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When a Jew gets 5/3 of a vote…

Kleiman
Kleiman

Mark Kleiman, a UCLA Professor of Public Policy, is against the “lunatic warmongering” Iran sanctions bill, and good for him. He’s a blogger, and started a post for the Washington Monthly:

If you’re a constituent of, or a contributor to, [he named the 16 Democratic senators supporting the legislation], please consider making a phone call or sending a fax or email telling that Senator to back off the lunatic piece of warmongering legislation known as the Kirk-Menendez bill, designed to torpedo the nuclear deal with Iran. As of now, they’re all co-sponsoring it. Please consider making your voice heard especially strongly if you’re Jewish, or have a Jewish-sounding name.

The professor of public policy and I agree, Jews count more on this issue. I wrote him:

Hi Mark,
I agree with you re Jewish sounding names, and re Iran policy; but isn’t your recommendation also an acknowledgment of a political truth, that we are 5/3 of a man, to reverse the old voting fraction of black people? And inasmuch as that is true, isn’t this something liberal Jews ought to seek to end? For instance, by speaking openly about the Israel lobby?

Kleiman wrote back:

Not at all. I don’t think a Jewish name would have extra weight on a question about heath care or crime control or global warming or Burma. It’s only on questions where “Jews” generically are perceived to have one opinion that a Jew expressing a contrary opinion is man-bites-dog.

I wrote back to Kleiman to say that he was making my point: on this issue, Israel, there is a real effect of Jewish influence– the lobby that presumes to speak in our name. “You are attacking that presumption of solidarity, for the best reasons. But any analysis of why the U.S. is where it is today re the Middle East has to grapple with my 5/3 formulation.”

I think this is a very important conversation. Kleiman’s appeal shows that the lobby is fracturing: that Jews are taking on the lobby as Jews, and many Jewish groups are now opposing AIPAC on this bill. But it raises questions, like, What is the basis of the Jewish influence here? I think it’s financial contributions and our presence in the establishment and yes, also a widespread cultural deference stemming from the Holocaust. Also, how long did the lobby successfully presume or impose solidarity on liberal Jews? Certainly back when my brother said to me in 2003, “I demonstrated against the Vietnam war, but my Jewish newspaper says this war could be good for Israel.” Of course Jews were against that war, by numbers; but how many denounced that “warmongering” lobby as Jews? Very few. Joe Klein for one.

Back to the main point. So long as Jews count more (and it’s probably more like 30/3, not 5/3), doesn’t that give people the right to count Jews when it comes to this policy? Put another way, why does the State Department’s Middle East team have one Arab-American that I’m aware of, and a half dozen Jews, or people with Jewish-sounding names? Kleiman’s law. The most important constituency must be addressed.

PS. Adam Kredo got to this story first. Also, today the New Yorker did a piece on the boycott issue in which it identified me as a Jewish American blogger. Fair enough. But it proves the point– in how many other contexts would my religion/ethnicity matter?

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I will just come out and say outcome (stopping a war) is more important than process (addressing privilege) here. If Jews are unfairly and wrongly privileged in a discussion about whether to go to war, we have an obligation to use that privilege against war as well as to use it against privilege itself (calling out State Dept., The Nation, etc. for lack of Palestinian voices).

Prof. Kleiman’s “man bites dog” argument is right: news coverage (e.g., Cokie Roberts; Kaper’s National Journal piece) of the sanctions bills often assumes there is pro-sanctions pressure from “constituents” in states, inferentially (but not stated) ones with heavy Jewish voting populations. So Jews who are against sanctions have a lot of potential leverage in disproving that presumption (and there’s no evidence of strong Jewish grassroots support for Mendacious-Kirk, or for going to war) just as we – unfairly – have a lot of potential leverage for undermining all of the assumptions that underlie the “special relationship.”

A ‘Jewish’ sounding name is a German sounding name, or sometimes a Russian sounding name, unless its in Israel, where its an Arab sounding name. What were the names before bringing light unto the nations ?

Phil writes, “Doesn’t that give people the right to count Jews when it comes to this policy?”

But how about counting Jews when it is irrelevant to this policy, like Janet Yellin. You are in favor of counting Jews and counting down ’til the day when the number of Jews will be less. Yes, Palestine and the Middle East is your highest concern, but celebrating the loss of Jewish representation in the elites’ power centers and urging on the decline of that representation is a secondary hobby of yours.

Kleiman’s law could also be called Judt’s law, after Tony Judt and his revelation that the NYT editors insisted that he identified himself as Jewish in his Op-Ed before it was published.

But whatever you call it, it’s there and it needs to be talked about. It stalks the entire conversation, one of many unspoken rules surrounding the I/P debate.
And yes, it’s also a question of privilege, not just power. Arabs are often pushed away, distrusted, Jews are more than not encouraged to participate, even if critical and dissenting of the status quo. The reason is that a Jew is trusted on these issues because the chances are high that he or she is a Zionist and if they are not following the Zionist script, there are (typically) communal ways to pressure them.
Just look at Goldstone.

A war of ideas, please. Not a war over ethnic entitlement or influence. America can survive and indeed thrives on the former, but the latter is un-American, since the era of multi-culturalism has arrived (and which resulted from the triumph of universal ideals over ethnic ones).