Bulldozer Attack in Jerusalem: “He tried to run over anything that moves” July 2, 2008

The Jerusalem Post today breaks the heart-wrenching news: three people were killed and 66 more wounded (1 moderately, the rest “lightly”) when a bulldozer-driving terrorist, 30-year-old Husam Taysir Dwayat from “Southeast Jerusalem” plowed through downtown Jerusalem. His rampage would crush six cars and overturn others, and would demolish a bus in its wake, and would end upon his being killed by a quick-thinking IDF soldier:

Three people were killed and 66 were wounded - one moderately and the rest lightly - on Wednesday afternoon when a bulldozer driver went on a rampage in downtown Jerusalem.

A half-dozen cars were flattened and others were overturned by the Caterpillar vehicle. A bus was also overturned, and another bus was heavily damaged. The attack, at the junction of Jaffa Road and Sarei Yisrael St., set off a panic in the area and left a large swath of damage in the heart of the capital. Traffic was halted, and hundreds of people fled through the streets in panic as medics treated the wounded.

A car was dragged several meters by the bulldozer before being crushed under the vehicle. A baby was pulled out by a passerby before the vehicle was crushed, with the child’s mother still inside.

The rampage would come to an end at the hands of Moshe Plesser and Eli Mizrahi — Plesser only being 18 years of age at the time — who would shoot a combined five rounds at Dwayat, killing him:

As he began running towards the bulldozer, Plesser said that he shouted out to onlookers for a gun. Together with another civilian, Plesser climbed aboard the bulldozer and began wrestling with the driver. “At one point he [the driver] yelled out “Allah Akhbar” [God is great] and stepped on the gas pedal,” Plesser recalled. “I drew the weapon of the civilian who was with me and shot the driver three times in the head. I think I did what is expected from every soldier and citizen.”

Seconds later, a police officer, Eli Mizrahi, climbed aboard the bulldozer and shot the terrorist again, killing him.

…The policeman, Mizrahi, later told reporters at the scene that he had acted “precisely as we were taught to do.”

Mizrahi said he had been on duty with his partner nearby when word of the attack came through and he sped to the scene on his motorbike. He saw a trail of smashed and crushed cars and wounded pedestrians, he said, cocked his gun and dashed toward the bulldozer in which the perpetrator was driving.

An armed Israeli civilian fired first, Mizrahi said, referring to Plesser, but the tractor was still moving, “crushing a car and heading towards more civilians.”

So Mizrahi climbed up to the driver’s cab. “I fired twice. And he was neutralized.”

Ironically, Plesser is the brother-in-law of of Capt. David Shapira, the IDF officer who killed the terrorist who went on a shooting rampage at the Mercaz Harav Yeshiva in March.

Three organizations claimed responsibility for the bulldozer attack - Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigade, the militant armed wing of the Fatah movement, the Galilee Freedom Battalion, suspected of being “affiliated with Hezbollah”, and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP).

Besides the usual outrage at the horrible loss of life, and my heart going out to my fellow Jews who died in the Holy City — here’s why I feel personally played out, betrayed almost, by this particular terror attack: (more…)

Washington Post/ABC News Poll: Racist Feeling in America June 22, 2008

Roughly 3 in 10 Americans admit to harboring “some feelings of racial prejudice”, a new Washington Post/ABC News poll released this week has found. Some 30% of white respondents and 34% of black respondents answered yes to the question: “If you honestly assessed yourself, would you say that you have at least some feelings of racial prejudice?”

The numbers in the June 15th poll represent a 12% decline from 1999, when 34% of Americans answered yes to the same question.

When asked, “Generally speaking, do you think race relations in the United States are excellent, good, not so good or poor?”, however, a full 51% of Americans — 36% of Black Americans — responded that race relations were positive in America (47% saying “good”), more than double the dismal 21% — 10% of Blacks — who answered positively to the same question in 1992, and nearly double 1996’s 28% (11% of Blacks). (The Post notes that the gap between White and Black positive responses — 17% — is the largest since polling on the topic began in 1992.)

These numbers should strike hope in all of us. While showing that we have far to go, these numbers also show some measure of how far we have come. While, yes, over 6 in 10 Black Americans considered race relations to be negative in America, this is a far cry from the 9 in 10 who considered them to be so in 1992 — and the number of Black Americans who consider themselves to have a close, personal White friend is up to over 9 in 10 in 2008, a 10% increase from even 2003. (I have a personal issue with the phrasing of the question, “Do you think blacks experience discrimination…?” in the Washington Post poll — this clearly ignores the anti-White discrimination that 1 in 4 White Americans said they experienced in a 2006 CNN poll. In that CNN poll, however, barely 1 in 8 Americans considered themselves “racially biased,” but this poll shows that an “honest” assessment of “racist feelings” perhaps brings out more closet racists.)

We really are coexisting more.

While a country where two-thirds of Black Americans have been subjected to hearing offensive racist remarks (as a March 2008 CBS News poll showed), the far-reaching majority (nearly 9 in 10) White Americans said that they think America is ready for a Black president, and that alone shows that we Americans have the perception that our country is ready to move forward to a new chapter in its history.

We Americans believe our country has “grown up” from its racist past to at least some degree.

And now all we need to do is take it that many steps further, towards what we all know we are capable of achieving.

Hawking Anti-Obama Propaganda June 18, 2008

Apollo Braun (real name: Doron Braunshtein), an Israeli-born New York-area visual artist, has begun to gain notariety as of late for his ever-creative anti-Obama gear. In March, he launched his line of $129-250 custom “Who Killed Obama?” T-shirts, calling himself very “punk rock” to the fashion blogger at the New York Press. In May, Braun launched his Jews Against Obama T-shirt (pictured), also retailing for $250 from his Lower East Side boutique. On the release of this newest piece of politico-fashion, Braun gave his true feelings on Obama in a statement:

“I am a true anti-Obama New York Jew. The word on the street is that New York Jews will vote for McCain anyhow. The majority of the Jews – at least the ones that are proud of their religion and practice it – like me, don’t want to see Obama – a man who’s middle name is Hussein, and his family from his Kenyan father’s side is Muslim, as the leader of this great country.

More than that, after Obama’s pastor, Jeremiah Wright honored Louis Farrakhan – definitely one of the most racist and anti-Semitic people alive – Obama lost us Jews totally. That made me start this political movement in the first place.”

And today, I get an Email from Mr. Braun’s publicist, telling of his new $30-creation, an “Obama=Hitler” T-shirt, perhaps his most shocking creation to date:

Israeli born, New York based pop artist and fashion designer Doron Braunshtein, also known as Apollo Braun, owner of the five year old “Apollo Braun” boutique on Orchard Street on the Lower East Side, crossed all limits and boundaries with his new creation: a t-shirt bearing the slogan “Obama = Hitler”. As of yesterday, the batch of the first 200 t-shirts came to his store and seven of his most devoted customers already bought the t-shirt, which cost only $30. “I never thought I would ever sell something that I created at such a cheap price,” Braunshtein says, “but you have to understand me, I want to see as many people as I can wearing my idea, and I don’t want money to stand between them and this fabulous t-shirt.”

Braunshtein explains why he made the association between Obama and Hitler: “I have an incredible imagination, you can call it a Jewish imagination if you want and it is what it is, Obama reminds me of Hitler in more ways than I can explain. I mean, every time I hear Obama speak, I automatically think about Hitler.

Hitler was an excellent speaker, who gave great speeches and made the masses follow him almost blindly, Obama is also an excellent speaker, who gives great speeches – like the incredible speech about race – who encourages the masses to follow him. But exactly like Hitler, in my opinion, Obama doesn’t talk, he just preaches, for God’s sake, does anyone understand a word he is saying? All I hear him do is just preach and preach. Also, Obama, exactly like Hitler in his time, will tell you whatever you want to hear, can manage any kind of crowd of people and will promise you the world, but what can I tell you, I am just not his fan. He cannot fool me.”

First of all, the fact that any Israeli-born artist would ever call anyone who is as pro-Jewish and pro-Israel as Obama “Hitler” makes me shudder and cringe. To do so is shortsighted, ignorant, and completely baseless. Dov Hikind’s March assessment of Barack-lash, that Jewish voters would make “a mass movement toward Sen. McCain” in November, while it could be expected, should not be applauded and certainly not taken as a harbinger of a “true New York Jew.” Obama was so pro-Israel when he addressed AIPAC it would leave Arab-Americans and Palestinians wondering if they could even support the nominee.

As blogger Gershon Goremberg says in the name of ambassador Dan Kurtzer: “The one candidate who speaks in clear terms of taking a new approach to the Mideast is Obama. This is what scares the small coterie of American Jewish rightists who would eagerly fight to the last Israeli. If you care about Israel, you should hit “delete” when you get their emails.”

People who care about Israel, says the ambassador, delete such filth from their inboxes.

So given Obama’s fervently pro-Israel stance, pro-Jewish stances, pro-diversity and anti-racist stances, and his distancing himself (or outright rejecting) sequentially from every prejudiced member of his inner circle, precisely where does one draw the parallel between Obama and Hitler? Precisely where does one get off making visual fiascos as offensive as to have someone dressed as Hitler in front of a Palestinian flag?

I’d say that “some people do anything for a buck”, but Mr. Braun is letting these objets go at one-eighth his normal asking price. Besides, he believes his own filth anyway.

Apparently, in some minds, no amount of fact can change a fallacious opinion.

Obama and The Jews II May 22, 2008

These past few weeks I’ve been touring, promoting my album, This is Babylon and haven’t been able to write as much as I had been in the past. From Berlin to LA and everywhere in between, these past few weeks have been a non-stop marathon of promotion and performance.

And I believe today’s travesty which graces the front page of the New York Times is a quite apt segue to make my return to the blogosphere.

Jodi Kantor’s “As Obama Heads to Florida, Many of Its Jews Have Doubts” highlights, in black and white, perhaps one of the most lamentable upshots of collective Jewish consciousness: the anti-Semitism still latently looming over America (and the world)’s present and ominously towering over the world’s recent past, combined with the advent of Web 2.0, has opened the door to a whole new era of misinformation and paranoia. Ms. Kantor’s article chronicled her visit to the “Aberdeen Golf and Country Club” (so right off the bat — mince no words — we know precisely which class of people we’re dealing with) where she met Jews who voiced their insecurities with voting for Obama.

Predominantly representing the aging South Florida demographic whose largely 70+ populace have become anecdotal (and the butts of painful puns like “Botoxodox Jews”), Ms. Kantor’s interviewees showed a downright depressing susceptability to the Obama-noia that’s been plaguing the inboxes of many likely Democratic voters:

“The people here will not vote for Obama…because of his attitude towards Israel,” Ms. [Shirley] Weitz, 83, said…”They’re going to vote for McCain.”

Does anyone realize — or care — that the Jerusalem Post said that Obama’s voting record was “impeccable” regarding Israel? Is it that Sen. Obama supports a two-state solution regarding Israel and Palestine — the same thing that is advocated by both Hillary and McCain? Is it that Sen. Obama expressed willingness to speak to Iran? Would it be better to just consider Iran the world’s first “suicide state” prima facie, and react accordingly?

Perhaps the most disturbing thing is the rundown in the continuation of the article. Ms. Kantor’s article continues with an interview with Rabbi Ruvi New — who mused about the entire election coming down to a “few old Jews in Century Village” — and then moves on to Jews who have become a “conduit” for Obama misinformation.

Ms. Kantor’s article notes that some “older Jews…as well as many younger ones” believed any number of fanciful inaccuracies, One man believed his friends’ word that Obama was “an Arab”. One woman suspected affiliation with Palestinian organizations, and one woman suspected al-Qa’eda had endorsed Obama. As Jack Cafferty alluded today on CNN, how is it possible that such affluent people, such educated people, such worldly people could be susceptible to such misinformation?

And perhaps the worst part of all comes out when racism — the elephant in the room thus far — gets brought up. Ms. Kantor alleges that some of the voters’ apprehension was as rooted in race as it was in Israel relations:

At brunch in Boynton Beach, Bob W…in his 80s, said…bluntly, “Am I semi-racist? Yes.”

Is this really just “par for the course”, the “nature of the beast”? Does it have to be this way? Is Obama campaigning in Florida in vain? Is there really nothing that David Axelrod and Robert Wexler, Obama’s Jewish Florida strategist, can do to change these opinions? And perhaps worse — will these Jews vote for a right-wing candidate who Bush said will “continue…his policy”, in spite of their own and the country’s best interests, just because at the most cursory of face values, a white face is more trustworthy than a brown one? Mr. Obama shares very little psychographically with most of the anti-Semites in the black community, as Ms. Kantor notes — he lives in a community alongside Jews and has “close ties” to Jews his entire career.

Obama has denounced Farrakhan, Rev. Wright, and virtually every other enemy of the Jews in the African-American community. The Jews in Florida are demographically less poised to flip-flop to the GOP — as opposed to their New York counterparts — and if it’s really racism that would cause such a flip it is time for anyone who has come to pooh-pooh such conduct to engage in self-examination.

All the information on Obama’s voting record is available and can easily disprove the online rumormonger set. But nothing in the world can make him un-black. We have to remember what is at stake — and if American troops are put on track to “stay in Iraq for 50 years”, it will be small consolation that an old white man sent them there.

Obama on Energy Independence and Diplomacy April 23, 2008

New Perspectives Quarterly this quarter ran an interview with Barack Obama on topics such as energy independence, the Iraq War, and foreign relations. NPQ (and the Huffington Post)’s Beverly Davis conducted the interview which gives even more of a clear-cut view as to what the Obama administration would look like.

Regarding energy conservation and independence, Obama would like to see a “national low carbon fuel standard”, encourage “clean energy blends” for American automobiles, and establish a fuel economy standard of “just 40 miles per gallon” — all in order “to reduce…oil dependency.” While it could be argued that this alone could provide an economic stimulus for Americans who are slated to pay up to $5 a gallon for gas in some areas, this shows Barack Obama has made carbon footprints a priority, in line with the growing, green-ing opinion of much of the nation he was accused of being “out of touch” with.

Obama also called into question many of the executive orders which made Bush infamous. Among them are the virtual elimination of habeas corpus, which Bush attempted in both of his terms, giving the government the power to arrest citizens and try them as military combatants, and that “civilian courts cannot intervene to inquire into the legality of such arrests”. I had been wary of the fact that, for all the Democratic party speaks about, there has been very little talk about the future of these orders. Obama says on the topic:

A lot of the encroachments on civil liberties have been done not by legislation but through executive order, so one of the things I want to do is first of all have an attorney general that believes in protecting constitutional rights and the separation of powers and have him or her and the Justice Department engage in a thorough evaluation of our executive orders.

Restoring habeas corpus, closing Guantanamo, strengthening the role of the FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act) court in reviewing wiretap requests — those are all areas where we can more rapidly roll back some of the more damaging aspects of President Bush’s approach.

Obama re-asserted that America must speak to its enemies and friends alike in the Middle East to achieve lasting stability in the region, and that he was disappointed with recent journalistic crackdowns in Russia.

Read the entire interview here.

In the urgency of now, America needs Barack Obama.

Canada: Another Record-Setting Year For Anti-Semitism April 16, 2008

Anti-Semitic incidents in Canada hit another record high in 2007, according to the League of Human Rights of B’nai Brith Canada. The 2007 total of 1,042 incidents represented an 11.4% increase over the previous year, and was nearly double the 586 incidents reported in 2003: (more…)

Hillary: Trying to be the new Huckabee? April 13, 2008

Hillary, Hillary, Hillary.

First she got played out by Tim Russert on NBC’s Meet the Press, where she was shown, vis-a-vis her campaign platform, to have flipflopped on a number of issues, most notably the Iraq War where, despite her claims to the contrary, she voted to fund the war numerous times.

But now, in her desire to paint herself as different from Obama, after Obama’s remarks about “small-town voters” being “bitter”, she’s reinvented herself — and now she’s a gun-totin’ hunter. ABCNews reports:

Sen. Hillary Clinton continued her critique of Sen. Barack Obama’s comments about small town America today, and used it to connect herself with the voters her opponent may have alienated.

Speaking about how Americans value their Second Amendment rights and enjoy hunting prompted Clinton to tell a story about her own hunting experience.

“You know my dad took me out behind the cottage my grandfather built on a little lake called Lake Winola outside of Scranton and taught me how to shoot when I was a little girl,” she said. “You know some people have continued to teach their children and their grandchildren. It’s part of culture, it’s part of a way of life. People enjoy hunting and shooting because it’s part of who they are. not because they are bitter”

When did the R in Hillary R. Clinton begin to stand for “rifle”? From Bill Ruthhart at the Indianapolis Star:

“I grew up in a church-going family, a family that believed in the importance of living out and expressing our faith. The people of faith I know don’t ‘cling’ to religion because they are bitter. People embrace faith not because they are materially poor, but because they are spiritually rich.”

While her comments about Obama headlined her Indianapolis visit, Clinton also touted her plan to create a “new generation” of defense manufacturing jobs…

The New York Times’ Julie Bosman said Hillary described herself as a “pro-gun churchgoer”.

CBS News’ Fernando Suarez:

“I am the granddaughter of a factory worker,” Clinton said. “My grandfather went to work at the age of 11, before there were child labor laws, and worked in the lace mills in Scranton, Pennsylvania.”

She added, “I grew up in the Midwest, born in Chicago, raised outside of that great city, and I was raised with Midwestern values and an unshakable faith in America and its promise.”

So now she’s avidly pro-gun, church-going Hillary with “Midwestern values” and “lives out” the “faith of her…grandparents” and wants to create a “new generation” of “defense manufacturing jobs”?

Not sounding very much like a Democrat.

While Obama “could have spoken better” about small-town voters, Obama was not referring to the millions of hardworking Americans who form the backbone of the American working class, he was talking about those who deviate from our social norms and turn to hate. “Clinging to guns and…religion” or “antipathy” does not happen to the average American hopefully; this is the reaction of a certain portion of the population.

Clinton called his remarks demeaning and her supporters handed out stickers saying “I’m not bitter” while Obama apologized, saying, “If I worded things in a way that made people offended, I deeply regret that.”

While Obama undoubtedly could have used a better choice of words — is Obama’s misspeaking a reason for Hillary to completely rebrand herself? Is she trying to out-rightwing the right wing? Is she trying to be the new Huckabee, positioning herself as the choice of churchgoing traditional voters? To do that, she will put herself at odds with most of the Democratic party — and even if Obama (G-d forbid) doesn’t get the nomination, she will have to somehow appeal to all of us who supported Obama because we do want change.

Or maybe she wants the election to go to the GOP?

Dutch Jewish Producer: “Geert Wilders Is A Bigot” March 24, 2008

I feel like a broken record but I had to chronicle this little piece of Jewish-Muslim unity, from the Monthly Review Foundation’s MR Zine.

Jewish TV producer Harry De Winter has blasted Geert Wilders’ anti-Islam film aspirations with a provocative advertisement on the front page of the Dutch de Volkskrant:

TV Producer Harry de Winter, President of the board of the foundation Een Ander Joods Geluid [Another Jewish Voice], today placed a remarkable advertisement on the front page of the newspaper Volkskrant. De Winter puts Geert Wilders’s criticism of Muslims in the same category as anti-Semitism…

What is your message?

[De Winter:] “We Jews know better than anyone else what this sort of discrimination can lead to. Wilders claims that the Muslims must be dealt with and that the Koran is a fascist book. That’s how the persecution of Jews once started, by generalization. Therefore, it is time for a sharper criticism from the Jewish community. If you say the same thing about the Jews or Israel, you are considered an anti-Semite and ostracized. It is good that this feeling of justice is so strong, but, for me, there is no difference between the yarmulke and the headscarf.”

The ad reads:

“If Wilders had said the same thing about Jews (and the Old Testament) as he does about Muslims (and the Koran), he would have been ostracized a long time ago and accused of anti-Semitism.”

Anti-religious prejudice — whether Islamophobia or anti-Semitism — is never OK and baruch Hashem Mr. De Winter has come out publicly to say so. He says he hopes to “get support from the whole Jewish community” — he already has mine.

Geert Wilders and Islamophobic Incitement

Geert Wilders, the Islamophobic (not, he says, to be confused with anti-Muslim, which would be wrong) right-wing Dutch MP who everyone loves to hate has decided to go full-speed ahead with releasing his anti-Islam film, Fitna — which has already begun to spark outrage throughout the European Union and the Muslim world:

Already, 15,000 people have protested in Afghanistan against the film, burning Dutch flags.

Nato commanders say that the Taliban could use it to whip up more anger and the Dutch ambassador in Malaysia said protests could lead to “dozens of deaths”. Indonesia, the most populous Muslim nation, said the film would threaten peace.

In a speech to the European parliament in Strasbourg this year, the Grand Mufti of Syria warned of global consequences. “If there is unrest, bloodshed and violence after the broadcast of the Koran film, Wilders will be responsible,” he said.

The website for the film - fitnathemovie.com - was taken offline by its Internet Service Provider, Network Solutions, for the flagrant violation of its acceptable use policy which bans such inciting speech.

Of course, like minds flock together — the Czech far-right National Party has offered to step up and broadcast the movie, offering Wilders asylum and protection in the Czech Republic in an “undisclosed location” should any attempts be made on his life.

And all this for what? To continue to give a voice to this man’s racist diatribe? This is someone who has called Islamic society “retarded” and inferior, and who has called the Qur’an a “fascist text”? Where is the heter, who gave this man permission, to just patently diss 1/6 of humanity like this?

Would he honestly be able to stomach an equivalent diss against his own faith, his own background, his own culture? And the National Party will be equally responsible if they take the disastrous step of broadcasting Fitna in lieu of Network Solutions.

Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard told the Dutch De Volksrant in an exclusive interview that:

Dutch politician Geert Wilders should definitely air his anti-Quranfilm, Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard says Monday in an exclusive interview in the Dutch newspaper ‘de Volkskrant’.

Westergaard says he does not understand Dutch politicians who say that Wilders should not air his film. ‘There is not a single politician in Denmark that would state a similar thing. That would mean political suicide for him. Every Danish politician knows you should never limit the freedom of speech.’

Westergaard does not regret his caricatures of the prophet Muhammad ‘at all’. ‘It started out as and still is a matter of freedom of speech.’ Westergaard considers starting this debate as a ‘duty’ of newspapers and cartoonists. ‘Muslims are to accept that.’

Muslims are to “accept that”? Freedom of speech, as the Egyptian ambassador to Indonesia already said, is circumscribed by a sense of responsibility which must likewise never be compromised — the International Human Rights Law makes provisions for hate speech and related things.

How is Westergaard living, by the way?

Death threats have forced Westergaard to live in safe houses. He will soon be moving to a new shelter for the sixth time.

He was first criticized after he had drawn a picture of the prophet Muhammed wearing a bomb-shaped turban for the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten. His caricatures were recently republished by several newspapers in Denmark. Three men plotting an attack on his life were arrested mid February….More than 200 thousand people demonstrated against the Danish cartoons and the Dutch film of Wilders in the Afghan city of Jalalabad on Sunday. ‘Death to Denmark, death to the Nederlands’, the crowd shouted.

So Wilders is willing to go through this, put Dutch troops on the frontlines in danger, cause millions of euros in losses for Dutch businesses, potentially cause hundreds of murders, and cause a worldwide furor by insulting the faith of 1/6 of humanity — for what? What could possibly be worth it?

Obama on Wright: “Outrageously Wrong” March 23, 2008

And I agree.

Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s decision to publish a Hamas manifesto in his church bulletin — perhaps one of the most abrasive things one could print in one’s church newsletter — seems to be part of his now increasingly indefensible MO. Obama has called the decision “outrageously wrong” and told the JTA:

“I have already condemned my former pastor’s views on Israel in the strongest possible terms, and I certainly wasn’t in church when that outrageously wrong Los Angeles Times piece was re-printed in the bulletin,” Obama said in a statement e-mailed to JTA late Thursday.

“Hamas is a terrorist organization, responsible for the deaths of many innocents, and dedicated to Israel’s destruction, as evidenced by their bombarding of Sderot in recent months. I support requiring Hamas to meet the international community’s conditions of recognizing Israel, renouncing violence, and abiding by past agreements before they are treated as a legitimate actor.”

Obama needs to keep this guy as far away as possible.

Just Deal With It, Gerri March 12, 2008

Geraldine Ferraro messed up. Bad. And refuses to admit it.

After making the now famous faux pas in Torrance, California’s Daily Breeze where she implied that the only reason Obama was in such a prominent position was because he happened to be black:

When the subject turned to Obama, Clinton’s rival for the Democratic Party nomination, Ferraro’s comments took on a decidedly bitter edge.

“I think what America feels about a woman becoming president takes a very secondary place to Obama’s campaign - to a kind of campaign that it would be hard for anyone to run against,” she said. “For one thing, you have the press, which has been uniquely hard on her. It’s been a very sexist media. Some just don’t like her. The others have gotten caught up in the Obama campaign.

“If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position,” she continued. “And if he was a woman (of any color) he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is. And the country is caught up in the concept.”

Obviously anyone with a shred of dignity would feel patronized by such an implication — “the only reason you’re even in here is because you’re black” — and Obama was no exception, telling the Today show:

“Part of what I think Geraldine Ferraro is doing, and I respect the fact that she was a trailblazer, is to participate in the kind of slice and dice politics that’s about race and about gender and about this and that, and that’s what Americans are tired of because they recognize that when we divide ourselves in that way we can’t solve problems.”

Obama’s campaign manager David Axelrod said that Ms. Ferraro should “be removed” from her responsibilities on the Clinton campaign, to which Clinton responded that she did “not agree” with Ms. Ferraro’s ever-so-enlightened assessment of the situation.

Marc Ambinder from The Atlantic rightfully notes, not only did Hillary not fire Ms. Ferraro, she did not denounce her statements or even “feel as if she has to apologize for Ferraro’s comments; after all, they are Ferraro’s, not her own”, according to her aides. Far worse than the “monster” comment from the Obama camp, Obama’s campaign manager David Axelrod said that for Hillary at this point, other than firing Ferraro, “there’s no other way to send a serious signal that you want to police the tone of this campaign.”

At this point, perhaps Ms. Ferraro should perhaps shut up for a while. Go below the media radar and work behind the scenes for a bit. Maybe take a strategically-timed “vacation”.

Or, she could try to make a huge stink, and try to turn the tables on Obama’s camp, claiming racism and discrimination herself and “vigorously” defending her statements:

‘Any time anybody does anything that in any way pulls this campaign down and says let’s address reality and the problems we’re facing in this world, you’re accused of being racist, so you have to shut up,’ Ferraro said. ‘Racism works in two different directions. I really think they’re attacking me because I’m white. How’s that?’…

Ferraro said she was simply stating an obvious truth, as seen in exit polls that show Obama taking as much as 80 percent of the black vote in the Democratic primaries.

” ‘In all honesty, do you think that if he were a white male, there would be a reason for the black community to get excited for a historic first?’ Ferraro said. ‘Am I pointing out something that doesn’t exist?’ …”

She says her comments were not racist, but a fact, and as far as Hillary is concerned, the New York Times says there is “no indication” that Ms. Ferraro will step down from her duties. And her attempts to throw gender into the mix and cry “sexist media” and portray herself as the dual victim of patriarchy and anti-white racism caused Feministing.com to respond simply, “F you, Geraldine Ferraro.”
(more…)

“The Redneck Shop”: The KKK Superstore March 11, 2008

Introducing “The Redneck Shop”.

Serving racists in Laurens, South Carolina since 1996.
(more…)