Not making the Cabal

Powerline has excerpts from Professor Samuel Freedman's response on reading the Mearsheimer/Walt "Israel Lobby" paper. "A footnote's footnote." The column opens:
Reading through the chronicle of perfidy that is the working paper by two leading American political scientists on the Israel Lobby, I could barely contain my outrage. I had made it 20 pages deep into the report by Stephen Walt of Harvard and John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago and I hadn't found myself listed among the conspirators.

There were Howard Dean, Dennis Ross, and Martin Indyk; there were Gary Bauer, Elliott Abrams, and George Will. But after years of writing about American Jews and Israel, to say nothing of that time a stranger at a Seder mistook me for Thomas L. Friedman, did I get any of the credit for tricking and pressuring and hypnotizing America into a self-destructive alliance with the Jewish state?

No, 20-odd pages into the professors' screed, and my name had yet to be named. I couldn't claim even the tiniest bit of responsibility for motivating al-Qaida and enticing America into Iraq, just two of the Israel Lobby's achievements, according to Walt and Mearsheimer. I'd been left off the most elite Who's Who (or should I say Who's Jew) this side of the Harmonie Club or the Herzliya conference. What was I? Chopped liver?

Then, at last, I spotted a reference to me. Leaping into the paragraph, I felt my pride turning into indignation. The authors had cited a statistic from a column that I'd written back in April 2003 for USA Today, showing that American Jews tended to be less supportive of the Iraq invasion than the nation at large.

My work was being trotted out to prove that the Israel lobby didn't even represent American Jewish interests. I didn't get to be part of the cabal. I failed the tzitzis check. Bummer.

...


There is more. A journalism professor who can actually write intelligent material gives some promise of hope for the profession, even if he is overlooked for his role in the cabal. I am sure I did not even make a footnote, but I am on your side professor.

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