Commentary’s new blog—as closed a mental universe as Commentary

If you want to talk online with neocon central, Commentary magazine has started its own blog. It is named Contentions, after the old newsletter of Midge Decter’s Committee for the Free World, which existed back when neoconservatives stood for something worthwhile, namely fighting a utopian ideology that was attempting to take over the world, instead of promoting a global utopian ideology of their own.

I glanced at Contentions, and the first thing I saw was an entry by Joshua Muravchik in which, as an example of the resurgent anti-Semitism in America, he mentions a New York Times article comparing Abraham Foxman to Al Sharpton. Seems like a fair comparison to me, so I sent a comment. When it did not appear online after a few hours, I wrote to the blog’s editors asking if the comment would be posted, and got no reply from them. Now a day has passed. So here’s the comment that Contentions did not consider fit to print:

It is amazing that in looking for examples of a resurgent anti-Semitism, Joshua Muravchik picks out the New York Times article criticizing Abraham Foxman. Muravchik apparently believes that there is nothing objectionable about Foxman at all. But in fact, Foxman is an anti-American, anti-Christian agitator who finds bigotry everywhere. For example, consider his report “Extremists Declare ‘Open Season’ on Immigrants: Hispanics Target of Incitement and Violence.” The document conflates the current opposition to Bush’s extreme Hispanic amnesty plan with a long catalog of racist hate crimes against Hispanics, all but two of which pre-date the current amnesty issue, many of them by many years. That is typical of the ADL’s agit-prop under Foxman’s leadership.

Or consider Foxman’s all-out attack on Christianity in a speech to the ADL in November 2005:

“Today we face a better financed, more sophisticated, coordinated, unified, energized and organized coalition of groups in opposition to our policy positions on church-state separation than ever before. Their goal is to implement their Christian worldview. To Christianize America. To save us! … What we’re seeing is a pervasive, intensive assault on the traditional balance between religion and state in this country. They’re trying to bring Christianity to all aspects of American life. They’re not just talking just about God and religious values but about Jesus and about Christian values. … [Evangelicals are becoming much more adept at] using elements of the government to achieve their goals. [The views of Evangelical political leaders are] moving into the mainstream. There’s no aspect of American life they’re not trying to impact…. We can’t use a fly swatter approach to this—it’s too serious.”

Foxman’s speech was roundly denounced by that notorious anti-Semite Hillel Halkin writing in the November 10, 2005 issue of that anti-Semitic rag, the Jerusalem Post.

Foxman and the ADL also publish continuing “studies” of anti-Semitic attitudes in America which say that if a person agrees with such questions as, “Jews have too much influence over the American news media,” that is a sign that the respondent is anti-Semitic. The assumption is that if a person is aware of the well-known fact that a distinct minority that constitutes two percent of the population overwhelmingly controls the news media, and that if he thinks that this is not a normal or healthy situation for a society, therefore he has an irrational bigotry against Jews. In my view this is casting the net of anti-Semitism too wide. Suppose a respondent agreed with the statement that “Jews are too liberal.” By the ADL’s reasoning, that would make him an anti-Semite. But of course Jewish conservatives themselves are constantly writing articles saying that Jews are too liberal and that this is a serious problem. So the implication is that Jews can say that Jews are too liberal, but if non-Jews do the same, they are anti-Semites.

For years I have been fighting against serious anti-Semites on the right who constantly and dishonestly complain, “If you say anything critical about Jews and Israel, they call you an anti-Semite.” But the sad fact of the matter is that there ARE Jews—Foxman and Muravchik among them—who do believe that any criticism of Jews or Israel makes a person anti-Semitic.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at January 24, 2007 11:30 AM | Send