Alfred Lilienthal, 1949: Israel’s Flag is Not Mine

How very intriguing it is to read the early Jewish anti-Zionists! Lilienthal, an American, articulately decried the way his lifelong faith became a tool of Israeli nationalism, and used as a competitor intended to weaken his American identity.  [H/T Servant Savant!]

ISRAEL’S FLAG IS NOT MINE
By Alfred M. Lilienthal

Dear Mother:

I brought you my hurts and troubles when both they and I were little: in that same spirit I bring them to you today.

Image by templar1307 via Flickr

Only last year, a new white flag with single blue six-pointed star was hoisted to a mast many thousands of miles away on the east coast of the Mediterranean Sea. This flag of Israel is the symbol of a new nationalist state, with its own government, army, foreign policy, language, national anthem and oath of allegiance.

And this new flag has brought every one of us five million American citizens of the ancient faith of Judah to a parting in the road.

Judaism, I have felt, was a religious faith which knew no national boundaries, to which a loyal citizen of any country could adhere.

By contrast, Zionism was and is a nationalist movement organized to reconstitute Jews as a nation with a separate homeland. Now that such a state exists, what am I? Am I still only an American who believes in Judaism? Or am I-as extreme Zionists and anti-Semites alike argue-a backsliding member of an Oriental tribe whose loyalty belongs to that group?

Biting the hand that feeds you

Or, the surprising story of how blue states subsidize red states

Image via Wikipedia

[UPDATE, 2-28-09: Turns out Gov. Jindal's juiciest anti-government anecdote— how he and Sheriff Lee faced down a rescue-preventing bureaucrat during Katrina— wasn't exactly true.  See Jindal Admits Katrina Story Was False.]

Anything strike you as odd about the GOP’s choice of Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal to give the response to President Obama’s speech to Congress?

How about this:  Republicans gave the task of making the anti- government pitch to the governor of the state that may well be the leading recipient of federal government largesse.

American taxpayers funded Louisiana’s Katrina recovery, to the tune of something like $300 billion dollars. Yet to hear Gov. Jindal tell it, you’d think Louisianans chose to go it alone.  Crediting their admirable “spirit,” he scoffed at the kind of government assistance that flooded his state with cash from the rest of us.

Hang on to that thought for a moment—red state governor pitching self-determination while surviving on barge-loads of federal cash—and back up to 2005.

Here’s columnist Steven Pearlstein writing in the Washington Post on the day before Pres. Bush’s second inauguration:

Image via Wikipedia

I have in front of me the latest report from the Tax Foundation showing how much each state gets back … for every dollar of taxes paid. And it shows that … the anti-government red states are the net winners in the flow of funds while the pro-government blue states are almost all losers.

Iran’s enriched uranium ready for bombs? Not by a long shot.

Iran does not have the capability of making weapons-grade enriched uranium.

I know, you heard that there was more enriched uranium there than previously thought. But there are, apparently, many grades of enriched uranium, and bomb material is far cry from what Iran has.

Here’s U of Michigan Prof. Juan Cole:

clipped from www.juancole.com Image via Wikipedia Iran Nuclear Program Hyped again Note to mainstream media: Iran cannot construct nuclear bombs with uranium enriched only to less than 4%. It needs to be enriched to something like 90% to make a bomb. Iran is not known even to have that capability, and no it cannot be done in 2 months (try a decade), assuming they were trying to do it, which our $40 bn. a year intelligence agencies say they are not. So all the silly articles on Friday about how iran now has enough enriched uranium to make a bomb are just illiterate. Moreover, the report in question actually says that Iran is slowing its enrichment activities. h/t Jay McDonough.

Reason for panic? Threat to world peace? Justification for a strike from Israel?

Hardly.

Why is it “reasons for war” stories are so rarely true?

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Tags: Iran, nuclear+weapons, Iran+nuclear+bomb, Iran+uranium, Iran+enrichment, Iran+nuclear+capability, Monte Asbury

Former KKK member apologizes to 1961 Freedom Rider, now Congressman

This’ll bring some healing – both directions, I expect.

clipped from blog.sojo.net Rep. John Lewis On May 9, 1961, when the … Freedom Riders came into town and attempted to enter an all white waiting room at the bus station, Ku Klux Klan member Elwin Wilson of Rock Hills, South Carolina was there. When he saw future U.S. Representative John Lewis enter, Wilson attacked, pummeling the young civil rights worker, who responded with nonviolence. [...]A few weeks ago, Elwin Wilson contacted representative Lewis to apologize for beating Lewis nearly 48 years ago. For the past several weeks, Wilson has been apologizing to members of the African-American community in Rock Hills for his numerous acts of racial hatred. He has had the guts to simply say “I’m sorry.” And representative John Lewis responded to this former member of the KKK with mercy, grace, and forgiveness [...] Lewis said that Elwin Wilson is the very first person out of the hundreds who attacked and abused him during the civil rights struggle to say “I’m sorry.” If we are to continue to come to terms with our tragic racial history, Wilson cannot be the last to have the courage to say “I’m sorry.”

Amen to that.  Takes guts to apologize.  Takes guts to forgive. But contrition and forgiveness are mighty restorers.

Just as racism—America’s “original” sin—has tainted us all, such transcendent heroism makes us all a little bit better.  Thank you, Wilson.  Thank you, Lewis.

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Tags: Freedom, Riders,, CORE,, Rep, John, Lewis,, discrimination,, racism,, KKK,, South, Carolina,, Rock, Springs, Monte Asbury

That scary socialism

Those who make their living by exaggerating have been on a tear lately. Socialism is the threat.  Talker Sean Hannity is especially apoplectic.

Columnist Bob Cesca has a brilliant idea: Hannity should spark a revolution—with right-wing pundits as co-revolutionaries—that casts off socialism’s tainted fruit.

Here’s the Cesca war plan:

clipped from www.huffingtonpost.com A Victim of Pernicious Socialism Image via Wikipedia I’m calling upon Sean Hannity to [...] end American socialism now! Refuse to send your kids to socialized public schools and universities; refuse to use socialized roads and highways; refuse to call upon socialized police and fire departments; shut down the socialized air traffic control; refuse to visit socialized national parks; tell grandma that her Social Security and Medicare checks will have to be sent back; demand the immediate dismantling of our socialized American military. Sarah Palin and her supporters in Alaska should refuse all forms of “redistributed wealth” by sending back their checks from the socialized oil program there. Send it all back. I’m sure the entire roster of [pundits] — Limbaugh, Scarborough, Hannity and the like — have already forgone their usage of these socialist services [...]

Uh-huh!

Was Joe McCarthy fifty years ahead of his time?

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Tags: socialism, Hannity, Limbaugh, Scarborough, media, right-wing, conservative, pundits, medicare, government+funded, stimulus+bill, stimulus+socialism, Monte Asbury

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