Jack Ross writes:
Seliger makes a number of serious distortions, I salute Dan Sisken for finding the
goods to back up my contention that he is at odds with Meretz
itself. And while I'm certainly not surrendering to despair on what Obama
will do on foreign policy, Seliger is being duplicitous when he
says foreign policy should not be on the agenda because withdrawal from
Iraq is a certainty (and the military will insist it be quicker than Obama said during the campaign). Seliger and The Forward don't want the empire itself to be on the table.
I must also address Seliger's gross distortion of the history of Workmens' Circle, which The Forward has a lot invested in perpetuating. All through the 50s at least, Workmens' Circle was decidedly non-Zionist (as opposed to anti-Zionist) in contrast to the militantly Zionist Forward. Most notably the Circle ably defended Norman Thomas when The Forward attacked him for his increasingly vocal anti-Zionism in the 50s.
I would just say in conclusion that I too am struck that folks like Nadler and Saperstein are allowing themselves to be seen with all these folks who get The Forward's panties in a bunch. Even if they're just sticking their finger to the wind, that in itself is a victory. Yes We Can!
P.S. I'm nervous that this event is going to encourage your more base leftist instincts.
I must also address Seliger's gross distortion of the history of Workmens' Circle, which The Forward has a lot invested in perpetuating. All through the 50s at least, Workmens' Circle was decidedly non-Zionist (as opposed to anti-Zionist) in contrast to the militantly Zionist Forward. Most notably the Circle ably defended Norman Thomas when The Forward attacked him for his increasingly vocal anti-Zionism in the 50s.
I would just say in conclusion that I too am struck that folks like Nadler and Saperstein are allowing themselves to be seen with all these folks who get The Forward's panties in a bunch. Even if they're just sticking their finger to the wind, that in itself is a victory. Yes We Can!
P.S. I'm nervous that this event is going to encourage your more base leftist instincts.
Weiss again: Great thanks to Jack on historical data. Also on his analysis of Nadler and Saperstein, who are going to appear at this event Sunday. (Congressman Jerrold Nadler, Rabbi David Saperstein of the Religious Action Center in Washington). More evidence that the left is back. Sorry: progressives.
Jockeying position for retaining power, nose always to the wind.
You are not wrong in that Nadler is there, not back there. But always remember what Nadler is–me first. No real principles when push comes to shove–right now you just described a slight tap, hardly a push, on his less than ample shoulders. He moved slightly.
Imagine if we had a real free press looking out for America First at all times.
Oh how Nadler would move.
I argue with Solomonia about the Workmen's Circle and the Roxbury Mosque here.
Martin Peretz and friends seem to have a project of Zionizing the remaining older Yiddishist non-Zionist and anti-Zionist organizations. (See Making YIVO a Zionist Organization.
I talk about the Workmen's Circle in passing in Mondoweiss: Dershowitz and Jewish Influence.
BTW, I have to clarify a statement in Mondoweiss: Dershowitz and Jewish Influence.
The Workmen's Circle is in the tradition of the Bund, but it was not a Bundist organization. Abraham Cahan and The Forward were socialist in the non-Marxist Yiddish tradition that preceded the Algemeyner Yiddisher Arbeter Bund, which was explicitly Marxist.
JM
Please elaborate on your distinction. I mean, especially in terms
of the USA's future, and secondarily, Israel's. Thanks, I value value your input very much.
I am not sure which distinction you mean.
I see an ongoing effort of the Zionist intelligentsia to control Jewish education and Jewish historiography in order to facilitate mobilization of several target groups to Zionist causes.
Such efforts are hardly unique to the Zionist intelligentsia.