Month: September 2008

The ADL has some good background here, here and here. Yes, Abe Foxman’s ADL. Money quote from the J4J founder:

"As we win and disciple Jewish people, we urge them to take their place in a local evangelical church or establish a congregation and call their own minister. Our duty is to aid the church at large and we work as an arm of that body to gather in the Lost Sheep of the House of Israel."

The ADL notes:

Not surprisingly, many Jews find the tactics and beliefs of Jews for Jesus offensive, and numerous Jewish leaders have condemned the group.

Christians of many denominations have also voiced their disapproval of the group’s theology and tactics… And while Jews for Jesus would convert all Jews to Christianity, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has stated that since the Second Vatican Council of the 1960s, the Christian evangelizing mission "no longer includes the wish to absorb the Jewish faith into Christianity and so end the distinctive witness of Jews to God in human history."

So Foxman’s assertion that the Catholic church is somehow worse than this seems at odds with his own website.

Goldberg finds a quote from Foxman in 1997:

"’Christians have been trying to make us disappear as Jews for 2,000 years. Now they’re trying a different method, which is for them to tell us that you can believe in Jesus and still be Jewish. It’s baloney, of course."

Now: not so much.

The backlash begins.

Joe Klein takes on Schmidt.

Jeffrey Goldberg agrees with me about Palin’s Jewish problem. Poulos differs.

This too reminds me of the Iraq war. Even though the warning signs are now blaring red and flashing, even though we face a meltdown if Palin is nominated, and the destruction of her family, and a horrifying tabloid car crash, the GOP leadership cannot apparently acknowledge an error and back down before it’s too late. They are clearly trying to decide if it’s worse if McCain acknowledges his fantastic mistake or if it’s better just to carry on and pretend nothing is really happening – or going to happen.

I knew today’s Republicans were masters of the art of denial, but this is getting ridiculous.

Yes, Google is an amazing thing. A reader finds this Jews For Jesus pamphlet (PDF) from 2004 that reveals more details about Palin’s pastor:

"If it were not for Jews for Jesus, I would not be standing here," the pastor announced. "And here is their executive director, who has come to speak to us this morning."

What a warm and wonderful welcome to a terrific church — Wasilla Bible Church — that sits a little less than an hour outside of Anchorage, Alaska. 

Pastor Kroon was referring to a presentation he and his wife had seen in Seattle back in 1974. The young couple realized their lives had strayed from the things of God, and they decided to begin attending church. Lo and behold, The Liberated Wailing Wall from Jews for Jesus was visiting that morning.

You can download the PDF of the pamphlet here. It comes up as the first search result on Google, a new-fangled thing the McCain campaign apparently hasn’t heard of. I mean: when you do vetting, you use Google, right? My reader came up with this a couple of hours after I posted about it. The McCain camp had months to do their homework.

The man who was caught on tape trying to get Palin’s ex-brother-in-law (and how much are the tabs going to pay him?) has now reversed himself and won’t testify on Troopergate.

How can a person who says this also have written this? Jeez, has everyone gone insane?