In response to Jay Goldberg’s letter (“False assertions,” WJW, Sept. 5) mocking my statement that Barack Obama dictates the sermons to reform rabbis:
If Mr. Goldberg had read the Wall Street Journal, the New York Post, and other publications, he would know that each year President Obama has indeed had telephone conferences with hundreds of rabbis where he gives points he believes that rabbis should discuss in their High Holy Day services. This years talking points are about the peace talks and immigration.
Mr. Goldberg should read, research, and think before attacking a fellow Jew.
JONATHAN E. GRANT, Silver Spring
Warming the cockles of GOP stalwart Jonathan Grant’s heart, the September 12 Washington POST featured an almost full-page ad entitled : “Who are the Gang of Five? The ad, an attack upon the Democratic candidate for governor of Virginia, was placed by a shadow group with the comic book name “Fight for Tomorrow.”
The ad assailed “Hollywood Partisans” and implored “Don’t let them Hollywood Virginia’s families and schools”.
In the 1930’s extending through 1960’s, especially in the South (including Virginia), assigning blame to Jew-commie-bastards was the mantra of many right-wingers in denouncing progressive politics.
Starting mid-century, when as much as two-thirds of U.S. Jewry resided in the greater New York metropolitan area, New York/ New Yorker was the euphemism of choice invoked by “gentlemen’s agreement” right-wing anti-Semites- kike being so very gauche and déclassé.
For the last few decades, however, Gotham has been replaced by Hollywood, especially in conservative talk-show circles, as the deluxe cover term to denigrate left-wing politics and its Jewish component. And by Hollywood is meant the entire entertainment industry, including the media – famously characterized recently by none other than communications mogul Rupert Murdoch as the “Jewish-owned press.”
Not to mention National Rifle Association (NRA) Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre’s December 21 excoriation of Hollywood as a “callous, corrupt and corrupting shadow industry that sells and sows violence against its own people.”
The irony, here of course, is that the allegedly “Jewish run” entertainment industry – with its ruthless winner-take-all competitive ethos in which you are only as good as your very latest hit record/movie – is actually a poster-child for the Chicago School unfettered free-market capitalism so idealized by the right.
Attorney Grant should exercise the “due diligence” of his profession and, from here on out, read, research and think before davening with enemies of the Jewish people.