Plame Knew What She Was Tweeting
Plame Knew What She Was Tweeting
by Alan M. Dershowitz , Gatestone Institute, September 22, 2017
Valerie Plame, who retweeted an anti-Semitic article and called it "thoughtful." Photo: Wikimedia Commons.
Valerie Plame had to know what she was tweeting. Plame retweeted a virulently anti-Semitic article by a well-known bigot, which she characterized as "thoughtful." Now she's trying to make excuses, but they don't wash.
The article by Phillip Giraldi itself contains the usual anti-Semitic tropes: Jews are guilty of dual loyalty; they control politicians, the media and entertainment; they want the US to fight wars for the country to which they have real allegiance-- Israel; they are dangerous to America. Giraldi has been pushing this garbage for years and Plame is one of his fans.
But this particular article goes much further in its neo-Nazi imagery. It advocates that:
"The media should be required to label [Jews like Bill Kristol] at the bottom of the television screen whenever they pop up ... That would be kind-of-like a warning label on a bottle of rat poison --translating roughly as ingest even the tiniest little dosage of the nonsense spewed by Bill Kristol at your own peril."
In other words, Jewish supporters of Israel, like Kristol and me, should have to wear the modern day equivalent of a yellow star before we are allowed to appear on TV and poison real Americans. Nice stuff that Plame was retweeting and characterizing as thoughtful.
This was not the first time Plame retweeted Giraldi's garbage. In 2014, she retweeted one of his screeds with the following notation: "Well put." And after tweeting the current anti-Semitic article she described it as: "Yes, very provocative, but thoughtful. Many neocon hawks ARE Jewish. Ugh." Nor is this the only time that Plame has re-Tweeted other nonsense from the bigoted platform this piece came from – a platform of which she has pleaded ignorance. According to journalist Yashar Ali, Plame has tweeted at least eight other articles from the same website since 2014. Sounds like she is into some strange websites.
I actually read the Philip Giraldi article before I was aware of the Plame tweet. I read it on a neo-Nazi website, where Giraldi's articles are frequently featured. That's where Giraldi's articles belong – on overtly anti-Semitic and neo-Nazi websites. For Plame, a former CIA operative, to claim that she was unaware of the anti-Semitic content of Giraldi's article is to blink reality. Plame had to know what she was doing, since she was aware of Giraldi's bigotry. Her apologies ring hollow. Her true feelings were revealed in what she said before she realized that she would be widely condemned for her original re-Tweet. She must now do more than apologize. She must explain how she came upon the article? Who sent it to her? Does she regularly read bigoted websites? Why is she reading and re-Tweeting a known anti-Semite? What are her own personal views regarding the content of the Giraldi's article.
The Plame incident reflects a broader problem about which I have written [ A new tolerance for anti-Semitism, by Alan M. Dershowitz, published by Gatestone Institute, 2017 ].There is a growing tolerance for anti-Semitism. Even when some people themselves do not harbor these feelings, they are willing to support those who do, as long as the anti-Semites are on their side of the political spectrum. This is an unacceptable approach, especially in the post-Holocaust era. Unfortunately, Valerie Plame is the poster child for this growing tolerance. She must be called out on it, as must others who follow the same path of bigotry.
The problem exists both on the hard right and the hard left. Both extremist groups see the world in racial, ethnic and religious terms. Both engage in identity politics: the hard left gives more weight to the views of certain minorities; while the hard right gives less weight to the views of these same minorities. Both are equally guilty of reductionism and stereotyping. Neither group is prepared to judge individuals on their individual merits and demerits. Both insist on judging entire groups and of stereotyping.
American Jews—like other Americans -- are deeply divided on important issues, such as the Iran deal, the current prospects for peace between the Israelis and Palestinians, and the Trump administration's foreign policies. To generalize about "Jews" is both factually and morally wrong.
What the hard right and hard left share in common is special bigotry toward Jews: the neo-Nazi right hates the Jewish people; and the hard left hates the nation state of the Jewish people and those Jews who support it. Both views are bigoted and must not become acceptable among centrist liberals and conservatives.
Alan M. Dershowitz, Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law, Emeritus, at Harvard Law School and author of, Trumped up! How Criminalizing Politics is Dangerous to Democracy, available now.
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And I will say "Well put" to Dershowitz's article.
Agreed Buzz. Well said and spot on.
Dershowitz is a hoot, some people believe he has his own bias, as he writes somewhat regularly for the Islamophobic Gatestone Institute.
Notes: The Gatestone Institute , formerly Stonegate Institute, is a “not-for-profit international policy council and think tank based in New York City” with a specialization in strategy and defense issues. Gatestone Institute is anti-Islamic, pro-Christian and Jewish/Israel. Many of the articles will link back to sites that don’t say what they claim or make the same rash judgments, without proof. Example: Obama tells Christians to not protest in Egypt then has no quotes or sources saying he said that. (M. Allen 12/30/2016)
Gatestone Institute - Powerbase
The Gatestone Institute publishes articles by a number of ... Promoting anti - Muslim writers. Gatestone publishes a number of prominent writers from the anti - Muslim .
Her Father Championed Jewish Refugees. She Finances …
Her Father Championed Jewish Refugees. She Finances the Anti ... an anti - Muslim activist known for spreading anti - Muslim ... Gatestone Institute produces a regular ...
It all depends on who you have the propensity to believe, and I don't pooh pooh an article if it states facts (ones you tend to ignore) and if the articles fit in with a lot of information gathered from other sources. I have a lot of respect for Dershowitz, you don't, so we differ.
I just posted an article by Robert Fulford on Islamophobia - a word that really is not used properly and is not defined properly in its useage.
Isn't that a personal attack Buzz/Lucifer? It sure doesn't address the seed or the content of John's comment.
How could that be an insult or personal attack? The SPLC is an organization that is respected and supported (to the extent of millions of dollars) and lauded by many Americans, especially anyone who, like John, is on the leftist side of American society. If it has not joined John's sentiments about Gatestone Institute by naming it to be "Islamophobic" and joining it to its long "Hate Group" list, then it must have accidentally missed it.
And by the way, I posted the article and I can decide what is relevant to post or not.
When you can't deny the facts, attack the source.
The accusation they are anti-Muslim is probably due to John Bolton being their Chairman:
Dershowitz is actually an American Jew, whom has remained a member of the Democratic Party despite being highly critical of them in the past several years:
I suggest you read the article about Dershowitz before you lambast him.
The fact that he remains a member of the Democratic Party, and professes to be a liberal, yet has the critical thinking skills to criticize that party when such is deserved, is proof that he is a lot smarter than those who blindly follow and agree with everything the party and liberals say and do.
When I read this in the Wikipedia article about Dershowitz, I burst out laughing:
He later said his teachers told him to do something that "requires a big mouth and no brain ... so I became a lawyer".
I think that for some people it's hard to admit that someone is a lot smarter than they are and provide them the respect that is their due, but I have no such problem. I think he's brilliant, and I believe, admire and respect almost everything he writes NO MATTER WHERE HE WRITES IT. But then, of course I'm obviously not as "smart" as those who can only find fault with him.
Buzz,
I actually respect him and he is one of the few Liberal Democrats that I do respect. I respect him, because he speaks his mind and speaks as honestly as possible and is not afraid to take even his own party to task for being stupid. The Democrats have been falling all over themselves to support Plame and now that she stepped deeply into the manure pit of racism; they are shocked about it. However, they only had to see when she talked about buying Twitter just to ban Trump; they should have realized that she is hate-filled at that point.
But not by you Buzz/Lucifer. You connected your abhorrence of them onto John.
I didn't say anything about relevance Buzz/Lucifer.
John,
I'm agreeing with Buzz on this one. This isn't about the Gatestone Institute, or Islamophobia but rather the facts to this particular story. Plame knew damn well what she was tweeting, she just didn't expect the blowback. And Dershowitz is right when he says:
How can that be considered extreme? Answer.. it isn't
I don't know enough about Valerie Plame to say whether or not she is anti-Jewish. If she regularly praises articles from an anti-semitic website that would be evidence against her.
Dershowitz is a topic here. He is castigating Plame for bigotry when he writes regular articles for a bigoted website. Sorry. That's the facts too.
Actually no, it's Plame. Even a broken clock is right twice a day, and he isn't the only one who has castigating her for these tweets.
he isn't the only one who has castigating her for these tweets.
I didn't say he was.
Dershowitz has a really big mouth about these things and if he wants to have moral authority he should stop writing for an anti-Muslim site.
Actually, I have to disagree with you. If you are going to bolster you position by quoting Dershowitz, his past actions become part of the discussion. Just as Dershowitz made Plame's past retweets from the same website and same author, part of the discussion.
IMHO Dershowitz is a patrician putz. His newest book decries the 'criminalization of politics' and he whines about Mueller's investigation without saying a word about Trump and Flynn leading their followers in chanting "Lock her up!" Hell, Trump did it again just yesterday.
Dulay,
No matter what Dershowitz has said or published the facts remain... she made these comments. They were all over twitter, and she didn't do it just once, but multiple times. Then when she got blowback, came the apologies. Well that didn't work for Mel, and it isn't going to work for her.
Dershowitz is not a topic here, nor is Gatestone Institute a topic. The source is not a topic notwithstanding that your comments are aimed to diffuse and deflect as much as possible from the facts in the article. Intelligent members are bound to see through that.
"Facts? Facts? Who needs facts?" (I'm trying my best to remember where I heard that - I think it was a movie, but perhaps someone else can identify the source). It is a relevent statement considering some of the comments on this article.
It's the pot calling the kettle black.
Mark Twain famously said...
I think the issue is more "Who needs Facts when we have Feelings"
Which is a phenomenon Stephen Colbert identified in 2014 and labeled "Truthiness" or "feelpinions"
In other words, "My feelings are more fact that actual fact." or "I Feel it is true so it MUST be true"
As an actual quote my friend, I see no general usage of this comment/question in the public disapora before 2014.
But, I have to admit, it does feel good....
I just realized that I made it up. I was thinking of a line spoken by the Commander in Chief of the French Army in the movie "The Life of Emile Zola", when asked if he had read Zola's latest negative writing about the French Army. He actually said "Books? Books? I don't read books". I guess the mind does weird twists now snd then.
Buzz, you are right. The seed is about what Plame said and did and the anti Semitic nature of what she retweeted. You as the seeder, Dershowitz as the author, and the source that published his writings is not the the issue to discuss here. Valerie Plame and her multiple retweets of works by an anti Semite are.
I could be IN SOMEONE'S OPINION wrong 10 times, but when I then make a comment that is RIGHT, only a bigot would say I have to be wrong BECAUSE IN THEIR OPINION I was wrong in the past.
And Brother, the concept of what you say here is lost on the politically subversive mind.....
And it isn't so much as bigotry, but a revelation of lack of intelligence as opposed to evidence of lack of education.