Professor Charli Carpenter Quits Lawyers, Guns and Money! — UPDATE!! Repsac = Racist = ASFL = Lying Asshat!!!

And I'm claiming credit for forcing her to abandon that demonic progressive stinkhole.

I noticed that Charli's name had been removed from the blog's masthead, and then new LGM blogger Erik Loomis introduced himself a few weeks ago, noting, "... how intimidating it is to be replacing someone as superb as Charli Carpenter. Those are some big shoes to fill. I know I’ll miss reading her posts."

Charli quit immediately following the publication of my essay, "Dr. Charli Carpenter and the Laws of War." I had long suggested to her that blogging at LGM was harmful to her academic reputation, and of course Charli's ambitious within the field of political science. She dismissed my advice and admonished me not to involve her in flame wars. But I offered legitimate criticism at "Dr. Charli Carpenter and the Laws of War," and she nevertheless ignored the post and then fled the scene of battle. Maybe it was the Serr8d Photoshop of Charli in a bikini, sporting what looks like to be a terrorist's bombing set-up. Feminists hate that stuff. (The bikinis, that is. The pro-Palestinian terrorism? Not so much.) And note how plugging "Charli Carpenter and International Law" or "Dr. Charli Carpenter" into Google pulls up my post at the #1 and #2 ranking. That's gotta hurt.

And that tells you something. Charli was listing Lawyers, Guns and Money at her biographical information on her Foreign Affairs articles, and she's still blogging at The Duck of Minerva, more than ever it seems. Charli likes blogging and wouldn't have quit LGM on a whim.

Frankly, it must have been damaging to be associated with a hate dump like Robert Farley's Lawyers, Guns and Money. And especially so now that LGM has emerged as a big outlet for progressive anti-Semitism in recent months, led by the idiot juvenile Scott Lemieux and his ill-considered blogging on Israel-bashing playwright Tony Kushner.

It's telling all around. Not only had blogging at LGM become a liability for Charli, but it goes to show that when challenged, progressives are cowardly when forced outside of their demonic cocoons.

I'm going to have lots more on the bloggers at Lawyers, Guns and Money. They've been attacking me and this blog for years, and recently those attacks took a very personal turn, which required me to retain an attorney. I'm still holding off on reporting on that, but it's going to be blockbuster when it comes out. One of the bloggers over there is going to be outed as evil once and for all. He'll be even more discredited than he already is, and while this has been costly, it's nothing that I initiated. Cheap kicks while it lasted it, but not anymore. Basically, don't fuck with me, assholes. You reap what you sow and it's very ugly. And you deserve the ignominy that's coming your way.

Stay tuned.

*****

UPDATE (2:25pm PST): I've been out taking my kid skateboarding, so a little late getting back to the blog. Not only that, I'm trying desperately to pull myself up after ROTFLMFAO, because REPSAC = RACIST = ASFL has responded to this post, and writes hilariously that Charli Carpenter is "paying little if any attention to Donald Douglas." Perhaps not, but stalker REPSAC = RACIST = ASFL sure the hell is!!

See: "Professor Donald Douglas is Envious of Professor Charli Carpenter."

And more lulz. Note how Charli Carpenter quit blogging precisely while coming under withering fire at this blog. Yep, perfect timing. The so-called "Grad Director" gig is a convenient out for pulling her name off the masthead at LGM, and totally transparent. God, that's pathetic, but expected, since she no doubt found she could no longer blog at a premier progressive anti-Semitic hate dump. It's pretty self-explanatory. And she's meanwhile blogging up a storm at Duck of Minerva. Yep, that "Grad Director" gig sure is taking up a lot of time, yuk yuk!!

And wrong, not envious in the least, RACIST REPSAC3 ASFL. I'm a tenured professor at a college without a grad program, so "Grad Director" is not something I'd be doing. And I have no need to publish, since community colleges are teaching institutions. But WE KNOW progressives like you hate teaching and denigrate those who do, cuz ur a typical asshat. And I'm raising two kids myself, not to be demonic left-wing terrorist wannabes, of course. Unlike you, freaking stalker.

Plus, I'm not "outing" anyone's identity, you idiot. I plan to report and document the moral degeneracy and evil of one of the bloggers at Lawyers, Guns and Murder. Still waiting for the go-ahead from the attorney, but you've got skills in this area, so it'll be interesting to demonstrate a past pattern of collaboration on your part. See: "DEFAMATION - DONALD STYLE --- Another year, another UPDATE: 2/17/2011." At the update, that's where hate sponsor RACIST = REPSAC = ASFL denies that he had anything to do with the campaign of workplace intimidation directed against me at my college, which of course is a lie, because RACIST = REPSAC = ASFL personally administers the blog and he personally recruited the progressives who published all of my workplace contact information, with the exhortation:

We know these behaviors all too well, and why some of you bother with this pinhead is beyond me. The Coward is not welcome at The Swash Zone; we delete his comments immediately. More disturbing are the comments and e-mails left by his followers: Profane, racist, sexist, homophobic, anti-Semitic … worthy of report to the FBI. What to do?

If the Coward or any of his followers harass you online you, contact President **** ****** at (562) ***-**** or Executive VP of Academic Affairs ****** **** at (562) ***-**** and describe the harassment. For serious online abuse or defamation, there is always this option (case file in progress).

This was published at REPSAC = RACIST = ASFL's blog, American Nihilist, Feb 12, 2009. (See here.) And REPSAC = RACIST = ASFL is fully implicated in this initial campaign of workplace intimidation, and he's now even doubled-down about how he thinks I should be fired for practicing my First Amendment rights to freedom of the expression, the right to be free in my private personal affairs. It's pretty bad, but this is what progressives do. And when I'm able to report fully on recent legal developments with my blog, REPSAC = RACIST = ASFL may well be implicated in the moral deviance, evil, and libelous activities that have been recently launched to destroy the moral clarity of myself and American Power.

Yale Kills Yale Initiative for the Interdisciplinary Study of Antisemitism

From Abby Wisse Schachter, at New York Post, "Yale's Gift to Anti-Semitism":

Yale University last week killed the Yale Initiative for the Interdisciplin ary Study of Antisemitism -- the only program of its kind in the country, an academically stellar one-stop anti-Semitism research shop. Worse, it almost certainly did so because YIISA refused to ignore the most virulent, genocidal and common form of Jew-hatred today: Muslim anti-Semitism.

Citing an official review by a faculty committee that it refuses to identify, Yale will shut down the program at the end of next month. The university's top flack, Director of Strategic Communications Charles "Robin" Hogen, wrote an e-mail claiming that YIISA had failed a key test: It was supposed to "serve the research and teaching interests of some significant group of Yale faculty and . . . be sustained by the creative energy of a critical mass of Yale faculty."

Funny, last year, at YIISA's hugely successful inaugural conference on global anti-Semitism, Yale Deputy Provost Frances Rosenbluth said just the opposite, noting that YIISA was "guided by an outstanding group of scholars from all over the university representing many different disciplines," including professors of history, sociology, comparative languages, psychiatry, economics and political science. Actually, Hogen's e-mail itself contradicts Yale's stated excuse: He notes that "the steering committee did express continued support for the faculty reading group on anti-Semitism." Plus, "institutional support will remain for the group of faculty who wish to continue their scholarly exploration of this important subject."
Which is it -- no faculty interested in studying anti-Semitism, or lots of faculty interest in studying anti-Semitism?

Well, depends on what kind of anti-Semitism. Can't be studying the Islamic kind, now can we?

'Naksa Day'

Okay, should be a big news day, for example, at Jerusalem Post, "IDF on high alert for 'Naksa Day' border unrest," and "30 protesters gathering on Syrian side of border."

And at Ynet, "Security forces on high alert for 'Naksa Day'." Also, at New York Times, "Israel Braces for Clashes During Border Protests":

JERUSALEM — Israel on Saturday was bracing for possible clashes along its borders after Palestinian activists in the region called for protest marches on Sunday, three weeks after a similar wave of coordinated protests led to deadly clashes with Israeli troops.

Protests on Sunday to mark the anniversary of the Palestinian “naksa,” or setback, in the June 1967 Middle East war were being planned in the West Bank and Gaza, territories that were conquered by Israel then. There have also been calls on social networking Internet sites for Palestinians in Lebanon and Syria to march at the Israeli border.

That echoed the conditions that led to the violence on May 15, the day Palestinians mark as the “nakba,” or catastrophe, of Israel’s establishment in 1948. Taking a cue from the so-called Arab Spring movement, organizers in multiple countries and territories called for a coordinated action against Israel, and huge crowds of Palestinians responded.

They clashed with Israeli troops on four fronts, and breached the border between Syria and the Golan Heights for the first time in more than 30 years. At least 14 protesters from Lebanon and Syria were killed, stoking outrage in Palestinian camps across the region and intensifying pressure on Israel to create the conditions for a return to peace talks.

The Israeli military was not giving out details of its preparations, but television reports showed soldiers repairing fences and bulldozers digging trenches along the borders in the north. On Thursday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he had instructed Israeli forces to act with restraint, but also with determination, to protect Israel’s sovereignty and borders. According to reports from Lebanon, activists there canceled plans to march to the Israeli border after the Lebanese authorities declared the border area a closed military zone.

Plus, at Haaretz, "Thousands march in Tel Aviv in support of Palestinian state based on 1967 borders."

RELATED: Leo Rennert, at American Thinker, "Joel Greenberg, the Washington Post's Palestinian Propagandist."

Added: At Jihad Watch, "Palestinian Authority presidential adviser: 'refugee' assaults on Israel's borders are the 'new Palestinian nuclear weapon'."

Circumcision Ban Gains Traction in California

At New York Times, "Efforts to Ban Circumcision Gain Traction in California":

SANTA MONICA, Calif. — When a group of activists proposed banning circumcision in San Francisco last fall, many people simply brushed them aside. Even in that liberal seaside city, it seemed implausible that thousands of people would support an effort to outlaw an ancient ritual that Jews and Muslims believe fulfills a commandment issued by God.

But last month, the group collected the more than 7,100 signatures needed to get a measure on the fall ballot that would make it illegal to snip the foreskin of a minor within city limits. Now a similar effort is under way in Santa Monica to get such a measure on the ballot for November 2012.

If the anticircumcision activists (they prefer the term “intactivists”) have their way, cities across the country may be voting on whether to criminalize a practice that is common in many American hospitals. Activists say the measures would protect children from an unnecessary medical procedure, calling it “male genital mutilation.”

“This is the furthest we’ve gotten, and it is a huge step for us,” said Matthew Hess, an activist based in San Diego who wrote both bills.

Mr. Hess has created similar legislation for states across the country, but those measures never had much traction. Now he is fielding calls from people who want to organize similar movements in their cities.

“This is a conversation we are long overdue to have in this country,” he said. “The end goal for us is making cutting boys’ foreskin a federal crime.”

Right. An anti-Semitic conversion.

RTWT. The piece reports on the Hess's despicable comic book literature

RELATED: "'Grotesque Anti-Semitic Imagery' — Literature for Circumcision Ban in San Francisco Features 'Monster Mohel'."

'Grotesque Anti-Semitic Imagery' — Literature for Circumcision Ban in San Francisco Features 'Monster Mohel'

Here's the press release from the Anti-Defamation League: "ADL Says Anti-Circumcision Comic Book Offends With 'Grotesque' Anti-Semitic Imagery."

San Francisco Chronicle has the backgound: "Literature for SF's anti-circumcision measure stars "monster" rabbis and blonde superheroes."

And at Los Angeles Times, "Jewish activists call circumcision ban superhero anti-Semitic":

A ballot measure to ban circumcision in San Francisco has taken a strange twist with the publication, by the measure’s sponsors, of a comic book in which an anti-circumcision superhero -– blond, buff and handsome -– battles evil Jewish characters who recall the stereotypical images of classic anti-Semitism.

"Foreskin Man" was written and created by Matthew Hess, one of the leaders behind the initiative to ban circumcision, the ritual cutting of foreskin on a baby's penis that, in the Jewish religion, is considered central to the covenant between the Jewish people and God. Opponents consider it painful and barbaric, akin to female circumcision rites in Africa that have attracted international condemnation.

The measure will be on the ballot in San Francisco in November. Hess is with a San Diego group, MGM Bill, which is also seeking signatures to put a similar measure on the ballot in Santa Monica.

From the rather crude comment thread at Joe. My. God.:

A guy whose last name is Hess probably should think about immediate perceptions that his work might be antisemitic.

Word.

Also, Zombie at Pajamas, "Proof that S.F.’s circumcision ban Is anti-Semitic" (via Memeorandum). And Atlas Shrugs, "NAZI LEGISLATION FOR A "JUDENREIN" (JEWFREE) CALIFORNIA: BANNING JUDAISM," and Bookworm, "The circumcision ban on the San Francisco ballot is driven by blatant antisemitism."

I blogged previously on the proposed circumcision ban in Santa Monica. Reports at the time didn't raise the issue of anti-Semitism, but something's really off with these proposals. See the Jerusaleum Post, 'No to a ‘brit mila’ ban."

Markos Moulitsas: Daily Kos' Anti-Semitic 'Decline and Death of Israel' Not Offensive

Still up at Daily Kos, "Eulogy before the Inevitability of Self-Destruction: The Decline and Death of Israel."

Yet, in an e-mail exchange with Tommy Christopher, regarding the extremely inappropriate publication of identities of minors at Daily Kos, Markos Moultisas responded:

from Markos Moulitsas
to Tommy Christopher
date Thu, Jun 2, 2011 at 10:34 PM

subject Re: VERY Urgent you call me! One of your bloggers is compromising identities of two minors

That’s a community member’s post. Not my staff. I don’t exert editorial control over what the community writes absent legal imperatives or deeply offensive material. Right now, I’m seeing neither ...

Read Tommy's report for the whole e-mail exchange.

But look, that "Decline and Death of Israel" post would make the authors of the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" blush. But apparently, that's not "deeply offensive material."

Moultisas doesn't care about protecting the identities minors at Daily Kos, obviously. Tommy Christopher is bothered: "It disgusts me to see any person behave this way, particularly a fellow liberal." Okay, well how about Markos Moultisas and the Jews, Tommy? Disgusted?

Take a good look at that entry, Tommy. Still call yourself a "liberal"?

Kudos to Tommy on the report, in any case, "Andrew Breitbart Did Not Run ‘Weinergate’ Evidence Which Turned Out to Be Fake" (via The Other McCain).

New York's LGBT Community Center Caves to 'Queers Against Israeli Apartheid'

Update from my report in March: "Queers for Palestine Party to End Apartheid!"

From the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Community Center, "STATEMENT ON DECISION TO ALLOW SPACE USE BY OUTSIDE QUEER IDENTIFIED GROUP."

And from the anti-Israel side, Queers for an Open LGBT Center, "QUEER VICTORY! Today's action is still on!" And The Cahokian, "Rightwinger now calls NYC Gay Center 'an anti-Israeli nest'."

But see Phyllis Chesler, at FrontPage Mag, "NYC Queers for Jihad":

Last Friday, May 26, 2011, “Queers Against Israeli Apartheid” exercised their hard-won right to hold their meetings at New York City’s Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) Center. Their right to hate and to be grossly misinformed was, as usual, presented as a free speech right and as yet another victim-driven Intifada (uprising).

This meeting followed the long campaign to vilify City University Trustee Jeffrey Wiesenfeld for daring to dissent from Tony Kushner’s anti-Israel views; Kushner, who happens to be both gay and Jewish, is nevertheless being given an honorary doctorate this week. These two events are intimately connected to each other and have been further empowered by President Obama’s shameful and dangerous actions towards the Jewish State.

We have all seen black and white footage of people dancing the night away, even as the crematoria or the machetes did their deadly work somewhere off camera. We understand that people elsewhere continue eating, having babies, buying first homes, going on vacations, even as genocidal wars rage on camera, even as tornadoes, nuclear plant meltdowns, and savage flash floods destroy whole communities elsewhere, also on camera.

Right now, in my little neck of the planet, Manhattan, the weather has turned gloriously sunny and summery; people are enjoying this respite from the unending rains and freezing winter weather. As people amble through leafy city streets, the world is preparing to slaughter the Jews again. As if the Muslim Brotherhood and the Gama’a al-Islamiyya in Egypt were not enough, a new swastika-flying Nazi party has emerged in Egypt—Egypt, Israel’s friendly neighbor; Egypt, which on Saturday opened the Rafah crossing to admit even more weapons and terrorist fighters into Gaza in the unending Arab war against the Jews; Egypt, where many are demanding an end to the cold peace treaty with Israel.

Some say that President Obama might be touring Europe in order to gain European allies to help him pressure Israel into accepting the “pre-1967” Auschwitz borders.

Here at home in America, we continue to enjoy Gazan Intifadas on our campuses. For example, the people are getting ready to party in the streets when, on June 3, 2011, City University of New York gives playwright Tony Kushner his honorary doctorate. In my view, they are feting Kushner, not so much for his art but rather for his celebrity and for his obsessively harsh views of Israel. The playwright has not led any campaigns against genocide in Sudan or against real gender and religious apartheid in the Arab and Muslim worlds. Like the “Queers Against Apartheid,” Kushner also scapegoats Israel for the crimes of the Arab and Muslim worlds.

The LGBT “queers” had threatened to storm or “surge” into the Center if they did not receive official approval for their group meeting.

“Surging” and “storming,” Arab street mob behavior, is a vision and a tactic that has been recommended by none other than journalist Tom Friedman, long adopted by international “Free Gaza” activists; it reminds me of Nazi Brownshirt behavior. Think Kristallnacht. Civilians and men in uniform breaking Jewish shop windows, breaking Jewish bones, burning Jewish books, eventually burning millions of living Jews.

But, you must understand: The German Nazis felt “victimized.” They had lost World War I and were humiliated because they should have been triumphant; they had also been unfairly economically penalized. Kushner and his supporters claim that the genuine dissent of one CUNY trustee, Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, somehow “victimized” their views because their views are supposed to triumph, not Wiesenfeld’s. His pro-Israel view is not supposed to exist and, in their view, is not protected by academic or free speech rights. Only the anti-Israel views deserve such protection.

One thousand six hundred and eighty people signed a petition to the Center on behalf of “Queers for Palestine.” Like Tony Kushner and his CUNY supporters, the aggressors first claim victimhood and protest the denial of their free speech rights; then, they “surge” forward as a mob (on petitions, on the Internet, on the streets, on other battlefields), to either murder Jews or to honor those Jews who hate Israel, and to silence gay Jews who are pro-Israel ...

More at the post, and then:

Now, in the light of what has happened, Lucas, a major financial supporter of the center, has withdrawn from it. His letter is brief, dignified, and to the point. I will give him the closing words. He writes:

Dear supporters of the state of Israel-

I just learned that tonight the Gay Center of NYC will be hosting the first meeting of the group Queers Against Israeli Apartheid. This organization stands for boycotts, divestments and sanctions of the Jewish state. In other words, it stands for boycotts, divestments and sanctions against Jewish men, women, children, and Holocaust survivors living in Israel.

I am a proud gay man and a proud Jewish man, but I have made my choice. I ask you to boycott, divest and sanction the LGBT Center of NYC. Today Jewish people in Israel are in incomparably greater danger than the gay people in America will ever be. This is a difficult choice and I am asking you to make the same choice.

Alienate yourself from NYC LGBT Center. Stand with Israel, stand with Israeli Jews, and defend their right to exist, their right to defend themselves, not to let the world exterminate them again.

And even if all the gay groups will condemn this letter, I will not change my mind.

Michael Lucas

Bill Whittle's Firewall: 'Turncoat Nation'

Via Right Klik:

RELATED: Victor Davis Hanson, How The Obama Administration Threatens Our National Security.

FLASHBACK: Whittle's original series, "What We Believe."

Robert Stacy McCain: 'Pacifism and Historical Ignorance'

An excellent post.

I promised McCain I'd throw him some traffic this weekend. He links to a Victor Davis Hanson essay, on which I'll have more later. Meanwhile, I'm snagging this video, a Legal Insurrection upload:

RELATED: From Evan Sayet, at FrontPage Mag, "Why Jews Support the Democratic Party."

More on all of this tonight ...

Student Activism at AIPAC

The video is especially interesting after 6:00 minutes.

And Barbara Efraim touched base with me yesterday, the first chance she's had since getting back from AIPAC in D.C. I already posted Barbara's recent commentary piece at The Daily Bruin, but she wanted to give me a heads up on this comment at the article:

Equating Noam Chomsky – a world-renowned public intellectual, linguist, writer, and emeritus professor at one of the most prestigious academic institutions in the world – to some marginal, goblin-like hate-monger as Horowitz is just plain foolish.

What “threat” of Sharia Law do you speak of? What Israeli “democracy” do you speak of? Your rhetoric is tired and ineffective.

John Hawkins: 'Liberalism in 120 Seconds: Why They Really Hate Israel'

At Right Wing News:

Oops. John mentions Arab anti-Semitism. Let's see how long this one lasts on YouTube. Sheesh.

Move Over AIPAC! Protests Netanyahu Speech

It's a Code Pink joint.

See Weasel Zippers, "Code Pink Does The Islamists Bidding at AIPAC: Continuously Interrupts Netanyahu’s Speech…"

Progressive Blue Texan's Instaputz Slurs Israel 'Über Alles'

Associated with the Nazis, the first stanza of Germany's official national anthem included "Deutschland, Deutschland über alles" (Germany, Germany above all). And thus Blue Texan slurs Israel as a Nazi state, quite common, of course, on the anti-colonial, neo-communist left (see Norman Finklestein, for example, "THE GRANDCHILDREN OF HOLOCAUST SURVIVORS FROM WORLD WAR II ARE DOING TO THE PALESTINIANS EXACTLY WHAT WAS DONE TO THEM BY NAZI GERMANY…").

Despicable, but not surprising at all. It's in fact progressives who're today's exterminationists and totalitarians:

Blue Texan alleges that "These people are nuts," and following the link takes us to The Hill, "Obama 'disrespected' Israel, threw it 'under the bus,' says Romney." (Also at Memeorandum.)

Scott Lemieux Backs Anti-Semitic Tony Kushner at Lawyers, Guns and Money

So now Lawyers, Guns and Money is a Jew-bashing, BDS-backing, anti-Semitic hate-site? Well, of course we know that Robert Farley worships Che Guevara, so fanatical Israel-hatred is the logical next step for LGM. The confirmation is in Scott Lemieux's jihad against Jeffrey S. Wiesenfeld, a Member of the Board of Trustees of the City University of New York, who has spoken out against the the university's plan to give an honorary degree to gay socialist playwright Tony Kushner. Here's the screencap of Lemieux's attack on Wiesenfeld this morning, "The CUNY Disgrace."

I commented at the post:

I’m calling you out right now as an Israel-basher, Scott. And a hypocrite. You’re for free-speech for Israel’s critics but you want to punish Israel’s defenders. Seriously. You’re a sick fucker.

And here's the hypocrisy, from an earlier post where Lemieux decried "political correctness":

If there was a contest among the trustees to see who could commit the most egregious breach of CUNY’s mission and traditions, I think we have a winner! Well, at least we know that Roger Kimball has a point about “political correctness” running amok on campuses ...

Actually, the issue here isn't political correctness. It's whether some forms of speech, while protected, are unworthy of the legitimacy and recognition that's conferred with an honorary degree. Frankly, Kushner's attacks on Israel are anti-Semitic, as Wiesenfeld wrote in an essay at The Algemeiner:

When you hold the State of Israel – a nation in a struggle for its survival from the beginning, a target for the misogynist, racist, anti-western, dictatorial regimes which surround it – to a standard you would hold no other nation under normal circumstances, let alone under such exigencies – and when you spew libel against our sole regional democratic ally for “crimes” concocted by delegitimizers, you are an anti-Semite.

See also, "Transcript of CUNY Trustee’s Speech on Kushner Award."

And Bruce Kesler's been all over this at Maggie's Farm, for example, "CUNY Chairman: Kushner 'made the trains run on time'."

And from Jonathan Tobin, at Commentary, "The New York Times Piles on Kushner’s Critic":

A New York arts world that considers a hard-core leftist theatrical polemicist like Tony Kushner to be “compassionate” and fair-minded must find it hard to accept the fact that there are people in the world who deem his anti-Zionism so hard to stomach they refuse to remain silent when asked to honor him. The belief that Kushner is a “writer of rare intellectual scope” with an “extraordinary, active empathy that pervades every one of his plays” is clearly the dominant viewpoint among the city’s chattering classes, and it is hardly surprising that dissenters like Wiesenfeld will be treated harshly as a consequence. The drumbeat of incitement against Wiesenfeld, in which Kushner is falsely portrayed as a victim, will accelerate in the days to come. By the time this nonsense is played out, Kushner may be in line for a Nobel Peace Prize.

That is the way the cultural elites play hardball. Wiesenfeld must understand that he will not be forgiven for his act of lese majeste against a leading cultural liberal. But in standing up against a man whose opposition to Israel has always brought him honor rather than the shame it deserved, Wiesenfeld has restored a little bit of balance to New York’s cockeyed world of high culture.

Also, from Phyllis Chesler, "Communist University of NY (CUNY) Denies Honor to Israel-Bashing Playwright Tony Kushner":

I once labored at the City University of New York (CUNY). I am amazed but thrilled that enough (five) members on their twelve member Board of Trustees actually viewed Kushner’s views on Israel as “racist.”

I once taught a graduate course at the very branch of CUNY which proposed Kushner. Once, I was friendly with some of the professorial union thugs who literally occupy positions to the left of Stalin.

Yes, many are gay, many are feminists. Some are also homophobic and sexist. Life is complicated over there at Communist U because I am describing the same people as well as their opponents.

God bless CUNY Trustee Jeffrey S. Wiesenfeld, who was the first to speak against Kushner. He said that Kushner had tied the founding of the state of Israel to a policy of “ethnic cleansing.” He was surprised that he got the votes necessary to knock Kushner’s honorary degree off the table.

RELATED: From David Horowitz, "Andrew Sullivan’s Misguided Defense of the Regrettable Mr. Kushner":

Andrew Sullivan has posted an attack on CUNY trustee Jeffrey Wiesenfeld for blocking a politically motivated honorary degree that was to be given to the over-rated, crypto-communist and Israel-demonizing playwright Tony Kushner. Andrew’s intelligence is on display in the opening paragraph of his piece where he reiterates his clear-headed views of Kushner’s inflated literary reputation. Kushner’s Pulitzer-winning agitprop, Angels in America, is a puerile embarrassment and in recognizing this Andrew shows that he is capable of breaking out of the bubble of liberal derangement when it suits him. All the more reason that Andrew’s attack on Wiesenfeld is an instructive illustration of the unhinged attitudes of current “critics” of Israel, who are apologists for Hamas and their Gaza supporter.

More at the link.

Also, on the front page of today's New York Times, "Tony Kushner Is Now Likely to Get CUNY Honor."

Figures.

Front page treatment at New York Times too. Another nail in the coffin.

City University of New York Blocks Honorary Degree for Anti-Semitic Playwright Tony Kushner

At NYT, "CUNY Blocks Honor for Tony Kushner."

And see Jeffrey Wiesenfeld, "Tony Kushner, an Extremist, Can’t Represent CUNY" (via Maggie's Farm):

Following our consensus decision to table the honorary degree nomination of Mr. Tony Kushner it is worthy to note that Mr. Kushner repeats the ugly charges against Israel for which he is known in a letter to the City University Board of Trustees and the media, in which he attempts to defend himself. He is disingenuous and dissembling.

If his libelous statements against Israel were made by anyone outside the Jewish community, that person would be correctly labeled an anti-Semite. When you hold the State of Israel – a nation in a struggle for its survival from the beginning, a target for the misogynist, racist, anti-western, dictatorial regimes which surround it – to a standard you would hold no other nation under normal circumstances, let alone under such exigencies – and when you spew libel against our sole regional democratic ally for “crimes” concocted by delegitimizers, you are an anti-Semite.

More at the link above.

And it turns out that Kushner's views on Israel are informed by hardline BDS types, including Norman Finklestein, who Weisenfeld cited when calling out Kushner.

And right on cue the Israel-hating left has jumped to Kushner's defense, at Lawyers, Guns and Murder and Mondoweiss. Plus, some overtime action from Justin Elliot at and Salon: "School blocks Kushner honor over Israel" and "Fight over Israel and Tony Kushner heats up" (via Memeorandum).

Holocaust Remembrance Day

Falls on May 1st this year, the same day as international workers' solidarity day. There's some profound puzzle in that coincidence, but I'll unravel it later. Jeff Jacoby, of the Boston Globe, lost family members in the Holocaust, and he writes: "A demon gone, but evil remains":

The Germans slaughtered 1.3 million human beings in Auschwitz, of whom 1.1 million were Jews. Six of those Jews were my father’s parents, David and Leah Jakubovic, and their children Franceska, Zoltan, Yrvin, and Alice. Gassed to death in 1944, they represent 1 one-millionth — 0.000001 — of the 6 million European Jews annihilated in the Holocaust.

On this Holocaust Remembrance Day, it hardly needs to be said that mass murder didn’t end with the defeat of the Third Reich. In the decades since 1945, innocent men, women, and children beyond number have been massacred — in Mao’s China and Pol Pot’s Cambodia, in the Soviet gulag and North Korean slave camps, in Rwanda and Bosnia, Sudan and Syria, Congo and Uganda. Yet even in an epoch that has shattered every record for bloodiness and barbarity, the Holocaust is unique. What sets it apart from other campaigns of butchery is not its body count or its brutality or its genocidal nature. Nor is it the rapidity with which it was carried out, or the international indifference against which it unfolded.

The destruction of European Jewry stands alone because it was not a means to any end. The “Final Solution’’ was an end in itself. Jews were not murdered by the millions in the context of a struggle for power or land or wealth. There was no political or economic rationale for wiping out the Jews; they had nothing the Nazis coveted, and Germany gained nothing by their deaths. There was only the maniacal ideology of eliminationist anti-Semitism — the determination to track down and kill anyone born of Jewish ancestry. “It was precisely this — the fact of being born — that was the mortal sin, to be punished by death,’’ the historian Yehuda Bauer has observed. “That had never happened at any time — or anywhere — before.’’

RTWT. No need to guess where today's evil resides.