It’s hard not to get whiplash these days while watching the modern GOP in action. On a day in which they made the most headlines by giving, in Jon Stewart’s words, the visiting Israeli prime minister “the longest blow job a Jewish man has ever received,” the chairman of the Missouri Republican Party was asked to resign because he was busted trying to discredit state Auditor Tom Schweich by launching a false whispering campaign that he is Jewish.
I should say was Jewish, not because he converted but because he responded to the nastiness of the allegation by committing suicide. It was especially noteworthy because Mr. Schweich was a candidate for the GOP’s gubernatorial nomination.
In truth, Schweich, like former U.S. Sen. John Danforth, was an Episcopalian. Danforth is actually an ordained priest, and he gave Schweich’s eulogy. The eulogy was memorable in part because the Missouri Republican chairman, John Hancock, didn’t show up. More noteworthy, however, was that Danforth basically accused him of killing the deceased with his words.
“We often hear that words can’t hurt you … well how about anti-Semitic whispers?” Danforth said…
“Words do hurt. Words can kill,” he added. “That has been proven right here in our home state.”
Hancock didn’t deny that he had falsely spread the rumor that Schweich was Jewish, he just argued that it was an innocent mistake. He might just as easily have mistaken Schweich for a Presbyterian. But Danforth wasn’t buying that excuse:
“Someone said this was no different than saying a person is a Presbyterian,” the former senator said, as quoted by the Post-Dispatch. “Here’s how to test the credibility of that remark: When was the last time anyone sidled up to you and whispered into your ear that such and such a person is a Presbyterian?”
Now, I live in suburban Philadelphia which has a big Jewish population. No one would ever sidle up to me here to tell me that such and such a person is a Jew.
“Did you know that Arlen Specter was a Jew?”
“That Allyson Schwartz seems nice, but did you know that she’s a Hebe?”
“I was thinking of voting for Ed Rendell until I realized that he’s a hook-nosed kike.”
I’m sure if you dig around in the right circles you can encounter these kind of remarks in Eastern Pennsylvania, but they sure aren’t commonplace. We tend to judge people by different criteria.
Still, over in Missouri, and in much of the country, being a Jew is not something that inspires trust, let alone massive outpourings of thoughtless applause.
If you were focused on the Capitol Building in DC yesterday, you might have thought that Republicans love Jewish people almost to the point of derangement.
If you were focused on Tom Schweich’s memorial service in Missouri, you got a much more accurate picture.
It’s not about Jews as people — it’s about Israel as an essential piece of the apocalyptic prophecy. Christian wingnuts don’t like Jews, but they love Israel. It’s truly bizarre, but it is very real.
This sort of behavior is classic “provincialism”, it’s what can be expected of those with a peasant mentality. If MO doesn’t want to be seen as “fly over land” then it needs to stop having stories like this erupt.
But some ethnic and religious principles can perhaps be deduced. No, American “conservatives” and Christianists do not “love” Jews. Surely they do not love American Jews, as this MO story makes clear. They never have and never will. That’s what “conservatism” means…
Now, as for Israelis who are Jewish, conservatives don’t much like them either, but there at least they like what Israel is doing politically and militarily, which is harming and oppressing Muslims, a group which American conservatives REALLY dislike….
For “conservatives”, it’s not a matter of who they “love”, it’s always who do they hate more!
They love whatever benefits them at any given moment. And yet some Jews support the party. But then the Log Cabin Republicans are beyond my understanding as well.
It’s the same stupid thinking that you’ll find among many Black Republicans, that (our group) will benefit by having two parties fight over our votes. The problem is that one of the parties would be perfectly fine with seeing you and yours swinging from a shade tree by your necks, so that tactic simply has no chance of working.
Ever.
Only if you take what they say seriously, which I would not recommend for anyone with functioning synapses…
From the little that I’ve read over the past few days, the answer for a significant portion of the MO GOP may be “Not.” However, it’s not clear to me that it has actually been tested and confirmed in an election, either recently or any time in the past.
There are/have been elected office holders at the state level in MO that are Jews, but they are all Democrats. Given MO’s “red” tilt, difficult not to conclude that Jews are not disadvantaged in general elections.
Hancock seemed to think that a Jew would lose among Republican primary voters. But he could be a deeply stupid man that overgeneralizes racism among the GOP primary base. Or maybe he was conducting an experiment with his “whispering campaign” against a man that wasn’t religiously or ethnically Jewish.
To quote my (still living in Missouri) brother:
“I can’t tell a Jew from a white man at over 10 yards.”
. . . he responded to the nastiness of the allegation by committing suicide.
But it’s not a nasty allegation, whether true or false.
And though not a Jew by religion the man was ethically Jewish, muddying the waters a bit more.
The suicide was utterly baffling.
Makes you think something else was going on that nobody has unearthed yet.