Alaska Dispatch Reports: In 1938, as the Nazis laid plans to annihilate European Jewry, a few desperate Jews dreamed of escaping to the other side of the world: Alaska. Joachim Hein, from Breslau, Germany, was one of many who wrote to the American Department of Interior for permission to immigrate to the vast northern territory with his wife, Anna, and daughter, Henny. “We shall in no way [be] a burden for the country,” he wrote in a letter now in the National Archives, “because we take our electric machines from here and furnish a manufacture in aprons and linen, like we have had here. But if this business is not agreeable to your Excellency, we are prepared to [do] every work.”

Interior Secretary Harold Ickes and a few others in President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s administration liked the idea of resettling German Jews in Alaska. Despite the isolationist and anti-Jewish sentiments prevalent at the time, they proposed to establish “a haven for Jewish refugees from Germany and other areas in Europe where the Jews are subjected to oppressive restrictions.” According to Ickes’s diaries, President Roosevelt wanted to move 10,000 settlers to Alaska each year for five years, but only 10 percent would be Jewish “to avoid the undoubted criticism” the program would receive if it brought too many Jews into the country. With Ickes’s support, Interior Undersecretary Harold Slattery wrote a formal proposal titled “The Problem of Alaskan Development,” which became known as the Slattery Report. It emphasized economic-development benefits rather than humanitarian relief: The Jewish refugees, Ickes reasoned, would “open up opportunities in the industrial and professional fields now closed to the Jews in Germany.”

The proposal won few fans in the far north. Widow Emma de la Vergne in Fairbanks was one of those who thought it was a good idea. “Let the German-Jews come to Alaska if they want to. Alaska is a big country. Give them a chance,” she said when interviewed by the city’s Daily News-Miner. But most of her fellow Alaskans disagreed. “German Jews Unsuited for Alaska Settlers Is Prevailing View Here,” read the paper’s headline on November 21, 1938. A few days later, an editorial declared: “Alaska wants no misfits and none who are unprepared to make their way without becoming a burden upon the territory.” The mayor of Fairbanks compared the proposal to one that advocated turning Alaska into a penal colony.

The idea went nowhere. But fears that Jews would not be able to make it in Alaska were unfounded. Jews were among the earliest settlers of “the Last Frontier,” and had played a major role in putting it on the American map. “It’s because of the Jewish presence that Alaska was developed when it was,” says Alaska historian Patti Moss, who lives in Juneau, the state capital in southeastern Alaska. “The first banks: Jewish people. Railroads: Jewish financing. The first college: East Coast Jewish money. The entire infrastructure of Alaska was built by Jewish people, Jewish money and Jewish knowledge.”

Danish-born navigator Vitus Bering, exploring on behalf of the Russian Tsar Peter the Great, sighted Alaska on a 1741 trip to map the Siberian coast. Decades later came the promyshlenniki – Russian fur traders and businessmen lured by Alaska’s untapped natural wealth. Among these hardy souls, it is believed, were Jewish furriers and Jews who had been exiled to Siberia by the Tsar. Most worked for the state-sponsored trading concern called the Russian-American Company, which had a monopoly on exploiting Alaska’s vast resources. One of its managers was Nikolay Yakovlevich Rosenberg, who ran the company from 1850 to 1853.

New Archangel — renamed Sitka — a harbor town on an island off the southeast coast, was the center of Alaskan commercial life. The first Jewish family arrived in 1848, says Moss. Alexander Cohen, whose daughters would become the state’s first postmistresses, bought two or three hotels and a brewery. The Cohens were followed by other Ashkenazi Jews from Germany who opened up a variety of businesses, including brothels. “Jews transformed Sitka from a tent city into a city,” says Moss.

Jewish traders from San Francisco who purchased furs from the Russian-American Company were among the first to recognize Alaska’s potential. “While historians differed as to the real motives for the sale of Alaska, there was substantial agreement that the efforts of the San Francisco fur syndicates to buy out the Russian-American Company was a factor in bringing about the purchase,” wrote Bernard Postal, author of an authoritative article on Alaska’s Jews in the 1960 “American Jewish Yearbook.” Former California Senator Cornelius Cole, according to one Alaskan pioneer, recalled that “the original and most active mover of the plan to buy Alaska after the Civil War was an enterprising Jewish-American promoter and trader named Philip [sic] Goldstone of San Francisco.”

Cole got Goldstone’s first name wrong but the rest of his facts were accurate. In 1865, Louis Goldstone, a California fur trader, brought news that the Russians wanted to sell Alaska to an American company. Facing competition from the British-owned Hudson Bay Company, Goldstone’s associates decided to pressure the American government to preempt the British. They engaged Cole, then a Washington lobbyist, to press his boyhood friend, U.S. Secretary of State William H. Seward. And thus it was that on March 30, 1867 “Seward’s Folly” — the $7.2 million American purchase of Alaska — came to pass. At less than two cents an acre, it was a land that, unbeknownst to both seller and purchaser, harbored untold deposits of gold, silver, copper, zinc, coal and oil.

Shortly after the U.S. purchase, two wealthy Jewish furriers in San Francisco Lewis Gerstle and Louis Sloss, bought most of the concessions owned by the Russian-American Company — 23 trading posts strategically located on accessible islands and coastal plains, as well as its entire stock of goods, warehouses, wharves and ships — and folded them into their own firm, the Alaska Commercial Company. “A company agent was aboard the government transport carrying the American officials who took possession of Alaska on October 1, 1867,” wrote Postal. And so was soldier Benjamin Levy, who, according to his 1882 obituary in The American Israelite, was credited “with hauling down the Russian flag and hoisting up the Stars and Stripes when the formal transfer of sovereignty took place at Sitka.”

In control of the new territory’s infrastructure, the Alaska Commercial Company had the inside track “in the race for commercial supremacy in Alaska,” wrote Postal. Gerstle and Sloss were particularly interested in sealskins, and also financed some of Alaska’s first mining ventures. But neither man ever set foot in the territory; they were Bavarian émigrés known more for their formal manners than for their love of sub-zero temperatures.

At the time of the sale, according to congressional records, there were about 2,500 Russians and 8,000 indigenous people living under the direct governance of the Russian-American Company, and possibly 50,000 Alaskan natives living outside its jurisdiction. U.S. sovereignty in Alaska proved to be a magnet for more newcomers. Soon, the streets of Sitka were lined with shops with Jewish names, and the small Jewish community thrived. One traveler, Emil Teichmann, describes how Sitka’s Jewish men prayed together in a warehouse on Friday night. “I had never heard a sound there in the evenings, but on that night my curiosity was aroused by the murmur of several voices in the adjoining room,” he writes in his published diary, “A Journey to Alaska in the Year 1868.” “Looking through a crevice I saw quite an assembly of some twenty men all of the Jewish persuasion, who were holding their Sabbath services and reading their prayers under the leadership of the oldest man present. It was a memorable thing to see this religious gathering in so strange a setting and it said a great deal for the persistence with which the Jews everywhere, even in the most remote countries, practice their emotional exercises.”

(Read More)

Politico Reports: Samuel Wurzelbacher, better known as “Joe the Plumber,” defended Wednesday his decision to draw a $5,000-a-month salary from his campaign funds as he runs for Congress.

The plumber, brought into the public eye for his confrontation of Barack Obama during the 2008 presidential campaign, argued that the pay was necessary for him to continue in the race.

“Per the FEC, it’s legal. People have done it for a really long time. I’m taking less than I ever made as a plumber, so that I can run,” Wurzelbacher told POLITICO. “The working class is not represented in Congress, by no means, so therefore, I want to step up and represent them. In doing so, I’m taking on a 30-year incumbent, so this is a full-time job.”

The story that he was drawing a salary from his campaign funds was first reported by The Cleveland Plain Dealer on Tuesday. FEC reports further show that Wurzelbacher has raised just over $54,000 as of Dec. 31, 2011, and has $17,486 cash on hand. He announced he was running in late Oct. 2011.

Wurzelbacher says that he has knocked on over 5,000 doors and called nearly 2,000 people as part of his campaign already.

“It’s an 18-hour-a-day job to do this,” he said. “My donors are aware of this… I have not sold my patriotism. If you have an opportunity to do good, it becomes a responsibility. And that’s the reason I’m doing this. It’s my responsibility to my fellow citizens to represent their point of view.”

“With the death threats I’ve received over the past three and a half years, obviously that brings concern,” Wurzelbacher said. “But I also bear arms.”

Wurzelbacher said he’s had about 30 or 40 death threats directed at him, the most recent just a few months ago.

Wurzelbacher is running as a Republican in Ohio’s 9th Congressional District, a seat that is also being contested by Reps. Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio) and Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) because of redistricting.

Read Full Report: Politico

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Haaretz Via Forward Reports: “The Arab world is in flames and the Security Council is dealing with  construction permits in Judea and Samaria (the West Bank),” Israel’s United  Nations envoy Ron Prossor said in a speech at the UN Security Council on  Tuesday.

Prosor used the Security Council’s monthly meeting on the situation in the  Middle East to direct harsh criticism at the body.

“The obsession with Israeli and the ignoring of countries where civilians are  tortured and killed undermines the credibility and calls into question the  relevance of the Security Council,” Prosor said.

“Iran’s efforts to develop nuclear weapons represent the greatest threat to  peace and security in the world,” Prosor said. “The silence of the Security  Council will be very costly. You must act today. Tomorrow will be too late.”

The National Jewish Democratic Council writes: Former Speaker Newt Gingrich asserted that President Barack Obama’s administration canceled Austere Challenge 12, a joint U.S.-Israel military exercise. The truth, however, is otherwise, as documented by journalists.

[The Staff of] NJDC President and CEO David A. Harris [writes that he] said: “Once again in tonight’s Florida GOP debate, former Speaker Newt Gingrich has simply fabricated recent events surrounding the U.S.-Israel relationship while discussing the postponement of a planned joint military exercise between our two countries—all in a deeply unfortunate ploy to smear President Barack Obama’s outstanding pro-Israel record. The U.S.-Israel relationship is simply too important to play games with and flat-out lie about. Enough is enough; Mr. Gingrich and all of the GOP presidential candidates must cease fabricating and smearing the President’s Israel record immediately. The stakes are simply too great.”

]]> http://gestetnerupdates.com/2012/01/24/njdc-hits-gingrich-for-lying-about-us-israel-military-exercise/feed/ 0 http://gestetnerupdates.com/2012/01/19/gov-cuomo-pushes-budget-message-in-queens/ http://gestetnerupdates.com/2012/01/19/gov-cuomo-pushes-budget-message-in-queens/#comments Fri, 20 Jan 2012 03:45:25 +0000 Yossi Gestetner http://gestetnerupdates.com/?p=6783 NYDN Reports: The determined Democrat, appearing on his home turf, drew the loudest applause when he talked up his plan to build a new convention center in Queens. “Queens has it all,” Cuomo said. “The entire mosaic of this country …

Read more »

Wash Post Reports: The agreement among six political parties all but guarantees that the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party will lead Egypt’s first elected parliament since the ouster of Hosni Mubarak in February, with the Islamist party expected to control as many as half the seats.

Under the power-sharing agreement, the ultraconservative Salafist Nour party and the liberal al-Wafd party would also claim top positions, with their representatives serving as deputy speakers, the parties announced during a news conference Monday at the Freedom and Justice Party’s headquarters.

With a week left until the lower house of the parliament meets, the Freedom and Justice Party said its nominee for speaker would be Mohamed Saad Katatny, the party’s secretary general.

NJSL Reports: Senate President Stephen Sweeney plans to open an exploratory committee to look at a possible U.S. Senate run in 2014.

“It’s to keep my options open, to explore some opportunities. Several people have come up to me and asked me to consider looking at that in the future,” Sweeney (D-Gloucester) said in a phone interview today.

The development was first reported by PolitickerNJ.com this afternoon, citing sources.

Longtime Democratic U.S. Sen. Frank Lautenberg’s term expires in 2014.

(Read More)

Team Romney has released a new ad Pounding president Obama on his recess appointment of Richard Cordray, in the ad Romney is heard saying “The National Labor Relations Board, now stacked with union stooges selected by the President, says to a free enterprise like Boeing, ‘You can’t build a factory in South Carolina because South Carolina is a Right to Work state.’ That is simply un-American. It is political payback of the worst kind.”

Dan Joseph loaded this video at MRC-TV:

The Right Scoop Reports: Somebody please get Debbie Wasserman Schultz’s head out of the washing machine because it is clearly in the spin cycle! You know, that unbalanced spin cycle where the washing machine is shaking back and forth.

DWS has gone nut-so trying to suggest that the unemployment rate hasn’t gone up under Obama.

Ed Morrissey at HotAir did the hard work on a few statistics to contradict the DNC Chair:

• Jobless rate in January 2009: 7.8%.  Jobless rate in November 2011: 8.6%.
• Number of employed in January 2009, in thousands: 133,563.  In November 2011: 131,708
• Civilian participation rate in January 2009: 65.7%.  In November 2011: 64.0%
• Unemployment level in January 2009, in thousands: 11,984.  In November 2011: 13,303
• Number of people not in labor force, January 2009, in thousands: 80,554.  In November 2011: 86,558.

Here is the video:

Liz Benjamin Reports: it could turn out to be an embarrassment of riches for E. O’Brien Murray.

Not one, but two Republicans connected to the veteran operative have been approached by party leaders and asked to consider challenging New York’s junior senator, Democrat Kirsten Gillibrand, next fall. And both are mulling it over.

As the NY Post reported this morning, Marc Cenedella, a 41-year-old Fredonia native and founder of the job-funding Website TheLadders.com, is in discussions with O’Brien about entering the political arena.

He has already discussed his possible U.S. Senate candidacy with state GOP Chairman Ed Cox and Conservative Party Chairman Mike Long.

In addition, according to Murray, freshman Rep. Bob Turner, whom Murray helped guide to an unexpected victory this fall, has also “repeatedly” been asked to run against Gillibrand and is considering it.

“Marc or Bob would be a great candidate against (Gillibrand),” O’Brien said in an early-morning email. “These are two people who have put New Yorkers to work.  They have made payrolls, she hasn’t.”

“Marc Cenedella has helped millions of people get jobs.  Bob Turner has reached across the aisle to show he can build support from all parties. Marc can put New York back to work and Bob has a proven track record of winning in Democratic areas. Either one could beat her.”

Gillibrand won her first statewide election last fall, easily beating former Rep. Joe DioGuardi, who defeated Bruce Blakeman and David Malpass in a GOP primary after he petitioned his way onto the ballot.

But Gillibrand’s poll numbers have remained fairly anemic, even as she has raised her profile by taking prominent roles in everything from DOMA to the Zadroga Act.

During his speech at the Republican Jewish Coalition’s Presidential Forum, Newt Gingrich suggested that he would ask former hawkish ambassador to the U.N. – John Bolton – to be his secretary of state. John Bolton responded yesterday on Fox News’ “On the Record” with Greta Van Susteren:

NYDN Reports: Gov. Cuomo’s change of heart on raising taxes, or revenue in his words, on the wealthy comes from a “new reality” of worsening budget deficits and a desire not to scale back promised 4% education and health care funding increases.

Cuomo at a late night press conference reiterated his stance that the state’s long-term competitiveness  rests with tax cuts. But situations change, and that is what he says ultimately forced him to consider higher taxes on the wealthy—even while arguing that he believes a revamping of the tax code was long overdue and rejecting the premise that taxes are going up since the rates are still lower than the expiring so-called millionaires tax.

He said the Occupation protests had nothing to do with his change of heart.

“My job as governor is to make the best decisions I can  at the time to meet the needs of the state at the time,” Cuomo said.  “The role of government is to try and help the people of the state, bring a direction for the circumstances of the moment.”

“And this is, I think, the best path for the state at this time.”

He added: “This is a different economic reality than anyone anticipated and you make the best decision you can  at that time for those facts for that reality. For this new reality that we’re facing, I think this is the best decision.”

Maggie Haberman at Politico Reports: Chris Christie is slated to be the keynote speaker at a luncheon during the  Republican Jewish Coalition’s GOP 2012 panel on Dec. 7, according to an advisory  a reader received.

As Mike Allen previewed in Playbook, the event will allow the seven candidates taking part – Ron Paul is not attending – 35 minutes to speak  each.

Christie is currently a Mitt Romney surrogate, but he’s also, for many conservative elites, the one that got away this cycle, and the  likelihood of him as a 2016 prospect remains.

The NY Post Reports: Republican Harry Wilson, a wealthy investor and friend of Mayor Bloomberg who ran a strong, but losing,  campaign for state comptroller last year, said yesterday he’s giving “serious  consideration’’ to challenging the once-moderate but now ultra-liberal  Gillibrand in the 2012 balloting.

Wilson told The Post that he had ruled out running against Gillibrand until  two weeks ago, when Inside Albany reported that leading GOP activists were discussing his possible  candidacy.

“Since the Inside Albany report two weeks ago, Harry has been inundated by Republicans and Democrats encouraging him to run,’’ said  Wilson spokesman Bill O’Reilly.

Until then, said O’Reilly, Wilson “had not planned to run’’ against  Gillibrand.

But now, “he is giving it serious consideration,’’ said O’Reilly, noting that  Wilson and his family are “thinking through whether to make this run or  not.”

O’Reilly said that Wilson wouldn’t make a final decision until early next  year, but noted he has the skills and “bipartisan credibility to make a major  difference in Washington.’’

Several public-opinion polls have recently shown Gillibrand with less than a  50 percent approval rating and with a large number of voters saying they know  little about her.

Gillibrand was plucked in 2009 by then-Gov. David Paterson from the relative  obscurity of being an Albany-area congresswoman to replace Sen. Hillary Rodham  Clinton, who had been named secretary of state by the then-newly elected  President Obama.

Gillibrand then cruised to an easy electoral victory over former Westchester  US Rep. Joseph DioGuardi last year, winning the right to complete the last two  years of Clinton’s term.

Wilson, who was raised in upstate Johnstown, once served on President Obama’s  automobile-industry restructuring task force and was recently made a member of  the advisory committee of the federal Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., an  independent agency that insures private pension plans.

Nassau Comptroller George Maragos has announced he’ll seek the Republican  nomination to challenge Gillibrand, but few in the talent-pool-challenged GOP  see him as a credible candidate.

“There’s no doubt that Wilson would be our best candidate. He’s sharp,  credible and wealthy, has friends in high places, and he made a strong run for  state comptroller last year,’’ said one of the state’s GOP leaders.

The annual meeting of Jewish federations kicked off exactly one year to the day before the 2012 general elections. But politics seemed to be an unwelcome guest at the event.

The 3,000-strong audience gave a tepid response to a call from top Democrat Debbie Wasserman Schultz for the Jewish community to speak out on behalf of President Barack Obama, a sign of the unease Jewish
communal leaders felt when discussing politics at this setting.

Wasserman Schultz, the keynote speaker at the annual General Assembly of the Jewish Federations of North America, the umbrella organization of federations in the U.S. and Canada, dedicated most of her speech to praise of the community and its activism around legislation dealing with women’s health, assistance to Holocaust survivors, and Jewish military chaplains.

Applause turned decidedly weaker when Wasserman Schultz, a Florida congresswoman who also chairs the Democratic National Committee, turned to politics. “Many of you received mails distorting the President’s record on Israel,” she said, referring to email blasts addressed to Jewish recipients.

Wasserman Schultz ticked off actions Obama has taken to strengthen Israel’s security and his strong stance against a Palestinian drive for statehood in the U.N. She called on the audience to “spread the truth” and speak out within the community against attempts to attack Obama on the issue of Israel.

“Israel should not be used as a political football,” she said. The appeal was greeted by unenthusiastic applause, but no boos, either.

The General Assembly agenda does not include any Republican politicians. The meeting is traditionally focused on issues relating to Jewish communal life and to internal debates within the federation system,
not politics.

(Read More at the Forward)

I must admit: While seeing the video, some good memories came to mind. However, it is a shame that Obama has squandered the good will that Americans of all stripes and colors gave him on the night he won the election. He came into office a few months later with an approval rating solidly above sixty percent. Yet three years late and he lost at least a third of it. No. Not because racism grew in America the last three years. Instead, the President has apparently failed the American people.

BTW, the video is posted at and linked to You Tube via the campaign website and Obama email list with more than twelve million recipients, but it has less than 50,000 views at this time.

The following is an article by Vin Poupard, a writer for Yahoo!

As a former political/business consultant, I have to laugh at the statements by the White House about the subpoena on Solyndra documents being “overbroad.” This is an argument I have seen before, and have found it is one that is used to stall an investigationor to defer from particular information being found out. The arguments by the White House are more of a statement of guilt than one of persecution.

In times of a congressional investigation, it is the responsibility of the president, the administration and White House workers to turn over all of the information that is requested. Remember the hundreds of boxes that were pulled from the White House during the Bill Clinton/Monica Lewinski scandal? This was also the case during the Watergate scandal and during the Church Committee’s investigation of Project MKUltra. The Solyndra investigation is no different.

The White House has said the gathering of information would conflict with President Barack Obama’s ability to meet his duties. Which duties would that be? Right now, all we have seen him do is tour the country and talk about how the Republicans are holding the jobs bill back. Is this a constitutional duty of the president? Where in the Constitution does it state that the president is responsible for blaming a Congress that he is “too busy” to meet with?

The White House refusal of the subpoena and saying it “is a significant intrusion on the Executive Branch interests.” This sounds like a play right out of Dick Chaney’s book. Is the Executive Branch above ever being questioned? Is the president too important to be questioned about a company like Solyndra that was given government money and flopped? Is the president worried about a paper trail?

 If nothing illegal or unethical was done with the Solyndra case, we would see a White House statement to Congress that it can have all of the information it wants without question. If Solyndra and the White House had not been bedmates, Congress would have everything it needed and all the time it needed to go over everything.

Arguments that President Obama is some type of victim to party politics and that the information needed is too broad are stalling statements to try to get the uninformed on President Obama’s side. That reads like an admission to me.

(Source: Yahoo! News )

The following is an Op Ed by NY GOP Chairman Ed Cox printed in the Long Island Jewish World:

While most ethno-religious groups have followed the rule that increasing prosperity leads to an increasing identification with the Republican Party, Jewish voters have been a reliable liberal vote for nearly a century; Democratic Presidents Kennedy, Johnson, Clinton and Obama all won about 80% of the Jewish vote.

Yet Jewish Americans’ support for President Obama has declined from a high of 83% in 2009 to 54% this fall, and in the recent special election in New York’s 9^th Congressional District, Republican Bob Turner split the Jewish vote with Jewish Democrat David Weprin, after winning endorsements from two Jewish Democrats, former Mayor Ed Koch and Assemblyman Dov Hikind, both of whom had also endorsed George W. Bush.

Obama’s treatment of Israel, Democrats’ support for social policies anathema to Jewish tradition and liberals’ desire to transform the American system suggest that Jewish interests are more closely aligned with the principles of the Republican Party.

Ed Koch made it clear that his support of a Republican was meant to send a message to the White House, and characterized the CD 9 race as a referendum on President Obama’s “throwing Israel under the bus.”  Indeed, Obama has crafted the most anti-Israeli foreign policy of any President in decades; a recent Jerusalem Post/Smith Poll found that only 12% of Israelis consider Obama to be pro-Israel.

And this at a time when Israel faces its biggest threats since 1973: the growing strength of Hamas and Hezbollah; potential radical Islamist goverments, especially in Egypt, following the “Arab Spring;” a potentially nuclear armed Iran; and an alienated Turkey with an increasingly Islamist government looking for influence in the Arab world.

Obama has pursued his stated goal of putting “daylight” between the United States and Israel by proposing that Israel use the indefensible pre-1967 borders as a basis for negotiation, suggesting that a united Jerusalem is not a part of Israel, and urging Israel “to engage in serious self-reflection,” while making no such demands on the PLO or Hamas, a terrorist organization that denies Israel’s right to exist.

When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited the White House last year to repair relations after being chastised by Secretary Clinton over the phone, Obama snubbed him during a negotiating session, declaring, “I’m going to the residential wing to have dinner with Michelle and the girls.” Netanyahu was denied the customary joint statement and photo op with the President and was summarily ushered out through a side door.

Prior to his endorsement of Republican Bob Turner, Assemblyman Dov Hikind, a prominent Orthodox Jew who has endorsed Republicans including George Pataki, Rudy Giuliani and Michael Grimm, had declined to support fellow Democratic Assemblyman David Weprin after Weprin’s Assembly vote in favor of gay marriage.

While many practicing Jews believe that the teachings of Judaism tend towards political liberalism, Orthodox Jews, those who shape their lives around Jewish religious tradition, oppose the politically correct liberal positions on many social issues precisely because they conflict with Jewish law, which forbids homosexual relationships and permits abortion only to protect the life of the mother.

In the late 19^th century, Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe called America “the Golden Land.” As Norm Podhoretz described in his seminal book, “Why Are Jews Liberals?,” the real fortune that awaited Jewish immigrants was the freedom and opportunity that has allowed Jews to prosper in America.

Yet liberals believe that our system, marred (as they would say) with economic, social, and political inequality, needs to be reformed, rejected, or otherwise apologized for.  Conversely, conservatives recognize that the values of individual freedom, accountability, limited government, fiscal responsibility and local control have afforded Americans more freedom and prosperity than the world has ever seen.

Nowhere is American exceptionalism more evident than in the history of the Jews in America.

Yet many on the left, manifest in the “Occupy Wall Street” crowd, seek to roll back the freedoms that have allowed generations of Jewish immigrants to improve their standard of living in America.

Even the New York Times admitted that “anti-Semitic signs have been spotted” at “Occupy Wall Street” events, funded by liberal organizations including labor unions and “World Can’t Wait” and “Alliance for Global Justice.”  One Zuccotti Park protestor held a sign that read, “Jews Control Wall Street,” and another was quoted as saying “the Zionist Jews…need to be run out of this country.”  The Arab American Association held Muslim Friday prayers in Zuccotti Park to demonstrate solidarity with the protestors, who one week prior had received the endorsement of the American Nazi Party, which tweeted, “Our people have joined in many of the protests. #occupywallst.”

I have just returned from Israel, where I visited with the Executive Committee of Republicans Abroad in Israel (RAI), a large and active group whose efforts complimented our own in Bob Turner’s victory in the 9^th Congressional District, after which Ed Koch cautioned that Democrats could no longer count on the Jewish vote.  If Democrats and liberals continue to assail Israel, promote social policy contrary to Jewish law and attempt to remake the socioeconomic system that allowed Jews to flourish in America, Jewish Americans may in time find a new home with the Republican Party.

(Source: NYGOP Website)

ADL released poll results today regarding Anti-Semitic attitudes of people in the USA. The Poll finds that 29% Blacks and 20% US-born Hispanics – both solid Democratic voting blocks – hold strong Anti-Semitic views. The same can be said on only fifteen percent of the overall U.S. population, according to the poll.

ADL notes that Blacks and Hispanics are now more than a quarter of the overall U.S. population and they grow at a fast rate. Therefore writes the ADL “these populations increase of the cohorts with a substantially higher percentage of anti-Semitic beliefs than the total population also means that anti-Semitic propensities in the coming years will be a challenge.”

More sobering is that 42% of foreign born Hispanics hold strong anti-Semitic views, according to this poll. This specific result may push more Jewish Americans to support more control at the borders and also to
oppose forces on the Left who want to give many rights to foreigners from the South side of the border despite their high rate of Anti-Semitism.

Other Results:

• Sixteen percent (16%) agreed that Jewish “business people are so shrewd, others don’t have a chance,” up from 13 percent in 2009.

• Thirty percent (30%) believe that Jews are “more loyal to Israel than to America,” a percentage that has remained virtually unchanged since ADL’s benchmark survey in 1964.

• Nearly half of all respondents agreed with the statement that Jews “stick together
more than other Americans, and 33 percent said they believe Jews “always like to be at the head of things.”

• 25% Americans believe that Jews “still talk too much about what happened to them in the Holocaust.”

The Cain is indeed on a fast learning curve: He went from now knowing two months ago what “the right of return” means, to making the above reference. The Daily Beast Reports:

Cain, the frontrunner among GOP candidates, invoked the phrase in an interview over the weekend with Israel Hayom, a mass-circulation Israeli tabloid owned by an American backer of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Asked about President Barack Obama’s Middle East policy, Cain referred to the Palestinian bid for U.N. membership: “I think that the so-called Palestinian people have this urge for unilateral recognition because they see this president as weak.”

He also said Obama’s failure to firmly support Netanyahu “emboldened Israel’s enemies.”

Cain’s remark raises further questions about Cain’s inexperience on foreign policy and his qualifications for the presidency. If elected president he will almost inevitably have to act as peacemaker between Israel and the Palestinians, as have all recent presidents. A businessman and former Washington lobbyist who has never been elected to any office, Cain has made a series of gaffes in debates and interviews on international issues, at one point last month dismissing “Ubeki-beki-beki-beki-stan-stan” as a small and
insignificant state.

די נישט-געענטפערטן אנטווארט צום רובאשקין פּעטישאן

אויב דאס ווייסע הויז זאל געבן פאר די 52,200 מענטשן וואס האבן אונטערגעשריבן דעם רובאשקין פעטישאן בלויז צען פראצענט אטענשאן וואס דאס ווייסע הויז האט געגעבן פאר די ‘אקיופיי וואל סטריט’ באוועגונג וועלכע האט אינעם גרעסטן טאג אין ניו יארק געהאט קוים פינף טויזנט מענטשן, וואלט יוסטיץ אין אמעריקע געהאט אן אנדערע פנים.

דאס איז די געשיכטע:

צוריק אין 2008 האבן פעדעראלע אגענטן געמאכט אן איבערפאל אויף די אגריפראסעסארס שחיטה ארט אין אייאווע. די פירמע איז דאן געפירט געווארן דורך שלום מרדכי רובאשין. מען האט אים ארעסטירט און אנגעקלאגט אויף אימיגראציע פארלעצונגען, און ער איז געהאלטן געווארן אונטער ארעסט פאר צען וואכן! פרעגט זיך זיכער, פארוואס זאל אן אמעריקאנער בירגער, א טאטע פון צען קינדער וואס ווערט איצט דאס ערשטע מאל אנגעקלאגט אויף א פארברעכן געהאלטן ווערן פאר צען וואכן אונטער ארעסט? זייער פשוט. ער איז א איד און פראסעקיוטערס האבן ג’טענה’ט אז ער קען אנטלויפן צו מדינת ישרא-ל.

נאך צען וואכן האט די רעגירונג צוריק געצויגן פון די אימיגראציע אנקלאגעס און שלום איז ארויס אויף די פריי. אבער א וואך דערויף האט מען אים ווידעראמאל ארעסטירט, דאס מאל אויף באנק שווינדלעריי קלאגעס. אין איין ווארט איז די געשיכטע אז שלום מרדכי האט געבאקען די ביכער כדי צו קענען האבן א גרעסערע הלואה, וואס איז פיין געפארן ביז מען האט געהאלטן ארעסירט פאר צען וואכן און געפרוירן זיינע נכסים. די הלואה איז געגאנגן קראכן, און די רעגירונג האט ג’טענה’ט ‘דו באטריגער. די האסט געבאקן די ביכער כדי צו קענען באשווינדלן דעם באנק מיט קיין פלאן צו באצאלן!’

די פראסעקיוטערס האבן ערשט פארלאנגט א לעבנסלענגליכע אורטייל, ממש לעבענסלענגליך! אבער נאך א ווייגעשריי פון זעקס געוועזענע אטוירניס דזשענעראל, האט די יוסטיץ דעפארטמענט פארלאנגט “בלויז” פינף און צוואנציג יאר. די ריכטערן האט אים געגעבן זיבן און צוואנציג יאר.

פאלגאנד זענען די סיבות וואס דארף יעדן אויפברויזן:

א)  רובאשקין איז נישט געבוירן געווארן אין איזריעל און ער האט אויך נישט אן איזרעלי פאספארט. זיין אמעריקאנער פאספארט ביים ארעסט האט מען געטראפן לעבן צוואנציג טויזנט דאלאר קעש. האלטן וויכטיגע דאקומענטן נאנט צו געלט אינדערהיים איז א נארמאלע זאך וואס יעדער טוט, און יעדער רייכער מאן וועלכער טיילט פיל צדקה ווי ר’ שלום האט געטיילט, זיצט מיט א שיין עטליכע דאלאר אינדערהיים. עס איז נישט א צייכן אז מען וויל אנטלויפן. די פראגע אלזא איז: וואלט די רעגירונג נישט יוצא געווען מיט’ן אוועק נעמען די פאסאפארט פון דעם פופציג יעריגער, פאטער פון צען, ערשטע מאליגער באשולדיגטער, און לייגן א מאניטאר אויף זיין פוס אז ער זאל נישט אנטלויפן?

ב)   רעגירונג’ס אגענטן פארשטעלט אלס אימיגראנטן וועלכע זוכן ארבעט, האבן עטליכע מאל געברענגט פאלשע פאפירן צו אגריפראסעסארס מיט’ן ציל צו באקומען א זשאב. אבער וויבאלד די דאקומענטן זענען אנזעבאר געווען פאלש, האט מען זיי ארבעט נישט געגעבן. אין אנדערע ווערטער, די 300 אומלעגאלע אימיגראנטן וועלכע האבן געארבעט ביי די פירמע (אויסמאכענדיג 30% די ארבעטס קראפט) און זענען כשר באצאלט געווארן, האבן באקומען פאסטענס ווייל זיי האבן געברענגט גוט-אויסזעענדע פּאפּירן. די פראגע איז: אויב פראסעקיוטערס האבן געוואוסט אז די פירמע נעמט נישט אויף במזיד אומלעגאלע אימיגראנטן, און אויב פראסעקיוטערס האבן סייווי געפלאנט צו דראפן די טשארדזשעס ווייל די גאנצע קעיס איז געווען לופט, פארוואס האט מען בכלל אנגעקלאגט רובאשקין דערמיט? (די סטעיט האט עקסטער געדראפט איבער 9,000 קאונטס פון קינדער-ארבעט און אומלעגאלע-ארבעטער, און רובאשקין איז ריינגעוואשן געווארן אויף די איבעריגע אכציג אנקלאגעס אין סטעיט געריכט)

ג)    וויאזוי ארבעט עס אז א רעגירונג קלאגט אָן א מענטש אויף א לאנג-לויפענדע הלואה וואס איז געגאנגען קראכן נאר ווייל די רעגירונג האט איינעם געהאלטן אונטער ארעסט אויף א פאלשע באזיס? דאס איז באן-רעלסן יוסטיץ וואס געהער צו פוילן אין די תר”צ יארן; נישט פאר די פאראייניגטע שטאטן.

ד)   פיין. די הלואה איז געווען גרעסער ווי עס האט געזאלט זיין צוליב דריידליך. מסכים. בעט דערויף צוויי, דריי יאר טורמע צום מערסטענס. וואס איז פּשט אז די בעטסט פינף און צוואנציג יאר, ספעציעל ווען עס האנדעלט זיך פון אן ערשט-מאליגער פארלעצונג וואס איז – נאכאמאל – צושטאנד געקומען נאר א דאנק די רעגירונג?

דיזע און פילע אנדערע פראגן עגבערן פאר טויזנטער אמעריקאנער, אריינגערעכנט 52,200 וועלכע האבן אונטערגעשריבן דעם פעטישאן ביי דעם ווייסן הויז וועבזייט, אבער די ענפטער פון ווייסן הויז איז געווען ‘מיר קענען נישט קאמאנטירן אויף געזעץ אינפארסירונג אנגעלעגנהייט, און די דזשאסטעס דעפארטמענט האט אן אפיס וואס פארשט אויס אומבארעכטיגונגען פון פראסעקיוטערס.’

וואס א שפּראך איז דאס מיסטער פרעזידענט? די דעפארטמענט אוו דזשאסטעט איז  טייל פון דיין הויז; עס איז אינערהאלב די עקזעקיוטיוו ברענטש. די סיבה פארוואס עריק האלדער, דער אטוירני זשענעראל און נישט דו פירט דעם דעפארטמענט, איז וויבאלד דו האסט אנדערע זאכן זיך אפצוגעבן ווי הלואות פאר סולינדרע, פארקויפן שעווי וואלטס און אפהאלטן קאמפּיין אויפטריטן. אבער ביים ענדע פונעם טאג איז די דעפארטמענט און אלע אירע פראסעקיוטערס דיינע ארבעטער! דו מעגסט, קענסט און זאלסט אנטיילן זאכן אויף די סארט אישוס, ספעציעל אז 75 געוועזענע פעדעראלע פראסעקיוטערס האבן אלע פארשריגן די אומרעכטן אין דעם קעיס.

איך פארלאנג נישט אז דו זאלסט אויספארשן די ריכטער אין דעם קעיס. גערעכט, דא איז וואו מען נוצט דעם ווארט “טיילונג פון מאכט” צווישן די דריי פליגלן פון די רעגירונג, טראץ דעם וואס די לעגיסלאטיווע צווייג, די קאנגרעס קען פאקטיש אויספארשן א ריכטער – די זשודישיעל ברענטש – וועלכע באגייט אן אומרעכט. אבער פעדעראלע פראסעקיוטערס ארבעטן פאר דיר מר. אבאמא! זיי זענען פון דיין שטאב און זיי (אריינגערכנט איינער וועם דו האסט געגעבן א העכערע פאזיציע נאכ’ן ווערט פרעזידענט) האבן געפירט דעם אפארעציע מיט גרויס אומרעכט. ווען 52,200 מענטשן נעמען מיט אן ערנסטקייט דיין פארשלאג אז מען קען דיר פעטישענען, איז עס א ביליגע זאך צו טוישן די תנאים איבער וואס עס וועט באקומען אן ענטפער נאכדעם וואס טויזנטער האבן שוין אונטערגעשריבן, און עס איז א באליידיגונג אז אזויפיל אונטערשריפטן האט באקומען א נישט-געענטפערטע אנטווארט.

Bob Schieffer asked former IRS employ Michele Bachmann how she can say Obama foreign policy is a failure when OBL, Al Awlaki and Gaddafi were all killed under Obama.

Bachmann didn’t give a coherent answer, but as I see it, OBL was not captured by an “Obama policy;” it was  military/intelligence tactics and tools that Obama opposed as Senator yet didn’t block as President that ended Osama Bin Laden. Bush killed and captured many Al Awlaki-level Al Qaeda figures; but is not much of a success. In fact, no one can name by heart one of them! As for Gaddafi: Making a mess is easy (it took only 23 days to topple real strong man Saddam). Cleaning it up is the tough part. See Tunisia, Egypt for more