ItsJessMe has a rescued diary [ttp://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/10/30/213527/05/924/645906] that is entitled a "Powerful Jewish Perspective on Obama." The diarist recommends using Deborah Lipstadt’s article Learning to love Obama after Clinton’s defeat when arguing with Jews who believe in the smears against Obama aimed at them. You are instructed
to get past the title and the... kind of PUMA-like.. first paragraph to get to the good stuff.
The diarist is a Jew who has bravely and vigorously argued against those smears and deserves our admiration and applause. So while it may seen ungrateful, I think it is important to challenge the advice that you forget the personal stuff.
Knowing that Lipstadt changed her mind allows two arguments with those Jewish smear believers. 1. She changed her mind—and oh, such a mind, one Jews are so proud of-- and if she did, why not you? 2. If the holdouts won't change their min for you--beloved child, loyal friend, whatever—why don't they do it for Deborah. After all, they owe her one.
So, nu already, why not follow this-- my very first diary (so help me with the things that have been wrongly done and the tags--below the fold.
Knowing who Lipstadt is and that she changed her mind on Obama is an argument in and of itself that can convince Jewish holdouts.
Deborah Lipstadt was an impassioned supporter of Hillary Clinton. She and Cam Kerry, John Kerry's brother and a converted Jew, wrote debating, even dueling, op-ed pieces on the two candidates in the Jewish magazine, The Forward in May that were themselves much debated http://blogs.jta.org/... When Lipstadt learned to love Obama, the History News Network http://hnn.us/... and the Jewish Telegraph Agency [Link seems to be broken], made her article Breaking News. Her conversion was obviously important, and not only to Jews.
But there is more. Some of you may remember that her book document the activities of deniers of the Holocaust got her sued. http://www.amazon.com/... One denier was David Irving, an amateur historian but a respected one, at least then. Irving had argued that Jews had died of natural causes at Auschwitz, that there was no evidence of gas chambers, of mass deaths. He went to British libel Court with the complaint that he was not to be tarred with the brush of being a denier, for history was on his side. This was no wingnut: he had been praised by some, even some of the best known, WW II historians for writing well researched books. Making things worse, in British libel court the accused must prove their innocence.
There were ways he could have been appeased. Lipstadt would have none of them and accepted the challenge to freedom of speech, to academic freedom, and to the accuracy of the historical record. It took 6 years and a life turned upside down, but after a trial in the British court Irving lost and history won. (For her book, see http://www.amazon.com/...
How Lipstadt came to love Obama is as important as the argument that the diarist so ably summarized. So try invoking Lipstadt when arguing with Jews who believe the smears.
It can’t hurt, it might even help.