Not being familiar with The New Republic's history, I read it as I read a few liberal blogs. Several of the writers in the magazine are strong supporters of Obama. (Chait, Cohn, Scheiber) These individuals are also for health care reform, financial reform, etc. They clearly liberals for good and worse. Some writers in TNR are more centrist, but one will have difficulty-finding right-wingers in TNR.
Martin Peretz writes short notes for TNR. He opposed the Cordoba house/Park 51/Cordoba Initiative, Chait is vehemently for it. For liberals that effort has become a litmus test. If you are against it, you are with Sarah Palin. How this became a litmus test is difficult to determine. Despite heavy protestation, being against the effort in its planned location has nothing to do with religious tolerance. Tolerance is not geographically depended. If Peretz doesn't agree to the effort being two blocks from the heart of 9/11 but agrees to a location that is, let say, ten blocks away, he is not a bigot except in the eyes of liberals. Actually, once you don’t accept societal disagreement you may be titled a bigot. That is, liberals are the bigots in this dispute.
Liberal decided that unless you totally agree with Muslim, you are against Muslims. Bob Somerby claims repeatedly that liberals are fools, but surely, they are not morons. The war on a single person such as Peretz or Rahm Emmanuel is foolish. Interestingly enough, these two individuals, whom liberals repeatedly vilified, are Jewish. Since most liberals also share a deep hatred of Israel, one may justifiably ask whether there is a taste of anti-Semitism involved in the war on Peretz (and Rahm).
Eric Alterman, a serious and intelligent, liberal has a long piece about Peretz in American Progress in 2007. A paragraph from the article appears below.
during his reign, Peretz has also done lasting damage to the cause of American liberalism. By turning TNR into a kind of ideological police dog, Peretz enjoyed the ability -- at least for a while -- to play a key role in defining the borders of "responsible" liberal discourse, thereby tarring anyone who disagreed as irresponsible or untrustworthy. But he did so on the basis of a politics simultaneously so narrow and idiosyncratic -- in thrall almost entirely to an Israel-centric neoconservatism -- that it's difficult to understand how the magazine's politics might be considered liberal anymore. Ironically Peretz's stance ultimately turned out to be not only out of step with most liberals but also most American Jews, who consistently cling to views far more dovish, both on Israel and on U.S. foreign policy generally, than those espoused in TNR.
It is a sad but true fact of American political life that liberals rarely exercise so much influence as when they happen to be endorsing conservative causes, and this temptation has proven consistently irresistible to Peretz and his magazine. TNR under Peretz has been a vehicle that proved extremely helpful to Ronald Reagan's wars in Central America and George Bush's war in Iraq. It provided seminal service to Newt Gingrich's and William Kristol's efforts to kill the Clinton plan for universal health care and offered intellectual legitimacy to Charles Murray's efforts to portray black people as intellectually inferior to whites. As for liberal causes, however … well, not so much. Eric Alterman | June 18, 2007
The claim that during his reign, Peretz has also done lasting damage to the cause of American liberalism is laughable. One person with a different approach within a larger and long lasting political movement is blamed for causing the movement lasting damage. Such a claim is utterly ridiculous. It is impossible for an individual to accomplish such a feat. The hatred of Peretz makes Alterman state the impossible. He goes on to blame Peretz of Israel-centric neoconservatism. I believe that Aletrman conflates two terms that shouldn’t be conflated. There is very little doubt that Peretz is pro-Israel, but I don’t believe that his opinions are anywhere close to William Kristol or his cohorts. (Like any two random individuals they may agree on particular topics and disagree in general.) Kristol is an extreme right-winger, Peretz isn’t. Furthermore, neoconservatism is almost synonymous with Jewish and that is probably the reason for the conflation. The Israel-centric sounds terribly biased. Why is Peretz Israel-centric? Most Palestinian Americans are Palestinian-centric; most Irish Americans are Irish-centric, etc. It turns out that it is fine to support your homeland as long as it is not Israel. Alterman is not anti-Semitic, but as a liberal he has blinds, actually heavy blinds, he is against anything that sounds as Israel biased.
Another claim that ignores reality is the opposition to Clinton’s health care reform. Most Democrats, and liberals in a leading roles. Strangely, liberals who knifed Clinton repeatedly suddenly accuse Peretz of behavior they are guilty of.
I know little about Peretz, I am not for or against him. From time to time, I’ll read his short notes in TNR, but his praise for Netanyahu, for example, is not my favorite part. It’s the hate and the unjustified accusation I strongly oppose to.
No comments:
Post a Comment