BY BRIAN BEUTLER

& CROOKED MEDIA

Tuesday, March 5, 2019

—Ty Cobb, the White House’s former Russia lawyer, on the investigation/durability of steel

GOOD FAITH, BAD FAITH

On Wednesday, the House will vote on another resolution condemning antisemitism, this time stemming from comments Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) made at a book event in Washington, DC, this past weekend.  

“I want to talk about the political influence in this country that says it is OK for people to push for allegiance to a foreign country,” Omar said.

It is the second instance in which Omar’s comments about the U.S.-Israel relationship have invited condemnation from both Democrats and Republicans. Depending on one’s perspective, this is either evidence that she is steeped in the idioms of antisemitism, if not an outright antisemite, or that she is right, and powerful forces in Washington have made it impossible for American politicians to freely, and in good faith, criticize Israel on democratic and human-rights grounds.

But both things can actually be true.

• Omar’s language is a problem, even if it’s not a symptom of underlying bigotry, because antisemites have long used accusations of Jewish disloyalty and shadowy influence to stoke hatred of Jews and brutalize them. She’s a member of Congress—a Democratic member of Congress—and should thus be more fluent in the kind of language that racial and ethnic minorities in the U.S. interpret as hateful code.

• But it’s worth pausing to consider what would have happened if Omar had criticized the Israeli government, AIPAC, and their influence on U.S. lawmakers without using any controversial language. AIPAC’s whole purpose as a lobbying organization is to pressure lawmakers to prioritize the U.S.-Israel alliance, even above competing U.S. interests and values. For instance: It has supported legislation that would allow states to punish entities that boycott Israel on human-rights grounds, in clear violation of the first amendment to the U.S. Constitution. That is undeniable, and yet if Omar had explained her concerns in these terms, it’s likely she would’ve been accused of antisemitism anyhow.

• That’s in large part because Republicans, who unambiguously tolerate antisemites in their ranks, would have pretended to find her positions antisemitic no matter how she phrased them. AIPAC would have objected as well, and the dialogue would have been closed down regardless. Supporters of the Iran nuclear deal are familiar with how this kind of bad-faith political pressure operates.

This is a problem not just for Ilhan Omar or Democrats who have misgivings about Israel, but for the majority of U.S. Jews, whose concerns about Israel’s human-rights record and right-wing lurch are frequently glossed over by people who claim to speak for all Jews when they attack critics of Israel. The language of the Democratic resolution is unobjectionable, and it’s a fine thing for the House to pass. But while they address Omar’s language internally, Democrats should also put some thought into how to normalize legitimate criticism of the U.S.-Israel relationship within the Congress, because letting Republican bad faith and hypocrisy shape the boundaries of Democratic politics is a fool’s errand.

Sacramento police arrested over 80 people Monday night, including at least three reporters, multiple clergy members, and several students after demonstrators marched through one of the city’s wealthy enclaves to protest the district attorney’s decision not to charge the Sacramento police officers who killed Stephon Clark last year. Those officers, Terrence Mercadal and Jared Robinet, chased Clark through his neighborhood and shot him seven times, in what turned out to be his grandmother’s backyard, claiming they believed the cellphone he was holding was a gun.

New York state regulators subpoenaed the Trump Organization’s insurance broker just days after Michael Cohen testified that the Trumps inflate their property values to insurance companies, which could constitute insurance fraud. The regulators have no prosecutorial power but could refer evidence of crimes to law enforcement.

The White House has officially rejected the House oversight committee’s demand for documents pertaining to President Trump’s process for granting security clearances, including to his son-in-law Jared Kushner, who repeatedly lied on his clearance application and was deemed a security risk by senior administration officials. Cue the subpoenas.

House intelligence committee chairman Adam Schiff has hired Daniel Goldman, a veteran Russian organized crime prosecutor, to spearhead the committee’s investigation of the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia.

Neither Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) nor Michael Bloomberg will will run for president. In case you were wondering. (If you weren’t, though, Merkley has lead the cause of filibuster reform, and Bloomberg plans to spend tons of money trying to elect Democrats, so this is good news on both counts.)

President “it’s time to bring our great young people home” Trump now says he agrees “100 percent” with keeping U.S. troops in Syria.

The movement to combat climate change has joined the fight to abolish the filibuster, because with the filibuster in place, the Green New Deal is just a bunch of words about cow murder.

FDA Administrator/anti-Juul warrior Scott Gottlieb will leave the Trump administration at the end of the month.

America’s seniors are apparently holding on for dear life so that they can see the Mueller report before they die. Hear that William Barr?

A second patient—and the first in 12 years—has been cured of HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. In both cases, the cure has stemmed from bone-marrow transplantation, because both patients were also undergoing cancer treatment. The replication strongly suggests that a cure for HIV is possible.

Amid two severe measles outbreaks, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY)—who once practiced ophthalmology—argued that liberty means being able to infect strangers with disease if that’s how you roll. Fortunately, Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA), another, better doctor, was there to smack him down.

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“About 75 percent of Americans favor higher taxes for the ultrawealthy. The idea of a federal law that would guarantee paid maternity leave attracts 67 percent support. Eighty-three percent favor strong net neutrality rules for broadband, and more than 60 percent want stronger privacy laws. Seventy-one percent think we should be able to buy drugs imported from Canada, and 92 percent want Medicare to negotiate for lower drug prices. The list goes on. The defining political fact of our time is not polarization. It’s the inability of even large bipartisan majorities to get what they want on issues like these. Call it the oppression of the supermajority. “

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