On politicians endorsing their bully
Profiles in...something.
We’re back!
Housekeeping notes: I’m co-hosting a new podcast! It’s called the Election Tricycle. Each week, Tom Hamilton, Rohan Venkat, and I will bring you the political news and analysis from our three countries—the United Kingdom, India, and the United States, respectively—all of which happen to have elections this year. (If you’re a paid subscriber to this newsletter, I’ll send you the longer, paid version of the podcast each week. But this week’s whole episode is free to everyone.) Listen on Acast, Spotify, or Apple, which is to say, wherever you get your podcasts.
With that! Onto news, views, and Jews.
THE NEWS
For the Forward, I wrote about Elon Musk’s visit to Auschwitz and conversation on antisemitism and why we should want more for Holocaust remembrance.
For The UnPopulist, I wrote about why Islamophobia and antisemitism need to be tackled in tandem, and why focusing on attacking DEI misses the point and the moment.
From the Guardian: “More than three decades after a mob of militant Hindu radicals razed a mosque to the ground in the Indian town of Ayodhya, the country’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, has inaugurated the new Hindu temple that will stand in its place.” (We also discussed this on the podcast this week.)
Congresswoman Nancy Mace reportedly wanted to get punched in the face on Jan. 6.
I highly recommend this piece from VSquare on the former head of police in Slovakia who was forced to resign in a scandal relating to the murder of investigative journalist Jan Kuciak and his fiancée—and who may soon be head of Slovakia’s security services.
This piece on the future of journalism is very good. It also made me cry.
MY VIEWS ON…
…endorsing Trump after he’s attacked you!
I talked about this on the podcast this week (did I mention that I am doing a new podcast?), but, after dropping out of the Republican primary, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis endorsed Donald Trump.
DeSantis has been called a variety of horrible and truly degrading things by Trump. I do not mean normal campaign jibes, but a “campaign of humiliation,” as the New York Times put it. Even if any number of things in the Trump administration; the first impeachment; Jan. 6; the second impeachment; or being found liable for sexual abuse were not breaking points, one might imagine that a politician’s ego would be enough to keep him from endorsing his rhetorical tormentor.
On the other hand: How surprised can we be? Texas Senator Ted Cruz got back on the Trump train after Trump attacked his wife. That any member of Congress, having lived through Jan. 6, would endorse him is, on one level, surprising, and yet many are all in.
Some are true believers, but others believe something else, which is that Trump is the surest bet for them to have political futures.
I am not sure whether this is true. Do voters want people who come crawling back after being degraded? Is that a future president to the voters of a party that clearly finds bullying compelling? And more than that: If you have a future in politics based out of fear of Trump and his voters, what kind of future is that?
I don’t think any of this is particularly sad. What’s sad is that students and teachers and families had their lives made more difficult by, for example, anti-LGBTQ campaigns and rhetoric and legislation as DeSantis’s political star ascended. Still, while we’re watching the descent, it’s worth noting how low people choose to go.
AND SOME STUFF ABOUT JEWS
Director Norman Jewison passed away. He was not Jewish (I know, right?) but I’m putting this in this section because I wanted to recommend to you the documentary Fiddler’s Journey to the Big Screen, which is about the making of the movie musical but really about Jewison and, yes, his relationship to Jewishness.
The ICJ will deliver “its highly anticipated verdict on South Africa’s request for an interim ruling in its genocide case against Israel” on Friday.
I thought that this piece on how Bollywood trivializes the Holocaust (beyond Bawaal!) was interesting.
Congratulations to this year’s Jewish Book Award winners and nominees.
-ET
"Politician (25455) - The Noun Project" by Pete Fecteau is marked with CC0 1.0.