On an area radio program during the primary, Harris Miller, Webb’s opponent, said the following regarding Webb’s anti-Semitic flier, “I was very disappointed in this piece. I mean frankly it’s despicable, I’ve never seen anything like this in Virginia politics before. I was very disappointed to see it, and I’m sorry its part of the campaign. It was also only distributed in certain parts of Virginia as if people there would fall for that imagery. One of the things I was hoping we could keep out of this campaign, because it has nothing to do with the campaign, is my religion and my background.” (The Politics Program with Mark Plotkin, WMAL Radio, 6/9/2006)
Now, one opponent complaining about you bringing up their religion and their background, you could dismiss that as simply politicking. But two straight opponents, from two different parties, and two different political ideologies, BOTH claiming that your campaign is unfairly focusing on your jewishness?
Webb has a problem -- he's probably NOT anti-jewish, nor do I think he really believes that Allen's heritage, or Miller's heritage, were truly appropriate things for his campaign staff to use in an election. But he hasn't lifted a finger to stop them, and when asked about it on Hardball tonight, he missed an opportunity to apologize. But rather than come clean, he avoided the questions and instead attacked Allen's campaign manager.
And lest we forget, the Webb campaign has been making fun of the campaign manager's name for months, calling him "Dick Wad(hams)". We don't know how Webb feels about making up names for people in the other campaign -- Allen did it once, and apologized for it. Webb won't answer questions about that, or about his paid bloggers, or his campaign's penchant for dwelling on the matter of jewish heritage.
Still my favorite allusion to jewish bigotry was that shown by a man who says he is half jewish, and who denies he meant ANYTHING anti-jewish in his statement. Discussing Democrat Harris Miller's use of an analogy regarding a church choir, Ben Tribbet (NotLarrySabato) felt he had to throw in THIS important piece of information:
From yesterday's debate:
"Asked later whether he thought Webb is a legitimate Democrat, Miller said that
"when you welcome someone to the church, you don't necessarily invite them to be
the choir director the next day."There might be nothing more uncomfortable than a candidate whose analogies don't come from personal experience. Harris Miller is Jewish and doesn't go to church! Of all the analogies he could choose- why this one which he obviously has no idea about?
Ben insists he meant nothing by it. But it plays into the theme that the "red-state" voters are christians and might not appreciate a candidate who doesn't "go to church" (I presume Miller DOES go to church, a jewish synagogue to be precise). Miller, BEING A JEW, wouldn't understand anything about the life of us "christians". Note the "why this one he obviously has no idea about?". Why would a christian vote for a man who has no idea what a choir is?
Ben INSISTS he meant nothing by it, but his entire complaint made NO sense without that context. Even athiests can grasp the concept of a church choir. And the analogy was a good one -- and I most certainly attend church regularly. No, This post by Ben, a major Democrat blogger, targets the democrat's perceived bigotry of christians toward people who "aren't like them" -- such as jews.
We all know that Miller, Webb's primary opponent, is jewish. We now know that Allen, Webb's general election opponent, has a jewish heritage. How many other candidates are there for which you know whether they have a jewish background? How many of those did you learn from the opponent's campaign?
There's a pattern here, and Webb refusing to answer questions about it only makes it seem he is directly involved. Webb needs to come clean. He needs to apologize, and frankly, he needs to dump Lowell Feld, like some democratic bloggers are calling for.
This is Virginia, and DailyKos/MoveOn.org-style tactics are not welcome.
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