It's (Not) All Greek To Her

I have an ambivalent relationship to "kids these days!" thinking.

On the one hand, I'm a professor, so I'm constantly exposed to the "kids". And overwhelmingly, they're alright! Great, even! I have very little patience for the notion that the young people of today are some sort of uniform blob of incuriosity, intolerance, and preachiness. It just isn't my experience.

That said, I've always been a bit of a crotchety old man at heart. And it being age-appropriate to shout "get off my lawn!" is one of the few things that excite me about growing older.

So for someone with my proclivities, this story is outright dangerous in how much it pushes some of my confirmatory bias pleasure buttons regarding youthful idiot "activists" being idiots.

A 23-year-old woman has been arrested after she posted on social media about having gotten away with ripping down Greek flags at a New Jersey restaurant that she believed were Israeli.

The incident at Efi’s Gyro in Montclair, New Jersey, occurred March 11, but it wasn’t until Amber Matthews posted the video to TikTok on Oct. 15 that police were able to identify her. She was arrested on Tuesday and charged with bias intimidation and harassment.

In the video, Matthews, who went by the name “Ambamelia” on her now-removed TikTok account, can be heard berating employees about the “genocide” in Gaza. She posted the video with the text “The time I mistakenly thought the flag for Greek was for Israel and took the restaurants flag down OMG.”

Both Greece and Israel have blue and white flags.

Just to sum the above up, this lady:

1. Tore down flags at a random restaurant as a means of protesting "genocide" (which is bad enough on its own);
2. Didn't realize the flag she tore down was that of Greece (excuse me, "Greek") rather than Israel; and
3. Was only caught because she posted a TikTok video where she bragged about her idiotic crime burst.

It's too much.

Is it fair of me to tie this sort of stupidity to a particular generation? Of course not. After all, how many Boomer insurrectionists on January 6 got caught because they flaunted their treasonous jaunt on Facebook?

But when someone is this stupid, in this public of a fashion -- I'm sorry, I just can't help myself.

Hungry for Apples?

There's an episode of Rick & Morty where Rick is trapped in a simulation by alien scammers seeking to steal some of his scientific discoveries. But somehow, Rick's idiot son-in-law, Jerry, is in the simulation too. Not wanting to be distracted from the primary mark, the aliens cap Jerry's part of the simulation at 5% power and let him be.

The result is a "simulation" of a human experience that is comically skeletal. Jerry's coworkers respond to every question with a simple "yes!" A few pedestrians (bodies reused) speak a single phrase on loop when they're not phasing into and out of trees. The radio plays "human music", a series of isolated beeps and boops.

Jerry loves it. He "sells" an ad campaign ("Hungry for Apples?"), has sex with his barely-mobile wife ("the best sex I've ever had!"), even talks himself into a promotion and an award for his apples slogan. Eventually, he declares it not just the best, but the most meaningful day of his life -- at which point simulation suddenly ends. Jerry is devastated; Rick patronizingly consoles him by asking "So what if the most meaningful day in your life was a simulation operating at minimum complexity?"

I was thinking about this in relation to the Russian bots which spread pro-Trump and pro-Putin propaganda throughout the right-wing ecosystem. The people who write these posts can barely speak English. They by design have no grasp on reality. It's not just that they appeal solely to people's baser instincts, it's that they appeal to these instincts in a transparently moronic way. They are a simulation of political reality, running at 5% complexity.

And yet a huge chunk of Americans are never happier than when they are gobbling it up. They love this. It's not just that they don't realize that it's all fake. It's more pathetic than that: they've never found more meaning than that which they get from automated Russian twitter accounts spitting out half-literate reactionary fantasies too stupid for Rush Limbaugh to run.

Basically, Trump's base is a bunch Jerrys. That was today's epiphany.

Sizzling Hot Academic Freedom Takes

An Iowa State Senator, Mark Chelgren (R), recently made waves after introducing a bill demanding parity between Democrats and Republicans on Iowa state university faculties. Lots of laughs ensued about conservatives demanding a quota replace meritocratic hiring. But Chelgren insisted that there was a serious need for the bill, citing his "personal experience":

"I'm pretty confident that any student that goes to any university anywhere in the United States of America has experienced intimidation for their conservative political views," he said. "I have personal experience with it. And I have heard from dozens of individuals who say they were too intimidated to say they supported Donald Trump or express a conservative viewpoint."

Sounds rough! What horrible bastion of hippie-leftism did Mark Chelgren attend where he was subjected to this terrible intimidation?

State Sen. Mark Chelgren's alleged alma mater is actually a company that operated a Sizzler steak house franchise in southern California and he doesn't have a "degree," Ed Failor, a spokesman for the Iowa State Republicans, told NBC News.

"This was a management course he took when he worked for Sizzler, kind of like Hamburger University at McDonald's," Failor said. "He got a certificate."

Asked if Chelgren has a college degree, Failor said, "That's not accurate."

To be fair, I bet campus politics at Sizzler U are cutthroat. And there were other hints that Chelgren's college experience may have been ... atypical.

Asked what difference it would make if, for example, a math professor were a Democrat or Republican, Chelgren responded: "If I knew a logics professor was a liberal, I would questions whether I should take that class."

 Got to watch out for those liberal Math professors teaching the logics.

Hijacking History

Shorter Sean Hannity:

There once was a time when the Confederate Flag stood for something honorable, like treason in defense of slavery. But now it's been hijacked by racist white supremacists! In conclusion, Black people are the real racists, because of rap.

Revolutionary Fervor

One of the more stressful things about being a graduate student, or other aspiring academic, is the constant refrain that there isn't necessarily a job waiting for you at the end. It's an exceptionally tight market right now, and many extremely smart and qualified candidates won't end up with a position. It can get a bit wearying. And it can get a bit infuriating when you see who has gotten these oh-so-rare positions:

An American college professor was arrested by Miami-Dade police on Saturday for launching into an extended rant about Venezula and smoking on an airplane, all of which was captured on video.

Karen Halnon, identified as an associate professor of sociology at Penn State, was on an American Airlines flight from Nicaragua to Miami, according to television station WFOR.

“The United States has declared war on Venezuela,” Halnon repeated throughout the video, which was posted to YouTube as a clip titled "Crazy woman on a plane."

“Venezuela has been declared a national security threat," she repeated on the video.

"You're a national security threat," another passenger shot back.

Halnon later told WFOR that she was returning from a trip to Nicaragua working with single mothers and felt the need to talk to people about the destructiveness of U.S. imperialism.

On the tape, she eventually unbuckled her seatbelt as passengers around her groaned.

"My great hero Hugo Chavez nationalized the oil supply," she said. Halnon was then informed by a flight attendant that the police would be arresting her shortly.

Oh lord. You "felt the need" to go on a bender about the joys of your favorite autocrat? Which do you prefer -- his paeons to Carlos the Jackal and Idi Amin, or his penchant for jailing judges he dislikes? To quote Ron White, "next time you have a thought, just let it go."

Oh, but it gets better:

At one point, Halnon calmly lit a cigarette as the passenger next to her got up and left.

"This girl's a gangster," another onlooker said.

Hanlon confirmed to WFOR that she indeed lit a cigarette on the plane.

“I took a few puffs out of it," she said. "Every other revolutionary smokes. Fidel. Daniel Ortega. Tomás Borge. Che Guevara."

"Every other revolutionary smokes"? What are you, twelve years old? This is a joke.

In any event, if you're a sociology graduate student wondering who's getting the job you so desperately want, here's your answer. Blergh.

Everybody Knows Nothing

It is a long-standing piece of advice on this blog to never listen to journalists talking about a legal issue, because they will butcher it. Badly. I would like to be able to say that this is contradistinction to listening to someone who (a) is a member of Congress and (b) has written the legal provision in question. Alas, that isn't always the case either, as the latest fiasco surrounding Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) demonstrates.

For those of you who missed out on the latest, there is a media narrative that Senator Cotton (while a House member) introduced langauge that "would 'automatically' punish family members of people who violate U.S. sanctions against Iran, levying sentences of up to 20 years in prison." In other words, the claim is that if I violated Iranian sanctions policy, Cotton's amendment would allow for my mom to be tossed in jail for 20 years ("automatically").

The Popehat link above pretty conclusively demonstrates that this is untrue: the law prohibits trade with certain high-ranking Iranian officials; Cotton's amendment would have similarly prohibited trade with close relatives of these officials (so, for example, one could not evade the sanctions by giving a fat contract to the prohibited-person's wife). This is a policy that can be supported or opposed on the merits (it does close a loophole for getting around the sanctions program, but it also arguably punishes innocent people if the bad guy's grandson has no real connection to the human rights violations). But no matter what you think of it, it is not (and is a far cry from) what is described in the preceding paragraph -- jail terms for family members of those who violate the sanctions law.

The problem is that Cotton, Harvard J.D. '02, doesn't seem to know what his own law would do. In a colloquy with then-Rep. Alan Grayson (D-FL) (Harvard J.D., '83 -- Harvard Law really is coming out poorly here), it is evident that neither one understands how this law interacts with a mens rea requirement. Honestly, Grayson seems more confused here than Cotton does -- but since it's Cotton's language, it would be nice if had cleared things up rather than engaging in irrelevant blather about the constitutional rights of Iranian citizens. Instead we got much confusion in Congress, which, naturally, the media made far worse by conflating who can and can't be traded with with who will be punished.

In conclusion, never trust anyone about anything, because everyone is a moron.

The Zionist Space Conspiracy Continues, Part III

Here is the logo for the National Reconnaissance Office's latest surveillance satellite (via):

Jesus, really? A giant octopus whose tentacles encircle the Earth, with the motto "nothing is beyond our reach"? It looks like the back cover of Der Sturmer.

(Prior semi-related posts here and here).

Roadspierre

Well this will certainly brighten the grim DC mood:

On October 11th, a group of right-wing truckers is planning to drive to DC to shut down the major commuter highway that circles the city. They’ll continue to block traffic, they say, until they see the arrest of elected officials who have “violated their oath of office.”

Organizers of the event, which is titled “Truckers Ride for the Constitution,” say they are fed up with a variety of headaches caused by the government: Fuel efficiency standards enforced by the Environmental Protection Agency, Obamacare, state and local laws over idling their trucks, and “insurance companies purportedly requiring technological updates,” according to US News and World Report.

They say that to demonstrate against violations of the constitution, they plan to circle interstate 495 — known widely as the beltway — and not allow through any traffic. If police try to stop them, they’ll park their trucks right on the highway.

Originally, reports from US News and World Report indicated the truckers were looking to impeach President Obama. But Earl Conlon, an organizer of the event, told US News, “We’re not asking for impeachment, we’re asking for the arrest of everyone in government who has violated their oath of office.” These include House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), and Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), both for purportedly arming al Qaeda linked Syrian rebels.

Oh joy. But wait! I take the Communist Socialist Metro for my commute! Joke's on them!

Beautiful Scenic Vistas are Just the Gift-Wrapping

This might actually be the dumbest thing I ever read:

Bryan Fischer, the director of issues analysis of the conservative fundamentalist American Family Association, on Thursday told a so-called “expert” who denies climate change that not using God’s fossil fuels would be like “crushing” someone’s feelings by rejecting their birthday present.

The Cornwall Alliance’s Calvin Beisner, who has previously said that believing in climate change “is an insult to God,” explained on Thursday that the Bible said it was also very rude to not use oil, coal and natural gas.

Fischer likened the situation to a birthday present he was given at the age of six. “I opened up a birthday present that I didn’t like, and I said it right out, ‘Oh, I don’t like those,’” the radio host recalled. “And it just crushed — and the person that gave me gift was there. You know, I just kind of blurted it out, ‘I don’t like those.’ And it just crushed that person. It was enormously insensitive of me to do that.”

“And you think, that’s kind of how we’re treating God when he’s given us these gifts of abundant and inexpensive and effective fuel sources,” Fischer added. “And we don’t thank him for it and we don’t use it.”

“You know, God has buried those treasures there because he loves to see us find them.”

Oh my goodness. Although I have to say if you had asked me to predict who would say the dumbest thing I'd ever read, Bryan Fischer would have been a top candidate, right alongside Steve King.

Great Moments in Juxtaposition: Bobby Jindal Edition

Bobby Jindal tells the GOP they need to "stop being the stupid party":

"It is no secret we had a number of Republicans damage our brand this year with offensive, bizarre comments - enough of that," he said, according to Politico. "It's not going to be the last time anyone says something stupid within our party, but it can't be tolerated within our party. We've also had enough of this dumbed-down conservatism. We need to stop being simplistic, we need to trust the intelligence of the American people and we need to stop insulting the intelligence of the voters."

Sound advice, Governor! But look at the next paragraph:

Jindal initially backed the presidential bid of his western neighbor Gov. Rick Perry, then campaigned for and alongside Mitt Romney.

Ah, Rick Perry -- the man who actually managed to prove you could be too dumb to win the 2012 Republican presidential nomination.

Specks and logs, Governor Jindal. Specks and logs.

If Only Jews Were Dumber....

This year's Jennifer Rubin award for conservative Jews who hate American Jews goes to ... Barry Rubin! It's a Rubin-to-Rubin handoff!

Like Jennifer, Barry Rubin is trying to answer the vexing question as to why Jews support liberals like Barack Obama. His consternation over the question is in inverse correlation to its difficulty: Simply put, Jews are liberal. Take a voting bloc that's 90% pro-choice, 70% pro-gay marriage, 60% pro-union, and 66% in favor of tax hikes on the rich, (not to mention strong supporters of a two-state solution to the Israeli/Palestinian conflict -- unlike the Republican Party) and yeah -- tough nut for Republicans to crack.

But Rubin eschews the obvious "liberals prefer liberals" analysis in favor of basically saying Jews are a bunch of dupes

Propaganda: As highly educated and literate people, Jews are more heavily impacted by schools, universities, and mass media that are engaged in indoctrination or highly concerted efforts to campaign for Obama and his ideas. By the same token, Jews as a whole tend to give higher credibility to the fairness of media and academia.

Camouflage: The concealment of Obama’s radicalism and that of those supporting his ideology as supposed liberals plays into Jewish reverence for liberalism.

Obama’s persona: While the notion of Obama as a “Jewish president” is absurd, its appeal to some does in fact have a material basis. His image as an apparently highly educated, supposedly intellectual, superficially sophisticated, cosmopolitan personality fits with majority Jewish preferences.

Jews like superficial sophistication and faux-intellectualism (and weirdly are willing to view someone with a Harvard law degree as "highly educated"). But if only we weren't so literate and educated, we'd be less prone to base our opinions on suspect sources like "media" or "academia", instead favoring more credible ones like Barry Rubin, Glenn Beck, or the semi-literate ravings of local talk radio hosts.

You know your argument is in trouble when it basically boils down "the problem is Jews aren't dumb enough to dislike Obama."

(Rubin also talks a bit about Jews' relationship with race and racial issues. It's pretty garbled -- boiling down to "Jews have a compulsion to appear anti-racist" -- and not all that helpful. For a better discussion, read Eric Goldberg's The Price of Whiteness, reviewed by me here).

It's So Random

You know, I was never the best statistics student. Math's just not my area. But I have enough basic competency so I would never be stupid enough to think a large, non-random internet poll is more accurate than a smaller, random-sample scientific poll. Which, unfortunately, is more than we can say for Rep. Daniel Webster (R-FL).


Webster is pressing to eliminate the American Community Survey (a critical part of the Census), in part because it is "too intrusive", in part because it's "non-scientific". Why is it non-scientific? Because, to quote Webster, it's "random"! The New York Times can barely keep it together as it proceeds to inform its readers "[i]n fact, the randomness of the survey is precisely what makes the survey scientific, statistical experts say."

Random sampling is what makes the survey world go round. It is the only way to cost-effectively gather data about large groups of people given the impracticability of querying all of them. This is Statistics 101.

Silly Studies, Part II

Last year, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) put out a list of NIH-research items that he deemed frivolous and examples of wasting tax-payer dollars. I found the list interesting, because pretty much all of the studies he picked sounded quite worthwhile -- providing useful information about various health and safety risks and the best responses to them.

In this same vein, I'm left gobsmacked by this Chronicle of Higher Education hit piece against the field of "Black Studies". I mean, the piece is appalling on a ton of different levels, but let's start with the most obvious: The author (Naomi Schaefer Riley) by admission didn't actually read the dissertations she's mocking. All she had was brief synopses of the proposed dissertations. This would be cringe-worthy enough without reading the title of her post: "The Most Persuasive Case for Eliminating Black Studies? Just Read the Dissertations." Oy. You first, Ms. Riley.

Amazingly, Riley defended herself in a follow-up post by attempting to argue that "it is not my job to read entire dissertations before I write a 500-word piece about them. . . there are not enough hours in the day or money in the world to get me to read a dissertation on historical black midwifery." One would think before dismissing a whole area of study, one would actually read full, completed works of scholarship in the field. One would vastly overestimate the prerequisites Ms. Riley thinks necessary before she confidently tries to bring the banhammer down on a whole discipline of study. (I will, however, agree with her that there likely is not enough money in the world to justify spending any of it on having Riley read much of anything, or employing her in jobs that would seemingly make that into a requirement).

But what's really getting me is that even on Riley's own terms (her incredibly, incredibly poorly argued terms), I don't see her point. All three of the projects she identifies seem like clearly valuable and important scholarly endeavors -- and I don't think that about every project I see. The first one, "'So I Could Be Easeful': Black Women's Authoritative Knowledge on Childbirth" (that's the Black midwifery one), is part of an important area of literature on laws and cultural meaning given to reproduction. This is an area I'm obviously prone to defend, given that my girlfriend's area of expertise is anthropology of reproduction, and this is an area that has historically been strongly mediated by race. From mandatory sterilizations to the mainstream American belief that teen pregnancy in the Black community is community-destroying pandemic, these sorts of issues have both historical and contemporary import (hell, one of the areas Ms. Riley says people should focus on instead of on Black midwifery is Black teen pregnancy! I'd ask if she even is listening to herself, but I suspect that the sort of "research" she wants done on the latter area can be summed up as "tongue-clucking").

The next dissertation is "Race for Profit: Black Housing and the Urban Crisis of the 1970s." Government, housing policy, race -- what could possibly go wrong? Again, finding out how various housing policies were or weren't motivated by racial ideologies, or did or didn't have important impacts that affect the current racial state of affairs -- important information! Why am I supposed to think that it isn't, exactly? Well, apparently, I'm supposed to dismiss this line of research unless I think that race is the only important social force in America today and that its salience has not changed in any way since 1954. Of course, all one actually needs to show is that race is an important social force in America today, and it's probably better from an intellectual novelty standpoint that it's salience has changed in important and measurable ways over the past several decades. Which it has -- but those changes do not include "everything that ever happened with respect to race no longer matters, and we can treat the past several hundred years as a really bad dream."

Speaking of which, how about that last thesis, which explores the role Black Republicans have played in conservative attacks on the mainstream civil rights establishment. That would seem to be exactly the sort of "change" that might be worth exploring, no? It specifically locates its agenda in cultural transitions that took place in the 1980s. But no -- the problem here is that the author doesn't like these Black conservatives, and thinks their contributions malignant. This is very upsetting to Ms. Riley, and if people have differing normative commitments than she does -- bzzzt! Not real scholarship. Seriously, that's all the last attack boils down to -- the author and Ms. Riley have a political disagreement. How we jump from that to "and therefore, what she's doing isn't academic" I have no idea, except that a true scholar would never, ever say anything that Naomi Riley would disagree with.

So to sum up. Black Studies is bad because (a) three student dissertation proposals which (b) Riley has only read summaries of are (c) personally not interesting to Ms. Riley and, a fortiori, to anyone else (even though actually all three seem very interesting) while (d) potentially demonstrating normative commitments that Riley doesn't like. Oh yes, color me persuaded.

Via.

Marxist Cannibal Nazis from Kenya!

Barack Obama wants to eat your babies:

"This is so reminiscent of the Twilight Zone episode 'To Serve Man,' " West wrote. "Obama and his liberal progressive disciples are the modern day Kanamits."

For those of you not intimately acquainted with insults taken out of television episodes from 1962, the Kanamits were a race of nine-foot-tall aliens that come to Earth and cure famine, blight, and nuclear warfare. They also bring in advanced technology to solve the world's energy problems. In other words, the Kanamits were acting like dirty, rotten progressives.

The problem, though, is that the Kanamits don't have noble intentions -- their kindness is really just a not-very-elaborate ruse to fatten up the human race so they can be carted back to the Kanamit home planet to be eaten. A Kanamit book called To Serve Man that was discovered by the humans turns out not to be about helping man at all -- it's a cookbook. (Get it? Serving man?)

The man is unreal.

I See Gay People

This year's Jerry Falwell Teletubby Memorial Award goes to ... Tony Perkins!

These days, you can't get a sugar high without experiencing a cultural low. Hello, I'm Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council in Washington, D.C. There's trouble in candy land. After more than 70 years together, Mike & Ike are calling it quits. The duo is staging a gay divorce as part of a new ad campaign to draw in younger customers. In this society, even candy has an agenda! From Facebook to Tumblr, the fruity pair says, "The rumors are true. We just couldn't agree on stuff anymore." Starting this summer, the company will spend $15 million on billboards and TV commercials that poke fun at the breakup. It's just another subtle example of society chipping away at the value of marriage. And I don't know what's more disturbing--that advertisers think divorce appeals to kids or that sexualizing candy will make people buy more.

I suppose at least Perkins has the fact that Mike & Ike have two dudely-sounding names and are presented as being in a marriage -- all Falwell had to go on was Tinky Winky's triangle symbol and purple color. But it's tough to live up to a legend like Falwell -- kudos to Perkins for giving it his best shot.

MIA

A African-American teenage girl from Dallas who had been reported missing for over a year has finally been found. In Colombia. Where she was deported.

To be clear, this girl is an American citizen and speaks no Spanish. But ICE screwed up and sent her packing anyway, and she's been working in Colombia ever since. Now that her identity has finally been cleared up, negotiations are underway to bring her back to the states, but the Colombian government is currently detaining her for reasons unknown.

Post-Travel Mini-Roundup

Settled into Maryland. I'm thinking of staying for awhile, then going directly to Minnesota (instead of flying back to Champaign in the interim). I just can't handle all this travel.

* * *

The IDF is thinking of expelling "price tag" settlers from the West Bank (they apparently are having difficulty mustering up enough evidence to charge them with crimes).

Meanwhile, the Jersualem Post notes that if it had been 50 Palestinians who infiltrated and attacked an army base, the outcome would have been far different (and far bloodier). The fact is, these "price tag" thugs are terrorists and should be treated accordingly.

If I were a poor Black kid, I'd magically become insanely technologically literate through sheer force of will. I'd also simply think away all the other constraints upon my life chances -- hunger, gangs, health care.... whatever. I'd basically be Superman. It'd be awesome. Damn it, now it's all I want to do. Where do I sign up?

Speaking of the above, the Onion beat them to it. Seriously, the parallels are scary (Via).

Feedback Loop

Sometimes, the breathtaking dimness just bedazzles me:

So far this week, four of the world's top five oil companies have announced more than $24 billion in third quarter profits. And by the logic of Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.), that should mean those oil companies deserve more subsidies, not less.

Speaking at a town hall meeting Oct. 22 in his home state of Florida, Stearns displayed a very sketchy grasp on how subsidies should work, explaining to Climate Progress that incentives should be given to mature companies, not early-stage companies.

"When somebody is successful, then you give them the subsidies and the tax credit," explained Stearns, talking to Climate Progress. In short, the rich get richer. This is how the 1% operate. No wonder income inequality is growing in this country.

For those in the slow section of the class, that's the exact opposite of how subsidies are supposed to work. Now, ideally, in a pure capitalist society there are no such thing as subsidies. But I'm not a pure capitalist, and subsidies often make sense as a way to get a new industry off the ground in the face of entrenched competition (e.g., environmental energy), or to maintain a public service that wouldn't be able to fund itself (roads, other public transportation options). The one area where subsidies make no sense is as some sort of governmental bounty for the already-profitable.

There's Always Someone

When various rabble-rousers in Egypt were agitating to annul the peace treaty with Israel, I remarked somewhat smugly that "reputation for rabid warmongering aside, there is no political constituency of note in Israel that has called for a repudiation of peace with Egypt. It seems that once Israel makes a final agreement with one of its neighbors, it is capable of keeping it with little fuss from its citizens' end." So of course I read an Israeli editorial in Ynet that proposes doing just that. Because Lord knows if Israel didn't have its share of morons it would just be too easy.

Fortunately, it does seem like this guy is quite the marginal figure -- there remains "no political constituency of note" making this call that I've seen. And even in Egypt, the claim that there is some groundswell support for annulling the treaty is also badly overstated (the "million man march" that was planned to press for canceling the treaty drew terribly). But still, it's just so, so annoying.

Not a "Right of Return" Question, or, Josh Rogin Needs To Read Better

Foreign Policy Magazine blogger Josh Rogin has a piece up announcing "White House: Jewish 'refugees' right of return should be 'on the table'".

I read that, and I was rather shocked. "Right of return" for Jewish refugees? That would be rather bizarre. While there were a little less than a million Jewish refugees forced to flee from their homes in Arab countries during the time surrounding the War of Independence, they've never asked for or desired a "right of return". Rather, there demand has always been for monetary compensation for the property they lost (or that was expropriated from them). This, of course, parallels the generally proposed restitution for Palestinian refugees (that it should come via monetary compensation, not a "right of return" to Israel proper). As JIMENA (Jews Indigenous to the Middle East and North Africa) puts it, the Jewish refugees and their descendants don't want to return back to Libya or Yemen or Iraq. "They want the international community to recognize their plight and integrate full compensation of their lost property as part of a final Middle East peace agreement."

So again, it would be very strange and very interesting for someone to ask about a Jewish "right of return", and it would be stranger still for an Obama administration official to say it is "on the table".

Alas, as it turns out, the simplest explanation appears to be the right one here--Rogin just made the entire "right of return" thing up. Here's the "full exchange", as relayed by Mr. Rogin:

"While Palestinian refugees have concerns that are understandable and need to be dealt with in the peace process, there was no reference in the president's speech to the approximately one million Jewish refugees that emerged from the same Middle East conflict. I'm talking about Jews from Arab and Muslim countries who were forced out of their homelands where they had lived for centuries," said B'nai B'rith International Director of Legislative Affairs Eric Fusfield.

"The international community has never acknowledged their rights and their grievances," Fusfield continued, "[C]an the U.S., as the peace process move forward, play a role in advancing the rights and concerns of these Jewish refugee groups and help ensure that as refugee issues are dealt with... that the focus will not just be on one refugee group but on all refugee groups emerging from the same conflict?"

[Obama administration official Ben] Rhodes responded: "Certainly the U.S., in our role, is attuned to all the concerns on both sides to include interests among Israel and others in Jewish refugees, so it is something that would come up in the context of negotiations. And certainly, we believe that ultimately the parties themselves should negotiate this. We can introduce ideas, we can introduce parameters for potential negotiation."

What's missing in that passage? Any mention of a "right of return". It's just not there, Rogin made it up out of whole cloth. I'm not sure why; possibly because he didn't realize there are other ways of "advancing the rights and concerns of these Jewish refugee groups" other than via a "right of return"? That would be weird -- it's not like monetary compensation for historical wrongs is some sort of novel and outlandish proposition. It's frankly baffling how this error was made -- and again, this wasn't a single slip -- he put it in the item title. But whatever -- however it is Rogin went astray, the point is, his post is flatly and flagrantly inaccurate, and needs to be corrected.

I emailed Mr. Rogin informing him of his error earlier today, but I haven't heard back (and he hasn't issued a correction). And in the meantime, since folks on the internet are already making hay over how this is an embarrassment for the Obama administration, it's important to push back against this egregious journalistic error now. Let's be clear -- if an Obama administration official had said this, it would be a grievous mistake. But he didn't say that. This was a case of a journalist completely blowing it, and other folks running with it.

And, as someone who has written before about the history of Jewish refugees from Arab countries and their (typically ignored) claims for restitution, I think it's a terrible thing that -- when a Jewish official (here, from B'nai Brith) finally got that question on the table, and an administration official responded positively to it -- the issue immediately got misrepresented and contorted in a way that only makes it less likely that these people will ever see a dime. Folks like Noah Pollak, who were smugly talking about how there "are no Jewish refugees today", effectively dismiss these people's claims for historical compensation, and betray ignorance of Israel's internal political dynamics, where such restitution is a must-have for certain political parties (notably, Shas) to sign onto any peace deal.

UPDATE: Here was my stab at delineating a just solution for all refugees, a couple years back.