I conceded long ago the possibility that Emanuel was being racist.

Once again, you’re being milquetoasty. It isn’t POSSIBLE the statement was racist. It WAS racist. There is no doubt in anyone’s mind here except yrs. Why would you refuse to acknowledge what sits right in front of yr nose?

you are in fact doing more to hurt the cause of Tikun Olam than you are to promote it.

Thanks for yr pt of view. I don’t know that I asked for it. But again you’re welcome to it. My relationship and commitment to tikun olam will withstand yr criticisms. You may not recognize it, but several hundred thousand Jewish readers visit this site every yr. & you’re the only one who isn’t right-wing who questions my commmitment to Jewish ethics and tikun olam.

I’m treating you as I am because you too are not examining the underlying assumptions of yr own thinking (which is what you accuse me of). Why would you feel the need to temporize about Joe Lieberman’s betrayal of the Dem. Party & its presidential candidate? Why would you temporize over a clear Jewish statement of racism? If you were truer to the facts you would concede this & move on. It is the fact that you refuse to admit what is right there that bothers me.

1) If you will check back in this thread, you will see that I conceded long ago the possibility that Emanuel was being racist. I simply enquired as to the possibility of an alternate reading. My criticism of you would not change even were I to accept that he was being racist.

2) I have no desire to put you in the dock. You are doing a fine job of that without my assistance. If anything, I am trying to take you out of the dock, to point out that you are in fact doing more to hurt the cause of Tikun Olam than you are to promote it.

4) Please point out to me and your other readers how I have been in any way uncharitable to you. I have simply noted flaws in your reasoning and your own failure to live up to the standards you claim to promote.

3) The one critical comment which you chose to ignore was my observation that you are treating me in a manner to which you would object being treated. Sadly, I am not surprised.

My challenge to you stands. Any time you wish to meet me in public and debate this issue, I am ready to do so. But I know better than to hold my breath.

you with your own obvious misstatements that are based not in personal opinion but in objective fact,

Thank you for making my argument for me. But what you wrote clearly isn’t what you meant to say. I have no patience for someone who can read a statement on the page that everyone knows is racist and yet you refuse to concede it is so.

This is a direct violation of the fundamental principles of Judaism.

Goodness, now I’m a bad Jew. How troubling. Maybe you’d like to convene a bet din and excommunicate me. Next time I’m in upstate N.Y. you can put me in the dock & call me to account for my corruption of Judaism as you see it. Until then, I’ll be quite comfortable in my own relationship with my tradition.

And why would you react so defensively as to assume that I was saying I knew more about Judaism than you & that we needed to debate the matter? THe diff. bet. us is that I don’t impugn anyone’s Judaism based on my own selective interpretation of precepts. I call out Jews for their expressions of hate. If I lived by yr precepts I would be living inside a nice gilded cage in which no one can call anything what it really is for fear of violating some precept or other. If you have a problem w. my calling ‘em as I see ‘em, that reflects on you more than on me.

BTW, could it be that you are the one who is being stubborn in refusing to concede the objective truth of the statements I’ve made about Emanuel, Sr.? And that you are in fact the one who is being uncharitiable towards me and my views? Oh no, couldn’t be, I know.

What you seem unable to grasp is that your lack of consideration is creating in its own way the identical intolerance for others that you claim to want to end. I will match my credentials with yours on any occasion you choose when it comes to my dedication to social democracy and trans ethnic justice. I just spent a year convincing the Hasidic community to support Obama’s candidacy. If you wish to come to upstate NY, I will be happy to arrange a debate between us at my synagogue. But whether you accept my direct challenge or not, you should try to understand how counterproductive your willingness to indulge in lashon hara and intemperate, ill tempered attacks is in our struggle to bring the greater Jewish community together again as a force for human decency and egalitarianism, as it was before 1967.

I am criticising you for adding your own inflammatory editorial comment

I have little patience for this. The comment was racist. Period. I’m not the Chofetz Chaim nor am I not a mussarnik. If that’s what you’re looking for you’re in the wrong place. I write ‘editorial comment.’ That’s the entire purpose of this blog.

I cannot condone your indignation

Sorry, but you’ll get no sympathy from me. I didn’t ask you to condone or agree with me.

his only policy difference with the Democratic caucus is on the issue of the war.

“Policy” isn’t his only problem w. Democrats. So yr attempt to narrow the issue to one of policy differences is specious. He trashed OBama fr. here till Tues. throughout the campaign. He was the Benedict Arnold of the Dem. Party.

There were very few Tories murdered in cold blood during the Revolutionary War. It was a diff. time & warfare was conducted differently. Aside fr. that, I have no interest in discussing the Revolutionary War. If I wanted to I would have. SO your asking me 3 times to do so is not only a waste of time, it’s a bit annoying.

As I understand it, the exception to the prohibition is restricted to the act of repeating a statement of the person being criticised or describing an act of that person which the describer personally witnessed. It does not extend to the making of derogatory comments about the person or any subjective statement whatsoever.

Therefore, Richard, I am not criticising you for reporting the matter. I am criticising you for adding your own inflammatory editorial comment which I fear only increases the tension and defeats your efforts for Tikkun Olam. And while I do not in any way condone Emanuel sr.’s comments if they were indeed racist, I cannot condone your indignation, as righteous as you may believe it to be; just as it seems you feel justified in taking your anger out on me for pointing this out.

As for the Leiberman issue, I again point out that his only policy difference with the Democratic caucus is on the issue of the war.

Finally, I repeat the two questions I have previously asked and which you have yet to answer:

1) Do you consider America’s founders to have been terrorists for their killing of civilian supporters of the monarchy in the colonies?

2) Do you consider opponents of the war who support the ban on stem cell research and/or the ban on abortion to be equally as worthy of sanction as Joe Leiberman?

Once again, I do not wish anyone to think that I am trying to discount your right to your opinion. I am just trying to get a full picture of your logical processes so that I can better understand your weltanschauung.

it was my understanding that they never made indiscriminate intentional attacks on Arab civilians and children and that the deaths of such were collateral rather than direct consequences of their attacks

Not correct I’m afraid. The Deir Yasssin massacre eliminated an entire Arab village & killed around 250 people. The King David Hotel bombing killed many civilians. They even assassinated in cold blood a UN official trying to negotiate an end to Israeli Arab hostilities. No, I’m afraid they were about as bloodthirsty as Palestinian terrorists. The times were different admittedly. Combatants observed more niceties of civilized behavior then–but not by much.

…any comment about another’s actions that can create, or contribute to, an atmosphere of baseless hatred.

But this is ludicrous. Emanuel Sr. can express baseless hatred of Arabs but my point ing this out to the world constitutes baseless hatred & is therefore treif?? Puh-leeze. You’re engaging in pilpul to justify a particular pt of view that you have by which Jews may be allowed to get away w. literal or verbal “murder.”

a person to whom English is at best a second language

Emanuel’s father has lived in the U.S. for many decades.

Apparently, you don’t understand why saying that his son wasn’t going to clean White House floors as an Arab would in Israel is a blatantly racist phrase. You’ve been spending too much time studying the Chofetz Chaim & not enough listening to the baseless hatred spewed by some of our fellow Jews against Islam and Arabs.

there still is very much a claim that he is one of the most progressive voices from Connecticut, given that his only disagreement with the Democratic caucus was in the prosecution of the Iraq War

You & Harry Reid are welcome to bury yr heads in the sand about Lieberman’s backward politics. But his truculent support of the war and his dissing of Obama throughout the campaign are not “mere” disagreements. They’re Mack truck disagreements. Fundamental in nature.

Don’t you recall Obama giving Lieberman a verbal thrashing on the floor of the Senate in full view of the gallery several months ago. DO you think Obama was telling him what a remarkable progressive he was?