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Wednesday, March 11, 2019 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon
O
P
I
N I
O
N
Jonah
Goldberg
Letters to the Editor…
The Nugget welcomes contributions from its readers, which must include the writer9s name, address and phone number. Let-
ters to the Editor is an open forum for the community and contains unsolicited opinions not necessarily shared by the Editor.
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To the Editor:
Re: the letter in the February 27 edition
from Lane Jacobsen about customers buying
from local, independently owned businesses:
I agree with him wholeheartedly. I have been
doing that for years with the simple belief, as
I have long been telling people, <What would
you rather support, a literally 8Mom and Pop9
family-owned-and-operated business or some
soulless corporation?=
As Mr. Jacobsen pointed out, local busi-
nesses keep tax dollars in the community
whereas corporations like Amazon, as was
very recently pointed out in the news, pay
zero. As a final point (to be clear, I have noth-
ing to do with his store and live in the L.A.
area), go to the store9s website, click on the
<Community= link and read the <We Share A
Community= part. Sums it all up quite nicely.
Rodney Gregson
s
s
s
To the Editor:
One of my favorite straight-talking
comedians is the late Joan Rivers. Given that,
<Can we talk?= What9s with the racist party-
of-slavery extreme leap to Socialism 4 many
ideologies similar to Communism? They and
their co-merchants of hate in the FAKE news
propaganda machine obviously detest Trump
more than they care for America. Live news
from Venezuela gives a clear picture of what
their agenda offers: a historically proven
failure.
All the new Democratic candidates for
president seem to be jumping on the extreme
socialist bandwagon in one form or another.
The new <boss= of the Democratic Party,
AOC, even has the hate Trump FAKE journal-
ist at CNN squeamish at her outrageous rheto-
ric. In a way I feel sad for her; now the brunt
of jokes on social media.
I don9t think extreme is rare for the racist
party of slavery. Racism has been their tool
of choice in pushing their agenda as long as
I can remember. It was only a couple days
ago that Will Smith was targeted for not being
See LETTERS on page 21
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The Democratic Party
is having a rough time con-
demning anti-Semitism. Rep.
Ilhan Omar of Minnesota
has, on several occasions,
made classically anti-Semitic
claims about American Jews,
and the effort to formally
denounce those statements
in the House ruined a week
in which the Democrats were
supposed to talk about their
agenda.
The gist of Omar9s com-
plaints is that the perfidi-
ous, string-pulling Hebraic
hordes control Congress
with their shady shekels,
Israel has hypnotized the
world, and American Jews
are guilty of dual loyalty.
The controversies have
been compounded by the fact
that her apologies suggest
she9s not actually apologetic.
Omar has claimed that the
anti-Semitism charge is an
effort to silence her because
she wants to talk about the
Jewish scheme to <push for
allegiance to a foreign coun-
try.= In an earlier sorry-not-
sorry episode, she apolo-
gized for hurting anyone9s
feelings, which is not quite
the same thing as recanting.
The whole issue of hurt
feelings is a red herring 4
which is precisely why so
many Democrats want to
focus on feelings rather than
on the relevant facts. Indeed,
if Omar had better facts on
her side, she wouldn9t be in
this mess.
For instance, Omar seems
to think the American Israel
Public Affairs Committee is
a political action commit-
tee that funds candidates
on behalf of Israel. Incon-
veniently for Omar, AIPAC
isn9t a PAC, doesn9t work for
Israel and doesn9t donate to
political campaigns.
More interesting, how-
ever, is the Democratic
leadership9s fact problem 4
namely the fact Omar simply
isn9t a fan of Jews, or at least
Jews who support Israel. It9s
fine to be a critic of Israel, by
the way. But when you hate
the country so much that
you can9t explain criticism
of Israel without resorting to
bigotry, you have a problem.
Or rather, the Democratic
Party does.
Because it9s not just
Omar. If Omar had no sym-
pathizers, House Speaker
Nancy Pelosi would prob-
ably have thrown her
under the bus already. The
younger, fresher and more
radical fringe of the party
led by New York Rep.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
doesn9t think Omar should
be singled out for criticism
or censure. In fairness, the
primary reason is not that
they all share Omar9s hang-
up with the Jews. Some are
just anti-Israel. Others think
it9s unfair that Omar should
be criticized when Donald
Trump or other Republicans
have said bigoted things.
Ocasio-Cortez called
efforts to censure Omar
<hurtful= because statements
by other politicians, most
obviously Trump, aren9t
similarly condemned. She
has something of a point. I
certainly wish Republicans
did more to condemn many
of the things Trump has said.
But she seems to have for-
gotten that Republicans did
condemn and punish Iowa
Rep. Steve King recently for
his on-brand racist blather.
The effort to avoid sin-
gling out Omar is putting
Democrats in knots they will
be hard-pressed to untie any-
time soon. Pelosi has said
Omar wasn9t <intentionally
anti-Semitic.=
South Carolina9s James
Clyburn, the No. 3 Democrat
in the House, offered a baf-
fling defense of Omar by
talking about4surprise! 4
her feelings. He says Omar9s
experience as a refugee from
Somalia who spent time in a
Kenyan refugee camp has to
be taken into account.
Leave aside the fact that
whatever happened to Omar
in Kenya or Somalia, it has
nothing to do with Israel or
Jews. Are we going to have
greater tolerance for big-
otry based on a time-since-
victimhood score? Slavery
was even longer ago than
the Holocaust. Does that
make racist comments less
outrageous than anti-Semitic
comments?
On Thursday, Pelosi
announced that the House
would vote on a resolution
condemning all forms of
<hate.= It might do the trick
to turn the page. But it will
almost surely be a tempo-
rary respite, because Omar
(and others) come to their
anti-Semitism honestly, and
they9re inclined to be hon-
est about it. So we9ll be here
again.
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