The Jewish Fear Of Populism

Posted on December 4, 2016 by Luke Ford

Only about 25% of American Jews voted for Donald Trump. A big part of the reason is that Jews instinctively fear gentile populism and nationalism. Jews have usually been ruled by an elite, and the more traditional you go in Jewish life, the more hierarchical it becomes.

The idea of everyone doing what is right in his own eyes is frightening from a Jewish perspective. There needs to law and order and a ruling class.

I picked up a 2016 Chayenu on Shabbos that articulated this fear. It was for the parsha of Korach. The “Parsha Snapshot with Perspective” was headlined, “The Need For The Elite.”

Inasmuch as the chief instrument God has given us for accomplishing this goal [sanctifying reality] is His commandments, and all Jews fulfill the commandments incumbent upon them in the same way, Korach concluded that all Jews are equally valuable and there is [no] purpose served by having an elite group of spiritual professionals, such as a leader like Moses or the priestly caste of Aaron and his descendants…

Moses realized that Korach had raised the stakes and was now jot just advocating the abolishment of the priestly caste but contesting Moses’ own leadership. He therefore asked God not to punish the rebels as aspirants to the priesthood…but to simply ignore their incense and punish them instead in some way that would demonstrate their error of challenging God’s appointed leader.

God agreed with Moses’ request, and after the incense offering in the morning, had Moses instruct everyone to distance themselves physically from Korach and his party. After the vast majority of the people had done this, a chasm opened in the earth and swallowed up Korach and the rest of the rebels.

Some of the people (over 14,700) then accused Moses of causing the murder of innocents; this accusation proved that these people still subscribed to Korach’s views, despite the miraculous demonstration of their incorrectness. God therefore caused an outbreak of an epidemic that started killing the guilty parties instantly…

Having conclusively endorsed Moses as the leader and Aaron as the high priest, God then demonstrated to the people that Aaron truly deserved his position…

The rest of the parsha is devoted [to] the laws that were pronounced in response to Korach’s mutiny and its aftermath: First, the Levites were made responsible for keeping lay Israelites away from those sacred precincts into which they were not allowed to enter. Next follows a list of all the donations the lay populace was required to give to the priests and Levites, as well as a list of what the non-priestly Levites had to give to the priests.

From all this, we learn that despite Korach’s correct emphasis on the primacy of action in Judaism, it is still crucial that there be a hierarchy of spiritual leadership, in order that those higher up on the spiritual ladder be able to inspire those lower on it…

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Jewish Journal: Pirkei Avot: A guidebook for the new administration

Posted on December 2, 2016 by Luke Ford

Isn’t this Jewish supremacist to argue that our traditional texts should guide the goyim? Yes, it is Jewish supremacist. I have no problem with Jewish supremacy. I believe Judaism is awesome. I believe in God and I believe this God gave the Jews His Torah and made them his Chosen People.

Because I have no problem with Jewish supremacy, I have peace with other groups asserting their supremacy. Much of sports and popular culture reflect black supremacy. There are a tiny number of whites who want to create whites-only countries. That’s fine with me too. If the Jews and the Torah designate that there can be no other religions in the Holy Land and no citizenship for non-Jews, I can allow the same exclusivity to others.

My main objection to Jewish supremacy is when we overreach and the goyim react badly. Every action precipitates a reaction. This is my same objection to other forms of racial and religious supremacy. There’s no problem feeling that your group is awesome, divinely chosen, but that does not make your group immune from consequences. If Hitler had stopped expanding in 1938, and then only concentrated on building up Germans in a peaceful manner, and presuming that Stalin and company did not invade him, he may have gone down as the greatest political leader of the first half of the 20th Century. Chutzpah is a common human affliction and when you over-step your boundaries, you might not like the repercussions.

By Rabbi Irving (Yitz) Greenberg:

The Bible instructs every Jewish king that he must have one book with him all the time: the Torah. He should read it every day so that he will know three things: that he is accountable to God for his behavior as ruler; that he is bound by the Torah, the Constitution of his people, and is not above the law; and that he must not become arrogant and carried away by his power.
Last week, in a Forbes magazine profile, we learned that Jared Kushner, President-elect Donald Trump’s son-in-law and close adviser, has one book prominently displayed in his company headquarters: Pirkei Avot, or “Ethics of the Fathers.”
Pirkei Avot is a collection of life wisdom sayings from the rabbis who wrote the Mishnah, the core of Judaism’s second most sacred text, the Talmud. What guidance or wisdom might he glean for his important role in the coming Trump administration if he reads the book every day?
As the author of “Sage Advice,” a translation and commentary of Pirkei Avot, I have more than a few thoughts on that question.
First, Kushner should be aware of when and why the book was written. The Mishnah/Talmud was written in the aftermath of the collapse of the ruling class of the Jewish state (Judea). The political/religious establishment was totally invested in the Temple-based religious system. When the Jews revolted, the Romans crushed the rebellion, destroyed the Temple and ended Jewish sovereignty. The establishment insisted that the Temple must be restored. To them, there was no other alternative but to repeat the past policies. They spent the next century trying to recover the Temple by military and political action — in vain. Exhausted, they disappeared from history.
The rabbis rose from obscurity, a marginal place in Jewish society. They brought with them a new policy option that saved the Jewish future. They would cut a deal with the Romans to accept Roman sovereignty in return for allowing the Jews to build an autonomous community, without a military or foreign policy. Within that society, Jewish values and religion would be rebalanced and revitalized. The people, led by the rabbis, would take greater power within the religion and build a better way of life — more local, more communal, more familial, more participatory, with more individual responsibility, religiously and socially. “Ethics of the Fathers” was edited to communicate to the masses this new religious and political path. The book consists of pithy wisdom statements from 66 rabbis, designed to guide people to live a more mature, more responsible, individual life and to build a better society.

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LAT: The ‘alt-right’ splinters as supporters and critics agree it was white supremacy all along

Posted on December 2, 2016 by Luke Ford

I don’t see why white supremacy is any more dangerous and disgusting than other forms of racial supremacy such as Filipino supremacy, Chinese supremacy, Japanese supremacy, Jewish supremacy, black supremacy, Christian supremacy.

Every group with spirit wants as much power and influence as possible, particularly over its own affairs. Is is Jewish supremacist for Jews to have the Jewish state of Israel? Surely many non-Jews in Israel don’t like being a minority. Surely these goyim citizens of Israel would prefer it if Israel was multi-cultural with no one ethnic identity. It’s not easy being a minority. I sympathize. Minorities everywhere have it tough. That’s why there are separate countries so that people who want to live as a majority with their own kind can do so.

Every important people (such as the Chinese, Japanese, Jews, Nordics) see themselves as marked out by the will of heaven for some transcendental purpose. So what if whites organize in this fashion just as other groups do? I’m sure latinos enjoy their growing population and importance in the United States.

How come you hear often about “white supremacy” but rarely about black supremacy or Jewish supremacy? If you watch the NBA or the NFL, it looks like black supremacy to me. If you watch Wall Street or Hollywood or pundits, it sure looks like Jewish supremacy to me. Are these supremacies dangerous? Well, different groups have different interests, so it makes sense that as one group gains in power, other groups are by necessity reduced in power.

You might argue that white supremacy is particularly dangerous because of Hitler. Well, plenty of other people have carried out genocide aside from Hitler. You might as well argue that belief in equality is dangerous because of communism’s genocides.

Los Angeles Times Nov. 29, 2016:

Paul Joseph Watson, an editor for the conspiracy-minded site InfoWars, said in July that he was “in the alt-right,” but then denied it last week, going on to argue that two different factions of the group had emerged.
“One is more accurately described as the New Right. These people like to wear MAGA [Make America Great Again] hats, create memes & have fun,” Watson wrote on Facebook, criticizing mainstream media for focusing on Trump’s racist supporters. “They include whites, blacks, Asians, Latinos, gays and everyone else. These are the people who helped Trump win the election.
“The other faction likes to fester in dark corners of sub-reddits” — a reference to branches of the social-media site Reddit — “and obsess about Jews, racial superiority and Adolf Hitler. This is a tiny fringe minority. They had no impact on the election.”
Some white nationalists themselves have a term for the split: the alt-right versus the “alt-lite.”
White nationalists are alt-right and right-wing sites like Breitbart News and its chairman, the new White House advisor Stephen K. Bannon, are alt-lite, according to Brad Griffin, a white nationalist who blogs under the pen name Hunter Wallace at the site Occidental Dissent.
“Steve Bannon is the most important figure in the alt-lite,” Griffin wrote. “We all see Breitbart as the premier alt-lite website which has popularized a diluted version of our beliefs.”
Breitbart News, which channels a more nationalistic form of mainstream conservatism, gained notoriety over the last year both for implicitly supporting Trump’s candidacy and for Bannon’s proud announcement to Mother Jones in August, “We’re the platform for the alt-right.”
Left-wing critics have called the site a front for white nationalism and anti-Semitism, which its staffers have vigorously denied.
Bannon and Breitbart staffers have distanced themselves from the alt-right label, which Bannon defined in a postelection interview with the Wall Street Journal as “younger people who are anti-globalists, very nationalist, terribly anti-establishment.”
Bannon said alt-right supporters had “some racial and anti-Semitic overtones” that he said he disagreed with, and that Breitbart News provides “an outlet for 10 or 12 or 15 lines of thought,” of which the alt-right is “a tiny part.”
The heightened scrutiny of the alt-right has led mainstream institutions to draw tougher policies on addressing the movement.
After the election, Twitter banished many prominent far-right users from its service, which had been a staging ground for racist, sexist and anti-Jewish attacks against public figures and journalists.
Many supporters have since retreated to the new social-media service Gab, which bills itself as a safe space from censorship. At one point last week, at least six of Gab’s top 10 trending hashtags either referenced Trump or the alt-right.
“Gab I love you,” a user named “Deplorable Daniel” posted on Nov. 22. “But man there is a scary amount of Nazis or National Socialists. I feel like Gab may be under Attack.”

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My Back Went Out Yesterday

Posted on December 1, 2016 by Luke Ford

So my back got all twisted in knots over Tuesday night, it got worse Wednesday, around 8 am I collapsed to the floor, had to be helped to my car. I’ve always relied upon the kindness of strangers. So the first DC examined me and said I won’t touch you without an MRI. So I went to a Network Spinal Analysis guy and he said, unless you fell out a 3rd story window, this is all emotional and has to do with identity.

Today I got some x-rays which reveal spinal bones pinching nerves in my back and some osteoarthritis.

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An Alt Right Obituary

Posted on November 29, 2016 by Luke Ford

I guess I’m about the only person following the Alt-Right who does not think this (a few Nazi salutes at the last NPI conference and some Nazi language such as “Hail Victory!” and lugenpresse aka lying press) was a big deal.

The kerfuffle reminds me of all the PR missteps of Donald J. Trump over the past 16 months and how all the pros said this or that would end his candidacy.

If the Alt-Right presents a compelling vision for millions of people, it will triumph. If not, it won’t. Bad PR won’t kill it.

People who imitate Nazi gestures or clothing are no more likely to be genocidal maniacs than those who wear Che Guevara t-shirts and adopt languages and dress of communists (and I don’t see trendies in America as likely to commit genocide).

My proof is that not even Nazis were always hell-bent on genocide. They were in power for more than eight years before they started slaughtering civilians in large numbers. Communism in Russia turned genocidal earlier than that, and overall, communism murdered far more civilians than did Nazism.

In its first six years, the Nazi regime facilitated Jews moving to Palestine (the Haavara Agreement). In some times and places, Nazis, communists and many other groups are genocidal threats to Jews and in other times and places, they are not. Everything is time and circumstance. Most Israelis wish that all the Palestinians disappear but that does not mean Israel is likely to commit genocide against the Palestinians.

Genocide happens when you have a dramatic conflict of interest and heightened stakes in group conflict. It does not happen from adoption of rituals or dress of those who committed genocide in the past. In some circumstances, Jews, Christians, Muslims, Nazis, communists commit genocide and in other circumstances they don’t. All groups are susceptible to pressure to survive and often that means slaughtering your enemies. There are no good guys or bad guys in the universe unless you look at things through the eyes of faith, and faith, by definition, is subjective.

There are no permanent enemies or allies in the world. At some times and places, for instance, Christians are allies to Jews. In other circumstances, the two sides are enemies. The same goes for gentile nationalists and Jews.

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