Is there a “Jewish conspiracy”? Let’s see how it works in practice.

   Remarks at a gathering of atheists

The following information comes from several articles published in the Star Tribune newspaper. That fact alone negates the secrecy aspect of conspiracies. Nevertheless, there seems to be a coordinated effort to whip members of Congress into shape regarding certain issues of concern to Jews.

On July 9, 2007, it was reported that Rep. Keith Ellison of Minnesota, a newly elected member of Congress representing the Minneapolis area, gave a speech to a gathering of atheists. As the first Muslim member of Congress, he wanted those atheists to know that he tolerated their religious stance. “You’ll always find this Muslim standing up for your right to be atheists all you want,” Ellison said.

Then Rep. Ellison went into some other issues. What got him in trouble was a comment that compared the tragedy on September 11, 2001, with the burning of the Reichstag building in Nazi Germany. He said: “It’s almost like the Reichstag fire, kind of reminds me of that. After the Reichstag was burned, they blamed the Communists for it and it put the leader of that country (Hitler) in a position where he could basically have authority to do whatever he wants. The fact is that I’m not saying (September 11) was a (U.S.) plan, or anything like that because, you know, that’s how they put you in the nut-ball box - dismiss you.”

    The Anti-Defamation League and its Congressional Allies Strike Back

There was immediate criticism of Ellison’s comparison of the September 11th attacks to the Reichstag fire. The shoe dropped a week later.

On July 18, 2007, the Star Tribune reported: “The Anti-Defamation League decried the remarks in a news release, calling on Ellison to apologize and retract his statement. ‘Whatever his views may be on the administration’s response to 9/11 and the conduct of the war on terrorism, likening it to Hitler’s rise to power and Nazism is odious and demeans the victims of 9/11 and the brave American men and women engaged in the war on terror,’ said Abraham Foxman, the national director of the ADL.

‘Furthermore,’ he added, ‘it demonstrated a profound lack of understanding about the horrors that Hitler and his Nazi regime perpetrated.’

Republican Reps. Eric Cantor of Virginia and Zach Wamp of Tennessee wrote to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi asking her to ‘swiftly and immediately’ reprimand the first-term congressman for the remarks.

Wamp wrote that Ellison’s comments ‘inflame hatred and division at a time when we should be promoting our unity and reconciliation.’

   Ellison Repents

"In a written statement released Tuesday afternoon, Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress, said his remarks had been misconstrued.

‘In response to a question, I stated that the Bush Administration exploited post-9/11 fears to advance a policy agenda that has undermined our civil liberties. I stand by this statement ...’

‘I want to be clear that the murderous Nazi regime is historically distinct and the horror of the Holocaust must be acknowledged as a unique event in human history. I did not intend any direct comparison between the totalitarian state of Nazi Germany and the current administration.’

‘I have taken consistent and strong stands against Holocaust denial throughout my life in public service,’ Ellison said.”

Ellison must have said the right things. Two weeks later, on August 2, 2007, an article appeared in the Star Tribune which reported:

“Rep. Keith Ellison will spend a week in Israel on a privately funded trip sponsored by the America Israel Education Federation. The AIEF - the charitable arm of the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) - is sending 19 members of Congress to meet with Israeli and Palestinian leaders Aug. 12 to Aug. 18. The group, made up mostly of freshman Democrats, has plans to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah. The senior member on the trip is House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-MD , who has gone three times. Rick Jauert, Ellison’s spokesman, said that Hoyer personally invited the Minnesota Democrat ...

The trip to Israel is Ellison’s second as a congressman. In the spring, he traveled to the region as part of a congressional delegation with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.

Later this month, Rep. Eric Cantor, R-VA, will lead an AIEF-sponsored trip comprised of Republicans.”

Some of Ellison’s campaign supporters charged that the Congressman’s trip to Israel under AIEF’s auspices broke a specific campaign promise that Ellison would not accept any such invitations to tour the Middle East from organizations that had a partisan interest in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It was evidently important to Rep. Keith Ellison to accept AIEF’s invitation even though this organization was sponsoring a similar tour for Republican members of Congress led by Rep. Eric Cantor, the same man who had asked House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to reprimand him for his comparison of the Reichtag fire to the Bush Administration’s post-September 11th security policies.

Why?

  Commentary

In his remarks to the atheists, Rep. Keith Ellison said that the Bush Administration’s policies after September 11th reminded him of how Hitler had used the Reichstag fire of 1933 to increase his power and authority. Objectively, this seems like a fair comparison. Political leaders do sometimes capitalize on tragic events in self-aggrandizing ways. Hitler blamed communists for the Reichstag fire and then greatly increased his dictatorial powers. President Bush declared a “war on terror” which meant increasing internal-security measures, curtailing civil liberties and, ultimately, invading the nation of Iraq.

Perhaps worse (though not mentioned in the Anti-Defamation League attack on Ellison) was the Congressman’s reference to theories that the U.S. government might actually have been involved in the September 11th events. Ellison did not deny the validity of those theories. He merely said that if you give credence to them, “they put you in the nut-ball box.”

Who puts you in the “nut-ball box”? Perhaps organizations like the Anti-Defamation League. This opens the door to possible belief in “Jewish conspiracies” as well as to belief that American Jews or Israelis were behind the destruction of the World Trade Center towers. Reports to that effect have been circulating on the Internet.

Ellison quickly recognized what was the issue. He had to pledge complete loyalty to Jews on core issues. What issues? It’s interesting that, even though the Holocaust was not mentioned in Ellison’s original remarks or the Anti-Defamation League’s condemnation of those remarks, Ellison said: “(T)he horror of the Holocaust must be acknowledged as a unique event in human history. I did not intend any direct comparison between the totalitarian state of Nazi Germany and the current administration. I have taken consistent and strong stands against Holocaust denial throughout my life in public service.”

Ellison recognized that professing belief in the uniqueness of the Holocaust and its supreme evil in human history would be enough to get him off the hook with the Anti-Defamation League and other Jewish organizations. Belief in the Holocaust as a supreme evil and its corollary that Jews are the supreme sufferers is a quasi-religious belief that demands acceptance in American public life.

The significance of this politically is to allow Jews to remain competitive in the politics of victimhood despite their comparatively privileged place in U.S. society. It is to establish a clear pecking order. Which is worse, racism or anti-Semitism? American Jews adamantly maintain the view that anti-Semitism is worse; and they have Hitler to prove it. They remind people like Keith Ellison, who might be tempted to assert the prime suffering of blacks, that Jews played a critical role in the Civil Rights movement.

Without Jews, black people would be nothing in white society. Only feelings of racial or religious guilt, reinforced through the churchs, can keep the oppressive white majority in check. And, remember, Jesus was a Jew. Non-Jewish whites buy into this guilt-laden scheme believing that they owe something to the victimized people.

Ellison’s remarks to the atheists were offensive to proponents of that “religion” not only because he was professing religious tolerance but also because he made a pedestrian reference to Hitler in comparing Nazi policies following the Reichstag fire to those of George W. Bush. No, Adolf Hitler was the supreme embodiment of evil. He was the “Great Satan”, so to speak, and any ordinary comparisons to Hitler profane that belief. One dare not mention or suggest this event with anything less than utmost reverence. “Avert your eyes, ye mortals, or die” would be the spirit of this compelling religious message.

Now, of course, the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights forbids any “establishment of religion”. In theory, Americans are free to believe anything they wish. In public life, however, someone who denies or makes light of core Jewish beliefs is subject to immediate reprisals. And successful politicians know it. When the Anti-Defamation League speaks, they quickly back down from positions that can be regarded as offensive from this quasi-religious point of view.

Keith Ellison was especially subject to those pressures. In his younger days as an African-American student, he had called himself “Keith X” and made several racially inflammatory remarks. As a Muslim, he was also accused of consorting with “known terrorist organizations” which supported his candidacy. Ellison’s Republican opponent, Alan Fine, attacked him overtly and relentlessly on those grounds. His Jewish friends in the Minnesota legislature and elsewhere suggested that Ellison publicly disavow his earlier beliefs and associations. He did that, paving the way for campaign contributions from Jews in his district and favorable treatment in the newspaper .

So a “carrot-and-stick” dynamic seems to be at work here. It’s all right for Ellison to be a Muslim but he must resolutely denounce anti-Semitism. Unless he does that, he will be punished. If he complies, he will receive favor. Again, if Ellison casually mentions Nazi Germany in connection with a contemporary event, that is a situation meriting punishment. The Anti-Defamation League first fires a warning shot across his bow. Then two Republican members of Congress demand that Nancy Pelosi reprimand Ellison. Ellison instead chooses to take the carrot. He accepts an invitation from AIPAC’s “charitable arm” to tour Israel.

There was a similar situation involving a member of Congress, again a Democrat, on the eve of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Rep. Jim Moran of Virginia had the temerity to tell an anti-war group comprised of religious activists: “If it were not for the strong support of the Jewish community for the war, we would not be doing this.” Six Jewish members of Congress called on Moran not to seek reelection. Moran was removed as one of the Democrats’ regional whips.

So where are we with respect to “Jewish conspiracies”? We can see the smoke, but not the fire. When the Anti-Defamation League and two members of Congress criticize Rep. Keith Ellison for some less-than-reverent comparisons of the Bush Administration and Nazi Germany, Ellison immediately caves in and is saved. When Rep. Jim Moran claims that the Jewish community is a key element in the U.S. decision to invade Iraq, six members of Congress call on him to leave Congress. The Democrats remove him as a regional whip. We can see the consequences of those politically intemperate remarks if not the mechanism - the actual “conspiracy” if you will - that produced those consequences.

Another letter to Pelosi

I think this is a deplorable situation, akin to Mafia control of our national politics. It is especially deplorable when related to decisions to use U.S. military force to achieve political objectives in the Middle East. As Ellison’s constituent, I therefore wrote House Speaker Pelosi the following letter, copying Reps. Ellison, Cantor, and Wamp. This is what my letter said:

“Dear Rep. Pelosi:

The Star Tribune reports this morning that two members of Congress, Rep. Eric Cantor and Rep. Zach Wamp, have written you urging that you reprimand my Congressman, Rep. Keith Ellison, for comparing the Reichstag fire of 1933 to the Administration’s use of the 9/11 attacks to ramp up the Iraq war and repress civil liberties. I think it is a fair comparison.

Now Rep. Ellison seems to be the target of a vicious campaign orchestrated by the Anti-Defamation League to make him toe a religious line about the Holocaust. As a constituent of his, I resent this attack. I would urge you to ignore the letters from Reps. Cantor and Wamp. They represent an inappropriate religious intrusion in a society such as ours which is dedicated to free speech.

Although I am Rep. Ellison’s constituent, I did not vote for him in the Congressional election. I worked actively for one of his opponents, the Independence Party candidate. Let me point out that this candidate, in receiving 21% of the vote, did about as well as the Republican candidate who expressed bigoted religious views similar to what Reps. Cantor and Wamp appear to be expressing.

The voters here repudiated that viewpoint of the Republican candidate and I hope you will repudiate the latest attack on Rep. Keith Ellison.”

Weeks later, none of the recipients has responded to my letter. That does not surprise me. But, again, there is no “conspiracy”. It’s just that members of Congress know their place. They are political survivors, not persons who go on suicide missions for the sake of principle.

 

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