A Case Study: Part 4

Part 4: 400 Rabbis Choose Politics Over Faith and A Station Wagon Full of Nuns

After the horrible tragedy of the Tucson shooting Media Matters and Uncle George cooled it on the Antisemitism slander for a while, not because they were heeding the President’s call for toning down the dialogue, but because they were too busy blaming, Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin, the Tea Party, Rush Limbaugh and other for the Tucson shooting.

Just before the weekend of the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday, the “Glenn Beck hates Jews” machine re-started its engines as the Soros-affiliated Jewish Funds for Justice (JFJ) delivered a petition to Fox headquarters criticizing Glenn Beckfor comments he made about George Soros back in October (the same ones Abe Foxman criticized). JFJ embellished the original Foxman allegation with a false charge that Beck used Holocaust terms to describe people he disagreed with “hundreds of times.”

Two weeks later in the January 27th edition of the Wall Street Journal was an advertisement/open letter signed by four-hundred Rabbis via JFJ. Repeating the libels found in the petition delivered earlier that month, the letter added a demand that Fox News Chief Roger Ailes disrespected the group because when JFJ announced they were preparing a complaint signed by four hundred Rabbis, Ailes dismissed the threat  describing the group as “Left-Wing Rabbis who don’t think anybody should be able to use the word Holocaust on the air.” Ailes was completely incorrect– the group was composed of Left-Wing Rabbis who don’t think anybody but progressives should be able to use the word Holocaust on the air.

This was the Soros/Media Matters anti-Beck strategy hitting the bottom of the barrel. That Rabbinical letter broke the Jewish laws against loshen hora (evil speech). Even worse, it tried to put Beck in a situation where in order to defend himself he would have to attack 400 Rabbis. Or, as Archie Bunker’s attorney Mr. Rabinowitz once advised:

In a court of law, you can’t beat a station wagon filled with nuns!

Being Jewish and somewhat observant, I still wouldn’t dare try to argue against the nuns, however felt completely comfortable challenging libelous accusations of 400 Rabbis.

Using Halacha  (Jewish Law) explained down by ancient Jewish sages, something the 400 should be practicing, I explained why that  Rabbinical letter broke the Jewish laws. Those sages explained that before people could make charges against anybody they should, among other things, research the veracity of the accusations and examine the motivation of the accuser. Jews are taught that even if the charges are true (which was not the case this time) in the vast majority of cases Jews are commanded to keep that kind of talk to themselves. Because of ignoring the rules they are supposed to be teaching, these 400 Rabbis  brought shame upon themselves, their holy profession, the entire Jewish people, and even worse, have committed a Chillul Hashem (desecration of God’s name).

Before the Media Matters types accuse me of making the same mistake I accuse the Rabbis, as well as Media Matters and Soros of making allow me to suggest their contention would be argued against by none other than the Chofetz Chaim, his real name is Rabbi Yisrael Meir Kagan.  In 1873 the Rabbi wrote what is considered the definitive book on the Jewish laws of proper speech  (Chofetz Chaim, meaning Desire Life is also the name of his book).  The Chofetz Chaim, of blessed memory,  would argue that when such desecration and Loshon Hora as committed as in the case of the Beck-libel,  one has a duty to respond, point out the infraction in order to give the offender’s an opportunity for teshuva (Hebrew for repentance). The purpose of this Case Study is not only to clear Becks name, but to point out to Soros, Media Mattes and the Rabbis how they have been operating, warn other who may be facing similar libel from Soros, the Progressives and Media Matters, and most importantly to give them an opportunity to change.

A Further investigation revealed that most of the people/or organizations whose quotes were used in the body of the JFJ letter to corroborate their slander were rebelling against the Soros effort. Out of the five quotes, three weren’t contacted prior to the use of their names, disagreed with the thrust of the letter and were not happy that they were included. A fourth came out and said the letter was too one sided. And, not surprisingly, the only group/person not raising an objection has multiple connections to the Dude himself.

Media Matters decided to weigh in-on that last report and as their usual practice; they used half-truths and distortions in an attempt to discredit.In this case not Beck, but your humble blogger–me.   This new evidence must have truly disturbed them since they brought out the “heavy”  ammo, Senior Fellow, Eric Boehlert to respond.

This was actually exciting, an experienced writer with all of the financial backing of the Spooky Dude  looking at the work of an unemployed marketing director living on a few freelance writing  jobs and the kindness of a few strangers hitting his tip jar, struggling  to find a full time paid writing gig.  Here was an opportunity to pick up tips from a professional, an opportunity to hone my craft.

Sadly, it was obvious that Mr. Boehlert did not spend much time with my piece. Well either that or he was deliberately trying to mislead his readers. Of course,  that wasn’t possible Eric Boehlert wrote a freaking book about blogging, he wouldn’t break rule number one, being honest with your readers readers, it must have been that he was forced to do a rush job.

Allow me to explain what I mean. Mr. Boehlert began his article saying:

The sweeping denunciation clearly touched a deep, right-wing nerve, since it prompted hysterical reactions like this one:

[T]he rabbis efforts brought shame upon themselves, their holy profession and the entire Jewish people.

A bit over the top, no? Or do rabbis no longer enjoy the freedom of speech if that speech includes criticizing Glenn Beck and Roger Ailes

To my surprise, Mr. Boehlert, the professional ignored the link/explanation which justified the sentence which he called over the top. If  Boehlert had read the section carefully he would’ve realized that no, it wasn’t over the top when you understand what Jewish law says the Rabbis are supposed to be teaching. Freedom of speech and the U.S. Constitution had nothing to do with my reaction, it was the Rabbis violation of  the religious tenets inherent with their sacred profession.

Before I proceed any further, I would be negligent not to thank  the Senior Fellow for linking to my blog at the beginning of his comments, the extra-traffic was welcome.  I don’t want to seem ungrateful but the next time, it would be nice if he reminded his readers to click on an ad or hit the tip jar, they seemed a bit stingy. I am a sole practitioner and unlike Mr. Boehlert don’t have George Soros to help pay my salary.

Boehlert continued with a weird attack on the main thrust of the piece.

From the site Yid With Lid:

Groups Whose Quotes Used by Soros Group to Attack Glenn Beck, Repudiate Anti-Beck Effort

And this [emphasis added]:

Over the past few days, three of the groups used to corroborate the false charges raised by Jewish Funds For Justice have repudiated the letter arraigned by the George Soros proxy. All three weren’t contacted prior to the use of their names, disagreed with the thrust of the letter and were not happy that they were included. A fourth came out and said the letter was too one sided.

And…this is just dopey for the very simple reason that all the JFSJ did in its ad was reference public quotes attributed to the three Jewish organizations (the Anti-Defamation League, Commentary, and the American Gathering of Jewish Holocaust Survivors). They are quotes critical of Beck’s Nazi rhetoric.

Gee, nowhere did I say JFJ was not allowed to use the quotes, what I said was the people involved were upset their quotes/ organizational names were associated with the bogus letter your Soros sister organization issued. He went on:

Those quotes are all on the record, and none of them are in question. Why would JFSJ need to ‘contact’ the groups before referencing their quotes? Why would JFsJ need to make sure the groups would be “happy” to be mentioned in the ad? It’s absurd. The JFSJ never claimed the groups were sponsors in the ad in any way

You are 100% right Mr. Boehlert, the JFJ ad never said the people or organizations were sponsors of the ad. Although by neglecting to mention that they weren’t connected with the Soros-led effort it misled the reader into thinking they were connected. It also caused the people who objected think JFJ was trying to tie them into their little hate project, something you should be pushing JFJ to apologize for.

But let’s be a little truthful here Mr. Boehlert, if that kind of disingenuous connection was made by a conservative (or if George Soros wasn’t paying part of your salary)  you would have not spared one penny of Spooky Dude’s billions to bash that fake claim from here, back to Soros’ birthplace in back in hungry.

Just curious Eric, (I assume I can call you Eric because we have been talking for almost 200 words now). How come you didn’t comment on all the charges and research presented in the first post last week? Or answer any of the questions raised in the Facebook conversation with Rabbi Steven Wernick? Why didn’t you bother to answer the specific objections made by the people whose quotes were misused. For God’s sake, one of them was Abe Foxman the progressive’s progressive.   Face it, when JFJ  lost Abe was the progressive equivalent of when Walter Cronkite editorialized against the Vietnam War and President Johnson said, “If I’ve lost Cronkite, I’ve lost Middle America”

It’s just so hard to understand; on one hand, Eric Boehlert is professional, remember  he even wrote a book on blogging. There is no way that he would leave out parts of the story on purpose, just to skew it in one direction or another. Just because he works for an organization funded by George Soros, it doesn’t mean that he would be deliberately misleading. Maybe he just had to rush and get the post out quickly, I can certainly understand deadlines. But why would my new good  friend Eric do a rush job that would mislead his readers? He is a professional dammit!

See my conundrum? I can understand how George Soros, Media Matters and the rest of the progressive army would exploit anti-Semitic bigotry to discredit Glenn Beck and protect George Soros; its just their desperate attempt to avoid answering the fact laid out by the Fox host, and a warning to others, not to follow in his footsteps. That is simply how the progressive Sugar-Daddy and his smear machine operates. But I can’t come up with an explanation as to why Eric Boehlert would ignore part of the story or mislead his readers, this guy is a professional , not simply some hack  writer of progressive propaganda.

--Jeff Dunetz