The Two Minutes Hate is Being Indefinitely Extended

by

Atlantic writer Franklin Foer:

Any strategy for enhancing the security of American Jewry should involve shunning Trump’s Jewish enablers. Their money should be refused, their presence in synagogues not welcome. They have placed their community in danger.

I wonder if Franklin Foer has been equally vehement in denouncing the anti-Israel and anti-Semitic harassment on American university campuses, or the ongoing relationship of prominent Democrats with Louis Farrakhan, or the attempted political murders of Steve Scalise and others. After Nancy Pelosi said “I just don’t even know why there aren’t uprisings all over the country,”  did he call for the shunning of Pelosi contributors?

Saturday, from a journalist named Julia Loffe:

And a word to my fellow American Jews: This president makes this possible. Here. Where you live. I hope the embassy move over there, where you don’t live was worth it.

So she thinks the US should establish its foreign policy to ensure against a possible violent reaction from any of the worst criminals, crazies, and thugs in the country?  That is an equation with no solutions, and her foregoing tweet doesn’t strike me as even being sane.

Also Saturday, journalist Salena Zito was confronted by a reporter for the Guardian:

In middle of a somber moment at staging area while I was talking to a member of the Jewish community this @guardian reporter started screaming at me that I was an anti-Semite/that I caused shooting because I reports on Trump   & to leave and kept screaming in my face to get out.

“Progressives” often accuse Trump supporters of being “haters”, but it should be obvious that many of the Progs are themselves filled with hate and rage to a frightening degree.

John Podhoretz:

Based on the early evidence, the shooter was not only consumed with a hatred of Jews but possessed a kind of sneering contempt for Trump on the grounds that Trump was basically a Jewish agent or a Jew-lover himself. Trump can only be blamed for the murderous Jew-killing actions of someone who thought of him that way by people who are so consumed by hatred of him that there is nothing they won’t blame him for.

It has even been asserted that Soros is shorthand for the Jews, and anyone who has said anything about him (presumably he means said anything negative about him) has blood on their hands.  (I suspect that the people making these claims are mostly the same people who object vehemently to “big money in politics.”)

Masha Merkulova, who came to the US from the Soviet Union:

Not a week goes by that I don’t hear about university professors who are concerned about openly identifying as Zionist for fear of being punished in their professional lives; or college students who worry about their grades and social lives if they object to their professors’ anti-Israel words and actions; or teens whose teachers are outwardly anti-Israel and anti-Semitic, or whose classmates draw a swastika next to their name.

Yet this sort of thing seems to be of little interest to most prominent journalists, “intellectual” writers, activist-entertainers, etc…most probably because it can’t be used as a hammer to beat up on their favorite targets.

Much of the Left today seems absolutely blinded by hate. (For one more example, see the disruption of a moment of silence for the Pittsburgh victims, at a Marsha Blackburn event in Tennessee.)  As the election approaches, I am convinced that it’s important to keep these people as far away as possible from the levers of power.  The assertions that there should be a prohibition against criticism of George Soros seems like a clear indicator that the Left, if they had the power, would like to treat this as a Reichstag Fire moment to shut down speech and political activity of which they don’t approve.

32 thoughts on “The Two Minutes Hate is Being Indefinitely Extended”

  1. I think there might be fewer mass-shootings in houses of worship if, the next few times someone tried it, the media 1) showed images of the dead perpetrator surrounded by armed guards/congregants and 2) did not mention the perpetrator’s name, show his picture or quote from his social-media rants.

  2. Among Alinskyites rule 10 (or 11 depending on the list), the one about pushing a negative until it becomes a positive by which they mean being loud and obnoxious and “getting in faces”, seems to be the one they have the most difficulty with these days. The tactic was to essentially provoke a violent response in order to win public support. In any political context their opponents have likely read Rules for Radicals or at least understand the basic tenets hence this tactic is typically met with restraint and swift removal from the conflict. Rule 6 or so is using a tactic your people enjoy. Unfortunately for leftists some of their people enjoy dressing up in black, breaking stuff and committing acts of violence. Even when not spilling over to violence or vandalism the lefts provocations are often delivered in such an intense manner as to convey deep hatred and barely contained intent to commit violence. If there was anything approaching a fair and accurate media these things would be fatal to their cause.

  3. Amen to both above. I carry and my place of worship does not discourage me or others who do likewise. We are a large congregation. This community has a large Muslim population, but has had no issues on either side of the equation. Perhaps the Muslim Student Association chapter being subdued is based on a rational calculation of the factors of this environment, carry being perhaps minor. Certainly there are few enablers in power here outside of the colleges.

    Making this anti-Semite a 24/7 celebrity encourages more of this crap. Notice the lack of such treatment when the targets are right of center. Thank God, he revealed himself as a Trump hater as well as irrational.

    Death6

  4. Shooting unarmed protestors and generally screwing up the entire Zionist dream of the Israeli homeland, is a big part of why many people do not like Israel.

    As a theophobe, its about what I would expect believers to do. Can we get past our childhood … please.

  5. “…shunning Trump’s Jewish enablers. Their money should be refused, their presence in synagogues not welcome. ”
    Well, that’s just plain, straight-up anti-Semitism right there.

  6. I don’t understand why a synagogue of that size did not have at least one security guard.

    Maybe the rabbi is an extreme leftist opposed to guns anywhere.

    The attempt to blame Trump with his Jewish family will backfire but the left seems addicted to own goals.

  8. Public hangings for mass shooters would be a good first step in the way of deterrence. The last convicted killer that was hanged was in 1996, so there is still reasonable institutional memory.

  9. Hate is the reaction to the ruling class losing some of its power. Look at what happened in Brazil to see what we could have had..

    Bolsonaro was stabbed and seriously injured in the campaign but won the election after he recovered.

    He is also dealing with a lot of hate but at least some of the corrupt party is in prison.

  10. “Public hangings for mass shooters would be a good first step in the way of deterrence.”
    The problem of course is that many of the mass shooters are seriously mentally ill. You can’t deter someone as detached from reality as the Sandy Hook shooter, or the VA Tech shooter, etc. In those cases it seems the best approach would be to make them completely anonymous, to the point of trial and execution (for those relatively rare ones who survive) kept completely out of the media as much as possible. I honestly don’t know if anonymity or ridicule would be more effective as a deterrent, but unfortunately we build them up because of how we publicly grieve through the media.

  11. I don’t agree. I believe the role of mental illness in recent mass shootings is overemphasized and unproven. But, then again, I find most psychology unscientific and unproven. One thing that I notice with many of these young shooters is an obsession with Columbine. My suggestion is to replace that with a different obsession consisting of violent retribution for evil wrongdoing.

  13. “I believe the role of mental illness in recent mass shootings is overemphasized and unproven.”
    I’m sure there are lots of studies quantifying the exact number, and differentiating between completely crazy (Sandy Hook, Gabby Giffords, Aurora) to pretty crazy (Parkland) to just plain evil losers (the Scalise shooter and the Pittsburg shooter). It seems like the crazy level is pretty high, though of course not universal. Again, I don’t see how to deter people who are completely divorced from reality. What’s needed is to institutionalize them, since in all these cases it has been darn obvious that they are incapable of functioning in society.

    “One thing that I notice with many of these young shooters is an obsession with Columbine.”
    I believe that Columbine is the most important cultural event of the last few decades, much more influential than 9/11 even. In combination with the couple of highest profile copy-cat events, it has profoundly scarred parents and schools. I can’t imagine going to school today, when they literally have lock-down drills on a monthly basis even at rural schools. It’s complete madness.

  16. After 9/11, many of us had to realize that within our “side” was a culture that believed in neither reproduction nor defense. When comments on the internet argue that the shootings were Trump’s fault – he has too many Jews in his administration and made the long promised move of the embassy, we see similar thinking at work. Or, the argument he was the anti=semite in charge – a bit strange with those choices. Our culture seems suicidal – at least our blue, elitist culture and the males who have traditionally achieved respect and affection as. the defenders of our culture. First appeasement: minor but telling symptoms are the quantities of morally and intellectually upright but misunderstood Muslims in the average cop/fbi/special forces drama. Dont’t ruffle feathers – don’t draw Mohammed and don’t move the Embassy, etc. But I’m not sure how this works to protect Jews (or anyone else – including the woman and homosexuals in a system governed by Sharia).

    The lack of clarity and honesty is central to the msm’s take on everything – sure, you wish Trump wasn’t always tweeting and acting the victim, but I’m with Jason Riley, who flung down the newspaper that said the bombings were Trump’s fault and said, this is why he tweets, this is why he has to tweet. And I think of the lies about Bush, petty and nasty, and think, well, I’m glad this one will fight. We needed him.

  17. In NH we have dangerous mentally ill people increase in number and agitation every four years because of the first-in-the-nation primary, and I get to know some of them because of my professional duties. We have our share of permanent resident political crazies as well. My estimate is that they are unmoved by the encouragement or discouragement of popular opinion or level of punishment. Worse, they might even be inspired by the notoriety of dramatic trial and punishment. So I don’t think that hangings or photos of dead shooters will have a good effect.

    However, hardening defenses and simply not letting them succeed is likely to be helpful, as is not dwelling on their names and stories. The copycat aspect and the desire to outdo previous violence is quite real. I have had patients who kept lists of what shooters/bombers had had the most victims and spoke openly of where they would “rank.”

    As for American Jews and Western Jews in general, they have largely adopted liberalism as their actual religion. This is a continuum, not an either-or. There are Jews for whom their politics are secondary, but that is no longer common. The phrase “never again” did not turn out to mean “Never again will we allow a people to be exterminated,” but instead it came to mean “never again will we consider the claims of anyone we are told is right-wing, because we were told the Nazis were right-wing, and we can’t have that.” You will notice that this change in meaning requires absolutely no courage or inconvenience, but is chockablock full of feeling righteous.

  18. It is always important to remember that Franklin Foer is a liar and fabulist and has been well known for it.

    The editor of the left-leaning magazine, Franklin Foer, has posted a 7,000-word description of the soul-searching that has consumed the magazine for the past four months over dispatches it published from Iraq by an army private.

    The articles were carried from a pseudonymous author later revealed to be Scott Thomas Beauchamp, who was stationed just south of Baghdad.

    The pieces captured the petty cruelty of war, from a scene of scavenger dogs eating corpses to a boy who craved to learn English but had his tongue cut out by Shia hardmen. The articles that sparked the furore described incidents of brutalised behaviour on the part of US personnel, including a soldier who revelled in running over dogs with his armoured car and another who paraded fragments of a child’s skull on his head.

    Questions were asked in July, initially from the right-of-centre Weekly Standard magazine and then through blogs. Foer said the magazine had asked Beauchamp for copies of the statements he gave to military investigators, to no avail. “In retrospect, we never should have put Beauchamp in this situation,” he said. “He was a young soldier in a war zone, an untried writer without journalistic training.”

    The articles were all lies and the Guardian (The Guardian!) finally had to admit it. That is Franklin Foer,

  20. I am convinced that it’s important to keep these people as far away as possible from the levers of power.

    An opportunity long passed.

  21. Actor tells Variety that there will be “blood in the streets” if Democrats lose the midterms.

    Thousands of actors burning L.A. in insurrection. Make it so!

  22. Regarding the “blood in the streets” if Democrats lose thing, given how just about all of the rioting and assaulting since (and before) the 2016 election cycle has been done by leftists that actor was accidentally correct. He just was projecting onto right-wingers the source of the bloodshed.

  23. Nohbody: No, the clear meaning of the comment was that if the Dems lose, they’ll riot. And that is supposed to be a reason to vote Dem, in Hollywood bizarroland.

  24. Hello, David.
    As someone living and working in architectural environment in NYC, with its characteristic authoritative, socialist, leftist prevalence and incidentally (as all professions requiring long and continuous education and training) heavy on Jewish representation – I’m so used to these views I’m not surprised.
    [Incidentally, you have a typo: the name of despicable journalist is Julia Ioffe, not Loffe].
    I read Bookworm’s post; I have to say, this is an old song and doesn’t bear reality check.
    In USSR there were precious few religious Jews – yet, we survived. Jews were persecuted, killed in the wars and pogroms, in Stalin “cosmopolitan” campaigns; we were denied means to feed our families, discriminated at work and educational institutions, yet we survived. Yes, there were lots of mixed marriages – but the Slavic new-comers were often bigger and more uncompromising Jews than us, who didn’t have to prove anything. One such was in my father’s extended family, so I know it first hand.
    I guess it depends of one’s definition of a Jew (again, an argument as old as the world). Bookworm seems to count only Jews who are religious/observant; she seems to ignore completely a plain fact that Jewishness is an ethnicity.
    I am Jewish and I’m an atheist. That doesn’t make me less Jewish, as it wouldn’t make an Italian less Italian if(s)he is not a Catholic.
    I am Jewish, and atheist, and very much Right libertarian politically. I guess in the eyes of people like Bookworm, I do not count. But I can tell her (ans anyone, for that matter) an open secret: I am not an oddity. There are a lot of us.

  26. Bookworm was lamenting the fact that Jewish culture is vanishing and being replaced by progressive political correctness. Ethnic identity isn’t just a function of biology and blood ties, but it also depends on customs and traditions and shared history. If you lose those links to the past, then there won’t be an ethnic identity for very much longer.

  27. If you lose those links to the past, then there won’t be an ethnic identity for very much longer.

    I’m listening to “The Revolt of the Elites,” which makes a similar point although not about the Jews.

    I am early in the book but it is talking about the culture of small enterprise around the Civil War and the role of the “Homestead Act of 1862.” This was the basis of democracy and against the tradition in Europe of ignorant peasants and “wage slaves.”

    An interesting case about losing traditions.

  29. So I don’t think that hangings or photos of dead shooters will have a good effect.

    I should have been more clear. I had in mind defenders posing over shrouded attackers’ bodies, not the showing of the perps’ faces. The people who might commit such atrocities should not expect to receive any attention as individuals.

  30. David, this is the post and thread I comment on.
    Bookworm proclaims decline of American Jewry, defining Jews only by confessional category. It doesn’t matter if she herself is less or more observant; it is her observations and conclusion I object to.

  31. Another hate crime hoax.

    The suspect in the vandalism of a New York synagogue was a Democratic activist and former City Hall intern who worked on anti-hate crime issues, The Daily Caller News Foundation has learned.

    He is a “queer” black man informally adopted by a Jewish couple, and The New York Times’ charity, the Neediest Cases, helped pay for him to go to college where his focus was African American studies, according to a 2017 New York Times profile.

    A political event with two Democratic candidates at the Union Temple of Brooklyn was canceled Friday after attendees found graffiti saying “Die Jew Rats” and “Hitler,” which one of the candidates said highlighted the need to vote out “hate.” Police arrested 26-year old James Polite later that night based on surveillance footage.

    Obviously a disturbed kid but so many of these “hate crimes” are hoaxes.

  32. Was it a hoax, or was it an example of fairly common anti-Semitism from non-whites? I don’t think we’ll ever know, since the authorities never actually investigate such things.

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