Evelyn Gordon, at\u00a0Commentary<\/a><\/em>:<\/p>\n

Answer: Never, as proven by Exhibit B\u2013the administration\u2019s silence in the face of an anti-Semitic slur against some even closer allies that same week. I\u2019m referring, of course, to\u00a0New York Times<\/em>\u00a0columnist Thomas Friedman\u2019s outrageous\u00a0assertion<\/a>\u00a0that lawmakers are siding with Israel against Obama on Iran not \u201cfrom any careful consideration of the facts,\u201d but \u201cfrom a growing tendency by many American lawmakers to do whatever the Israel lobby asks them to do in order to garner Jewish votes and campaign donations.\u201d<\/p>\n

Not only is this another classic example of the anti-Semitic \u201cJews control the world\u201d trope, but many of the lawmakers whom Friedman accused of blindly obeying Jewish dictates rather than thinking for themselves are President Obama\u2019s fellow Democrats, who have loyally shepherded his domestic agenda through Congress. Yet even so, the administration couldn\u2019t be bothered to utter a word in their defense.<\/p>\n

When an administration doesn\u2019t see fit to condemn anti-Semitic slurs even against its closest allies\u2013its negotiating partner abroad and congressional Democrats at home\u2013you know anti-Semitism has attained the height of respectability. My only question is when all the American Jews who voted for this administration are going to wake up and start objecting.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This isn’t exactly the Coolidge Administration. \u00a0Obama, Holder, and their underlings have no problem popping off on just about any subject they care about, so their silence here isn’t accidental – it’s carefully calculated to marginalize Israel, and if that means marginalizing Jews or readmitting anti-Semitism to polite company, it’s just eggs and omelets. \u00a0Not like the President spent decades attending the sermons of an obviously anti-Semitic preacher, or anything.<\/p>\n

It’s a commonplace to remember that William F. Buckley led the charge to rid conservatism and the Republican party of its anti-Semitic and paranoid elements, perceiving not only that they weren’t helping the cause, but that they were morally wrong. \u00a0It’s long past time for some Democrat or visionary on the Left to do the same thing. \u00a0The problem is, it’s hard to do this with a Progressive President in power, and when doing so would evidently offend so many other important client groups.<\/p>\n

And unfortunately, we won’t hear much from Jewish Democrats about this. \u00a0Too many of them have already decided they’re more Democrat than Jewish.
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