Our new issue is out! Our cover story celebrates the inauguration of Barack Obama with an exclusive photo essay spotlighting the political alliance of Jews and African-Americans from 1909 to 2009. From the co-founders of the NAACP to members of the new administration, Jews have long been on the frontlines of the struggle for racial equality. Has Obama’s campaign and election helped heal the rift between Blacks and Jews that began in the late 1960s?
Other highlights of the issue include:
• Veteran Syria-watchers including Tom Dine, Martin Indyk and Michael Oren weigh the chances of breaking up the alliance between Syria and Iran—isolating Hamas and Hezbollah—and brokering peace between Syria and Israel.
• Tova Hartman stirs controversy in the Orthodox world by co-founding a synagogue where women read from the Torah and lead services.
• Conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer and his wife Robyn rescue lost East European Jewish music.
•Columnists Eric Alterman, David Frum, Letty Cottin Pogrebin, Clifford D. May
and Naomi Ragen.
• Sherwin Nuland’s review of Melvin Konner’s The Jewish Body
• Ari L. Goldman on Moment co-founder Elie Wiesel’s 50th book A Mad Desire to Dance
• The New York Times’ Ethan Bronner on Martin Indyk’s memoir, Innocent Abroad: An Intimate Account of American Peace Diplomacy in the Middle East.
It isn’t the first time that Jews are crowding the top of the power podium. It reminds me of the Soviet Union when it first began. The Jewish-led campaigns to increase ethnic participation in politics and power, as well as college admission preferences for the ethnic non-Jewish population, worked all too well–by the time we had to flee the Soviet Union, the Jews had trouble getting into colleges, get jobs, or advance at work. By that time, there was a single, token Jew at the top.
The Jewish campaign to help others seems good, charitable, the right thing to do. Yet it only makes me fear for our future. Thinking that other people are as carrying about us as we are about them is fallacy. Thinking that other people are as smart and capable as we are is arrogance. Our goodness always ends badly for us. The little Jews, the average Jews inevitably suffer discrimination thanks to our “better” who are more concerned for everyone–black, green, and red–than their own Jewish people.
Affirmative action is discrimination. Left-wing policies will fail. The Jews will be blamed once again. The rotten top spoils the life of the little people.
There is little to be proud of in the Jewish participation of Obama’s smokescreen Messiah-like election. Demagoguery leads to cult of personality, loss of personal freedom, and poverty.
Shame! Shame on Moment for glorifying this moment in our Jewish history.