Thomas Friedman, a Communist Chinese admirer takes issue with Newt Gingrich’s and Mitt Romney’s support for Israel while he channels his inner Walt and Mearsheimer. I have noticed that Friedman has become increasingly deranged (almost like Charles Johnson) as his inner Jew hatred starts coming out and Obama is exposed as the most anti-Israel president ever.
by Jennifer Rubin
Today’s Tom Friedman’s column has set off a firestorm. Now, he says and writes many wrong-headed things, about China and other dictatorial regimes, primarily. But today he hits rock bottom:
I sure hope that Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, understands that the standing ovation he got in Congress this year was not for his politics. That ovation was bought and paid for by the Israel lobby. The real test is what would happen if Bibi tried to speak at, let’s say, the University of Wisconsin. My guess is that many students would boycott him and many Jewish students would stay away, not because they are hostile but because they are confused.You see, in Friedman’s eyes, the entire U.S. Congress is bought and paid for by a cabal of Jews.
Rep. Steven R. Rothman (D-N.J.) is the first elected leader to go on the record. He has released this statement:
Thomas Friedman’s defamation against the vast majority of Americans who support the Jewish State of Israel, in his New York Times opinion piece today, is scurrilous, destructive and harmful to Israel and her advocates in the US. Mr. Friedman is not only wrong, but he’s aiding and abetting a dangerous narrative about the US-Israel relationship and its American supporters.
I gave Prime Minister Netanyahu a standing ovation, not because of any nefarious lobby, but because it is in America’s vital national security interests to support the Jewish State of Israel and it is right for Congress to give a warm welcome to the leader of such a dear and essential ally. Mr. Friedman owes us all an apology.Others are weighing in as well. Former deputy national security adviser Elliott Abrams responds by citing recent Gallup polling that shows support for Israel is at an historic high. He writes:
[.......]
On Capitol Hill, Republicans and Democrats alike were fuming. A senior GOP adviser e-mailed me: “Bibi’s standing ovation in Congress was bought and paid for by the American taxpayers who overwhelmingly support Israel. They vote, they pay our salaries and they stand with Israel. Statements to the contrary can be chalked up to frustrated leftists who can’t understand why they stand alone.”A Senate aide on the other side of the aisle put it this way: “Today, Tom Friedman did a cheap imitation of [Steven] Walt and [John] Mearsheimer as he charged that the ‘Israel lobby’ bought a congressional ovation for Bibi. If Friedman did actual reporting rather than opining from his anti-Israel perch at the Times, he would have learned that, in an otherwise polarized Congress, there is genuine, bipartisan support for Israel that reflects America’s heartland.”
The good news here is that, while Friedman’s views are ingested readily on the Upper East Side, he’s entirely irrelevant where it matters — everywhere else in America.
Read the rest – Tom Friedman, hitting rock bottom
The guys from Powerline weigh in
by John Hinderaker
Tom Friedman isn’t the worst of the New York Times columnists–not while Paul Krugman is around–but he is the most overrated. If Friedman has ever had an original thought, he has chosen not to share it with his readers. Unfortunately, the thinkers he recycles keep going downhill. Now he has come to the bottom of the barrel, John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt.
In his current column, Friedman blasts Newt Gingrich for his “invented people” riff and Mitt Romney for saying he would move the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a long-time Republican Party Platform plank. These criticisms are par for the course for Friedman, a loyal Democrat. But he goes on to bash, simultaneously, all of Congress, the “Israel lobby,” and Benjamin Netanyahu’s Israeli government:
[......]
I can’t explain the weird obsession that so many on the Left have with the “Israel lobby.” In some cases, it is transparently driven by anti-Semitism; Mearsheimer and Walt appear to fall into that category. But that diagnosis doesn’t seem to apply to Friedman. Maybe in his case, like so much that one reads in his columns, it is just a reflexive repeating of something he heard someone else say. But one hardly needs a nefarious “Israel lobby” persuading Congressmen–let alone bribing them, as Friedman claimed–to support Israel.
Israel enjoys broad support among the American people, and it is natural to see that support reflected in Congress. This graph from Gallup shows how Americans have answered the question, “In the Middle East situation, are your sympathies more with the Israelis or more with the Palestinians?” from 1988 to 2011:
Support for Israel is strongest among conservatives, but the poll data suggest that it is likely the broadest bipartisan consensus that Americans share on any contentious issue. As for the claim that Congress has been “bought and paid for by the Israel lobby,” Jennifer Rubin notes the blowback from Capitol Hill.
Friedman’s thinking on this entire subject is hopelessly confused, as shown by his casual smear of Newt Gingrich:
That thought came to mind last week when Newt Gingrich took the Republican competition to grovel for Jewish votes — by outloving Israel — to a new low by suggesting that the Palestinians are an “invented” people and not a real nation entitled to a state.
Stop to consider that for a moment. Gingrich and other Republicans are “grovel[ing] for Jewish votes” by supporting Israel? How much does Friedman know about the demographics of America west of the Hudson? As of 2010, there were 6,190 Jews in Iowa out of a population of more than three million–0.2% of Iowa’s population. How many of those do you suppose are Republican caucus-goers? A few hundred? Then there is New Hampshire, where Jews represent 0.8% of the population; Republican Jews, a smaller proportion still. Or South Carolina, where a little over 11,000 Jews are sprinkled among a population of more than 4.5 million. And finally–I can’t resist this one–ask John Thune what he thinks about Israel. Thune represents South Dakota, home to a grand total of 395 Jews, which rounds to 0.0% of the state’s population.
Friedman is unable to think outside the crude boundaries of stereotype, but it is obvious that the GOP presidential contenders are not “groveling for Jewish votes.” Rather, they are reflecting the strong support of conservatives generally, and Christian conservatives in particular, for Israel.
It isn’t easy to display such comprehensive ignorance of a topic in the space of a 900-word newspaper column, but Tom Friedman has pulled off the trick.
Read the rest - Tom Friedman goes Mearhseimer and Walt