Defending Hanukah in the White House

A couple of readers disagree with my post, “Hanukah at the White House.” One writes:

Isn’t there a difference between providing a Jewish celebration and a Muslim one? The Jews, after all, don’t wage jihad against us, don’t try to force us into dhimmitude, and (from a Christian perspective) have an incomplete understanding of God rather than a distorted one. While what drives Bush may be the same multicultural liberal belief system, objectively a Jewish dinner is less problematic than a Muslim dinner.

LA replies:

I think you’re missing the point. The point is not the relative degree of harmfulness or harmlessness of different groups. The point is multiculturalism, which means all groups must be recognized as groups and treated equally. Multiculturalism assures that there will be Muslim celebrations at the White House.

The reader replies:

I recognize that Bush’s reason for hosting the affair is multiculturalism, and that he would probably be just as happy hosting a Muslim celebration, and that this is bad. However, I think it would be possible to host a Jewish celebration (since Jewish culture, though different from ours, isn’t anathema to it), while rejecting outright the possibility of celebrating Islam.

In other words, one might be cheered by a Jewish celebration while being unhappy about the multicultural motivations that brought it about. At least it shows that the White House isn’t overrun with anti-Jewish sentiment, as many liberals are today.

LA replies:

Do you really think (1) that there is a reasonable suspicion that the White House is overrun with anti-Jewish sentiment, and therefore (2) that the only way to show that the White House is not overrun with anti-Jewish sentiment is to turn the entire White House over to a highly orthodox Jewish religious celebration? This is right out of the PC play book: when some party is suspected of prejudice, it must bend itself out of shape to “celebrate” the very group it’s suspected of disliking. In this case, the suspicion, as well as the cure, is absurd.

So, since that can’t be your reason, why do you care about a Jewish celebration at the White House? We have had a president for 216 years without having a Jewish Kosher dinner in the official presidential residence, with Marines asking Jewish women if it violates their religion to shake the president’s hand. Why is it important to have this now?

In any case, the fact remains that it’s all part of one continuum, the Jewish and the Muslim. Have one, have the other. I’m amazed that people don’t see this.

Another point to be added. It’s not just that having orthodox Jewish celebrations in the White House logically leads to having orthodox Muslim celebrations. It’s that Bush is probably having the Jewish celebrations as a “cover” for the Muslim celebrations. Bush has been criticized for hosting Muslims and sucking up to them so conspicuously. But now that the Jews have been sucked up to with their conspicuously religio-centric treatment at the White House, how can anyone complain about the Muslims getting theirs?

And what’s worse, the Jews don’t mind being used like this, since they’re getting theirs. No one cares about America anymore. No one acts and thinks as an American. It’s the same with the Powerline writer, Scott Johnson. He was delighted and honored to be a guest at the White House. He didn’t see how the whole evening was corrupted by being an event, not for Americans (who may be of different backgrounds including Jewish), but specifically for Jews, along with a handful of non-Jewish co-celebrators of Hanukah.

We’re not a country any more. The “conservatives” have joined the liberals in the multicultural destruction of America.

[This conversation continues in another blog entry.]

Posted by Lawrence Auster at December 08, 2005 12:22 AM | Send