No Apologies to Coulter, Hannity, et al.

Dear President-elect Obama,

I am sorry.

Keenly aware of your avid attention to the opinion pages of the Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles, I am sure you paid special attention to the open apology letter to Senator John McCain authored this week by Dean Rotbart. Rotbart unashamedly declared that your victory meant that the "nuclear holocaust won." I hope your feelings were not hurt by Rotbart's right-wing rant, and I assure you that this ridiculous rhetoric is not widespread in the Jewish community. Please accept my apologies on behalf of all American Jews for this attack.

More than anyone else, the Jewish community understands the horror of the Holocaust, and we know that the Holocaust has no place in our partisan bickering - a fact Rotbart seems to have forgotten. Invoking the Holocaust for partisan gain is the lowest of the low. When you are President, please remember that over 78% of our community supported you and your strong record for issues we care most about. Please ignore the shameless fear and smear campaign waged against you by a small minority in our community.

During the election, American Jews showed how deeply we care about the peace and security of Israel. Jewish voters take great comfort in America's bipartisan support of Israel. Some Republicans, like Rotbart, continue to use Israel as a partisan wedge issue event though it makes no practical sense for strengthening the U.S.-Israel relationship. In fact, Rotbart's attempt to smear you damages the bipartisan pro-Israel consensus surrounding this issue. It seems that some are more motivated by their reactionary anti-Obama feelings than their support for maintaining historic the crucial bipartisan support for Israel in America.

Over the course of the campaign, both candidates for president possessed strong pro-Israel records and continually expressed their support for Israel. Why, then, did the vast majority of American Jews vote for you and Joe Biden? The answer is simple: the Jewish community undoubtedly supports Israel, but we also care about the same issues the rest of Americans care about. The Jews who voted for you are worried about our economy, poverty in America, our education and health-care systems, about reproductive rights, the assault on civil liberties, the separation of church and state and our standing in the world.

Rotbart and others who share his view need to take a close look at themselves in the mirror. Do they want to continue supporting people like Ann Coulter who said that Jews need to be "perfected" and Sean Hannity, who invited Andy Martin, an anti-Semite, as a guest on his show? (This is the same anti-Semite who started the rumors about your "Muslim" faith.) While I do not believe Rotbart to be an anti-Semite nor do I believe that Rotbart thinks that Jews need to be perfected, I do know that the 78% of Jewish voters who chose the Obama/Biden ticket have no need to apologize. You do deserve an apology for Rotpart's use of "the gathering clouds of Holocaust II" and his outright statement that the "nuclear holocaust won" in this election.

Rotbart does need to write an apology letter, he just addressed it to the wrong people.

Follow Marc R. Stanley on Twitter: www.twitter.com/NJDC

Comments

[dsmth29]

"The answer is simple: the Jewish community undoubtedly supports Israel, but we also care about the same issues the rest of Americans care about. The Jews who voted for you are worried about our economy, poverty in America, our education and health-care systems, about reproductive rights, the assault on civil liberties, the separation of church and state and our standing in the world. "

This says it all, and that's why the Republicans like Rotbart, Hannity, Limbaugh, Colter, Palin, McCain are now on the outside looking in! Together with Obama and his team, we will straighten out THEIR mess and unite this country and the world!!

[local21]

I want an America where racists, homophobes, anti-semites, and Zionist are marginalized. And I want a President I admire, who will be good for America. That's why I voted for Obama. People like McCain and Palin have nothing to offer me.

[BARRISTER]

What if wer kept religion out of Politics; like we keep Churh out of State??

[realpolitic]

Hannity and O'Reilly and the other haters really help the Democratic party. The way they demonize illegal aliens and any multi-culturalism, it sends Hispanic voters, the fastest growing voting bloc, into the arms of Democrats. Thanks guys!

[pons1595]

They continue to preach their hate to haters; a vast majority of Americans reject their idiocy and hatred. Keep up the good work Sean, Rush, Bill O and cohorts. You drive away reasonable thinking folks.

[Digeeedad]

Hannity encourages his radio audience to visit his website and its interaction forums. I too encourage EVERYONE to visit the "Washingtom Politics" forum on his website. There you will regularly find some of the most dispicable and vile and racist nonsense imaginable. One poster recently wrote "Obama threw his grandmother under the bus because he's a racist and she was a white woman. Other's AGREED!

[lwilkerson50]

Amen. That's one thing that we can give them thanks for.

[Ohg]

Sarah Palin represents the Hannity Coulter class - everything that is wrong with America and the GOP. ............

http://thefiresidepost.com/2008/11/11/palin-everything-that-is-wrong-with-america/

[Einstein44]

Most unfortunately,hate comes in all shapes and sizes...truly despicable !

[devanate]

Israel is not the 51st freakin state. I'm sick of hearing about it in every goddamn policy discussion. I just don't care about it. They're a tough county, they can take care of themselves. We've got enough to worry about.

[Jamesdean]

the fact that it is a 51st state is a foregone conclusion, no doubt about that. but the question is what good, if any, has it done to america?

[Kremfresch]

[e-mail]
There's Dean-o's email. I think he should get a few emails explaining what a real holocaust is, and what a piece of sh*t he is.

[11907281]

I wonder if there will ever be a pro-Palestinian President or media outlet? It would be refreshing to have the, so-far, exclusively Christian POTUS live by the words of Christ.

[neem]

As an American Jew, I don't want "protection" from the likes of McCain and Palin. I want an America where racists, homophobes, and anti-semites are marginalized. And I want a President I admire, who will be good for America. That's why I voted for Obama. People like McCain and Palin have nothing to offer me.

[kjstjohn]

"I want an America where racists, homophobes, and anti-semites are marginalized. And I want a President I admire, who will be good for America. That's why I voted for Obama. People like McCain and Palin have nothing to offer me."



My thoughts exactly.

[Plus15]

Late last week i picked up a copy of the Jewish Journal. Skimming throught it I saw the article. The headline and opening phrase caught my eye "Dear Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin: I apologize for the Jewish vote for Obama". I read the first paragraph "This is my public apology to John McCain, Sarah Palin, Republican voters, Christian evangelicals, Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity, Mike Gallagher" and glanced at the accompanying photo of the wild eyed, crazed looking author and thought to my self "Wow this is obviously going to be a piece of satire". That it turned out to be a nasty insulting slap across the face of the Journal's readers and advertisers shocked me. Why did the Jewish Journal publish this attack on most of it's readers and why didn't the author one Dean Rotbart publish his screed in some right wing publication read by the people he was sucking up to. Frankly I can't get past his apologizing to "Sarah Palin, Christian evangelicals, Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity, Mike Gallagher" some of this country's leading hate mongers. Rotbart using "the Holocaust" as a political wedge issue is a sin against mankind and flat out disgusting. I'm being way to kind leaving my comments at that.

[mikey76]

Coulter should have to endure an event as Stacey Keech did on "The Twilight Zone". As long as the right keeps buying her garbage, she will continue that avenue. The same is true for Hannity, Limbaugh, O'Reilly and other drones on the right. But I know their blood pressure is doing great, so I say, "OBAMA in 2012!, Don't believe it? Keep up your frothing and watch, you are doing it to yourselves.

[Takae]

"Stacey Keech did on "The Twilight Zone"."

Could you explain further about that? Am I right to guess that he was dismissive about a specific event until he experienced it himself?

[mikey76]

As I remember, he was in a bar with friends and he was yelling about blacks taking low paying jobs and how the world would be better without them. Then he hollers about the Jews and how the Holocaust never happened and then something else.

As he exits the bar, he enters the twiight zone and has to experience life in their shoes. Kind of humbled him. Ask Gov. Wallace's legacy, things can turn on a dime. President -elect Obama has gone down the road and he has earned our respect and everyone that is really an American (yea a Palinism) will get behind this effort to help this country, because those sitting in power, right now - are not helping.

[Schaef]

I'm a little confused about the disjunction between the title and the content of the article. The letter seems to be about Jewish support for Obama and how both candidates were strong supporters of Israel. I don't know what Coulter or Hannity have to do with that, nor do I know why tangential issues merit titular attention.

Moreover, I don't understand the claims behind your comments in the first place. Why would someone not support a person who... what? Has the gall to actually believe that the religion she practices is also the correct one? Who invites controversial figures onto a talk show? Both of the links *you provided* give evidence 180-degrees removed from your claims.

This smacks more of the tired act of inventing racism where none exists, using the remaining vestiges of racism that does exist in this country as a cover. And the best part is, as much as you take exception to Rotbart's words, you elevate his status above that of two people who made otherwise innocuous comments.

I am never going to be inspired by or persuaded to a political philosophy based on comments that value scoring political points over being fair and honest about people and their intentions.

[1dogs2]

If you can't figure out what's wrong with someone who "actually believe[s] her religion is . . . the correct one," which religion, by the way, includes persecuting women as witches and public exhibitions of hysteria, or with inviting an appalling anti-Semite to spew rubbish on the public air waves, I'm not going to explain it to you because your views are so uninformed that it would be an utter waste of time.

[jestfam]

so you believe that her religion is worse than Obamas which clearly hates whites, and does not like white america and only wants blacks to be with their own kind. Seems to go with another clan that started wearing white robes but we cant talk about them. YOUR AN INGNORANT FOOL if you believe what you write. Why dont you read up and maybe even watch some of obamas videos and grab one of his books which are actually good reading and maybe you might be informed on the history of the man you speak so totally uniformed about that it would be a waste of my time to explain it all to you.

[Schaef]

Ouch! You got me! I thought if I skipped my monthly "persecuting women as witches" meeting, you might not catch on as to how uninformed I am! You don't find it at all ironic that people are happy to crucify Coulter for daring to say that her religion would make good people better, but you don't have a problem coming along and slandering her religion?

I also think it's funny when you take a very simple premise of "when you have a discussion about an issue, you invite a variety of differently-minded people in order to explore a broad range of perspectives" and say that it's so ridiculously uninformed that you're not going to bother explaining it to me. How hard can it be to explain what's wrong with hearing more than one side of the story, even if you don't agree with it?

Lastly, and again this is not hard to grasp, saying your religion makes good people better does not mean you are hostile to Jews. Having a broad range of views on your show does not mean you are hostile to Jews. The author suggested both of those things, and they simply are not logical conclusions nor are they supported by the facts. And most interesting of all, you didn't even try to defend the idea that they're anti-Semitic; you were content to tear them down just for being who they are.

[indyleftist]

The sad thing about these kind of attacks is that they work, and not just public opinion.

It Pushed Obama to the right, so eventually he was giving speeches saying that "Jerusalem will never be divided" and nonsense like that. It seems like almost a guarantee that under no circumstances will there be a peace deal in Israel under his administration. And what's so sad about it is that when Obama and McCain are saying stuff like that, the Prime Minister of Israel is saying that Israel should go back to the 1967 borders, which means a divided Jerusalem.

[siciliabel]

I would think the state of Israel would have a lot more to worry about if everyone named in Robart's apology were the only ones behind it. A more concentrated bunch of cuckoos' names I haven't seen recently. These are irresponsible words, and inflammatory, as well. The day reason resides only in the mind of Ann Coulter, et al. is a far more worrisome prospect than an Obama presidency.