The New Democratic Meme Jews Opposing Obama Are Evil, Greedy, and Have Dual Loyalty

by Barry Rubin

I was horrified by reports that the powerful congressman, Henry Waxman, had said that Jews in the ninth New York district voted against President Barack Obama “to protect their wealth.” Could the obsession with backing Obama have led a leading Jewish politician to make such a stereotypical antisemitic remark?

In fact, Waxman’s statement was taken out of context. As usually happens, however, a proper understanding of what someone is saying teaches far more than stereotyping their argument.

Let’s examine Waxman’s statement as quoted in The Hill newspaper:

“I think Jewish voters will be Democratic and be for Obama in 2012, especially if you get a Republican candidate like [Texas] Gov. [Rick] Perry. But there’s no question the Jewish community is much more bipartisan than it has been in previous years. There are Jews who are trending toward the Republican Party, some of it because of their misunderstanding of Obama’s policies in the Middle East, and some of it, quite frankly, for economic reasons. They feel they want to protect their wealth, which is why a lot of well-off voters vote for Republicans.”

Let’s consider this statement. The first part is correct: More Jews are voting against Democrats and will vote against Obama, but the majority will continue to support them. The problem comes in the second part and an accurate reading teaches us several things.

First, the Democratic Party has taken a sharp turn to the left and much of which passes for “liberalism” nowadays is in fact a radicalism that opposes traditional liberal ideas. American liberalism has never been systematically or doctrinally anti-capitalist, much less anti-American.

There is a vast scam going on that represents the current left’s success in doing what the Communist Party tried to do in the 1930s. That’s why many liberal—and especially Jewish—intellectuals have turned against what’s happening now. Even many of those Democrats and Jews in general who vote for radicals-pretending-to-be-liberals do so with deep doubts.

Hey, Mr. Waxman, I’d love to vote Democratic but I can’t because your party and president advocate and implement policies that endanger the United States, destroy the economy, create unemployment, and destabilize the world. They also damage Israel’s security, Middle East stability, the struggle against revolutionary Islamism, and even build anti-Israel views and hatred among many American supporters of your side. If you want my vote, get rid of Obama and change your policies.

Instead, what we’re getting is the manipulation of habit and fearmongering to make Jews–and others–think that conservatives and Republicans as a blend of country club antisemite, Nazi storm trooper, and religious fanatic. The administration and its supporters are doing everything possible to spread hate, fear, and arrogant snobbishness toward fellow Americans.

The reference to Perry is an example. Is the fact that Governor Rick Perry is a pious Christian really some threat to Jews? Definitely not, but how many Jews will believe that? Well, under 50 percent for sure. There is, however, a new paradigm, at least in the United States, in which believing Christians are more friendly to Jews and Israel on the whole than are atheists.

Second, it is absurd to say that Jews “misunderstand” Obama’s Middle East policy. They understand it all too well. I want to stress, however, that the problem is not just U.S .-Israel relations but the wider regional approach taken by the administration that makes Israel’s situation far worse and more dangerous.

Let’s remember that Waxman campaigned hard for Obama by telling Jews that the candidate loved Israel and was no problem for it. Waxman lied; the peace process died, thanks not to Israel but to Obama. Equally, Obama has been soft on or actually favored the forces most inimical to Israel: Egyptian revolutionaries including the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas, the Palestinian Authority, the Islamist regime in Turkey, and the Syrian government. His policies have helped to block any discussion of Islamist and Islamic antisemitism, the main threat to Jews in the world today.

Thus, while many have overstated the problems Obama’s policies have brought to Israel–for example, military ties are as good as they have ever been; Obama will veto the unilateral Palestinian independence move in the UN–the dangers and damaged arising from Obama’s administration have been gigantic. Incidentally, in three years I don’t think Obama has made a single statement ever that combined support for Israel with blame for its enemies.

Finally, there is the big controversial point. Waxman doesn’t say that Jews are voting based on their wealth but only Jews who vote against Obama and his supporters. This is an old theme: anyone who doesn’t support this administration is doing so because they are greedy while supporters vote for it because they are noble and altruistic.

This mirrors Obama’s own claim that those who vote against him are merely reactionaries, racists, religious fanatics, and gun nuts. When he said that, Obama was speaking to a wealthy crowd of rich people in San Francisco ridiculing the less affluent. In some ways, despite the pejoratives, it was more truthful than what Waxman said, implying that Jews who don’t vote for Democrats are “bitter clingers” to Israel and their wallets.

Of course, this misrepresents points that people like Waxman want to hide.

I would bet that on the whole the income of Jews who will vote for Obama in 2012 is higher than those who will oppose him. A large proportion of those opposing Obama are not affluent but are hurt by his policies. I wouldn’t be surprised that if one only counts white voters, the average income of Obama supporters is higher than that of Obama opponents.

While the most wealthy people are probably disproportionately anti-Obama (though by a smaller margin than many would think), the upper middle class is disproportionately pro-Obama. Among white workers, at least, Obama supporters come from what Marxists used to call the “labor aristocracy,” highly paid union members. The ninth district of New York is a good example. Those voters are not affluent at all.

I cannot prove the above points statistically but there is undeniably a lot of truth in them.

In addition, Obama supporters are also acting “for economic reasons” and “to protect their wealth.” On one hand, there are the beneficiaries of government spending, many of whom don’t pay taxes. Those who work for government and those who benefit from handouts are also voting for their material interest. What do they care if taxes go up and debt becomes dangerous? And what of crony capitalism, in which favored fat-cats get billions in taxpayer money? Bureaucrats of the world unite! You have nothing to lose but your entitlement claims.

A useful way of thinking about it is that Americans who vote against Obama are indeed thinking about their wealth. If the depression continues, if the economy collapses, if they cannot find a job or lose their job, if the dollar is reduced in value, if energy and other prices rise due to administration policy, then these people will certainly have less wealth. Since the administration’s policies are so damaging, there are likely to be more people worried about losing their life style or livelihood than those who think the administration will give them “free” (that is, funded by other American) goodies.

Of course, Waxman is still playing with dangerous antisemitic concepts. Similarly, the demonization of Israel by Obama supporters also feeds antisemitism. What is one to make of such common themes as Israel doesn’t want peace, is oppressive and brutal, etc. How far is the distance between that and saying that terrorism against Israeli citizens is justifiable or that Israel should be a pariah?

We haven’t gotten to the point where Waxman is saying that Jews who oppose Obama kidnap little Democrats and use their blood to make matzot but—and, yes, I’m joking—we may see something like this before November 2012.

Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center, editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal, and Middle East editor and featured columnist at PajamasMedia http://pajamasmedia.com/barryrubin/. His latest books are The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley), and The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan). GLORIA Center site is http://www.gloria-center.org.His articles published originally outside of PajamasMedia are at http://www.rubinreports.blogspot.com>    

President Speech Was Out of the Twilight Zone (Speech Text and Snarky Comments Included)

President Obama seems to be losing it.  His speech tonight went beyond his usual lying into the twilight zone.  It was almost if he was trying to attack a deal that was already made. He kept talking about the "balanced approach" even though Harry Reid already presented a plan with no tax increases, and Obama endorsed it!

The President's speech was the usual that we have been hearing for a few weeks, Blame Bush, Balanced Approach, Scare Grandma, the Tea Party caucus is pushing Boehner to hurt old people, I am being bipartisan, they aren't.

Below is the text of Obama's prime time speech with just a few snarky comments included.

Good evening. Tonight, I want to talk about the debate we’ve been having in Washington over the national debt – a debate that directly affects the lives of all Americans.

For the last decade, we have spent more money than we take in. In the year 2000, the government had a budget surplus. But instead of using it to pay off our debt, the money was spent on trillions of dollars in new tax cuts, while two wars and an expensive prescription drug program were simply added to our nation’s credit card.

As a result, the deficit was on track to top $1 trillion the year I took office. To make matters worse, the recession meant that there was less money coming in, and it required us to spend even more – on tax cuts for middle-class families; on unemployment insurance; on aid to states so we could prevent more teachers and firefighters and police officers from being laid off. These emergency steps also added to the deficit.

Now, every family knows that a little credit card debt is manageable. But if we stay on the current path, our growing debt could cost us jobs and do serious damage to the economy. More of our tax dollars will go toward paying off the interest on our loans. Businesses will be less likely to open up shop and hire workers in a country that can’t balance its books. Interest rates could climb for everyone who borrows money – the homeowner with a mortgage, the student with a college loan, the corner store that wants to expand. And we won’t have enough money to make job-creating investments in things like education and infrastructure, or pay for vital programs like Medicare and Medicaid.

Because neither party is blameless for the decisions that led to this problem, both parties have a responsibility to solve it. And over the last several months, that’s what we’ve been trying to do. I won’t bore you with the details of every plan or proposal, but basically, the debate has centered around two different approaches.

The first approach says, let’s live within our means by making serious, historic cuts in government spending. Let’s cut domestic spending to the lowest level it’s been since Dwight Eisenhower was President. Let’s cut defense spending at the Pentagon by hundreds of billions of dollars. Let’s cut out the waste and fraud in health care programs like Medicare – and at the same time, let’s make modest adjustments so that Medicare is still there for future generations. Finally, let’s ask the wealthiest Americans and biggest corporations to give up some of their tax breaks and special deductions.

This balanced approach asks everyone to give a little without requiring anyone to sacrifice too much. It would reduce the deficit by around $4 trillion and put us on a path to pay down our debt. And the cuts wouldn’t happen so abruptly that they’d be a drag on our economy, or prevent us from helping small business and middle-class families get back on their feet right now.

Of course the POTUS is forgetting that he announced support for Reid's plan which had no tax increases. In fact with this speech, President Obama is the only one left in Washington DC talking about tax increases.

This approach is also bipartisan. While many in my own party aren’t happy with the painful cuts it makes, enough will be willing to accept them if the burden is fairly shared. While Republicans might like to see deeper cuts and no revenue at all, there are many in the Senate who have said “Yes, I’m willing to put politics aside and consider this approach because I care about solving the problem.” And to his credit, this is the kind of approach the Republican Speaker of the House, John Boehner, was working on with me over the last several weeks.

And President Obama is putting politics aside just as long as raising the debt limit does not interfere with the 2012 election.

The only reason this balanced approach isn’t on its way to becoming law right now is because a significant number of Republicans in Congress are insisting on a cuts-only approach – an approach that doesn’t ask the wealthiest Americans or biggest corporations to contribute anything at all. And because nothing is asked of those at the top of the income scales, such an approach would close the deficit only with more severe cuts to programs we all care about – cuts that place a greater burden on working families.

If you scare easy don't read the next part.

So the debate right now isn’t about whether we need to make tough choices. Democrats and Republicans agree on the amount of deficit reduction we need. The debate is about how it should be done. Most Americans, regardless of political party, don’t understand how we can ask a senior citizen to pay more for her Medicare before we ask corporate jet owners and oil companies to give up tax breaks that other companies don’t get. How can we ask a student to pay more for college before we ask hedge fund managers to stop paying taxes at a lower rate than their secretaries? How can we slash funding for education and clean energy before we ask people like me to give up tax breaks we don’t need and didn’t ask for?

That’s not right. It’s not fair. We all want a government that lives within its means, but there are still things we need to pay for as a country – things like new roads and bridges; weather satellites and food inspection; services to veterans and medical research.

Keep in mind that under a balanced approach, the 98% of Americans who make under $250,000 would see no tax increases at all.

Well that is pretty easy because 50% of Americans pay no taxes at all.

None. In fact, I want to extend the payroll tax cut for working families. What we’re talking about under a balanced approach is asking Americans whose incomes have gone up the most over the last decade – millionaires and billionaires – to share in the sacrifice everyone else has to make. And I think these patriotic Americans are willing to pitch in. In fact, over the last few decades, they’ve pitched in every time we passed a bipartisan deal to reduce the deficit.

Don't remember all those times there were protest marches where there were rich people screaming, "Tax us More!" What does he think we're stupid? Does he really believe that people want to pay more in taxes?

The first time a deal passed, a predecessor of mine made the case for a balanced approach by saying this:

“Would you rather reduce deficits and interest rates by raising revenue from those who are not now paying their fair share, or would you rather accept larger budget deficits, higher interest rates, and higher unemployment? And I think I know your answer.”

Those words were spoken by Ronald Reagan. But today, many Republicans in the House refuse to consider this kind of balanced approach – an approach that was pursued not only by President Reagan, but by the first President Bush, President Clinton, myself, and many Democrats and Republicans in the United States Senate. So we are left with a stalemate.

Now, what makes today’s stalemate so dangerous is that it has been tied to something known as the debt ceiling – a term that most people outside of Washington have probably never heard of before.

Yep because everyone outside of Washington is an idiot  (at least that's what the progressives think).

Understand – raising the debt ceiling does not allow Congress to spend more money. It simply gives our country the ability to pay the bills that Congress has already racked up. In the past, raising the debt ceiling was routine. Since the 1950s, Congress has always passed it, and every President has signed it. President Reagan did it 18 times. George W. Bush did it 7 times. And we have to do it by next Tuesday, August 2nd, or else we won’t be able to pay all of our bills.

Unfortunately, for the past several weeks, Republican House members have essentially said that the only way they’ll vote to prevent America’s first-ever default is if the rest of us agree to their deep, spending cuts-only approach.

If that happens, and we default, we would not have enough money to pay all of our bills – bills that include monthly Social Security checks, veterans’ benefits, and the government contracts we’ve signed with thousands of businesses.

Sorry Mr. President but that is a lie! Even without raising the debt limit there is plenty of cash to pay the interest on our debt, social security, medicare/ medicaid, and soldiers salaries. Although some of your SEUI buddies may have to be furloughed. And maybe we wont have the money to pay both a cabinet secretary and a czar for each department, etc.

For the first time in history, our country’s Triple A credit rating would be downgraded, leaving investors around the world to wonder whether the United States is still a good bet. Interest rates would skyrocket on credit cards, mortgages, and car loans, which amounts to a huge tax hike on the American people. We would risk sparking a deep economic crisis – one caused almost entirely by Washington.

Actually the credit rating will be downgraded because the President was not serious about cutting the deficit until pushed to by the tea party.

Defaulting on our obligations is a reckless and irresponsible outcome to this debate. And Republican leaders say that they agree we must avoid default. But the new approach that Speaker Boehner unveiled today, which would temporarily extend the debt ceiling in exchange for spending cuts, would force us to once again face the threat of default just six months from now. In other words, it doesn’t solve the problem.

First of all, a six-month extension of the debt ceiling might not be enough to avoid a credit downgrade and the higher interest rates that all Americans would have to pay as a result. We know what we have to do to reduce our deficits; there’s no point in putting the economy at risk by kicking the can further down the road.

But there’s an even greater danger to this approach. Based on what we’ve seen these past few weeks, we know what to expect six months from now. The House will once again refuse to prevent default unless the rest of us accept their cuts-only approach. Again, they will refuse to ask the wealthiest Americans to give up their tax cuts or deductions. Again, they will demand harsh cuts to programs like Medicare. And once again, the economy will be held captive unless they get their way.

Plus six months from now he will be deeper into his re-election campaign.

That is no way to run the greatest country on Earth. It is a dangerous game we’ve never played before, and we can’t afford to play it now. Not when the jobs and livelihoods of so many families are at stake. We can’t allow the American people to become collateral damage to Washington’s political warfare.

Congress now has one week left to act, and there are still paths forward. The Senate has introduced a plan to avoid default, which makes a down payment on deficit reduction and ensures that we don’t have to go through this again in six months.

I think that’s a much better path, although serious deficit reduction would still require us to tackle the tough challenges of entitlement and tax reform. Either way, I have told leaders of both parties that they must come up with a fair compromise in the next few days that can pass both houses of Congress – a compromise I can sign. And I am confident we can reach this compromise. Despite our disagreements, Republican leaders and I have found common ground before. And I believe that enough members of both parties will ultimately put politics aside and help us make progress.

I realize that a lot of the new members of Congress and I don’t see eye-to-eye on many issues. But we were each elected by some of the same Americans for some of the same reasons. Yes, many want government to start living within its means. And many are fed up with a system in which the deck seems stacked against middle-class Americans in favor of the wealthiest few. But do you know what people are fed up with most of all?

They’re fed up with a town where compromise has become a dirty word. They work all day long, many of them scraping by, just to put food on the table. And when these Americans come home at night, bone-tired, and turn on the news, all they see is the same partisan three-ring circus here in Washington. They see leaders who can’t seem to come together and do what it takes to make life just a little bit better for ordinary Americans. They are offended by that. And they should be.

The American people may have voted for divided government, but they didn’t vote for a dysfunctional government. So I’m asking you all to make your voice heard. If you want a balanced approach to reducing the deficit, let your Member of Congress know. If you believe we can solve this problem through compromise, send that message.

America, after all, has always been a grand experiment in compromise. As a democracy made up of every race and religion, where every belief and point of view is welcomed, we have put to the test time and again the proposition at the heart of our founding: that out of many, we are one. We have engaged in fierce and passionate debates about the issues of the day, but from slavery to war, from civil liberties to questions of economic justice, we have tried to live by the words that Jefferson once wrote: “Every man cannot have his way in all things…Without this mutual disposition, we are disjointed individuals, but not a society.”

History is scattered with the stories of those who held fast to rigid ideologies and refused to listen to those who disagreed. But those are not the Americans we remember. We remember the Americans who put country above self, and set personal grievances aside for the greater good. We remember the Americans who held this country together during its most difficult hours; who put aside pride and party to form a more perfect union.

That’s who we remember. That’s who we need to be right now. The entire world is watching. So let’s seize this moment to show why the United States of America is still the greatest nation on Earth – not just because we can still keep our word and meet our obligations, but because we can still come together as one nation. Thank you, God bless you, and may God bless the United States of America.

Boehner's speech was much better (if you cannot see video below click here)