TRUMP'S NEW SUPPORT GROUP

Okay, let's chat about Congresswoman Ihan Omar, Senator Bernie Sanders, Senator Elizabeth Warren, and the new Democratic Left.

Last week, NYTimes columnist Bret Stephens wrote a piece criticizing, as antisemitic, the statements of Congresswoman Ilhan Omar. I was stunned when I scanned the readers' Comments section appended to that article. Many ignored Omar's patent antisemitism, and focused instead on denouncing Israel's policies toward the Palestinians!

What's going on here?

Stephens expressed no opinions about the desirability of a two-state solution, West Bank Israeli developments, or other Israel-Palestinian disputes. The question he raised was the propriety of Omar's suggestion of "divided loyalty" -- that if you support Israel, then that is a scar on your patriotism, i.e., you are less than 100% American.

Omar is hardly the first to suggest that Jews constitute a Fifth Column in the country of their citizenship. Disloyalty to the nation is a standard antisemitic trope. It is the centerpiece of that historic antisemitic fraud, The Protocols of the The Elders of Zion. It was an argument used by Hitler, and he wasn't the first. The assertion that Jews constitute an undesirable "nation within a nation" is a centuries-old anti-Jewish calumny. Countless millions have been murdered on account of that libel.

Equally offensive was Omar's suggestion that it was wealthy Jews who controlled our government's foreign policy on this subject.

Democratic leadership tried to suppress the conflagration by explaining that Omar was "unsophisticated" and simply did not realize what she was saying.

But that ain't gonna fly.

Congresswoman Omar is hardly unsophisticated. She was educated in the United States, and was a "Policy Fellow" of the University of Minnesota School of Public Affairs. She has been a campaign manager, a community organizer, and was sophisticated enough to be selected as part of the team that went to Paris to persuade the international World's Fair Committee to make Minneapolis a host city for next one. She won a seat in the in Minnesota legislature and was part of the minority leadership.

Unsophisticated? She didn't realize the true impact of what she was saying? Please.

If the description of her education and experience is not convincing, let's look at some directly material facts. You remember facts? Once upon a time we relied on them to make judgments.

Some years before she was elected, Omar was quoted as saying, "Israel has hypnotized the world, may Allah awaken the people and help them see the evil doings of Israel."

In January, 2019, when challenged by a reporter, she said she had not recognized the antisemitic implications of those words, and apologized for them.

In February, 2019, in reference to her views on U.S. policy regarding Israel, she said "It's all about the Benjamins, baby." (I.e., $100 bills.) When asked to elaborate, she referred to AIPAC, the pro-Israel registered lobbying group. When publicly criticized again, she apologized again.

In March 2019, she nevertheless persisted, and made the dual-loyalty-trope remark that supporting Israel was the equivalent of "allegiance to a foreign country." Notice, please: Not support, but allegiance. Right out of The Elders of Zion, and perpetrators of pogroms and The Holocaust.

What, she still didn't know what she was saying? Nobody is that dumb. The mistake she made was going public with her real views on the subject.

Okay, at least we now know where she stands. Too bad she is in Congress, but she is only one out of 435.

Nevertheless, the new Democratic left could not leave it alone, and hastened to her support. Yup, we could count on Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, and new-left tyro Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, to rush to get their far-left views into the headlines. (Ahh, I was disappointed to see Kamala Harris join that crowd.)

Of course the Republicans are having a field day with this. One could not reasonably expect less. 

Will the Dem-Left crowd keep it up, continue to tweet and refresh the newsworthiness and Democratic support of this antisemitic outlier? If so, that will have an influence on whether we get rid of Trump in 2020.

Sad.

Worse than sad. Horrific.

A bientot.