Very true. I found myself ethnic-profiling the names of the contributors to Majette (for I thought that her backers might be mainly out-of-state and indeed "pro-Israel" but might not be predominantly Jewish as alleged), which I wouldn't have done but for the controversy. To be fair to Cockburn, the same thought would have occurred to me without his article posted here, for others -- corporate media as well as what's circulated on the Net -- had already made an issue of it (with a less flamboyantly inflammatory language, to be sure), beginning with Earl Hilliard's campaign. Is there any way we can discuss this sensibly, without stirring ethnic hatred? Because all Americans who read newspapers -- Jews, Arabs, and blacks included -- must be by now thinking similar thoughts, whether or not they mention them in public....
At 9:48 PM -0400 8/21/02, Max B. Sawicky wrote:
>Let's not go all Al Gore and blame outside forces.
>CM should have disavowed her Daddy's odious
>statements; she should have asked Louis F. to go home.
>She should not have fudged her endorsements. She should
>have returned the contributions from Alamoudi (the Hamas
>'moderate') and, as a practical matter, Sami 'Death to
>Israel' Arian. This is just ABC politics. No compromise
>of principle is involved. Most important, she should not
>have succumbed to conspiracism, even for a second.
>If you are progressive, in politics a second can kill you.
I agree with you on all scores, and Cockburn should have discussed them, too, if he wanted to really analyze McKinney's demise.
Progressive candidates can't expect to win by out-fundraising the opposition anyway besides.
On the other hand, unreasonable demands that go way beyond the ABC of electoral politics could be placed on progressive candidates, pressuring them to reject all Arab-American contributions for instance:
***** James J. Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute in Washington, said he feared a return to the 1980's, when Gov. Michael S. Dukakis of Massachusetts, the Democratic presidential nominee in 1988, rejected his group's endorsement, and Mayor David Dinkins of New York refused to meet with him, concerned about angering Jewish constituents.
"This painting of Arab-American donors and political participants as being terrorists in disguise is a garish and grotesque caricature," Mr. Zogby said. "This is not about three or four donors, this is about widely targeted politics of exclusion that could end up in the disenfranchising of the entire Arab and Muslim American community."
<http://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/22/politics/22ELEC.html> *****
Comparable flaks would never materialize if candidates met and received support from right-wingers who supported settlements and wished to see all Arabs expelled from the occupied territories, even if they flat out said so in public. Actually, some politicians are already saying that -- "I happen to believe the Palestinians should leave" (Dick Armey) -- without anything untoward happening to them. -- Yoshie
* Calendar of Events in Columbus: <http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/calendar.html> * Anti-War Activist Resources: <http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/activist.html> * Student International Forum: <http://www.osu.edu/students/sif/> * Committee for Justice in Palestine: <http://www.osu.edu/students/CJP/>