Philip Weiss writes September 17, 2015: Everyone is talking about one thing today, anti-immigrant activist Ann Coulter’s outburst on twitter during the Republican debate last night about the Israel pandering by the candidates. Salon characterizes it as anti-Semitic, and John Podhoretz is also worked up about it– “Holy shit, Ann. Shame on you.” They refer to a hate-tweet about “fucking Jews,” though Coulter was raising a legitimate issue.
Her tweets began like this.
Cruz, Huckabee Rubio all mentioned ISRAEL in their response to: “What will AMERICA look like after you are president.”
— Ann Coulter (@AnnCoulter) September 17, 2015
That’s a fair point, right. It happened again and again during the Iran debate. Politicians were asked about the U.S. and they talked about Israel. Then came this tweet, which is getting all the headlines. Salon calls it “gratuitously anti-semitic.”
How many f—ing Jews do these people think there are in the United States? — Ann Coulter (@AnnCoulter) September 17, 2015
Leaving aside the invective, this is a fair question. The answer is 2.2 percent overall and even in states where Jewish voters are said to be crucial, New Jersey and Florida, the numbers are actually fairly low, at 5.9 percent and 3.3 percent. New Hampshire, .8 percent, Iowa .2 percent. The point is, The candidates are bending over backwards for Sheldon Adelson’s money, not for primary voters. That’s why Jeb Bush has tacked right on foreign policy and hired Paul Wolfowitz and thrown Jim Baker under the bus, to get money from the Republican Jewish Coalition. If they were doing this for the Koch Brothers, the media would be all over it. Remember that Adelson called for the U.S. to nuke Iran, and this man has power over the candidates!
Coulter’s next tweet:
Maybe it’s to suck up to the Evangelicals.
— Ann Coulter (@AnnCoulter) September 17, 2015
Maybe she was being intellectually honest; there are a bunch of evangelical Christian Zionists out there. Then she said:
How to get applause from GOP donors: 1) Pledge to start a war 2) Talk about job creators 3) Denounce abortion 4) Cite Reagan 5) Cite Israel. — Ann Coulter (@AnnCoulter) September 17, 2015
Right, donors are pushing a warmongering neocon agenda in the Republican Party.
Coulter’s big offense was exclaiming about “fucking Jews” on twitter– in between anti-immigrant invective. The issue here is that the power of the Israel lobby derives from conservative Jewish wealth. There are many ways to counter this influence, including other Jews who are critical of Israel giving money; but sunlight is the best disinfectant. When an issue is suppressed, people are going to explode.
