Category Archives: Politics

Hertzberg on Perry

Oopsday at Rancho Perry

Hendrik Hertzberg gathered a pile of Perry poop for his New Yorker magazine article (January 30, 2012)

At Rancho Perry, every day was Oopsday. Along the trail, he forgot how many Justices the Supreme Court has (eight is not enough); forgot the name of one of them (Sonia Sotomayor); placed the American Revolution in the sixteenth century; identified the voting age (fixed at eighteen four decades ago by constitutional amendment) as twenty-one; and suggested that the chairman of the Federal Reserve is a traitor, that Turkey (a nato ally of sixty years’ standing) is governed by Islamic terrorists, and that Social Security is not only a Ponzi scheme but also a criminal enterprise, a monstrous lie, and unconstitutional. And there’s this whopper, from his farewell speech: “As a former Air Force pilot, I don’t get confused.”

Gaffe Collection Gaffe Gumbo: A U.S.A. Miscellany

 

 

Gaffe Collection: Gumbo (A U.S.A. Miscellany)

Pit Bull

What is the difference between a hockey mom and a pit bull? 

Sarah Palin’s single-word answer to her own question—“lipstick”—propelled her from relatively obscure Alaska governor to political superstar. A superstar that fizzled out fast.

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Gaffe Collection: No Gaffes Please, We’re British

When Big Ben can’t make his mind up….

Vote for my party and, if elected, we will put 10,000 more police on the streets. What’s not to like?

Vote for my party and, if elected, we will build 50,000 social homes. Sounds good to me.

Wait a minute. How much will these initiatives cost?

In 2017, after Britain’s Labour Party announced that it would hire an additional 10,000 police, radio interviewer Nick Ferrari asked Labour minister Diane Abbott how many coppers these new coppers would cost.

£300,000, she replied.  

Wrong answer. £300k would suffice to pay each policeman a few pennies per hour. She tried again, upping the total to £80 million. Wrong again. The real cost would be about four times that amount.

A similar gaffe-by-number felled Green Party leader Natalie Bennett a few years earlier when the same interviewer asked her about the price tag for those 50,000 homes.

£2.7 billion was her prompt – and incorrect – answer.

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A New Order?

What if…?

What if a Noam Chomsky-like figure, or Chomsky himself, did an ideological u-turn and stated openly that he had been far too critical of the Jewish state, and too forgiving of the Palestinians?

Would many—indeed, any—anti-Israel radical leftists follow suit and change their own minds?

When Soviet leader Josef Stalin said “Dance!”, Nikita Khruschev shuffled his feet. Continue reading

Seeing No Evil

Gaming the Blame Game

Shelby Steele

Shelby Steele

Old news: When Syrians kill Palestinians, America’s radical left neither notices nor cares—even when hundreds, even thousands, are killed.

When an Israeli kills one Palestinian, the left becomes apoplectic with rage.

Man-bites-dog: When blacks kill blacks, America’s radical left has little to say—even when the death toll is tragically high and many victims are children. When a policeman kills a black, the left erupts in anger and indignation. Continue reading

Israel’s “Colonial Project”

Demonizing Israel—“A Leftist Project”?

school projectWhen Israel emerged victorious from the Six-Day War in June 1967, the anti-Israel left in America, Britain and other western countries immediately pronounced judgement: the Jewish state was guilty of, among other things, “colonialism.” The main “other things” were “fascism” and “militarism.”

Israel did not plead guilty to these charges. Continue reading

“Racist Endeavour” Coming to a Bus Stop Near You

“Racist Endeavour”

A new anti-Israel slogan recently rode into town: “racist endeavour,” as in: “Israel is a racist endeavour.” Anti-Israel activists get a good bang for their buck with this compact phrase. “Racist” accuses Israel of being, well, racist.

“Endeavour” suggests that this racism is not accidental or incidental but is intentional, an integral part of Zionism. Continue reading

Leftists Marching Backwards

Leftists Marching Backwards

By Robert Liebman, timesofisrael.com, August 7th, 2017

Notorious anti-Semite Louis Farrakhan. Fugitive terrorist murderer Assata Shakur, a.k.a. Joanne Chesimard. Would-be police killer Baba Sekou Odinga.

America’s top feminists—leaders of several well-attended progressive, gay and anti-Trump marches—openly and unapologetically admire the unadmirable.

Bari Weiss, New York Times Opinion Section editor

Will progressives have more spine than conservatives in policing hate in their ranks?,” asked Bari Weiss in a recent [August 1, 2017] New York Times op-ed.

My answer: “No!” It’s too risky. Continue reading

The Right-On Loony Left

Bias of the Myopic Left

By Robert Liebman, Jewish Chronicle (UK), March 10, 2016, slightly modified July 2018

The radical left can chew gum and protest two or more causes at the same time. In fact, as self-proclaimed humanitarians, they should cast a wide net. Why, then, in a wicked world, do western boycott activists focus only on Israel? Continue reading

Prime Time, Ready or Not: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

The Gaffe Collection: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

On June 26, 2018, 28-year-old political novice Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez soundly (57-43 per cent) defeated ten-term Democrat incumbent Joe Crowley in the primary contest for a seat in Congress. Continue reading

Lefty Academics Gunning for Israel

Poor Aim, Wrong Target

By Robert Liebman, originally published in Scholars for Peace in the Middle East (SPME), January 10, 2015

Several recent initiatives reveal the deep intent of many academic BDS supporters to attack Israel at any price, even if their own credibility and integrity foot the bill. Continue reading

Princeton Profs Reveal Bias

Garden Variety Israel Bashing in the Garden State

By Robert Liebman, originally published by SPME (Scholars for Peace in the Middle East, December 10, 2014; this version slightly modified and images added, August 2, 2018.

More than fifty tenured Princeton academics recently signed a petition urging divestment from companies which supply military-related equipment to Israel. The organizers hope that many more of their colleagues will join them. The petition threw the local Jewish community into uproar. Continue reading

Oy-ometer

The Biased Article that Send my Oy-ometer off the Scale

By Robert Liebman, Jewish Chronicle, May 9, 2014, this version slightly modified, and images added, August 1, 2018.

oy vey Alongside notifications of jumble sales and concerts, an article in the newsletter of my local church propelled the needle on my Oy-ometer off the scale.

Israel, this article proclaimed, was cruelly and arbitrarily mistreating the residents of a Palestinian Christian village. The writer supported her contentions with evidence that was weak (where it was comprehensible) and blatantly biased. Continue reading

Six Day War: Unfinished Business

The Left’s Hate Affair with Israel

By Robert Liebman

This is a slightly modified version of an article that originally appeared in algemeiner.com, June 10, 2015.

June 10, 1967 marked the end of the Six Day War and the beginning of the radical left’s hate affair with the Jewish State.

Although Israel neither welcomed nor wanted this conflict, the Left declared that Israel, not the invading Arabs, had been ‘militaristic,’ ‘colonialistic,’ and ‘fascistic.’ Continue reading

Hating Israel is forever, not just for Christmas. Or Chanukah. Or May Day.

Hating Israel (Religiously)

Hating Israel is forever, not just for Christmas. Or Chanukah. Or May Day.

By Robert Liebman, Times of Israel, December 24, 2016 – slighted modified and photographs added, July 26, 2018

Which Side Are You On, Boys?”

The fiftieth anniversary of the Six Day War in 2017 is likely to be overshadowed by commemorations for the one-hundredth anniversary of the Balfour Declaration. Each is monumentally important.

Leftist detestation of Israel did not begin with Israeli statehood in 1948 or the Suez crisis in 1956. Continue reading

Bashing Israel: A Beginner’s Guide

Bashing Israel: A Beginner’s Guide

By Robert Liebman, Times of Israel blog, May 5, 2014 – slighted amended and photographs added, July 25, 2018

If you want to criticise Israel in terms so extreme as to definitely impress your friends and neighbors, you can amass an impressive intellectual arsenal by boning up on Middle East history.

Or you can save yourself considerable time and energy by learning a dozen or so emotive buzz words. Simply utter them and you win the argument as if by magic. Continue reading

The Gaffe Collection: Greg Gianforte

British Journalism’s Jugular Warfare

By Robert Liebman, Times of Israel blog, May 26th, 2017 – slighted modified and photographs added, July 24, 2018.

“I’m sick and tired of you guys!” Wham! Bam! Politician slams journalist to the ground.

Greg Gianforte, the Republican candidate in Montana’s special House of Representatives election, grappled with British reporter Ben Jacobs and threw hiim to the floor. Continue reading

Britain’s Loony Leftists: A Study in Spinelessness

A UK political car crash resonates in Israel

By Robert Liebman, Times of Israel blog, March 4, 2014 – slighted amended and photographs added, July 24, 2018

A collision between a paedophilia advocacy group, a civil-liberties organisation and the Labour Party has resulted in a major British political scandal. The kerfuffle has nothing at all – and everything — to do with Israel. Continue reading

The Gaffe Collection: Off the Cuff

Off the Cuff

by Robert Liebman, originally published July 21, 2012, this version slightly tweaked

My collection of gaffes by American politicians grows—boy, does it grow – with each election, and with every session of Congress.

But the details of one past gaffe elude me. Whodunnit? When did he do it? Alas, why did he not have enough sense to finesse his way out of danger? Continue reading

The Gaffe Collection: Ron Akin

The Gaffe Collection: Ron Akin

by Robert Liebman, 2012

Mister Potato(e) Head

When a schoolboy correctly spelled “potato,” George H. W. Bush’s Vice Presidential running mate Dan Quayle intervened, saying that “potato” should end with an e.

Quayle misspelled.

Todd Akin

Todd Akin

Missouri congressman Todd Akin said that rape victims could biologically fend off pregnancy.

Akin “misspoke.”

Running for a Senate seat in Missouri, Akin said what he meant and believed about abortion, but he ended up on the canvas. He knocked himself out. Continue reading

Wimbledon Olympics 2012

Bum’s Rush

by Robert Liebman

Good afternoon. Have a nice day.

The police may have been trying to tell me something, but a simple No Tickets Available sign would have sufficed.

The London 2012 Olympics opened with glorious pageantry soon followed by controversy, especially over empty seats.

The Games ended on a note of euphoria, and the empty-seat sagas seem to have been completely forgotten. Continue reading