my last post (maybe) on rick sanchez

Ok, this will be the last (maybe) round-up of a few more articles/blogs which looked past the surface of the Rick Sanchez firing. Here are some of the highlights:

In Slate: Is it so offensive to note the effectiveness of the Jewish lobby? by the famously secular Jewish British author, Christopher Hitchens we read:

It's not that long since the late Yitzhak Rabin was complaining that groups like AIPAC had too much influence on Israeli policy. Is there any other lobby that exerts a comparable influence? Perhaps the National Rifle Association. And, of course, on the single issue of the maintenance of a failed embargo, the Cuban-American caucus and its funding base in Florida and New Jersey. (I wonder if Rick Sanchez would offer me an argument there.)

Coming to Sanchez, then, I ask myself if the world in which I have worked for so many decades—the intersecting and overlapping world of the news media, publishing, the academy, and the think-tank industry—is even imaginable without the presence of liberal American Jews. The answer is plainly no. Moreover, I can't think of any other "minority" of which this is remotely true, unless it were to be the other minority from which I can claim descent: people of British or Anglophile provenance.

In I, Sanchez Chez Pazienza gives a much more behind-the-scenes and personal account of her own experiences with Rick Sanchez and the CNN staff and why she believes we haven't seen the last of him.

The Black Snob piece: Rick Sanchez Gets Fired Over Most Epic "Jews Sux" Stupidity Ever (Rants) gives us a refresher course on the first two rules of American society:

Look. This is America and there are certain things in America that will guarantee you will get fired. One -- Be a white person saying the actual N-word in its proper context, as a dirty, dirty slur. You can be as racist as you want in America, but DEAR LORD! Don't actually SAY the word "nigger." It has magical powers apparently. So, you can make all the watermelon jokes you like. Just don't say that word in it's proper context. White people DO NOT LIKE THIS. The fact that black people also don't like this goes without saying.

Two -- Don't diss Jews.

Americans don't do criticism of the Jewish people very well. Unlike the black people, of whom you can smack around as much as you like as long as you don't say that dastardly word and mean it, you can't say anything that even looks like it might want to be wrongiddy-wrong-wrong about the Jewish people. Almost anything negative comes off as antisemitic, so you really don't have to say much to offend. Hell, just try to take the side of the Palestinians in the Middle East conflict and you could get called out as antisemitic even though you're criticizing a sovereign country with nuclear weapons ... not all sons of Abraham. Some folks, bless their hearts, don't know that Israel isn't the last word on Judaism, not even among Jews who are, wow, really critical of Israel at times.

But, whatever.

The most thoughtful and thorough discussion I've seen of the Rick Sanchez affair is in the Racialicious piece: On Rick Sanchez, Jon Stewart, and Why We All Lose Playing the Oppression Olympics by Latoya Peterson.

Peterson's piece is unique in at least two respects. First, hers is the only article I've found which didn't just take Stewart's (And Colbert's) non-racism totally for granted and actually questions the ways both shows use racial stereotypes to get a laugh (e.g. The Daily Show’s “Asian Correspondent” Olivia Munn, Dear Olivia Munn, The Daily Show Introduces Us to Gitmo, Open Thread: Cornel West on Stephen Colbert – Respect or Mockery?)

Second, Peterson's piece is also the only one I've seen on the Sanchez issue to actually take the time to debunk the idea that Jews run/own the media with any kind of evidence. She extensively quotes from a FAIR report The Jewish Media: The Lie That Won't Die and also links to Wikipedia's American Mass Media Owners

Of course, the ideal way to refute claims like Six Jewish Companies Own 96% of the World’s Media and put the issue to rest once and for all would be for someone to just do a survey or census of the media at the various levels (owners, executives, behind the scenes staff, columnists and anchors) and just deal with the issue objectively.

See also:
rick sanchez, jon stewart, jews and the media
cnn on rick sanchez
jews and the media

cnn on rick sanchez

Ok, I'm not going to blog on this for a while after this...Today on CNN's Sunday morning show Reliable Sources, (transcript) there was a "discussion" of the firing of Rick Sanchez. I put "discussion" in quotes because CNN basically used the show to justify their decision to get rid of Sanchez.

What I thought was ironic is that Sanchez got in trouble for saying that Jews were not really a persecuted minority in the news industry, while several of the pundits on the CNN show were essentially saying the same thing about Sanchez himself.

Carole Simpson said:

he thinks that he could have been better and bigger and all of these other things, and he wasn't because of his race, as being a Cuban-American. And then it tickles me, because he looks as white as any white man. I mean, without his name, you probably would not know he was Cuban.

While Jamie McIntyre was much more dismissive: "...to say that he was made uncomfortable at CNN because of his Hispanic heritage, I think it's close to delusional."

The most accurate comment on the show came from Paul Farhi:

Well, I mean, CNN is an employer, and in America, if you criticize your employer the way he did, you're going to lose your job. He went public. It's on satellite radio. Potentially now millions of people have heard Rick Sanchez' criticism of his own company. Not kosher.

Also see Matthew Yglesias: Rick Sanchez for a perspective from a Cuban-Jewish blogger.

jews and the media

The whole Rick Sanchez issue reminded me of a joke from this year's Oscar award show:

Some related links:
An LA Times article, Who Runs Hollywood? C'Mon by Joel Stein who actually celebrates (to the point of gloating) the high levels of Jewish achievement in the entertainment industry.

A list of Jews in The American Media (From SimpleToRemember.com Judaism Online). Actually this one surprised me because I don't think I'd ever seen a list of names laid out like that. Did Rick Sanchez lie?

--
See also:
Mondoweiss: Do Jews Dominate in American Media? And So What If We Do? by Philip Weiss

rick sanchez, jon stewart, jews and the media

As you may know already, Rick Sanchez was fired from CNN, apparently because of a conversation he had on Sirius XM radio with Pete Dominick which included a passing implied mention of the role of Jews in the media.

This whole controversy is a bit surreal to me. The issue seems to have started off as just a personal conflict between Stewart and Sanchez. Over a period of time Jon Stewart repeatedly mocked Sanchez on various episodes of the Daily Show. (The Colbert Report has done similar things but to a lesser extent) For example, at one point Stewart calls Sanchez an over-caffeinated control freak (among other things) and Sanchez was featured several times on the Daily Show's "moment of zen" segment (for example in the wake of Sotomayor's nomination Stewart even did a bit including Sanchez' own mother.)

Then, this past Thursday, on the show with Pete Dominick, Rick Sanchez talked about a number of topics, his new book, his family, his faith, and his experiences of feeling marginalized in the news industry (including the mocking he's been getting from Stewart and Colbert).

Rightly or wrongly, Sanchez frames this marginalization in terms of race and class. He is Latino with a working-class upbringing in an industry where many of his colleagues are white and raised middle-to-upper-class. And if you listen to the entire interview Sanchez isn't fixated on Stewart or Jews but also mentions prejudice coming from Stephen Colbert, Glenn Beck, O'Reilly and some unnamed "top brass" at CNN as well:

Sanchez: I had a guy who works here at CNN who's a top brass come to me and say, ‘You know what, I don't want you to --

Dominick: ‘Will you wash this dish for me, Sanchez?’

Sanchez: No no, see that’s the thing; it’s more subtle. White folks usually don't see it. But we do - those of us who are minorities and women see it sometimes too from men in authority. Here, I’ll give you my example its this 'You know what, I don't want you anchoring anymore, I really don't see you as an anchor, I see you more as a reporter, I see you more as a John Quinones - you know the guy on ABC. That’s what he told me. He told me he saw me as John Quinones. Now, did he not realize that he was telling me, ‘When I see you I think of Hispanic reporters’? Cause in his mind I can’t be an anchor. An anchor is what you give the high-profile white guys, you know. So he knocks me down to that and compares me to that and it happens all the time i think. To a certain extent Jon Stewart and Colbert are the same way.

(I have to wonder if the same "top brass" Sanchez alludes to is still an executive at CNN.)

As a counter-balance, Dominick brings up Stewart's Jewishness to suggest that he is also a minority and has some understanding of Rick Sanchez's position. But based on Sanchez's childhood in Miami, Jews were just another flavor of white Anglo.

I grew up not speaking English, dealing with real prejudice every day as a kid; watching my dad work in a factory, wash dishes, drive a truck, get spit on. I’ve been told that I can’t do certain things in life simply because I was a Hispanic. My friends who are black, I’ve seen that with them; I’ve seen that with a lot of minorities. I can’t really think — although I understand the plight of Jews, and all the experiences, and the things that have happened historically for them — but I can’t say that my buddy Glen or my buddy Izzy who I grew up with in South Florida ever were prejudiced against directly simply because they were Jewish. There may have been jokes around them or about other things, but it’s kinda — you know what I’m saying, it’s kind of a different thing.

This is all context to the essential gaffe. When Dominick suggests that Stewart has minority status which should help him understand where Sanchez is coming from, Sanchez comes back with:

He’s such a minority, I mean, you know [sarcastically]… Please, what are you kidding? … I’m telling you that everybody who runs CNN is a lot like Stewart, and a lot of people who run all the other networks are a lot like Stewart, and to imply that somehow they — the people in this country who are Jewish — are an oppressed minority? Yeah.

Sanchez doesn't hold Jews in the media to any special scrutiny or suspicion. He just views them as part of the dominant establishment with all other white people. If anything, he is actually indifferent about the distinction. As he says to Dominick:

You brought the whole Jewish conversation into this. I don't think Jewish has anything to do with this. I don't think you are are less apt to be prejudiced or more apt to be prejudiced because you are or aren't Jewish.

Here is a partial Transcript of the Sanchez/Dominick interview but I would definitely recommend that you go to the very first link above and listen to the whole conversation. Sanchez does not go on a rant. He does not have a meltdown. He does not say "Jews are in control of all media". (Contrary to how some of the coverage is parsing the incident).

Some other thoughts:
If CNN is so racially sensitive then how was Lou Dobbs able to stay on CNN for such a long period of time before leaving? It's pretty clear that Mexicans don't run CNN. For that matter, even Dr. Laura is still on the air after her N-word rant. She announced her retirement after the incident, but she's still basically leaving on her own terms. Helen Thomas unceremoniously lost her job within a day or so.

At the same time, how is Patrick Buchanan able to stay on the air, on MSNBC no less? I would argue that comments about Jews are much more of a third rail than comments about other groups, but the whole picture is more complex than a question of who gets offended. To be honest, I suspect that Rick Sanchez's real mistake wasn't what he said about Jon Stewart, and implied about Jews, as much as what he said about "top brass" at CNN. Don't bite the hand that feeds you, regardless of ethnicity.

Grenada's Past
thoughts on helen thomas
more on helen thomas
why don't they talk about bennett the way they talk about farrakhan?
us deports lou dobbs

Phoenix New Times: CNN Fires Rick Sanchez, Hires Eliot Spitzer, World's Most Famous "John"

kind of like jews

Over at Killing the Buddha, Kind of Like Jews by Gordon Haber is an article about a group of former Messianics who converted to the Noahide faith. The article is a nice glimpse of the modern community of Shomrey Tzedek. The main reservation I would have is that Haber seems to view Noahidism only as a "new" religious movement which he traces back to the nineteenth century Italian rabbi Elijah Benamozegh and his French Gentile disciple, Aime Palliere. But even in the Bible, the book of Acts mentions the Gentile Godfearers who had some attachment to Judaism in ancient times.

See also:
"god gave noah the rainbow sign..." (part four)
"god gave noah the rainbow sign..." (part one)

the end of the covenant

God's Covenant, Judaism and Interfaith Marriage by Paul Golin starts off as a pretty unsurprising review of Jewish views on inter-religious marriage on the occasion of the Chelsea Clinton and Marc Mezvinsky nuptuals. But I was definitely surprised by the second half the article which started to swim in much deeper waters:

In the 1970s, when radical modern-Orthodox thinker Rabbi Irving "Yitz" Greenberg grappled with the full implications of the Holocaust, he concluded that God's withdrawal from earthly affairs and failure to protect His chosen people meant, quite dramatically, that "the covenant was broken." However, Rabbi Greenberg suggested that "the Jewish people was so in love with the dream of redemption that it volunteered to carry on with its mission." And in fact those who took up the "voluntary covenant," as he called it, were even greater than those who acted "only out of command."

Personally I found the above intriguing for a number of reasons. First, while many (but not necessarily all) Christians, Muslims, Bahais, etc. might readily admit that God's covenant with the Jewish people is no longer in effect, it seems unusual (perhaps even contradictory) to find an Orthodox Jew making that claim.

Secondly, as horrible as the Holocaust was it really more theologically significant than other great tragedies in Jewish history like the destruction of the First Temple and the Babylonian Captivity, or the destruction of the Second Temple and the subsequent diaspora?

Thirdly, the quote serves as a cautionary "tale", the article makes me wonder if Muslims attitudes towards the sharia will ever become comparable to Jewish attitudes towards the halakhah?

reyes de las calles - el mundo va acabarse

Just some amusing Afro-Cuban, Afro-futuristic, anti-racist, apocalyptic hip-hop. If I had more patience I would transcribe the lyrics along with the translation. (And I'm actually surprised and a little disappointed that no one else out there seems to have done it already.) The group's name means "Kings of the Streets" and the song's title means "The world is going to end". The lyrics tell the story of what happens when God (and the Martians) come down to Earth to set things right.

michael jackson - they don't care about us

MJ at his most controversial (at least in terms of his music). Before the song "They Don't Care About Us" was even released, Michael Jackson was accused of antisemitism due to his use of the lyric: "Jew me, sue me, everybody do me/ Kick me, kike me, don't you black or white me". Jackson argued (rather reasonably) that the intention of the song as a whole is opposed to prejudice and oppression and the disputed lyrics should be viewed in that context.

Michael Jackson - They Don't Care About Us (Long Version) sélectionné dans Musique et Rock / Pop

In an interview with The Guardian, Spike Lee puts his finger on a certain inconsistency in how the video was treated:

And you wonder if [Spike Lee] regrets any of them [various controversies he's been involved in]. His verbal disembowelling of Quentin Tarantino, for example, after taking offence at the latter's use of the word "nigger" in his 1997 caper Jackie Brown? He's already answering by the time I've got to "Quent-".

"Oh, I don't regret that at all. And to put the record straight, because a lot of people never got the whole story... I never said that Quentin Tarantino should not be allowed to use the word nigger. My contention was that his use of it was excessive. You know, Harvey Weinstein [co-founder of Miramax, Jackie Brown's financiers] called me up and said he wished I'd leave this thing alone. And I said, 'Harvey - would you ever release a film that on so many occasions used the word kike? He just cleared his throat and said, 'No.' So, it's like, 'Oh - you can't say kike but nigger is OK?' "

He lets the question hang. But he's not done yet.

"And then of course they say, 'But Tarantino's an artist, he's just expressing himself.' Well, if we're talking about artists, let's talk about..."

Everything slows with the realisation of what's coming next.

"Michael Jackson. Because, forgetting all that other shit for a minute, in the song They Don't Care About Us, Michael Jackson said 'Sue me, Jew me, Kick me, Kike me.' What happened? He was ripped apart by Spielberg and David Geffen, and the record was pulled from the stores. So, Quentin Tarantino says nigger and he's an artist, but Michael Jackson says kike and it can't be exposed to the public?"

So what's he saying? Are they both acceptable, or neither? "All I'm saying is why is it OK for Quentin Tarantino to say nigger and not for Michael Jackson to say kike?" His point, at least what I think is his point, is well taken: I really am starting to wish he'd stop saying kike. "So that's the question," he says. "Why is one OK and one not?"

I think part of an answer has to do with the fact that various communities have different notions and sensitivities when it comes to deciding what is really offensive. For example, I don't know a Jewish analogue to a spoken word piece like "Niggers are Scared of Revolution" let alone the prevalence of the n-word in contemporary hip-hop. (And as the line goes, "You can't complain if you are dancing to it.") A second (and more important) factor has to do with the relative political power of various communities and their ability to impose their sensitivities on the public. (For example, I don't think anyone has ever gotten in trouble for using "gyp" as a verb but then again Gypsies/Roma have almost zero visibility or political power in the United States.

1100 to 13?!?!?

I've been reflecting a lot on the basic mathematics of the Israel/Palestine/Gaza situation. The Arab birthrates in Gaza are among the highest in the Middle East. Even within the borders of Israel, the Arab birthrate is higher than that of Israeli Jews. In other words, in a peaceful democratic Israel, the Arabs will become a majority and the Zionist project would eventually, organically, naturally, evaporate in the long term. So if the Jewish character of the state is to be maintained, Israel almost "has to" commit genocide. And in that context, the continual atrocities and illegal actions... bulldozing Palestinian homes, illegal Jewish settlements, the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and the West Bank, etc. should not be surprising.

Now, in the current Gaza situation, the numerical discrepancies in the casualties are huge, but also shouldn't be surprising. Since the conflict in Gaza began, nearly 1,1000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, about half of them civilians, many of them women and children. On the other hand 13 Israelis have died, almost all of them soldiers, and almost half of them due to friendly fire! (i.e. the Israeli forces themselves have almost killed as many Israelis as Hamas)

There is no way this conflict makes sense in terms of Israel merely defending itself from Hamas. It makes much more "sense" as a low-level genocide against the Palestinians.

Al-Jazeera: The president of the UN General Assembly has condemned Israel's killings of Palestinians in its Gaza offensive as "genocide"
Al-Jazeera: Israel breaking law with Gaza war
BBC: Strike at Gaza school 'kills 40'
Jewish Congress Says World Jewish Population Shrinking

thoughts on mccain's disavowal of the pastors

Thoughts on McCain's recent disavowal of John Hagee and Rod Parsley, the pastors whose endorsement he sought:

1. To begin with, it was pretty cynical of him to seek the endorsements in the first place. He was basically trying to shore up his relationship to the evangelical base of the Republican party, especially in swing states. (Parsley is in Ohio).

2. Even with a bad vetting job, I don't believe the McCain camp would have been totally ignorant of Hagee and Parsley's bigoted comments about Muslims and Catholics. (Which as I've said before are more "mainstream" than the media seems to be acknowledging. In fact, the extent of religious bigotry in the evangelical community should be a story, even apart from the campaign).

3. It is conceivable to me that the McCain camp perhaps missed Hagee's comment that Katrina was sent as a punishment for a planned New Orleans gay pride event but they definitely had to know that Hagee and Parsley would have strong statements against homosexual behavior.

4. Finally, I think McCain's decision to ultimately disavow the pastors was calculated and cynical as well. McCain was fine with bigotry against Muslims, Catholics and homosexuals. But once it is discovered that Hagee made an odd comment involving Hitler (suggesting that Hitler was God's instrument to ultimately herd the Jews to Israel) it was time to pull out for fear of alienating Jews. The "funny" thing is that as a Christian Zionist, Hagee is actually a staunch supporter of the state of Israel and has even won a number of humanitarian awards from a number of Jewish organizations.

5. In the long run, I wonder if this whole episode has alienated McCain even more from the evangelical base? One can only hope.


Slate: The Devil's in the Details: Why John Hagee's views on the Holocaust aren't the only reason for McCain to reject him
AP: Pastor says parting with McCain best for both

Grenada's past;
more on mccain's racially problematic politics
mccain, racism and religious bigotry
mccain - romney ?
mccain's spiritual advisor hates muslims and islam
should john mccain reject and denounce minister john hagee?
john mccain: "i hated the gooks. i will hate them as long as i live."

obama, farrakhan, hillary and islam

This is mostly a clip from the recent debate between Hillary and Obama and shows Obama giving a rather thorough response on his non-relationship to Farrakhan and antisemitism. (There is also a bit about Congressman John Lewis, one of Hillary's early supporters, switching sides to Obama).




Associated Press: Obama Fights False Links to Islam

As I watched the clip, and saw the sequence of the questions and answers, I really started to see how Jewish hypersensitivity about Farrakhan and antisemitism is really about Israel/Zionism more than about ethnic/religious prejudice. The accusations of antisemitism then become a convenient tool to delegitimize the person who is not sufficiently pro-Israel. For a vivid example of how this dynamic works, check out the case of Nobel Laureate Desmond Tutu. (A , B , C)

Grenada's Past:
why don't they talk about bennett the way they talk about farrakhan?
farrakhan steps back
millions more marching
john mccain: "i hated the gooks. i will hate them as long as i live."
spilling the beans

see also:
Garvey's Ghost: Black Folks: America's Charlie Brown

more on black jews

Over at ChickenBones: A Journal, I recently saw two articles by Adeyinka Makinde which discuss the possible Jewish descent in the Igbo of Nigeria: on the Igbos: A Lost Tribe of Israel? and The Igbo and Jewry. But really, these sorts of articles shouldn't be surprising. As I point out in another post:

...according to the Bible, Jacob (Israel) and his sons went into Africa as a group of 12 households and hundreds of years later they came out of Africa as a nation of millions. Either the children of Israel are really really really inbred or they intermarried with the people around them and became basically an African group. The Bible even explicitly says that Abraham, Joseph and Moses married African (Egyptian and Cushite) women [Genesis 16:3, Genesis 41:45, Numbers 12:1].

I think I need to read How Jews Became White Folks and What That Says About Race in America by Karen Brodkin which has been recommended to me on more than one occasion. There is so much history and politics behind racial classifications and I would like to have a better understanding of how the process unfolds. 

 See also: 

the lemba 

"i've seen ethiopians knocking out rome" (part 2) 

reclaiming jewish traditions in mexico 

are desis white?

reclaiming jewish traditions in mexico

New American Media: Reclaiming Jewish Traditions in Mexico

For more on Jews in Latin America, see also:
adio kerida
chavez and anti-semitism