I notice an interesting dichotomy in two news stories today.
The first one concerns Republican Senator Jim DeMint of South Carolina.
I noticed that Senator DeMint felt compelled to denounce something two GOP chairmen not employed by him wrote recognizing the value of thrift in Washington:
"There is a saying that the Jews who are wealthy got that way not by watching dollars, but instead by taking care of the pennies and the dollars taking care of themselves," the piece read. "By not using earmarks to fund projects for South Carolina and instead using actual bills, DeMint is watching our nation's pennies and trying to preserve our country's wealth and our economy's viability to give all an opportunity to succeed."
What exactly is 'anti-Semitic' about that? And why would anyone need to apologize? The Torah value of thrift used to be a virtue in America. Remember?
The sentiment behind Jim DeMint denouncing this as well as the chairmen's subsequent apologies does them honor, but as far as I'm concerned it was totally unnecessary.
One thing I find fascinating is that the articles on this nonsense all run pictures of DeMint rather than the two GOP chairmen who actually wrote the op-ed..with the result that the sort of mentality that typically doesn't pay attention thinks DeMint wrote it and is apologizing for something he did!
If you don't believe me, just check out the comments on this article or any of the others in the dinosaur media.
And speaking of paying attention, that's brings me to another piece that hit the news today.
Laura Rozen, one of the Politico's Leftist 'foreign policy experts' ran a story under this cheerful headline: "Maryland scientist arrested for attempted espionage for Israel" .
Here are some more headlines on this story:
"Moon scientist Stewart Nozette held as Israeli spy in FBI sting" ( The London Times)
"Top US scientist accused of trying to spy for Israel" (The British Telegraph)
US scientist charged with attempting to sell military secrets to Israel ( al-Guardian)
US scientist Stewart Nozette charged with trying to sell secrets to Israel (The Christian Science Monitor)
Only one thing wrong with these headlines. Israel wasn't involved in the least.
What we actually had here was an FBI sting where someone posed as a Mossad agent, and Nozette made it known that he had secrets to sell for cold, hard cash. The agent could have just as easily said he was from Britain's MI5, or the French Sûreté, or the Russians. It would have made no difference.
Some of the articles made a throwaway of the fact that Israel was not involved, some did not. Rozen's article tippy toed around it like this, implying that those evil Jooos might be involved:
The FBI has arrested a former senior NASA space scientist who worked in the George H.W. Bush White House space office for attempted espionage for Israel, the Justice Department announced today.
The complaint "does not allege that the government of Israel or anyone acting on its behalf" committed any offense against US laws in this case, the release said
Needless to say, it made no difference,because people paid as much attention to the fact Israel wasn't involved as they did to the fact that DeMint wasn't involved. Especially in Rozen's case,where she almost made it sound like it might have been a Mossad operation. All you have to do is check out the comments sections on these articles.
Which brings me to this interesting query: whom do you think dredged up more anti-Semitism? A piece by a couple of South Carolina Republican chairmen citing Jewish thrift as a virtue or a bunch of misleading, bogus headlines and articles?
-selah-
UPDATE: Laura Rozen e-mailed yours truly and made a special point of letting me know that her intention was to inform her readers that the Israeli government was not involved, quoting directly from the Justice department release.
Well and good,and I'm sure she wasn't intentionally trying to mislead. Unfortunately, the way the article was framed coupled with a misleading headline means that she failed. All one has to do is read the comments.
7 comments:
I think the actions by Mr. DeMint go a long way toward trying to explain why the Republicans are in the minority and can't seem to gain any traction in spite of Democrat failings. This is puzzling. Why would Mr. DeMint apologize? The statement is a very high compliment of Jews!! Why should someone apologize for complimenting someone. Is it becaue the media tells him he should? This is my point. In spite of Republicans doing all they can to try and suck up to the mian stream media, it does not help them. A better approach would be for Republicans to actually fight back. In other words, don'd apologize for complimenting someone!! You only make yourself look stupid.
"The Torah valud of thrift used to be a virtue in America. Remember." This is quite right. At the time of its founding and throughout much of its history, America was heavily influenced by Judeo-Christian principles, such as those found in the Torah and the New Testament of the Christian Bible. In recent years, America has largely turned its back on these principles and on the God who formulated them. Unless America changes course and rededicates themselves to the God who formulated these princples and to the principles themselves, it is hard to imagine that God will continue to bless our country.
Now for the alleged Israeli spying. Such accusations are more likely to lead to anti-Semitism than the compliments supposedly made by Mr. DeMint.
If we assume the spying accusations are true, they have to be examined in their context. 1.) Israel is in a fight for survival against enemies who are far more powrful than she is. She will only survive either throguh divine intervention or through sheer guile or a combination of these two. 2..)Israel has done all that it can to support America through the years, giving far more to America than she receives. 3.)America has often been duplicitous toward Israel witholding valuable information from her and in some cases doing things that might be construed as back stabbing. Given these factors, Israel could hardly be blamed for spying on America.
It would make far more sense for America to simply give Israel what she needs. After all, Israel is our most important buffer between us and the Islamic terrorists who seek to destroy us.
Given every thing thats happened, Israel could hardly be faulted for spying on America. In their analysis of these things, the media would do well to evaluate the full context of the situation.
Finally, when Russia, China, or some Middle Eastern country spies on America, the media hardly raises an eyebrow. In fact, such spies are often praised by the main stream media.
Btw, I didn't read the articles yet but why would the Telegraph or the Guardian who are British papers care about who spies on America? Ordinarily if they did care they would be praising the spies. Western Europeans are on balance fundamentally anti-American, as are their leaders, and should probably be regarded as enemies and treated as such.
This does not necessarily mean we shoudl invade them but we should be wary of them and we should not expect any help from them and should we meet with calamity expect them to celebrate. Don't rely on them for any thing. Don't turn your back on them or if you do expect to find a knife in your back.
One person writes a headline and the rest of them are too lazy to do anything but repeat it in one form or another.
I too found nothing wrong with the statement about saving pennies. People are too quick to look for something to point a finger at, even if it innocent.
Deborah F. Hamilton
Right Truth
http://www.righttruth.typepad.com
Hi Poster,
The whole point was that Israel wasn't involved in this at all! But to read the headlines and the way the articles are phrased,a lot of people are going to think this was an Israeli 'spy' operation.
Hello Deborah,
I couldn't agree with you more.
But this goes beyond that. In every one of the articles, DeMint was prominently featured and this essentially became a GOP smear.
Even the morons at the Republican Jewish coalition (who ought to know better) went public emanding an apology.
And yeah, theyheard from me, but it did about as muchgood as it ever does.
Regards,
Rob
Freedom Fighter,
You're right there is no evidence Israel was involved in a spying operation against America. I meant to make clear in my post that I understood that, however, somehow I failed to do so. In any event, I think the rest of the post is spot on. If Israel did choose to spy on America, they would have ample reason to do so and in my opinion would probably be fully justified in doing so.
Also, it's most puzzling that when China, Russia, or an Arab country spies on America it is generally given scant coverage by the media or it is praised and the Americans who would try to prevent such a thing are condemmed as "racists", "xenophobes", or something to this effect. Yet the false accusation of an Israeli spying operation generates five headlines!!
Clearly someone is trying to slander Israel. When the American people read these head lines, they would be smart to ask the following questions. 1.) If China spies on America it is deemed a non event hardly worthy of discussion yet when Israel is accused of it, it is bad. Why is this so? 2.)The media has never stood up for American interests. What changed? When did the maintenance and integrity of American national security secrets become important to them?
In other words, every thing put forth by the media should be treated with great skeptisim. I would have asked these questions had I come accross these headlines myself even before I delved into the actual article.
Again, your point is correct. Israel was not involved in this. I should read what I post more carefully.
No biggie, Poster. You and a lot of other people made that mistake..which was my whole point.
Regards,
Rob
What is also missing in all these “spy” stories is the fact that, while Israelis may spy IN America, they do not spy ON America. In big cases, like the Pollard case and the AIPAC case, the information in question was the information Israel’s enemies that US might possess. For example, in the case of Pollard, he was trying to pass info on Syrian chemical weapons to Israel. His superiors were supposed to pass the info anyway, according to an agreement with Israel. But they chose not to do so because they wanted to have some leverage. My source is Alan Dershowitz’s book “Chuzpa”.
Eric.
Hi Eric,
You might enjoy this
Regards,
Rob
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