I don’t know about my fellow Jewish Americans, but this past week felt a lot like Chanukah in July, with my head spinning like a turbo-charged dreidel.
Here’s what happened.
Robert Kennedy Jr., who is running to upend Joe Biden, has a history of cozying up to conspiracy theories. But his latest rant went off the rails.
He said COVID-19 is targeted to attack Caucasians and Black people. He said, “The people who are most immune are Ashkenazi Jews and Chinese.”
I trust the readers of this blog really don’t need me to lay out how bigoted that crackpot theory is. But just in case, I’ll give you a couple of thoughts.
Ashkenazi Jews are Caucasians, even though anti-Semites say we are a mongrel race. Plus, Jews, since the Middle Ages, have been hatefully accused of poisoning wells and spreading disease they’ve somehow, demonically protected themselves from.
But a couple of days after Kennedy said what he said, he gave an incredibly lucid, nuanced and historically accurate interview to the Jewish News Service about the State of Israel.
https://www.jns.org/us-news/robert-f-kennedy-jr/23/7/17/303383/
He said “This affection, this affinity relationship with Israel, is part of the DNA of our family.”
So I ask you. Is he an Anti-Semite or not an anti-Semite?
RFK Jr. may be crazy but for sure he isn’t stupid. As Abe Foxman, former head of the Anti-Defamation League said of his COVID remark, “It can’t be ignorance because he is not ignorant, so he must believe it.”
But then there’s that JNS interview.
For me, that’s head spin number one.
Also this past week, Washington Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal stood up in front of a conference of progressives in Chicago and said, “I want you to know that we’ve been fighting to make it clear that Israel is a racist state.”
When her fellow Democrats reigned crap down on her head, 43 of them condemned her remarks, she backtracked saying, “I do not believe the idea (emphasis mine) of Israel as a nation is racist” only that the current Israeli government is engaging in “outright racist policies.”
Okay, blah, blah, blah.
Adding to the bile-on (no typo), the ever reliable and predictably progressive New York Times chimed in.
Did you see its headline on Michelle Goldberg’s column? “The Hysterical Overreaction to Jayapal’s ‘Racist State’ Gaffe”.
I have news for the Times. Jayapal’s remarks weren’t a gaffe. Just like RFK Jr., she ain’t stupid.
At that same event, Michigan Congresswoman Ilhan Omar, said the Palestinians “have now experienced occupation and displacement for 75 years.” Of course she is totally ignorant of history but here’s what she means. The Jewish state, granted its independence by the United Nations partition plan 75 years ago, is illegitimate and should cease to exist.
Israel’s President Herzog said it correctly and succinctly. In his speech this past week before Congress he said, “Criticism of Israel must not cross the line into negation of the State of Israel’s right to exist. Questioning the Jewish people’s right to self-determination is not legitimate diplomacy, it is anti-Semitism.”
So how come there was no condemnation of Omar’s remarks?
Congress’ pro-Israel resolution after Jayapal’s gaffe, isn’t an overreaction. But its silence after Ilhan Omar’s anti-Israel speech is certainly an under reaction.
So, what brings Congressional condemnation and what doesn’t when it comes to Israel and the Jews? That’s head spinner number two.
And now, the anti-Semitic incident this past week that, for some reason, saddened me more than what RFK Jr. said or what Jayapal or Omar spouted.
It came from none other than one of the greatest baseball players of all time. It came from Hall of Famer, Johnny Bench.
Some quick background for those of you who may not be familiar with him.
In the 1970’s, Johnny Bench was the star catcher for the Cincinnati Reds. He was a 14-time all star. He was part of the Cincinnati team nicknamed the Big Red Machine that dominated the game, winning four National League pennants and two World Series titles.
This past week, there was a tribute in Cincinnati to the Reds’ former General Manager, the late Gabe Paul, who happened to be Jewish.
During the ceremony, another Reds legend, Pete Rose, described how Paul signed him right out of high school for $400 a month.
When someone in the room shouted out “That’s cheap!” Bench blurted out, “He was Jewish!”
Some in the crowd laughed, others smiled. But as the organization Stand Up to Jewish Hate tweeted, “Making a joke about someone being cheap because they are Jewish is no laughing matter.”
Indeed it isn’t.
Here’s why I found that incident in Cincinnati the most troubling, the most head-spinning if you will, during a week filled anti-Semitism and anti-Israelism.
It didn’t come from the highly educated heir to a great American family, or from duly elected Congresswomen. It wasn’t political. It wasn’t idealogical. It came from a guy who played baseball and who became rich and famous working for a Jew.
It came from the age-old and corrosive anti-Jewish tropes that are, in the year 2023, still deeply ingrained in our American society.
Shame on Johnny Bench and shame on those who laughed and snickered when he opened his big, fat, anti-Semitic mouth.
You make me worry. You make me sick. You make my head spin.
1 thought on “Head Spinning Haters”
1. Bench attempted to be funny but made a bad joke – he deserves to be gonged.
2. Kennedy ? You have to wonder; certainly not the only smart person afflicted with conspiratorial thoughts. Need to ask sociologists, psychologists, and psychiatrist about this phenomenon. Agree he had excellent come-back on JNS.
3. Jayapal, Omar, and the Eight others best left nameless – good to know who are your enemies. They are a cancer. As such, they need to be completely removed from the body politic and ideally the public forum; the body then needs to bolsters its health and immune response with better ongoing surveillance to prevent, or stop early the cancer recurrence.
4. New York Times: Imagine how good it will be if it turns around one day – hope it won’t take 40 years of wandering in its current desert deficient in honest thinking and reporting.