Welcome to Political Points, where we streeeeetch our 10:30 deadline.
It’s twelve days to polling, and we’re entering a kind of neverland of politicking, where two plus two equals dirty money, Nazi associations and biker Jews.
In other words, the rhetoric is becoming so overheated, it’s boiling over.
In other words, enough with the metaphors, and let’s go.
**First, Republican Rep. Mark Kirk‘s campaign for Illinois’ open U.S. Senate seat just eblasted a call on opponent Alex Gianoullias to return $2,000 he got from George Soros.
Tax records discovered by the Washington Times show Soros and his family contributed $245,000 to J Street in 2008, and J Street President Jeremy Ben-Ami acknowledged that the group has received $500,000 more since then as part of a three-year gift. J Street is a controversial group known for its harsh criticism of Israel. Earlier this year, Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz said, “I reject J Street because it spends more time criticizing Israel than supporting it. They shouldn’t call themselves pro-Israel.”
“It’s time for Alexi Giannoulias to decide whether he stands with Israel or with George Soros and his J Street agenda,” Kirk spokesperson Richard Goldberg said.
So far so good: The e-blast correctly associates Soros with J Street, it correctly notes that J Street is controversial, and that it has harshly criticized Israel, also correct (although without the context of its praise — but that kind of omission is commonplace in a political campaign). And it notes that J Street’s views are outside the pro-Israel mainstream, also correct on several fronts.
So far, so sterling, in terms of partisan political rhetoric. But then there’s this:
“If Alexi Giannoulias stands with supporters of Israel, he will immediately return his dirty Soros money.”
Say what? Dirty?
I asked Goldberg, and he emailed me this 2006 International Herald Tribune story about a court in France upholding an insider trading conviction against Soros.
A) What does that have to do with Israel?
B) Check out this OpenSecrets.org record of donors to Kirk: over $32,000 from JPMorgan Chase and Co. Now check out Wikipedia’s list of same’s settlements for wrongdoing in recent years. (It’s Wikipedia, yes, but the footnotes check out.)
Let’s file this under "closing sentences that should have been resisted," or "bridges too far" or even under "Never shoulda gone there."
UPDATE: Richard forwards me this story from WLS-AM, in which Giannoulias accuses Kirk of "economic treason" for the crime, it seems, of making a long-distance phonecall. (Kirk fundraised from U.S. businessmen while they were in China.) Wild rhetoric — nothing to do with Israel, but to be fair, I should throw it in.
FURTHER UPDATE: A couple of readers have contacted me to mention that J Street didn’t endorse Giannoulias.
**Republican Allen West‘s campaign in Florida, smarting from reports of his associations with the Outlaws Motorcycles Club, a group that defends members behind bars for murder and robbery as "prisoners of war," is distributing these pictures of Rep. Ron Klein (D-Fla.) with members of the Leathernecks, and here’s the text:
The hypocrisy is astounding, as Ron Klein appeared with, and courted for support, the same Vietnam veterans he now refers to as criminals and thugs. The facts speak for themselves. Ron Klein will say or do anything to try and defame the character of LTC(R) Allen West – a decorated war hero. Allen has spent a career serving our country, and looks forward to continuing to serve the good people of South Florida.
Okay:
A) The Leathernecks are not the Outlaws.
B) Did Klein or his campaign attack as thugs any of the vets in the photos, or for that matter, the Leathernecks? West’s campaign doesn’t say, and I can’t find evidence that Klein did.
C) Repeated invocations of the "liberal media" won’t make go away the email NBC obtained in which West praises the Outlaws and says he has accepted their protection.
D) The reference to "thuggishness" comes not from Klein, but from a University of Miami professor in this NBC report about bikers threatening a Klein campaign videographer at a West event.
Here’s a response from Klein’s campaign:
This conversation is not about bikers or veterans, many of whom support Congressman Klein’s campaign. It is about Allen West’s direct connections to dangerous organized crime.
Of course Congressman Klein has attended events with veterans, he has made serving our nation’s veterans one of his top priorities as a member of Congress.
Now the Jewish interest in this story — aside from the Palm Beach County/Broward County district’s heavy Jewish population, and aside from Klein’s own Jewishness, and aside from West’s attacks on Klein’s pro-Israel bonafides — is the Outlaws’ alleged flirtation with Nazi symbols.
I’ve looked into these allegations, and they are not only remote, there’s nothing suggesting that West knew about them. (The gang’s insignia reportedly incorporated a Swastika until 2000.)
More appalling is the gang’s unabashed defense of members serving time for horrendous crimes, and its blatant misogyny.
**The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People has published this report on Tea Party nationalism, including a chapter covering allegations of bigotry — including anti-Semitism.
The NAACP praises the Tea Party — which remains a disparate and not strictly hierarchical movement — for expelling some bigots from its ranks but wants it to go further. The problem with the report is, most of its references are to appearances by bigots at Tea Party events in the first half of 2009, when the movement kind of defined "nascent."
It also makes what has become a reflexive gambit in such reports (by liberal critics of the right and conservative critics of the left) to note bigoted comments on web pages. Have these been removed? Do we know if the commenters are formally affiliated with the movement? It doesn’t say.
Tea Party spokesmen push back against such a broad brush in the Kansas City Star.
But Sal Russo, a California political consultant and chief strategist for the Tea Party Express, called the report ridiculous.
“To attack a grassroots movement of this magnitude with sundry isolated incidents only goes to show the NAACP has abandoned the cause of civil rights for the advancement of liberal Democrat politics,” Russo said.
“The Tea Party Express has publicly and explicitly repudiated racism.”
Hat Tip, the Huffington Post.
**Speaking of the Tea Party and Jews: Politico reports that Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) and the Associated Press reports that Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) are Democratic incumbents likely to win — but still pushing back against Tea Party-backed challengers.
Here’s the AP in an overview of Tea Party challenges:
Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff holds a nearly 20-point registration edge in his suburban Los Angeles district, but he sent voters a two-page letter contending that the election of tea party-backed Republican John Colbert would mean the end of Medicare and the Environmental Protection Agency.
"His campaign is no joke," wrote Schiff, who carried the district with 69 percent of the vote two years ago. "We have seen tea party radicals elected in state after state. We cannot take this threat lightly."
And Politico:
Longtime Massachusetts Rep. Barney Frank has given his re-election campaign $200,000 as he faces his toughest race in years.
A campaign finance report filed Tuesday showed that Frank, the chairman of the powerful House Financial Services committee, lent himself the money Tuesday.
(snip)
The chairman is facing one of his toughest fights in recent memory against Republican Sean Bielat, a 35-year-old Marine veteran with degrees from Georgetown, Harvard and the University of Pennsylvania. Republican Sen. Scott Brown won Frank’s congressional district, which President Barack Obama carried in 2008. Bielat has zeroed in on Frank’s service atop the financial services committee, indicating that the Democrat had a hand in the financial turmoil over the last few years.
CBS reports Franks is still considered a likely win.
