Political tidbits: Biden talks Israel, Palin gets the Jewish e-mail treatment

• “A strong America is a strong Israel,” Joe Biden tells the Philadelphia Jewish Exponent, while also blasting President George W. Bush’s Middle East policy.
• More e-mails designed to scare the Jewish community? Choire Sicha breaks down one on Sarah Palin – and points out that it misspells “anti-Semitism.”
• Jim Besser at The Jewish Week quotes a number of Jewish historians saying Palin’s nomination will cripple John McCain’s efforts to attract Jewish votes – with one calling the Alaskan “chilling” to Jewish voters and another comparing her style to Joe McCarthy.
• Jewish Republicans from the Washington, D.C. area talk about how much they loved Sarah Palin’s debut last week in St. Paul
• Writing in the Wall Street Journal, Beliefnet’s Steven Waldman compares the reaction to Palin’s religion to the outcry over the film “Passion of the Christ,” and advises what is and isn’t problematic about the intersection of her religious and political views. Back on his own Web site, Waldman says he is concerned about Palin’s backing of Christian Heritage Week in Alaska – because the proclamation “plucks Founding Father quotes out of context to give misleading impressions about their views on the role of religion in society.”
• In the Huffington Post, Menachem Rosensaft calls a McCain-Palin-appointed Supreme Court “disastrous.”
• Jerusalemite Daniel Seidemann, writing in the Washington Post’s On Faith blog, wants presidential candidates to stop using his city to score political points.
• Writing in The Jerusalem Post, McGill University professor Gil Troy asks why Democrats call Barack Obama’s nomination an “historic breakthrough” but say the GOP is guilty of tokenism in giving Sarah Palin the VP nod. He adds that Jews are just as inconsistent – celebrating Jewish political appointees while wanting to be treated as “normal” Americans.
• Daniel Levy argues on his blog that with their actions of the last two weeks, Republicans are driving Jews back to the Democratic Party.
• New Jersey Jews launched their Obama outreach effort on Monday.
• Arutz Sheva interviews Jackie Mason about the presidential race. He says Jews only support Democrats because they feel guilty and want to help the underdog, and is not a fan of Obama – riffing about the Democrat and his relationship with Jeremiah Wright.