Tuesday, April 15, 2008
Republican Jewish Coalition
Elections piece by
Ari Kaufman
Similarly to other urban minorities, Republicans have had difficulty acquiring the Jewish vote, especially in the past half-century. While President Reagan and (the current) President Bush increased their share of the “Jewish vote” over their party’s predecessors, it will be considered a noteworthy achievement if one in three Jews will vote for John McCain in the fall. Why is this?
The Republican Jewish Coalition, founded in 1985 by the late Max Fisher and “a group of dedicated Jewish Republicans,” seeks to explain and reform this quandary. The last decade, since terrorists changed America ’s (and Israel’s) world on September 11, 2001, has seen tremendous growth in the number of Jews identifying with Republican ideas and the GOP. The Coalition presents itself as “the sole voice of Jewish Republicans to Republican decision makers and the Jewish community, expressing our viewpoint on a wide variety of issues.”
With a strong presence in Washington DC, a National Women’s Committee, and more than 40 chapters and over 30,000 members nationwide, The Republican Jewish Coalition is the premiere Republican organization in the Jewish community.
And their success, especially recently, has been palpable, with the Republican candidate’s percentage of the “Jewish Vote” rising from 10% in 1992 (Pres. G.H.W. Bush) to the aforementioned 26% for President Bush Jr. in 2004, according to CNN election poll results. The Jewish vote has risen each general election for the Republican candidate.
“We expect Sen. McCain will do very well with Jewish voters come November,” Suzanne G. Kurtz, Press Secretary of the RJC recently told me.
Larry Greenfield, director of the 3,000-member strong Republican Jewish Coalition of Southern California, believes that nearly 30% of Jews voted for Bush in 2004 and eyes a much higher goal in November for John McCain. Greenfield relies on the support of Eastern European Jewry who now has a heavy presence in the Los Angeles area.
He often tells them antidotes such as “The Democratic Party is no longer that of JFK but of Teddy Kennedy. Bush has gone on the offensive against terrorists. Pakistan is cooperating; Libya’s WMDs have bitten the dust. Bush is driving the spread of democracy that is vital to the survival of the West and Israel.” For those who have lived amongst the horrors of Eastern Europe, this is often reassuring. President Bush, as seen in his hero’s welcome in Albania and elsewhere in the Balkans last summer, is immensely popular in that war-torn region.
But what in particular does the RJC do on a daily basis? A few main goals and efforts include, as per their Fact Sheet/Mission Statements:
-The Republican Jewish Coalition “seeks to foster and enhance ties between the American Jewish community and Republican decision makers.... while articulating and advocating Republican ideas and policies within the Jewish community...”
-The RJC works closely with leading Republican decision makers, including former Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush and former Vice President Dan Quayle, President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney, senior administration officials and Republican lawmakers on Capitol Hill.
-The RJC began hosting Presidential Candidates Forums in 1987 to introduce the Republican primary candidates to the Jewish community.
-In 1998, the RJC arranged a trip to Israel with four governors, including George W. Bush of Texas. On this trip the RJC introduced two future leaders, friends and allies in the war on terror—George W. Bush and Ariel Sharon.
-In 2007, the RJC hosted more than 300 grassroots events around the country including events with Rep. Eric Cantor, Sen. Norm Coleman, Sen. John Thune, Sen. Susan Collins and former White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer.
-The RJC Congressional Affairs office meets regularly with lawmakers and their staffs. Its Legislative Update highlights significant achievements in Congress of interest to the Jewish community. Recently, the RJC worked to promote legislation to end American support of the United Nations’ anti-Israel “Human Rights” Council. The RJC also took the lead in pushing for passage of the Global Anti-Semitism Act and successfully advocates congressional investigations of the U.N. Oil for Food Scandal.
The RJC also constantly sends out press releases in an attempt to expose Democratic politicians or their choices dealing with Jewish matters. For example, currently one is calling on Barack Obama to remove General Tony McPeak as his military advisor and campaign co-chair, after McPeak’s controversial comments about the influence of American Jewry on US mid-east policy. Another delas with Jimmy Carter’s visit to Hamas as well as Obama’s reticence to condemn Carter amongst other evil-doers the Illinois Senator has cozied up to.
While Obama and Hillary Clinton are often the chief targets, Jimmy Carter, Howard Dean, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, Nancy Pelosi, the mainstream media and the UN are regularly mentioned.
The RJC also spearheads campaigns to draw attention to their missions. The most recent, occurring in late February, was called “I used to be a Democrat.” The series of ads “tells the true-life political journeys of former Jewish Democrats. While circumstances may vary, one common theme persists among them: Each is now a Jewish Republican.”
The challenge of acquiring a high percentage of the Jewish vote is a different one that that of two other large “minorities.”
When attempting to draw Latino and black votes, Republican politicians tend to focus on social issues like abortion, gay marriage, Christians spirituality, education and family values. With blacks, they also may specifically target the very proud history of the Republican Party with African-Americans.
Republicans proudly disclose that their formation in 1854 as the party of Fremont and Lincoln was in an effort to free the slaves. After the Civil War, and over the next century as Southern Democrats resisted abolition and reconstruction, then initiated the KKK which terrorized, murdered and lynched blacks for a century to get their vote; to the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments and Eisenhower’s original Civil Rights Act which Democrats refused, the GOP has a proud history with Black-Americans. According to “The National Black Republican Association (http://www.nbra.info)," the NAACP was founded by the GOP on Lincoln’s 100th birthday (2/12/09) as were nearly all historically black colleges; and famous black heroes like Martin Luther King Jr., Frederick Douglas, Harriet Tubman, George Washington Carver and Booker T. Washington were Republicans as well.
In comparison to such famous revolutionary blacks, a Jewish list of Republicans includes Senator Arlen Specter, former White House Press secretary Ari Fleischer, former Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman, and Economic hero Milton Friedman. But the “New Media” of the past decade or so, also includes many Jews. A short list might show Dennis Prager, Michael Medved, David Horowitz, Roger L. Simon, Al Michaels and William Kristol.
Comedians Jackie Mason and Raoul Felder are supporters of the RJC as well. The two have been long been critics of Democrat-voting Jews, calling them “clueless,” regularly penning articles on sites like Jewish World Review, and publishing the book Schmucks on the topic in 2007. NYC Mayor Mike Bloomberg and Fed Chairman Ben Bernake, tacitly independent but with strong conservative economic leanings, are also Jewish.
With the Jews, the original draw to conservatism may have been fiscal and taxation matters, but since 9-11-01 , for most it has been national security. Indeed, aside from the more religious/conservative Jews, many who vote Republican may not agree with the party’s social policies or evangelical wing, but consider themselves “9-11 conservatives.” The RJC and its supporters believe the Bush Administration and the Republicans, despite some bumps on the road in The War on Islamic Terrorism, are seen as the party best equipped to defeat Radical Islam and save liberal values and America, Israel and the world .
Matt Brooks, Executive Director of the RJC, recently opined in the New Jersey Jewish News:
“When, after September 11, 2001 , America finally woke up to the threat of radical Islamic terror, Bush and the Republican leadership in Congress took the threat seriously. Implementing tough, decisive, and long-overdue security measures at home and abroad, the safety and security of the United States and its citizens became a top priority. America declared war on terror.”
He then added:
“But we in the Jewish community have long known that Israel has been fighting this same war. With common goals and priorities, the Republicans unwaveringly supported Israel’s tough decisions on safety and security. It is no wonder Prime Ministers Ariel Sharon and Ehud Olmert have called Bush the greatest friend Israel has ever had.”
The RJC also seeks support from Christian Zionists. Members receive complimentary copies of books like David Brog’s Standing with Israel: Why Christians Support the Jewish State. Evangelical leaders like Perry Stone, James Dobson and Hal Lindsay, who guide missions to Israel because “The Jews are G-d’s Chosen People,” often are cited by Jewish Republicans as essential supporters of Judaism.
While this likely endears Zionistic Jews, Democratic leaders may often irk Jews with some of their more radical wings being hostile to Israel , as well as many Democratic politicians’ reticence to make Israel, the lone liberal democracy in the region, a priority. The liberal Union for Reform Judaism, which represents nearly 1,000 American synagogues, and its president, Rabbi Eric Yoffe, has also been very hostile toward Zionist evangelical Christians in accepting their honest support of Israel. Earlier this month, he called San Antonio-based Pastor John Hagee, who addressed AIPAC last summer, an “extremist” on his pro-Israel policies. (Senator McCain did distance himself from Pastor Hagee in March, after the pastor endorsed him, following an uproar over Hagee’s views on Catholicism. A polarizing man for sure, but he’s no Jeremiah Wright either, most RJC members feel.)
To influence the politics of public opinion, the Coalition relies upon the stories like the recent experiences of Sen. Joe Lieberman. Due to his unflinching support for the War on Islamo-Fascism, he was bounced from his Party after standing as a reliable Democrat for nearly decades. Lieberman still won re-election in 2006 as an Independent over Ned Lamont, despite being outspent by the far left money machine sponsored by George Soros, a Hungarian “Jew” who denied his Judaism and aided the Nazis during the Holocaust.
The Jewish vote will most likely go higher to the Democrat this November than even the moderate John McCain. But should there continue more of the left-wing hostility toward Israel influencing Democrats, and “good Jews” like Lieberman, it seems change is in the air. After all, for an orthodox Jew like Senator Lieberman to stand before “Christians United for Israel” last summer and declare, “And I know, as a Christian friend likes to remind me, that there are a lot more Christian Zionists in America than Jewish Zionists. And, I know the support of Christian Zionists today is critical to Israel’s security and strength, and to America’s security and strength,” that has to bother even the most apathetic and secular of Jews. At least the RJC hopes so.
RJC Chairman Brooks emphatically closed his editorial, by claiming, “If you believe that Israel has had no greater friend today than the United States, then its safety and security will not be in better hands with a Democrat at the presidential helm. For that matter, neither will the safety and security of the United States and American Jews. As Ed Koch acknowledged, “I want a president who is willing to go after [radical Islamic terrorists] before they have the chance to kill us. “Is there any issue more crucial than that?"”
To nearly all liberal “Jews” (in quotations since these are cultural Jews not religious), the answer is, sadly, Yes. They have little appreciation for our religion’s incredibly proud history, no sense of good and evil, and misunderstand how dangerous our enemies in the Arab/Muslim world are. Their priorities too often are hatred for Mel Gibson, fear of Jesus Christ, and excusing evil while supporting organizations like the ACLU and candidates like Barack Hussein Obama. They’re very educated, but they don’t often think nor read, and, lacking facts, are always unwilling to debate with “sell out” conservative Jews who have seen the proverbial light.
With Al Qaeda’s plans to target Jerusalem should America leave Iraq, the GOP and the RJC believe nothing compares in priority to fighting evil; nor does Ed Koch apparently, and he’s a Jewish Democrat who supported President Bush in 2004.
To be run in the Jewish Post on April 30.
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