American Conservative magazine wants you to know they are not anti-Semitic

By Michael HoffmanSome quotes from Mr. Scott McConnell, founding editor of  The American Conservative magazine (the publication which has banned advertising for our book Usury in Christendom), July-August 2014, pp. 22 and 24:“(William F.) Buckley is rightly credited with pushing hardcore anti-Semitism out of the American right. As recently as the 1950s, it was widespread on the right: one of the most popular conservative books of that decade was The Iron Curtain Over America, which purported to describe how Khazar Jews were taking over the Democratic Party. It went through 14 printings. National Review (Buckley’s magazine), founded in 1955, sought to break from this kind of nuttiness.”Mr. McConnell’s words remind us of a statement by Mr. Buckley’s son, Christopher, that Gore Vidal had the “tiresome” habit of saying that President Franklin Roosevelt had foreknowledge of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.Imperial personalities write this way. No data need be advanced concerning what makes The Iron Curtain Over America qualify as being both the epitome of “nuttiness” and "hardcore anti-Semitism.” Mr. McConnell says it is so and that’s all “Conservatives" need to know.Christopher Buckley finds the idea that FDR let Pearl Harbor be bombed, “tiresome.” My, my, old boy, so sorry to have disturbed your cocktail hour with the thought of it. Let’s dismiss all historical revisionism when we find it tiresome. Truth can be a bit of bore, you know.Mr. McConnell writes: “(Joe) Sobran’s career subsequently deteriorated into the indefensible.”Those are strong words about a dead man known for his nobility of soul and coming from a magazine that claims to be independent of the Israeli (if not the Talmudic) agenda. May we trouble Mr. McConnell for the slightest evidence of Joe’s indefensibility? No such luck. We’re just supposed to believe it because the "founding editor” has decreed it.The same issue of the magazine contains an undistinguished essay by Samuel Goldman, “What Would Jeremiah Do?,” the publication of which seems intended to show that The American Conservative is not “anti-Semitic.” On p. 29 Mr. Goldman quotes from the erstwhile Chief Rabbi of England, Jonathan Sacks, who is on record applauding the Talmudic claim that the rabbis defeated God and God admitted it. The author doesn’t mention that part of Sacks’ writing. Rather, he advertises the rabbi’s supposed unique insights into the Book of Jeremiah.Mr. Goldman goes on to state, “At least in the diaspora, Jews have demanded to live as Jews — but not the imposition of Jewish law or practices on others.”Really, Mr. Goldman? If that is the case why is so much of my food here in the U.S. marked with a small letter “K” or a letter “U” inside a circle, representative of the fact that my victuals have been blessed by a rabbi, rendering it kashrut (kosher)? Consumers pay the rabbis for this privilege. It’s a hidden tax on our food. The freedom to abort unborn children in America is in accordance with rabbinic halacha, which determines that an unborn child may be killed at any time in the womb, if it is determined that it is a rodef (“pursuer”) —  a baby seeking to kill its mother. Talk about nuttiness!What of the activist Supreme Court justices who make law by judicial decision? This is a traditional form of Talmudic legislation.Why is the U.S. Congress occupied Israeli territory?Why do I see a Chanukah menorah on Union Square in San Francisco in December, but no Nativity Scene?The Talmudic Noahide Laws (these have no connection to the Biblical Noah), have been enshrined in Federal Law as part of "Education Day USA.” One of those laws provides for the execution of idolaters. Rabbi Maimonides, a hallowed halachic authority for Ashkenazi Judaism, defined idolater as one who worships Jesus Christ as God.How is it that I am likely to lose my employment and my reputation if I object to Orthodox Judaism with the same zeal that tens of thousands of pundits, preachers, priests and politicians object to Islam?Mr. Goldman’s amusing writing serves as a means for the frightened editors at The American Conservative magazine to point to when they themselves are accused of the perpetual charge of anti-Semitism. They can reply, “No we’re not — we smeared Sobran, and held Samuel Goldman and Rabbi Sacks aloft. How can we be anti-Semites?”How can you be Conservatives?Hoffman is the author of Judaism Discovered.***