Jewish voters and the Ron Paul effect )(And how the "Sarah Palin effect" was a myth)

What happens to Jewish Republicans, or to Jews who might consider voting Republican if Ron Paul takes Iowa - not an impossible scenario according to current polling. What happens to the Obama-bad-for-Israel Republican theme if Paul becomes the leading voice of their party - even for a week (until the New Hampshire vote). What chances do GOP Jews have to finally break the unending chain of broken Jewish-shift promises. How can Jewish GOPers withstand the ensuing Democratic attack on the “isolationist”, “anti foreign aid”, “anti-Israel” party – how can they defend a party that is seriously considering the nominating for President of a candidate that Jewish Republicans defined as “a virulent and harsh critic of Israel”?

A. Iowa is not important. If Ron Paul takes Iowa GOP Jews might be somewhat embarrassed, but the real loser would be the state of Iowa. “Paul’s late surge this year may help nudge Iowa back toward political obscurity. Giving the nod to a novelty candidate like Paul would further undermine Iowa’s already shaky claim to first-in-the-nation status”, writes Margaret Carlson. My prediction: Jewish war against Iowa.

B. The Primary is a process: Wait for the final outcome (Romney, Gingrich – two better-for-Israel candidates), and don’t bother us with the ups and downs of the long campaign.

C. The other party also has its fringe characters and beliefs (weak argument until the Democratic fringe takes over at least one state in the primaries).

And a half: That’s a tricky one, but I’ve heard it, tongue in cheek, from a Jewish Republican hack who told me that “our fringe candidate might take one state, but theirs took over the party and the country three years ago”. Namely, Paul is the right-wing equivalent of Obama’s. Such a blunt message might fly with some extremely unhappy voters, but would not sway rank and file on-the-fence Jewish Floridians.

A Paul Iowa victory will, no doubt, make life more complicated for the forces of Jewish Republicanism. The Pauls, Ron and son Senator Rand Paul, “have handed the Democrats a handy tool to use every time the Republicans bring up Jesse Jackson, Rep. Jim Moran and others as ‘proof’ of a Democratic Party that is turning away from Israel”, Jim Bnesser wrote two months ago. But will it have real impact on voters? And what kind of impact? Some Jewish Democrats have suggested that the Paul surge can be even more devastating than the Sarah Palin effect on Jewish voters back in 2008. So I had to go back and revisit the Palin effect – or should we call it the Palin myth?

The story of a Palin negative effect on Jewish voters is a well documented story. It keeps popping up whenever there’s need for a diagnostic analysis of the inherent incompatibility of Jewish voters and Republican politics. “As it turned out”, explained this Daily Kos report, “a key factor in John McCain’s failure to get American Jews to choose him was his choice of Sarah Palin as his running mate. In the run-up to the 2008 election, Newsweek reported that ‘Palin may hurt McCain among Jewish voters.’ The dynamics in Florida, later carried by Barack Obama, were particularly telling”.

Telling in what way? Here’s the way the Daily Beast chose to explain the story of the Jewish vote in 2008: “this year’s Democratic nominee, Sen. Barack Obama, has appeared to lag among Jews. The AJC poll showed only 57 percent of Jews nationwide supporting Obama, with 30 percent backing McCain and 13 percent undecided. “There’s no question that Obama came into this election with probably less going for him than most Democratic nominees,” says Wald. But the Palin pick “probably blunted any gains the Republicans had made.”

In short: Obama was in trouble, as documented by an AJC survey, then McCain picked Palin, and winds have shifted back to the left. Sounds reasonable? If you read the 2008 AJC survey of Jewish opinion you might be tempted to believe this line of argument. Only 57% of Jews said they’d vote for Obama in September, but something changed their minds until Election Day. Could it not be Palin, is she not the most likely instigator of such change?

I’m afraid to say the answer is no. With all due respect to all writers explaining that “John McCain may have helped Obama with his Jewish problem by choosing Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate”, and to Jewish Democrats who “believe the nomination of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has driven many undecided Jews back into the arms of the Democrats” – the evidence isn’t exactly supportive of such a theory.

While I’m pretty sure there are Jewish voters, here and there, who decided to vote Obama because of the Palin nomination, most Jewish voters have jumped on the Obama bandwagon way before Palin was nominated. And to realize that, one has to abandon the AJC survey that was both late and is considered to be relatively conservative, and look at the numbers released by Gallup. The Palin surprise came in late August of 2008 – but Jewish voters were abandoning McCain two months before Palin became a player in the campaign. In July of 2008 McCain could still hope for 34% of Jewish support, in August of 2008 his numbers among Jews went down to 25%. That’s pretty much the percentage of Jews who eventually voted for him. Palin didn’t add anything and did not take anything away from the McCain campaign (To be honest: If Joe Lieberman would have been nominated as McCain’s VP candidate, it could have changed the numbers).

The Palin effect than is a Palin myth. That Palin is not well-liked in many Jewish circles – is a given. However, in those Jewish circles, no one was ever serious about voting for McCain, with or without Palin.

1. It will put Jewish Republicans on the defensive side for a while. 2.It will harden believes among Jewish Democrats that their Party is the only party a real Jew can vote for. 3.It will force other Republican candidates into raising the level of rhetorical support for Israel even more. 4.It will make Jewish Republicans work even harder for the candidate they’d believe can defeat Paul (I think Romney is the one that is likely to benefit). 5.It will make very little impact on the actual vote of Jews. For details: see the Palin effect myth.

All this changes of course if Paul is able to capitalize on Iowa and to have strong showings in other states. Very few Jews would ever consider voting for a candidate Paul (26 out of 2300 Jews, according to this unrepresentative Windmueller survey). And many conservative-tilting Jews would not feel comfortable with a party in which Paul is playing a major role. No, this isn’t a likely scenario, but politics is a tricky game so who knows: A great year for Paul might even give President Obama a chance to do better than he did in 2008 with Jewish voters.

"Can you find one of Paul defending Christian...."

Paul has emphatically stated that he believes the principle of pre-emptive war goes against the 'Just War Theory' of Christianity. He has also stated that being in perpetual war does not go along with Christ's teachings. So you are wrong, he seems to be the only candidate who actually CARES about our foreign policy being in line with Christian values.

Here's a clip of him at a debate speaking about pre-emptive war.

Yes, he believes war against Muslims is wrong. But the 9/11 gang were justified in "defending" themselves against evil Christians, according to Paul.

By the way, you still haven't shown him defending Christians. Even if he alluded to a Christian (among others), it was only to defend Muslims. He's still not on the record ever defending Christians;.

...Palin was more on our side than the majority of our coreligionists.

Absolutely true! And in this year's race, the same can be said for Michele Bachmann. In many ways, Bachmann can be viewed as this year's Palin. In fact, according to Bachmann's autobiography, the two are friendly with each other.

Paul is an anti-Semite.

Please see my post # 16.

Ron Paul is a neo-isolationist, not a Nazi. He appears to be antisemitic because his wacko foreign policy works to the disadvantage of Israel. But he has the utmost respect for several important (since deceased) Jewish intellectuals of the past in the libertarian movement, some of whom he had personal contact with - Ayn Rand, Murray Rothbard, Milton Friedman, Ludwig von Mises, Friedrich Hayek - and who influenced his economic views.

One can be isolationist without being anti-Israel. Paul is anti-Israel. He has made his distaste for that country plain on numerous occasions.

This anti-Israel philosophy doesn't so much come from isolationism or libertarianism, but European style rightism, which is abundant among "palaeoconservatives," whether libertarian or statist.

Jews naturally associate public Christianity with anti-Semitism. It’s not personal. Right or wrong, Ron Paul is portrayed as much more secular in outlook than Sarah Palin.

Well, having just emerged from an extremely nasty argument with chr*stians just last week, here's where I win back my "unclassifiable curmudgeon" bona fides:

What kind of chr*stianity? Roman Catholicism? Eastern Orthodoxy? Mormonism? Primitive Baptists (who absolutely refuse to engage in any proselytary activity whatsoever)? Chr*stadelphians? Swedenborgians? Assemblies of G-d? Moravians? Wesleyans? Chr*stian Scientists? Seventh Day Adventists? Quakers?

What about public Black and Hispanic chr*stianity? Or is that different?

And Jews are likely to see a certain amount of anti-Semitism in any non-Jewish culture. So the preference for Democrats may just be because Jews are numerous and influential there despite obvious anti-Semitism

Then why doesn't the Democrat Party promote the Noachide Laws?

You know that little hut Lionel Jeffries lived in in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang? That's my house now, and there's plenty of room for all of me.

One can be an isolationist without being anti-Israel.

Given today's geopolitical alignment, it's just about impossible to be an American isolationist without risking the security and existence of Israel - as well as several other American allies.

I’m afraid I don’t understand your animus.

If it’s based on the New Testament, it’s Christianity.

Either political party can be prone to Jew-hate. Jews may simply be picking the one that has more Jews in it, not because they believe one is morally superior. Quite the opposite.

If it’s based on the New Testament, it’s Christianity.

That's the point. Some forms of chr*stianity are murderous, some are harmless. To simply have a negative reaction to "public chr*stianity" (outside of a Torah context) is to engage in stereotyping based on ignorance.

Either political party can be prone to Jew-hate. Jews may simply be picking the one that has more Jews in it, not because they believe one is morally superior. Quite the opposite.

Yes, that's true, but the fact that it's true is not a good thing. Three hundred years ago almost all Jews lived in a self-governing Theocratic entity under the authority of the Rabbinate. Then enlightenment fever came along and brought about the unnatural situation we find ourselves today, where secular figures, organizations, and publications claim to represent the "official Jewish community." That this crowd is now accepted as the "Jewish leadership" (and their presence in the Democrat party makes it "the Jewish party") is a tragedy.

Rabbi 'Asher Meza is definitely outside the mainstream, but I nevertheless appreciate his attitude towards multi-generational secular Jewish "leadership."

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