The enemy of your enemy can still be your enemy
by digby
Billionaire Sheldon Adelson said last week that he was going to vote for Trump. He had a personal chat with him and was convinced that Trump is good for Israel so he's fine with him. Trump made a big speech at AIPAC that went over very well with the crowd. (AIPAC issued an apology but only for Trump's rudeness toward the president.)
I wonder if the Jewish conservatives who think Trump's nomination is good for their cause have thought this through:
Julia Ioffe has filed a report with the D.C. police department over the anti-Semitic threats that she received — many from apparent Trump supporters — after writing a penetrating profile of Melania Trump in GQ.
The alleged offense is listed as “threat to kidnap or injure a person,” as outlined under the Code of the District of Columbia 22-1810. Said threats came through phone calls and email, notes the report. And the “public narrative” section reads as follows: “C-1 states that an unknown person sent her a caricature of a person being shot in the back of the head by another, among other harassing calls and disturbing emails depicting violent scenarios.”
Melania Trump responded to the story (which as really quite benign) with an angry Facebook post almost certainly dictated by her husband and this happened:
Hate site the Daily Stormer responded with a story titled, “Empress Melania Attacked by Filthy Russian Kike Julia Ioffe in GQ!” The attacks against Ioffe then started flowing over social media, email and phone. The Erik Wemple Blog cited some examples of the vileness in this post. Several of the blasts came from people who showed signs that they supported Trump. “The Trumps have a record of kind of whistling their followers into action,” the 33-year-old Ioffe told the Erik Wemple Blog. A quarter-century ago, Ioffe and her family fled anti-Semitism in Russia and moved to the United States. She has worked at the New Republic and written for the New York Times Magazine; she recently joined Politico Magazine as a contributing writer.
In an interview last week with Wolf Blitzer of CNN, Trump said, “I haven’t read the article, but I heard it was a very inaccurate article, and I heard it was a nasty article,” said Trump, showing off his intellectual independence. Speaking of Melania Trump, the candidate said, “She doesn’t need to have bad things said about her.” Pressed on the anti-Semitic threats, Trump said he didn’t know anything about the situation. “You’ll have to talk to them about it,” he told Blitzer, before ripping the press for being “dishonest.”
Donald Trump has a harder time disowning white supremacists than he does the Repubican political establishment. These are his people. And he seems to know it.
I'm sure I don't have to tell Sheldon Adelson and the members of AIPAC that just because Trump hates Muslims and Mexicans it naturally follows that he loves Jews. The White Supremacists who love Trump put them all in the same basket of hate. And Trump doesn't seem to mind.
Update: Former KKK leader Tom Metzger recently gave an interview about Trump. Most of it was silly trolling but this seemed right:
Do you believe Donald Trump is flirting with white supremacists to get their vote?I think the white supremacist vote is very small. There is little for him there. But I do think that there is a third or a quarter of this country who are closeted racists. When I talk to the blacks they agree with me. Too many white people are ashamed to say they’re proud to be white or that they want to marry white. So, this is a chance for them to come out and flex their muscles.
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