Thursday, April 14, 2016

Bernie Sanders: Not Jewish but "Jew-ish"

So begins this article in the New York Post by someone named Andrea Peyser. (This author also has an article entitled, "Megyn Kelly is no different than Kim Kardashian." Make of that what you will.) She describes "Jew-ish" as being "a non-practicing, anti-Israel, kinda, sorta Hebrew." Wow, that's really professional language right there! 

"Raised in a veritable shtetl in Brooklyn, the Bernmeister had a bar mitzvah, worked as a volunteer on an Israeli kibbutz — a collective farm modeled on communist principles — for several months while in his 20s, and counts a number of his European ancestors as victims of the Holocaust."

Kibbutz is a Hebrew word for "communal settlement." The Jewish Virtual Library describes it as thus: "a socioeconomic system based on the principle of joint ownership of property, equality, and cooperation of production, consumption, and education." Dictionary.com describes it as "usually agricultural" and "organized under collectivist principles." Note how Ms. Peyser describes it communist in order to bring up images of tyranny. This is classic example of political spin.

She brings up the fact that Bernie Sanders stared in a low-budget comedy back in 1999 in order to bring us this piece of truly genius investigative journalism:

"In the flick, Bernie/Manny rants disjointedly before wedding guests in a thick outer-borough accent, slamming the Dodgers for leaving Brooklyn and bemoaning the big money paid to baseball-playing free agents. Was he signaling that, if elected president, the self-described “democratic socialist” might one day try to redistribute athletes’ wealth?"

Yes, I'm sure he was signaling to his fellow insidious socialists that one day, in seventeen years, he would run for President with the express purpose of redistributing the wealth of pro-athletes. This is a perfectly rational assumption to make.

"Bernie Sanders, 74, has forged a far-left political brand, siding with Jew-haters and Israel foes, which is redundant. I urge Jews and their supporters voting in New York’s Democratic presidential primary on April 19 to reject Bernie. He’s not good for the Jews, or anyone else. The rotten actor is certainly not good for the City of New York, home to more Jews than Jerusalem is."

*blink* I'm sorry, you want to run that by me one more time? How do we go from a low-budget movie starring Bernie Sanders to Bernie Sanders being a Jew-hater? I love how she implies that opposing Israel and hating Jews are one and the same. No wait, she doesn't imply that, she explicitly states that outright. He's "certainly" not good for New York. I like how she emphasizes that over him not being good for the Jews. Is it because NYC is home to more Jews than Jerusalem? How is that relevant? 

"Bernie is strangely quiet about his recent history-making achievement. Winning the New Hampshire Democratic primary on Feb. 9, Sanders became not only the first Jew ever to win a presidential primary or caucus, but the first non-Christian to do so.
This might help explain why he doesn’t talk about it. Sanders was the only presidential candidate, Democrat or Republican, to skip the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s Policy Conference in Washington, DC, last month. Campaigning in Utah, Sanders instead delivered a speech to the pro-Israel lobbying group from afar that was highly critical of the Israeli government’s treatment of Palestinians."
You don't know how to structure articles, do you? This information should have been placed before the part where you said he was bad for the Jews. As for him being the "first non-Christian" to win a presidential primary, I'm pretty sure there were a lot of people who didn't consider Al Smith to be a real Christian in 1928. 
"He was the first US senator to join House Democrats boycotting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech before Congress. He rejected Netanyahu’s dire warning that the nuclear deal entered into by the governments of Iran, the United States and other world powers threatens the very existence of the Jewish state."
That's good, because Netanyahu's warning was demagogic bullshit. 
"Campaigning in Dearborn, Mich., last month, a city whose population contains the nation’s highest proportion of Arab-American Muslims, Sanders stuck it to his own people.
“Hopefully, we can have a level playing field, the United States treating everyone in that region equally,” he said about US involvement in the Middle East. A playing field in which bloody attacks on Israel don’t draw a “disproportionate” response? Sanders scored an upset victory in the Michigan primary, beating Dem front-runner Hillary Clinton."
I've taken the liberty to bold the font containing the most absurd framing in this piece. Dearborn contains the highest proportion of Muslims in America! This is relevant because...actually it's not. But it's a way for Peyser to paint Sanders as being anti-Israel, and thus bad for Jews, because apparently all Jews should support Israel. 
That was the primary message of this piece: You're not really Jewish if you don't support Israel. In fact, opposing Israel means you are "sticking it to your own people." By that logic, women who don't vote for Hillary are "sticking it to their own gender." 

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