I can only dream that someday I get a quote as awesome as "the insufferable enfant terrible of the liberal blogosphere" that I can use as my personal slogan.
I'm sorry, I am literally only now starting to read Harry Potter (as in, Harry got to Hogwarts on my morning train ride)--what's the connections?
It would be terrible to let Yglesias get stained as a self-hating writer. I really enjoy it when he writes about Judaica. Is there nothing to be done?
what's the connections?
Lord Voldemort, the villian, is often referred to by characters in the books as He Who Must Not Be Named.
Oh, duh. I guess I don't associate that with just Harry, but frightened people in general. ..it's actually the mid-way punchline of a 50-year old family joke involving, um, those animals that must not be named. Thanks!
Someone is clearly envious of young Sausagely's success! I hope he doesn't let himself be goaded into saying anything stupid.
Saheli works at Hogwarts? And took the train to work?
Please explain why being called an anti-semite is more destructive to the discourse than calling someone a Nazi or comparing Israel to pre-apartheid South Africa. Both seem over the top to me.
Comparisons imply non-identity, no?
Even by IKDF standards, it's pretty breathtaking chutzpah to maintain that the anti-Semitism charge is never misused in the same media environment that produced David Brooks, and not a few months after the Mearsheimer and Walt saga. Crikey.
Has any close-to-mainstream writer called anyone a Nazi, and meant it in the sense that the person so called is a white-supremicist who advocates genocide? People aren't being called anti-semites metaphorically or by analogy.
And Israel is similar enough to pre-apartheid South Africa that the comparison doesn't seem over the top at all.
And Israel is the Occupied Territories are similar enough to pre-apartheid South Africa...
Carter wasn't making the other claim; he's getting hammered for the more defensible one, so it would make sense to at least start discussion there.
7: Uh, yes. Yes. Fine day for commenting here at Hogwarts.
No, I only wish my life was that great. I started reading The Philosopher's Stone last night, and was amused that Harry got on his train just as I got on my train this morning.
But seriously kids, is there nothing we can do?
Yeah, on the latter point. Objections to it seem to focus much more on how offensive it is rather than on how similar the factual situations are -- two populations living in seperate but interpenetrating areas, with the poorer/less powerful population significantly burdened by legal restrictions on where they may live, travel, and work. There are plenty of points to be made about how the motivation in SA was straight racism, while in Israel there is a security rationale, but denying the similarities seems screwy to me.
is there nothing we can do?
No. Now that the title has been announced, there's no telling Rawlings that "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" is a silly phrase.
Please explain why being called an anti-semite is more destructive to the discourse than calling someone a Nazi or comparing Israel to pre-apartheid South Africa. Both seem over the top to me
Umm, because no one really believes you (or anyone else) might be a Nazi, absent actual neo-Nazi tells. Being called an anti-semite is akin to being called a racist--there are enough out there that a random assertion might be true.
SAHELI POSTS VIA OWL OMG!
I'm not sure what Yggypie could do. This discourse sucks 17 ways from Sunday. Maybe just ignore and post whatever he thinks about Israel anyway? It's not like everyone's going to be all sunshine and puppy dogs as long as he's advocates anything less than a rah-rah Israel cheer anyway, so he might as well not pull punches.
But seriously kids, is there nothing we can do?
Yglesias will be fine. I think he has a decent read on the media environment at his age, and that's the group of people that he needs to most worry about, I'd guess.
I don't know what the Examiner's editorial policy is like; would it be worthwhile to send them email, or are they like the WSJ editorial board?
SAHELI POSTS VIA OWL OMG!
you should see the mess that happens when a Google pigeon accidentally runs into a Hogwarts Owl. I almost feel sorry for those flying rats.
I don't think there much. . .um. . .Yggypie(!). . . .could do, except be himself and hold his ground, but I was hoping there might be some counterblogbuzz that could help from the rest of us.
Also, these accusations can have very, very serious consequences. I've been a close witness to one senior professor who didn't get a job offer (but he did get a whole lotta death threats!) over such accusations. I've been a bystander to a whole bunch of other professors have their reputations tarnished and careers threatened. One of my best friends was denied a Fullbright because the US embassy representative on the committee (the only voting non-scholar) blackballed the professor he was to work with.
And I think the important thing is to keep pointing out what's happening. People can recognize unfair accusations, and there should be contemporaneous rebuttals that people can point to if he's ever accused of being self-hating.
16: Yes, well, they're working on some way to make the letters on the cover magically shift into something better at a later date.
but I was hoping there might be some counterblogbuzz that could help from the rest of us.
I suspect that's a mistake. On the whole, the blogverse is very friendly to Yglesias, and doesn't treat the issue of whether he's a self-hating dhimi-semite as a real issue. That's the appropriate attitude; I think raising a stink frames it as if there is something to be contested, and that might actually harm Yglesias.
14 and 18 both make sense to me. LB, I think that part of the problem about using words like apartheid is the assumption of racism, and ignores the security issue. And being called an anti-semite when you're not is something a commenter on Israeli politics has to get over.
Saiselgy ought to call his enemies out as Horcruxes. Of course, he hasn't read any of the books, either, but his helpful roommate is a fan.
being called an anti-semite when you're not is something a commenter on Israeli politics has to get over
This is, strictly speaking, true, but it's not acceptable.
I think raising a stink frames it as if there is something to be contested, and that might actually harm Yglesias.
I dunno. It's one thing coming from the pajamas media, quite another from the op-ed page of the Los Angeles Times.
Sausagely does need to be careful, though. I mean that just in the sense of not losing his head and saying something truly intemperate because, unfair as uncontextualized quotes are, short quoteable intemperateness will never ever go away.
Does "He-Who-Cannot-Be Named" come from "She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed"?
8: I think you mean apartheid South Africa -- to which Israel has sometimes been compared because of the eerie resemblance of the Occupied Territories to Bantustans, and of the resemblance of its forced removal policies at various points to South Africa's. The comparison doesn't seem over-the-top to me in the slightest. It's not flattering, but then the actions involved aren't very flattering.
14: There are plenty of points to be made about how the motivation in SA was straight racism, while in Israel there is a security rationale
Actually, the racist rationale in SA was a security rationale. Africans were a conquered population who had to be kept under strict controls so as not to pose a threat.
I'm with Becks on envying Yglesias for being called an insufferable enfant terrible. I want one!
He can keep right on what he's doing, he's not going to be silenced. I wish people would lay off just a TINY bit on that. Who, precisely, is going to silence him, and how?
I despised the Walt - Mearshimier article and found it somewhat...well, so irrational and poorly thought out that I wondered about what possibly could have motivated them to approach it that way. Yglesias I more or less agree with, and I think there's a very healthy % of American Jews who have no problem with it. Certainly more than Jonah Goldberg.
There is a lot of self-censorship on Israel, but I think it's based less on a fear of being blacklisted by THE LOBBY and their minions than on a generalized wish to avoid emotionally-laden fights that get very nasty very quickly, which intensifies as you get towards D.C. to the point where it's genuinely destructive. But that's not quite silencing as a combination of self-censorship and not-listening-to, and the cure for this is for people to do exactly what Yglesias does.
actually, now I'm remembering some instances of actual blacklisting. But it's relatively rare.
31: I loved that show, inexplicably.
27: Well, I'm glad to know I'm not the only one. I'm picking them up now b/c they're handy, but I avoided them after someone actually locked me their bedroom for a half hour unless I started reading. Too much of a cult.
Plus I find it unpleasant to read gossip about one's colleagues.
25:
Well, I'm not in any position to raise a stink, and won't, but I'll try to be quick on the draw next time I hear it bandied about.
I'm with Becks on envying Yglesias for being called an insufferable enfant terrible. I want one!
True, PK doesn't sound either insufferable or terrible. Perhaps Yglesias is available for borrowing?
26: And part of the problem with the push-back against comparisons to apartheid is that it assumes that the racism issue should be taken off the table when it's quite clearly in play, and when it quite clearly influences declarations about "security." Coupled with the blithe assumption that people should just "get used" to being unjustly painted as anti-Semites, that's exactly the sort of thing that has continually damaged apologetics for Israel in recent years.
32. Yes, hard to be pre-apartheid unless we go way back. And security was used an excuse for their policies, but I don't remember they're being the same level of violence, so I see it as more of a control thing.
I think I disagree, Katherine. Most people care very much about not being called anti-semitic, because it has real social and professional costs, and also because it hurts. So no, no one is being dragged away in the night, but there does exist a threat: if you talk about Israel in ways which are disapproved of by its right-wing supporters, you will be called, directly or by innuendo, an anti-semite. I think that needs to be noticed and noted when it's happening.
39: I think the security fears of white minorities in southern Africa were "real," inasmuch as the example of white Rhodesia's collapse in the Chimurenga was readily at hand and MK was active in South Africa itself. In terms of actual vulnerability, Israel's situation is probably more similar to Rhodesia's than South Africa's. Of course no comparison is perfect in every detail.
The other problem with the anti-semite thing is that it (deliberately) changes the subject. Suddenly we're not talking about politics or policy any more, which ensures that the political and policy issues will remain unaddressed or uncriticized.
40: I wasn't talking about people being dragged away at night. That ought to be obvious I think. It hurts, but in most cases the costs are going to be limited, and the proper response is--well, exactly what Yglesias is doing. AIPAC and friends are bullies, but assuming they *actually* speak for the Jewish community is a mistake.
Calling it the Israel Lobby assumes that they speak on behalf of everyone who considers them a strong supporter of Israel. My husband thinks he's included in the Israel Lobby when it's talked about that way, and it pisses him off--he's a lot closer to Yglesias and for that matter you than to the neocons or Goldberg.
43: Calling it the Israel Lobby assumes that they speak on behalf of everyone who considers them a strong supporter of Israel.
What? Seems to me it assumes that a given lobbying organization is in the business of advocating policies they believe are good for Israel.
What does it mean that the costs are limited? How do we know that? I assume there are jobs Yglesias can't get because of the things he's written about Israel. I don't think you're saying "charges of anti-semitism are no biggie" but that's how it's sounding.
I agree we shouldn't call it the Israel Lobby; I think I did a post about just that a week or two ago.
He can keep right on what he's doing, he's not going to be silenced. I wish people would lay off just a TINY bit on that. Who, precisely, is going to silence him, and how?
As Yglesias has pointed a few times, this really isn't an attempt to silence him - that is, the "self-hating Jews" who criticize Israel. It's about maintaining the taboo that it's inappropriate for non-Jews to criticize Israel. Jewish critics of Israel are going to be more or less inoculated against charges of anti-Semitism because nobody really buys the "self-hating Jew" line, but there's really no such automatic defense for the gentiles.
Oh come on, it does more than that. People who mean AIPAC should bloody well say AIPAC.
It's too bad that the article that raised a genuine problem had to be such a F**** piece of crap.
What? Seems to me it assumes that a given lobbying organization is in the business of advocating policies they believe are good for Israel.
No, Katherine's clearly right in her description. To say you support Israel is not to say you support the Likudniks. I know a ton of Jewish Americans who feel just that way. But in the absence of an alternative infrastructure to address concerns regarding Israel, AIPAC appears to be the only means of supporting Israel. This is changing, which is nice.
And Yglesias is going to be fine because he's well-regarded by people who themselves are well rooted and able to address this should it become an issue. Ackerman, OTOH, I worry for a little.
46: this is probably right. I'm not defending the atmosphere, I'm saying it works through self-censorship far more than blacklisting, and exaggerating the nefarious Lobby's power to blacklist actually is counterproductive. As well as putting a huge chip on some liberal Jews' and wanna-be Jews' shoulders.
But self-censorship requires something to motivate it, and that's the purpose of these digs at Yglesias.
Hillary & The Foreign Policy Establishment ...Steve Clemons today quotes a long piece. Clemons is hard to cut-and-paste from. But I think, he is noting that the Beinarts & Pollacks and Perles keep getting work and access, although Clemons and who he quotes, do not quite explain why.
It is not just Israel or ME issues, it is also MY's strong opposition to the war. The kid is screwed, at least in a sense, as a big-weight foreign policy player. I think he realized it several years ago.
49: see, I get so mad that I can't even count asterisks, and forgot I'm posting in the friendly unfogged comments section where it's okay to curse.
The only place I can think of where this specifically is likely to prevent Yglesias from getting hired is TNR. I think he's aware of this and doesn't care given the number of times he personally calls Marty Peretz a bigot (which he is absolutely correct about, needless to say).
TNR is influential, but insofar as Yglesias and Ackerman have a problem is that there are so. damn. few. jobs for liberal journalists. (and Yglesias doesn't seem to have any problem at all--he's incredibly talented but he's also doing astonishingly well even given that, it's so hard to break in.)
"The kid is screwed, at least in a sense, as a big-weight foreign policy player"
This may be true. But this is because the Democrats and press won't listen to liberals on foreign policy in general, and being not-listened-to isn't the same as being censored (though frustrating enough! Believe me, I have a ton of experience being not listened to.)
I'm not defending the atmosphere, I'm saying it works through self-censorship far more than blacklisting, and exaggerating the nefarious Lobby's power to blacklist actually is counterproductive.
Yes, but even self-censorship doesn't happen in a vacuum, and requires the kind of pervasive social pressure driven by campaigns like the one launched at Mearsheimer and Walt. Which is to say that when a prominent non-Jewish liberal blogger maintains a conspicuous silence in the middle of the Lebanon war, and suddenly posts, "You know, I'm not going to comment on this thing because it's just too contentious," that it's naive to assume that act of self-censorship is uninfluenced by the long history of organizations like AIPAC.
I think Ezra may have been a little more innocent, but remember who Matt's father and grandfather are, and I am sure that he would have some kind of talk with Bob Kuttner and Tomasky and some of the Vietnam Era crowd at and around Tapped. I can think of no early Vietnam opponents who ever had great FPE careers.
I could be wrong, but I think MY accepted he would have a role like Max Sawicky or something. Outside looking in. I think MY is...well, hell I have been reading him since Harvard.
btw, this sentence, from the original article, is amazing:
"But, amazingly, according to many on the left, Jews prohibit honest debate by smearing those with whom they disagree as "anti-Semites.""
Characterizing complaints about a specific group of hawkish Israel supporters as a complaint about "Jews"--there's your innuendo of anti-semitism right there.
48: To say you support Israel is not to say you support the Likudniks
To support Israel is, for that matter, not to say you support the Israel lobby either. That's my point.
47: Oh come on, it does more than that.
No, seriously. I think it would be unremarkable to say that the term "LATO lobby" does not implicate all Latvians, and that PhRMA does not implicitly speak for your local pharmacist. The argument that the term "Israel lobby" implictly tars all supporters of Israel relies on aggressively reading racist intent into the use of a term that in others contexts non-controversially and quite clearly refers to a group of lobbying oganizations with a specific declared interest.
It's possible to contend that some anti-Semites could use the term "Israel lobby" as a kind of coded means of saying "Zionist Occupation Government." But it's unsupportable, IMO, to claim that that's inherently how the term functions, and doing so amounts precisely to a kind of misuse of the accusation of anti-Semitism.
I could be wrong, but I think MY accepted he would have a role like Max Sawicky or something. Outside looking in. I think MY is...well, hell I have been reading him since Harvard.
Couldn't disagree more. Yglesias is well-positioned, as Katherine says. He'll be fine.
Yeah, I firmly expect to be reading Yggles and the rest of the Tapped crew in thirty years, preening myself slightly on having been paying attention to them since before they were anointed.
Calling AIPAC "THE" Israel lobby implies that they are THE political voice of people who care a lot about Israel.
M & W deserved most of what they got for that article as far as I'm concerned. My in laws thought it was anti-Semitic, and I wouldn't jump to that conclusion or state it publicly without more evidence, but I didn't think they were crazy. That's probably due to a bit of hypersensitivity...and no one gets angrier about the Israel Lobby being blamed for the Iraq war than liberal NY Jews who consider themselves supporters of Israel and were against the war from the start. It was also just a function of how stupid it was.
I should go, these debates make me hate everyone.
I have been in a months long argument about this stuff with Matt & Ezra anyway. I think there is a lot of personal TNR-Tapped internecine DC bullshit going on here, and I think MY and EK have gone way overboard.
Marty Peretz & AIPAC are not pulling the Bush/Cheney puppet strings. There are players even bigger involved, they just aren't attending the wine & cheese policy luncheons.
I personally think the AIPAC Israel Lobby stuff is a deliberate smokescreen. a stalking horse, staked goats. The Saudis thrive at avoiding attention, the Saudi don't want anyone to know they and Carlyle are in town.
"Marty Peretz & AIPAC are not pulling the Bush/Cheney puppet string"
Right. Marty Peretz has undue influence at the New Republic, not the White House. Cheney and Rumsfeld are not motivated by a generous concern for Israel. Some of their advisors, maybe--but not all.
AIPAC's probably more a destructive influence on the Democrats, who should know better but are afraid to say so.
Last thing: in talking about the M & W thing I'm probably making people think I don't think accusations of anti-semitism are a big deal or that most of them are bullshit. That would not be accurate. First, saying around the dinner table that an article seems anti-semitic to you is not the same thing as publicly accusing its authors of that; the latter is much more serious and better be well supported, and it usually isn't. Second, while M & W deserved some of the crap they get, many critics of Israel don't, at all. Yglesias, Ackerman, Alterman don't. And just do not get me started on the "Ken Roth is a self hating Jew and Human Rights Watch is anti-semitic" thing during the Lebanon war. God, that was such crap.
M & W deserved most of what they got for that article as far as I'm concerned.
I'm sorry, but this is silly. Parts of the Mearsheimer and Walt paper were certainly sloppy, but nothing they wrote was anti-Semitic, and "most of what they got" was accusations of anti-Semitism.
Marty Peretz & AIPAC are not pulling the Bush/Cheney puppet strings.
Neither Yglesias nor Klein have said that they are. This is a perfectly silly strawman to tackle.
How the hell is this discussion (the "who does AIPAC speak for" one, not the Save Sausagely one) going on without anyone noticing the precise analogueantecedent that happened just last week.
Let's see: Idiotically right-wing org that self-identifies as the representative of all US members of a group? Wild accusations of bigotry? Debate over the actual IRW impact on writers? Insistence from members of that group that the org doesn't, in fact, speak for them, but no actual counter-force in the public arena?
AIPAC isn't exactly the same as Donohue's Bigots for the Pope (or whatever it's called) - even Donohue doesn't claim that his opponents want to see Muslamofascists take over Vatican City - but we just saw this movie. And I see the same problem that I did last time. Who, Katherine, is standing up in public for MY? I'm not trying to be accusatory, but you're very strongly out there insisting that no one should say AIPAC speaks for American Jews. But who else does, in terms of "gets their representatives TV time to push the American discourse"?
I know lots of Jews, and I don't think a single one of them buys AIPAC's whole line - but I also don't see my friends' positions getting a lot of play in the national press. Same deal with all the Catholics who think Donohue is full of shit.
The solution isn't to say on blogs "X Association doesn't speak for all X" - that's just meta, process talk. The solution is to make damn sure that the Union of X can get its own ass on TV. I take from 43 that Katherine's husband is maybe a Union of X type, so I'm not saying nothing is being done. But what is being done is inadequate. When Donohue accuses someone of bigotry, he wins. When AIPAC (or Foxman, who has gone around the bend) does the same, they're winning too. Everyone but right-wing ideologues is losing, and it needs to change. Denying the dynamic isn't going to make it go away.
"This is a perfectly silly strawman to tackle."
This is a blog comment thread, stras. Lighten up.
"Marty Petertz and AIPAC are somewhat influential of administration ME and Israel policy, but not so influential as the attention Matt Yglesias awards them would seem to imply."
Am I getting any closer to something measured, reasoned, comment worthy? Fuck off.
H Rider Haggard, "She", "She who must be obeyed", possibly = "She who must not be named".
McManus and I met on Yglesias's comment threads way back in the Harvard days. Heart-warming, ain't it?
Most of Yglesias's stuff is high-quality mainstream stuff, but on the Israel issue he (and also Alterman) are taking the initiative. It may cost him, but I think it's the best, most exceptional thing he's done, just because of its scarcity.
Whether you call it The Israel Lobby or something else, and whether or not there are actual anti-Semitism accusations, there's a lot of intimidation on the Israel question. The range of permissible opinion runs from hoping the Israelis escalate to blanket support for whatever the Israelis are doing to slightly criticial support of Israel. Even to say "Let Israelis deal with their own problems, the way the Sri Lankans do" would call down abuse; it's quite a reasonable statement, but you never hear it. Actual support for the Palestinians over the Israelis, even on specific points of contention, is never heard.
though it may cost him.
62: Calling AIPAC "THE" Israel lobby implies that they are THE political voice of people who care a lot about Israel.
No, actually, that doesn't follow. That's my point. The tobacco lobby doesn't necessarily speak for your local convenience store. The oil lobby doesn't speak for the guy pumping your gas. The Israel lobby doesn't speak for anyone on the street who happens to support Israel. It's a group of lobbying organizations whose issue is Israel. That's it.
I don't want to hijack this into an in-depth Mearsheimer and Walt discussion, but I should point out that they were actually pretty clear on this point, and that they used the term "Israel lobby" not just as code for AIPAC but as a reference to a group of lobbyist organizations and interests who are (as they took the trouble to point out) signficiantly more hardline on average than the bulk of US Jewry. Most of the accusations of anti-Semitism that ensued exploited relatively minor quibbles like the use of the term "lobby," or what could be read into a sufficiently vicious interpretation of a couple of ambiguous phrasings. This wasn't very impressive.
68: My apologies, Bob. It's so hard to tell when you're saying random shit that you actually want people to respond to, and when you're saying random shit just to say random shit.
No, my in laws don't support Union of Jews-who-like-Israel-and-not-AIPAC, they follow politics but they're not nuts like me....
Such a group may exist but if so it's not nearly powerful enough. Liberals generally have an infrastructure problem in D.C.
stras, I don't actually have a problem with anything Yglesias or Klein says. Nothing specific anyway. I had a problem with the last sentence of this post.
Bob, I think one of the reasons that EK and Sausagely are so fixated on Peretz (other than the fact that he's a Dickensian comic creation and a genuinely ghastly writer) is that TNR is the only liberal (schmiberal) publication capable of catapulting young liberal writers into mainstream prominence. If Sausagely wants to get op-eds in the Post or the Times, he's going to have to do it via writing a book, because he won't be able to climb up via TAP. That's where the hating comes from. Plus Dickensian comic creation and a genuinely ghastly writer!
"relatively minor quibbles like the use of the term "lobby"
No, it's the combination of those things, and a really really stupid thesis that doesn't actually explain what they say it does.
I think their problem is that they wanted to write an editorial against specific people doing specific things wrong, but instead they tried to do it as analytical and descriptive, and in fact their thesis does not make much sense and is very very bad at explaining what they say it explains. And when you combine that with using the term The Israel Lobby, people get pissed.
he won't be able to climb up via TAP
I don't know about that, Ezra already writes regular op-eds for the L.A. Times. Getting into the WaPo or the NY Times isn't such a huge leap from that.
71:Sometimes I say random shit, often even unto Dada. Often I say meaningful shit quite carelessly, or with an affected indifference to precision. These are blog comment threads, one giant leap below actual bloggers. Crikey.
Brad DeLong has a post on why the dollar remains high (higher than macroeconomic analyses would presume for traditional balance theories to hold, for stras). One of the commenters said outright that Saudi Arabia had directly threatened China. If China dumps dollars, they get no oil, or very expensive oil. Don't know this is so.
Steve Clemons is an indispensable resource on foreign policy, and really deserves close readings.
I'm a Texan, and Bush & Cheney & new SoD Gates are Texans, and I honestly spend days wondering why all these Jews are yelling at each other over foreign policy? Who do they think is listening?
Ya know, this story of liberal/left East Coast Jews fighting each other to the death over tiny crumbs of influence and attention dropped to them by Waspy Industrial and old money folk is even older than Israel.
Galbraith and Keynes decided how the world be run after WWII. Acheson. Hasn't changed that much yet.
75: EK benefitted from the OC Mafia.
Ya know, if he switches to EK now, by 2010 he could, dramatically, move to EX. Then it's just a matter of time before we hear, "I'm Chric Matthews, and with me tonight is The X."
If the Israel Lobby doesn't get to him first.
74: a really really stupid thesis that doesn't actually explain what they say it does
IIRC their basic thesis was that an Israel lobby exists and has specific and noticeable effects on discourse about Israel and Middle East policy more generally in Washington. That should not be a controversial point, and the merits of their specific examples should be debatable without digression into whether the term "Israel lobby" should be permissible. I don't think the M & W paper was flawless or anything -- I remember finding some of their specific examples convincing, others unconvincing -- but I've yet to see a criticism of its "thesis" that didn't amount to reading a series of strawman anti-Semitic arguments about monolithic Jewish power into it.
As for the Israel lobby's overall influence, it's hard to say. I can't really buy Bob's contention that they're a bunch of ineffectual beggars for scraps from the table of WASP supreme power, nor do I buy that Israel was the prime mover behind the Iraq War. I think it's plausible that the lobby's influence is in fact out of proportion to the actual benefits accruing to strategic partnership between the States and Israel, and that M & W are non-crazy and not anti-Semitic for thus arguing, whether or not they're correct.
is that TNR is the only liberal (schmiberal) publication capable of catapulting young liberal writers into mainstream prominence.
Much less true now than it has been, and that's a good thing. On the war, TNR didn't just break with "liberals," (with whom it had always been broken), it broke with centrist technocrats that are its market. They went Weekly Standard just as centrist Dems were deciding that David Brooks was not the nice Republican you could bring home to mother, but a wingnut unwilling to let accuracy or evidence get in the way of facts. TNR is not quite the magazine with the ability to bless its writers as "smart and sane" that it used to be.
Foer seems to be trying to address that breech, though I'm not sure if it will take. If you look at the people who get published more regularly in TNR or even hired by TNR, you'll note an increasing number of (a) war critics, and (b) left-of-centerers. I'm not sure that's precisely the way to address its market, but he's clearly trying to do so. I'm not even sure this was necessary; maybe TNR could have just stuck it out until things got back to normal.
"IRC their basic thesis was that an Israel lobby exists and has specific and noticeable effects on discourse about Israel and Middle East policy more generally in Washington"
I remember their thesis very differently, but I don't want to go re-hash it now. I remember them using this Lobby to EXPLAIN U.S. policies in a way that was completely unconvincing (when it came to things like Iraq war) and question begging (they say that the lobby is just like any other, but more powerful--well, why is this particular one more powerful and successful? If you don't have the answer to that what's the use of your article as a piece of analysis? It's fine to editorialize against AIPAC and pals and say that people shouldn't listen to them and they have too much influence, but this is not what they did..)
My actual opinion, which I think is Yglesias's and Alterman's too, is that American militarists in alliance with Israeli militarists, including a small but disproportionately powerful part of the American American Jewish community, have succeeded in controlling the debate on Israel in both American parties, and often enough the Israeli debate too. AIPAC is not the only group lobbying on Israel issues, but as far as I know it's by far the most influential -- no moderate group has remotely the same influence, much less any Palestinian-sympathizing group. Most American Jews are not especially hawkish on the Middle East, but the hawks are well mobilized.
80: I'm going to regret this, but:
they say that the lobby is just like any other, but more powerful--well, why is this particular one more powerful and successful?
Um, because if you call AIPAC out on its shit, a lot of people explicitly call you an anti-semite, a lot of other people hint at it, and a lot of people who disagree with AIPAC's policies spend more time debating just how anti-semitic you are, rather than how right your critique is?
As for outsize influence, look, the Tobacco lobby claims to represent tobacco companies, and, to a lesser extent, growers (that is, actual constituents); the oil lobby pretty clearly represents about 4 huge companies, plus a thousand smaller ones. But AIPAC, et al, claim to represent however many millions of American Jews there are (15?), while it does no such thing. With no apparent diminution of power.
Forget the balance-of-interests equation - Let's say 10% of American Jews are basically on board with AIPAC. But if AIPAC paints someone as an anti-semite, probably 50% of American Jews will take the accusation semi-seriously, not to mention all the well-meaning goys who think, "Mearshimer - wasn't he that anti-semite?" That gives a lot of leverage to a group representing ~1.5 million Americans.
JRoth is worst than the Protocols of Zion. Drezner's view of the W&M paper struck me as fair and accurate: sloppy, and what was true wasn't new, and what was new wasn't true. A weird way to try to force open a conversation. Further, the one thing he said that I found noteworthy was that W&M have something of a ideological/field bias (or chose another, less problematic word) against Israel: as realists, they don't believe our Israeli policy should exist. Not that it's wrong, but that it shouldn't arise. "The Israel lobby" functions (to Drezner's mind, and I found it convincing) as something of a deus ex machina.
82: am I included in "a lot of people" or "well meaning goys"? I think I am but I have a tendency to take things personally that I shouldn't and regretting.
Actually, you know, I'll regret it anyway. Let's just say you don't understand what I'm saying at all and trying to further explain is not worth the tsuris.
SCMT is just like apartheid South Africa, Hitler, and Darth Maul from The Phantom Menace. But on review, he's right that Drezner's take on the whole fracas was fairly convincing.
85: My favorite thing that I only recently learned: some rabbi labeled Portnoy's Complaint "worse than the Protocols of Zion" when it first came out. So awesome. I forget where I read that. And I am your father, DS; feel the power of the Dark Side.
84: I didn't intend you as "a lot of other people" at all - but I can see where you might have, and I should have been more careful. What I was getting at was more-coordinated campaigns, where some have the role of being explicit, others in hinting. I'm not suggesting conspiracy as such, but if 8 years of watching the VRWC have taught me anything, it's that these attacks are not coincidental. I'd point to the Pelosi nonsense as an analagous situation - an attack is leaked (in that case, from the Pentagon), some run with it (WashTimes, Drudge), others seamlessly incorporate it into their narratives without ever having to stand by the story itself.
Anyway, perhaps I don't understand what you're saying at all, and I'm sorry about that. But I wonder if you've tried to understand what I'm getting at either.
Oh, and SCMT? My Catholic/Hasidic/Lutheran/elderberry ancestors will haunt you.
Unless, of course, the Mormons are right.
I am your father, DS
So he's...your boy?
My rejoinder has been stolen by Mexican imperialists. So, this.
Okay. Comity.
I pretty much agree with this take from the NY Review of Books, though he's probably say that the article was a net good and I don't know that I'd agree.
Unlike M & W, he actually examines how AIPAC works...
I just think they get it upside down and backwards. I don't think AIPAC explains the lack of Congressional opposition to the Iraq war. I think that there is something else about the way things work in D.C. that explains why Democratic Congressmen are so out of step with the Democratic electorate on foreign policy issues, and these are both symptoms of that.
Unless, of course, the Mormons are right.
We are! There's plenty of room in Zion (UT)!
I spent a lovely night in the (very) unfortunately-named town of Blanding, UT.
I don't know about that, Ezra already writes regular op-eds for the L.A. Times. Getting into the WaPo or the NY Times isn't such a huge leap from that.
This is much, much less true than you might think. Frankly, my life will be fine as long as people buy my book so that's really all I ask of Team Unfogged. You don't need to read it, mind you.
Trying to get articles placed is crazy-making.
I'm not buying the book unless it's entitled "dood, wtf: [the rest of title Heasman (I think) came up with]."
Heasman (I think)
But I think "Strength Without Stupidity" would be more effective for publicity purposes.
You mean it could be marketed as "Wettham Sausagely's Final Martial Arts Masterpiece"?
I find it amusing that the first Jew to chime in on this thread was Saiselgy himself in comment 94.
Katherine is talking the talk and walking the walk, Teo. If I can just get her to come to services I've got her badge all ready.
What about Dr. Slack, our resident black Canadian Jewish gay man?
Well he was in the thread way prior to 94.
(And none of us really knows one way or the other about Mr. Jones.)
Unfortunately, I'm a boringly straight lapsed SubGenius, so I don't count.
And none of us really knows one way or the other about Mr. Jones.
He's stated before that his family is both Palestinian and insanely Christian.
Is your handle, then, a reference?
'Fraid so. It seemed like a good idea at the time.
The Church of Slack is insanely positive thinking. 3 of 4 reviewers gave five stars (one gave four), and all the reviews of the reviews were positive.
"Lord Voldemort, the villian, is often referred to by characters in the books as He Who Must Not Be Named."
H. Rider Haggard made famous She Who Must Not Be Named, in She in 1886. There have been nine film versions.
I wouldn't give Rowlings much credit for originality in changing pronouns here.
The relevant point is what Yglesias means by it.
I wouldn't give Rowlings much credit for originality
You could have stopped right there.
Wait, that was ""She Who Must Be Obeyed"; okay, some credit.
If Yglesias is the insufferable enfant terrible, what does that make, say, Zembla or Rude Pundit? I always thought of him more as Captain Sensible.
WHO IS ANTI-SEMITIC, WHO IS ANTI-AMERICAN ??
68% of the people of Jewish Faith residing in America, are opposed to the Lobby (AIPAC) and
other so called Jewish organizations.
They do not believe that the actions of Israel are
justified in any way. Nor do they want such government and organizations associated as
being a part of their faith.
Are they really anti-semitic as others are accused.
Or are they proud to be American, and concerned
about the dirrection of such foreign policy as lead
by a lobby and its money trail.
They see this administration, the Zionist movement
the same as we do. Anti-american.
"I pledge to vote against every Senator and Representative who approves funding to continue the disastrous Iraq War. We have already given far too much of our blood and treasure - and killed far too many Iraqis - for a war based on lies. We are now occupying a hostile nation divided by civil war for the benefit of military contractors and Big Oil.
The only way to support our troops is to bring them home NOW, and no funds should be used for any other purpose. If Congress fails to bring our troops home, I will do everything I can - and urge everyone I know - to defeat pro-war Senators and Representatives, both in my party's primary elections and in the November general election."
We the American people demand that the WAR be ended and our troops be brought home.
We are prepared to STRIKE and cause complete
shut down.
We expect the Senate and House to demand
such end to the atrocities committed.
No more appropriation bills, no more immigration bills, no more spending at all until the vetoed bill
is resubmitted and signed.
No action on any issue until this Illegal War Issue
is resolved.
Petition all agencies, offices, unions, organizations,
and faternities regarding an end to the conflict.
We Americans know that 911 happened.
We also know that it could have been prevented.
We know something could happen again, and the
necessary steps to secure us and borders has not
happened. We are no safer, in fact are less safe.
We know that Israel, has caused MOST ALL the
problems in the Middle East.
None of you talk about steps to be taken against
Israel. Their aggression and terror activities for
59 years now.
We do not want to continue giving and giving to that
regime, as if they were another part of the USA, they
are not, nor do we want them to be.
We understand, more then you corrupt officials that
accept AIPAC money & support, how and why we
there.
The fear factor of terrorist, is not so much about our
safety as it is Israel's.
We do know that Iraq had nothing to do with 911, and
there is question as to who was. Answer the questions
about Mossad agents, and Saudi royalty and flights.
You want to trace history and other wars.
Have we ever pre-empted an attack under such pretense
in the past. If so what were those results.
We know six more wrongs, will never correct the first,
and until some one is held responcible, and made
accountable, nothing good will come out of this mess.
It seems you all are in bed together. No one wants to
hold BUSH/CHENEY to account for their actions.
The UN has tried to make Israel responcible for their
evil actions, but is always vetoed by the USA.
If we don't bring fair, honest, & credible solutions to
the table. Which means holding the culprits to pay
for the injustice we all have witnessed, and you all
denied and continue to.
We know we will pay dearly for your mistakes,
Bush/Cheney mistakes, and Israels mistakes,
simply because of your unwavering support
for a regime that is absolutely the worst in the
region.
We want America to be the America we knew,
prior to the ambush of AIPAC and other such
foreign influences.
Will any of you stand up for the principles of
consequence and truth...
Regardless, we Americans know the truth, and
when you all decide to face it, do something about
it.
We then will be behind you 150 %, but until that, the
captain is going down with his ship. Mission accomplished or not.
IT IS UP TO YOU, IF YOU ALL STAY IN DENIAL !!
Israel's form of Apartheid is borderline genocide. In South Africa, we did not see tanks with guns blazing protecting armored bulldozers reducing homes to dust. We did not see helicopter gunships taking out militants with their families, children and their homes with calculated precision. In South Africa, we did not see the destruction by bombing of apartment blocks such as in Rafah in the Gaza Strip where children were sleeping. We did not see town centers such as Jenin and Ramallah razed to the ground reminiscent of the bloody suppression of the Jewish uprising in the Warsaw Ghetto during the Second World War. In fact, only around 26,000 people were killed in South Africa during the height of the struggle against apartheid, between 1960 and 1994. Israel, on the other hand, has killed more than 265,000 Palestinians since its invasion. According to Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the violence of the apartheid regime was a picnic in comparison with the utter brutality of Israel's occupation.
AIPAC'S DANGEROUS GRIP ON WASHINGTON:
The congressional reaction to Hezbollah's attack on Israel and Israel's retaliatory bombing of Lebanon provide the latest example of why AIPAC's lock on US foreign policy in the Middle East must be examine:
In early March, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) held its forty-seventh annual conference in Washington. AIPAC's executive director spent twenty-seven minutes reading the "roll call" of dignitaries present at the gala dinner, which included a majority of the Senate and a quarter of the House, along with dozens of Administration officials.
As this event illustrates, it's impossible to talk about Congress's relationship to Israel without highlighting AIPAC, the American Jewish community's most important voice on the Hill. The Congressional reaction to Hezbollah's attack on Israel and Israel's retaliatory bombing of Lebanon provide the latest example of why.
On July 18, the Senate unanimously approved a nonbinding resolution "condemning Hamas and Hezbollah and their state sponsors and supporting Israel's exercise of its right to self-defense." After House majority leader John Boehner removed language from the bill urging "all sides to protect innocent civilian life and infrastructure," the House version passed by a landslide, 410 to 8.
AIPAC not only lobbied for the resolution; it had written it. "They [Congress] were given a resolution by AIPAC," said former Carter Administration National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski, who addressed the House Democratic Caucus on July 19. "They didn't prepare one."
AIPAC is the leading player in what is sometimes referred to as "The Israel Lobby" -- a coalition that includes major Jewish groups, neoconservative intellectuals and Christian Zionists. With its impressive contacts among Hill staffers, influential grassroots supporters and deep connections to wealthy donors, AIPAC is the lobby's key emissary to Congress. But in many ways, AIPAC has become greater than just another lobby; its work has made unconditional support for Israel an accepted cost of doing business inside the halls of Congress. AIPAC's interest, Israel's interest and America's interest are today perceived by most elected leaders to be one and the same. Christian conservatives increasingly aligned with AIPAC demand unwavering support for Israel from their Republican leaders. (In mid-July, 3,000-plus evangelicals came to town for the first annual "Christian United for Israel" summit.) And Democrats are equally concerned about alienating Jewish voters and Jewish donors -- long a cornerstone of their party. Some in Congress are deeply uncomfortable with AIPAC's militant worldview and heavyhanded tactics, but most dare not say so publicly.
"The Bush Administration is bad enough in tolerating measures they would not accept anywhere else but Israel," says Henry Siegman, the former head of the American Jewish Congress and a Middle East expert at the Council on Foreign Relations. "But the Congress, if anything, is urging the Administration on and criticizing them even at their most accommodating. When it comes to the Israeli-Arab conflict, the terms of debate are so influenced by organized Jewish groups, like AIPAC, that to be critical of Israel is to deny oneself the ability to succeed in American politics."
There are a few internationalist Republicans in the Senate and progressive Democrats in the House who occasionally dissent. Representative Dennis Kucinich and twenty-three co-sponsors have offered a resolution calling for an immediate cease-fire and a return to multiparty diplomacy between the United States and regional powers, with no preconditions. But even the resolution's supporters admit it isn't likely to go anywhere. Another bill introduced by several Arab-American lawmakers that stressed the need to minimize civilian casualties on both sides was "politically swept under the rug," according to Representative Nick Rahall, a Lebanese-American Democrat from West Virginia who voted against the House resolution. Dovish American-Israeli groups, such as Americans for Peace Now, have largely stayed out of the fight.
The latest hawkish Congressional activity is primarily intended to show voters and potential donors that elected officials are unwavering friends of Israel and enemies of terrorism. "It's just for home consumption," said Representative Charlie Rangel, a powerful New York Democrat who signed on to Kucinich's resolution. "We don't have the support of countries that support us! What the hell are we going to do, bomb Iran? Bomb Syria?" His colleagues, said Rahall, "were trying to out-AIPAC AIPAC."
Discussion in Congress quickly widened beyond Israel to include a broader policy of confrontation toward the entire Middle East. Congressmen sent a flurry of "dear colleague" letters to one another, hoping to pressure the Administration into tightening sanctions on Syria and Iran, Hezbollah's two main state sponsors. Former Middle East envoy Dennis Ross addressed a packed AIPAC-sponsored luncheon on the Hill, where, according to one aide present, Ross told the room: "This is all about Syria and Iran ... we shouldn't be condemning Israel now." Said Representative Robert Andrews, a Democrat from New Jersey and co-chair of the Iran Working Group, which this week hosted an official from the Israeli embassy: "I concur completely with that approach."
Democrats, as they did during the Dubai ports scandal, used the crisis to score a few cheap, easy political points against the Bush Administration. The new prime minister of Iraq, Nouri al-Maliki, found himself engulfed in a Congressional firestorm after he denounced Israel's attacks on Lebanon as an act of "aggression." Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee chair Rahm Emanuel, who volunteered in Israel during the first Gulf War, called on Maliki to cancel his planned address before Congress. Asked Senator Chuck Schumer, who skipped Maliki's July 26 speech: "Which side is he on when it comes to the war on terror?" Howard Dean one upped his colleagues, labeling Maliki an "anti-Semite" during a speech in Palm Beach, Florida.
Ironically, during the 2004 campaign Dean called on the United States to be an "evenhanded" broker in the Middle East. That position enraged party leaders such as House minority leader Nancy Pelosi, who signed a letter attacking his remarks. "It was designed to send a message: No one ever does this again," says M.J. Rosenberg of the center-left Israel Policy Forum. "And no one has. The only safe thing to say is: I support Israel." In April a representative from AIPAC called Congresswoman Betty McCollum's vote against a draconian bill severely curtailing aid to the Palestinian Authority "support for terrorists."
Not surprisingly, most in Congress see far more harm than reward in getting in the Israeli lobby's way. "There remains a perception of power and fear that AIPAC can undo you," says James Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute. He points to the defeats of Representative Paul Findley and Senator Charles Percy in the 1980s and Representatives Cynthia McKinney and Earl Hilliard in 2002, when AIPAC steered large donors to their opponents. Even if AIPAC's make-you-or-break-you reputation is largely a myth, in an election year that perception is potent. Thirty-six pro-Israel PACs gave $3.14 million to candidates in the 2004 election cycle. Rahall said his opponent for re-election issued his first press release of the campaign after Rahall voted against the House resolution. "Everybody knew what would happen if they didn't vote yes," he says.
AIPAC continues to enjoy deep bipartisan backing inside Congress even after two top AIPAC officials were indicted a year ago for allegedly accepting and passing on confidential national security secrets from a Defense Department analyst. "The US and Israel share a lot of basic common values. The vast majority of the American people not only support Israel's actions against Hezbollah but also the fundamental US-Israel relationship, and the bipartisan support in Congress reflects that," says AIPAC spokesman Josh Block. Rosenberg, himself a former AIPAC staffer, puts it another way: "This is the one issue on which liberals are permitted, even expected, by donors to be mindless hawks."
By blindly following AIPAC, Congress reinforces a hard-line consensus: Criticizing Israeli actions, even in the best of faith, is anti-Israel and possibly anti-Semitic; enthusiastically backing whatever military action Israel undertakes is the only acceptable stance.
Recent Gallup polls show that half of Americans support Israel's military campaign, yet 65 percent believe the United States should not take sides in the conflict. But it's hard to imagine any Congress, or subsequent Administration, returning to the role of honest broker. What the region needs now, according to Brzezinski, is an American leader brave enough to say: "Either I make policy on the Middle East or AIPAC makes policy on the Middle East." One can always dream.
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