is slated in Virginia Beach with former Middle East negotiator Dennis Ross at the Sandler Center for Performing Arts.

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Political tidbits: Schlep talk, Coleman pulls negative ads

By Eric Fingerhut · October 13, 2008

• Sen. Norm Coleman (R-Minn.) says Yom Kippur convinced him to withdraw all his negative ads in his race against Al Franken.
  
• The New York Times looks at Andy Martin, the “man behind the whispers about Obama” who has a trail of anti-Jewish comments in his past.
  
• Newsweek says Sarah Palin is costing John McCain Jewish votes.
• “The People of the Button”: New York Rabbi Peter Schweitzer on the history of presidential campaign buttons in Hebrew, in the New York Times.
• Alan Dershowitz states that all the major party presidential and VP candidates are enthusiastic backers of Israel, so supporters of the Jewish state should base their voting decision instead on “more general considerarations” of who would be best for America and the world. The Green Party, though, is another story, he writes in the New York Daily News.
  
• British newspapers love “The Great Schlep”: The Times of London talks to Jews visiting their families in Florida. So does The Guardian.
  
• Haviv Rettig in the Jerusalem Post argues that the Jewish Council for Education and Research videos (those featuring Sarah Silverman and retired Israeli generals) are actually hurting Obama in the Jewish community – because they’re not taking Jewish concerns seriously.
• Jonathan Rosenblum tells bubbe and zaide to ignore the grandchildren, in the Jerusalem Post.
• The latest on this weekend’s courting the Ohio Jewish vote, from the Cleveland Plain-Dealer.
• What right-wing extremist groups has Todd Palin been “palling around” with? Menachem Rosensaft wants to know, in the Huffington Post.
  
• Liberals always threaten to move to Canada if a Republican wins the presidency? Where should conservatives threaten to go if Obama wins? Chris Wilson in Slate suggests Israel as one possibility.
• The Forward’s Brett Lieberman wonders if the Jewish community in Virginia could end up playing a crucial role in the election.
• Arab American Institute leader James Zogby criticizes McCain – and the Republican Jewish Coalition – for using “Arab” as a pejorative term.
• Rep. Robert Wexler is still a “heavy favorite” for re-election, but he has some “aggressive” opponents this year, writes the Palm Beach Post.
• Sarah Silverman talks to Keith Olbermann about “The Great Schlep,” but the best part of the interview is probably when Silverman tells Sarah Palin how she should have answered Katie Couric’s question about the newspapers and magazines she reads.

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Political tidbits

By Eric Fingerhut · August 21, 2008

• MSNBC’s First Read reports that Dan Shapiro, Obama’s new senior foreign policy adviser and Jewish outreach coordinator, lobbied for the American Petroleum Institute – but the campaign responds that he de-registered as a lobbyist before joining the campaign.
• Lynn Sweet of the Chicago Sun-Times notes two instances yesterday of Republicans “making plays to erode Obama’s Jewish support” – and the Obama campaign’s pushback.
• Brett Joshpe of TownHall.com argues, not particularly persuasively, that a VP pick of Eric Cantor could transform “traditional Jewish voting patterns.”
• Cantor continues to be a top McCain surrogate, joining Mitt Romney in Denver to try to distract attention from the Dem convention, reports Media General.
• The New Jersey Jewish News provides some details on what went on at that $1.3 million fundraiser the pro-Israel group NORPAC sponsored for McCain last week in Teaneck – as well as a second one Cindy McCain spoke at in the home of a Jewish philanthropist.
• 
  Time’s Joel Stein suggests Obama’s strategy in Florida should be based on the principle that “a Jewish grandchild is never wrong.”
• A Jewish Republican blogger provides highlights from a debate between Obama and McCain surrogates at a Los Angeles synagogue.
• And the Children of Jewish Holocaust Survivors Los Angeles want the two presidential candidates to join Mike Huckabee in “denouncing the folly of [the] Israeli-Palestinian ‘two-state solution.’ “

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Previewing Chesapeake Tuesday

By Ami Eden · February 11, 2008

JTA’s Ben Harris has a preview of tomorrow’s slate of primaries, including a look into the fight for Maryland’s Jewish votes and the Obama camp’s efforts to head off any upset over the endorsement of U.S. Rep. Jim Moran.

NEW YORK (JTA) – The Obama and Clinton campaigns have squared off in a fight for the Jewish vote in Maryland, the next state with a sizable Jewish population to have its say in the fiercely contested Democratic primary.

At the same time, an endorsement in Virginia has the Obama camp racing to reassure Jewish voters there.

More than 200 delegates are at stake in Tuesday’s primary, when voters in Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia head to the polls in one of the last big days of Democratic voting.

In Virginia, the Obama campaign was working to head off any potential fallout over the endorsement of U.S. Rep. Jim Moran (D-Va.), a controversial figure in Jewish circles for repeated statements claiming that Jewish support pushed the United States into the Iraq war.

The Obama campaign issued a statement distancing the Illinois senator from Moran, but nevertheless accepted his endorsement. Moran appeared with Obama at a campaign rally Sunday in Virginia.

“Senator Obama has received the support of millions of Americans who are inspired by his vision for change, and he welcomes that support,” the statement said. “There are clear instances where he disagrees with views expressed by individual supporters, and that is the case with Congressman Moran’s comments on the Jewish community’s role in the decision to wage war in Iraq.

“Senator Obama is proud of his close and longstanding ties to the Jewish community, and blames Washington’s failed conventional thinking for a war in Iraq that should never have been authorized, and never have been waged.”

On Saturday, however, Obama had much kinder words for Moran at the Virginia Democratic Party’s annual Jefferson-Jackson Day dinner. Obama thanked Moran, calling him a “wonderful congressman and a great friend.”

U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) also appeared at the dinner and acknowledged Moran along with other Virginia Congress members.

Asked about the apparent discrepancy, an Obama campaign official said there would be no further comment on the matter.

“I think the statement that we put out on Congressman Moran speaks for itself,” the official said.

“It sounds like Obama needs to keep explaining his supporters,” said a pro-Clinton Democratic consultant in Washington, noting Obama’s ties to a Chicago pastor who has spoken critically about Israel, and foreign policy consultant Zbigniew Brzezinski, an adviser to Jimmy Carter seen as cool to Israel.

“How many times is he going to have to explain the exceptions that he takes with the people he chooses to have around him?” the consultant asked.

Jack Moline, a rabbi from Alexandria, Va., told JTA he believed Obama’s response to the Moran affair would figure more prominently in the calculations of Virginia Jews than the Moran endorsement itself.

“I think frankly that Virginia Jews have written Congressman Moran off and his endorsement or lack thereof really doesn’t mean that much to the voting patterns of Jews in Virginia,” Moline said. “What I do think is how Senator Obama responds to this endorsement could work very much to his benefit if he’s willing to stand up and say the things that need to be said about Congressman Moran’s rhetoric.”

In Maryland, the State Attorney General Douglas Gansler, five state lawmakers, two officials of suburban Montgomery County and a host of Jewish leaders signed on to an e-mail letter backing Obama ahead of Tuesday’s primary.

“The time for change, the time for a leader who will heal, unify and make the world a better, kinder and safer place for our children, grandchildren is NOW,” said the e-mail sent to Maryland Jews. “We believe that Barack Obama is such a leader.”

Meanwhile, U.S. Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) met with area rabbis on Thursday to urge them to support Hillary Clinton. A longtime friend of the Jewish community, Mikulski has been a vocal advocate of federal funding to protect non-profit institutions from terrorist threats, support that won her an award from the Orthodox Union in 2006.

A top Clinton aide, Ann Lewis, outlined the campaign’s effort to reach out to the Jewish community.

“In advance of the Chesapeake primaries, we have been organizing our supporters and attending events with the community, with distinguished supporters like Sen. Barbara Mikulski. Josh Kram, our director of Jewish Outreach, represented the campaign at Kemp Mill Synagogue in Silver Spring on Saturday for a candidate forum,” Lewis said.

“In addition,” she added, “our Chai for Hillary effort has helped bring in many young Jewish supporters and they are working tirelessly for our effort over the past week, we have hosted several phone banks at the campaign to reach Jewish voters in the DC-MD-VA area.”

In the capital, Obama’s Jewish proxies met with young Jewish professionals at a Havdalah service Saturday night at a bistro in the trendy Dupont Circle area. U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) said Obama stood “shoulder to shoulder” with Israel but understood peace negotiations were the key to ensuring Israel’s security.

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Obama: Moran’s my friend, but don’t worry

By Ami Eden · February 11, 2008

Barack Obama’s campaign is clearly aware that the endorsement from U.S. Rep. Jim Moran (D-Va.) might rub some Jews the wrong way, given his assertion in 2003 that the Iraq war would not happen without Jewish support.

Here’s a statement that the Obama campaign has put out to address any potential concern in the Jewish community:

“Senator Obama has received the support of millions of Americans who are inspired by his vision for change, and he welcomes that support. There are clear instances where he disagrees with views expressed by individual supporters, and that is the case with Congressman Moran’s comments on the Jewish community’s role in the decision to wage war in Iraq. Senator Obama is proud of his close and longstanding ties to the Jewish community, and blames Washington’s failed conventional thinking for a war in Iraq that should never have been authorized, and never have been waged.”

At the Virginia Democrats’ Jefferson-Jackson dinner on Saturday night, Obama thanked Moran, calling him “a wonderful congressman and a great friend.” Hillarly Clinton also acknowledged Moran, along with the other Democratic members of Virginia’s congressional delegation, but was less effusive in doing so.

For the record, Moran has apologized for the remark about the Iraq war. And, let us not forget, some of his best daughters are Jewish.

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Moran endorses Obama

By Ami Eden · February 10, 2008

U.S. Rep. Jim Moran (D-Va.) has endorsed Barack Obama.

As Politico’s Ben Smith suggests, it could cause Obama some problems with Jewish voters. (Click here to see why.)

Of course, at Saturday night’s Jefferson-Jackson dinner in Virginia, both Obama and Hillary Clinton mentioned Moran in the potions of their respective speeches praising the state’s Democratic officials.

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