Kerry and Edwards campaigns mull Jewish strategies with New York primary

[Herschel]

With New York emerging as a key battleground in next week’s Super Tuesday presidential primaries, supporters of the top two Democratic contenders are stepping up Jewish outreach efforts here.
Jewish advisers to John Kerry of Massachusetts, a 19-year veteran in the Senate, kicked off a focus group on Tuesday to work on polishing his image.

At the same time, supporters of North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, who has been on the national political scene for five years and represents a state with a minuscule Jewish population, are working on raising his profile.

“There’s been no real Jewish presence in campaign so far,” said Steve Rabinowitz, a top Democratic media consultant not involved in either campaign.

In addition to New York, key primaries will be held Tuesday in Maryland, California and Ohio — states where Jews typically turn out in excess to their proportion of the electorate.

On Tuesday, the Edwards campaign recruited two elected officials well known in the New York Jewish community to make their case for him in a conference call with reporters from Jewish newspapers.

cut

http://www.jta.org/page_view_story.asp?intarticleid=13810&intcategoryid=3

It would appear Kerry is in line on Israel and has the advantage. He must continue to express an acceptable position.

[Darranar]

1. Acceptable to whom?

I also find it rather offensive that this article, and many others, seem to think that all Jews think alike when it comes to Israel.

[Herschel]

2. Acceptable

to those supporting Israel's right to self defense. Kerry has approved the wall.

[Darranar]

3. I support Israel's right to self-defense...

Nevertheless, Kerry's position on the matter is not acceptable.

There is no justification for land-grabbing walls.

[MikeGalos]

7. Personally

I find it offensive that an article on the primaries is put in I/P rather than GD:2004 just because it deals with US Jewish voters.

Is this now the ghetto for any discussion involving Jews? It's not as though Jews are a one-issue voting block.

[_Jumper_]

12. Post it there then

I wonder if it will be locked. The threads about candidates' stance on Israel were locked but this may not be locked because it is talking about a group of voters.

[tinnypriv]

4. Or

We could be democractic instead, and simply say:

"I stand for policy (a), (b) and (f), and if you like them, support me. If not, support somebody else".

What a radical idea. It would save on having to repeat the Am Chai catchphrases and the like too - always a bonus.

Oh, and as an aside, the JCPA just loves Kerry (quote, "despite his pro-palestinian statements"), so you imagine how much of a jerk he is going to be when in office.

[Darranar]

5. The major candidates must all agree on some issues...

They must be fanatically pro-Israel, they must support the current structure of global trade (the fact that developing nations are not at all benefitting from neo-feudalism (aka "free" trade, thanks goes to DuctapeFatwa for the apt term) has been lost in all the fuss about outsourcing), they must be "pro-business", and they must be against an end to the occupation of Iraq until the US firms are established enough to control any political processes there.

"Democracy."

[tinnypriv]

6. One disagreement

I'd put "pro-Israel" in quotes.

There is nothing pro-Israel about supporting militaristic, expansionist Israeli policies.

[MikeGalos]

8. Not true

By your standards of "fanatically", Kucinich is fanatically pro-PA. Of course, that doesn't mean he gets a right to voters just because his unpopular opinions aren't shared by more than a tiny part of the electorate.

You see, to be a MAJOR candidate, you actually have to appeal to a MAJOR amount of the electorate and while it's very self-satisfying to be able to say "it'd be totally different if my fringe candidate had won", it's more important to most of us to see a good candidate elected than a great candidate take an embarassing defeat and have another 12 years of the Bush family.

[Darranar]

9. Kucinich is not pro-PA...

such people are very rare, since it is very hard to defend a group of corrupt and incompetent people when neither side of the debate will provide you with helpful rhetoric. Generally, both the pro-Palestinian side and the pro-Israel side dislike the PA, though the reasons differ.

Defending every action Israel does is most certainly fanatically "pro-Israel", the same way someone going as far as to defend terrorist atrocities against innocent Israeli civilians would be fanatically "pro-Palestinian" (though of course suicide bombings don't benefit the Palestinian people any more than Sharon's policies benefit the people of Israel).

I don't think it is as much a lack of resonance with voters as it is an inability to separate oneself from the corrupt political system of this country. On the particular question of I/P, I don't think that the majority of politically aware Jews agree for the most part with Sharon, and the ones that do may well be replaced by Muslims distressed over Democratic stances on social issues but disgusted with Bush's foreign policy. Most other Americans don't really care about the situation there, aside from the Christian Right, which won't support the Democrats anyway.

[MikeGalos]

10. The statement was parallel to yours

You called the mainstream players "Pro-Israel" and not "Pro-Israeli" but you insist that it's wrong to call Kucinich "Pro-PA"

The equivalent to "Pro-Israel" is "Pro-PA"
The equivalent to "Pro-Palestinian" is "Pro-Israeli"

So, which parallel construct do you want to use for all the candidates? Is it:
Kucinich - Pro-Palestinian
Kerry - Pro-Israeli
Edwards - Pro-Israeli
Dean - Pro-Israeli
Clark - Pro-Israeli
Sharpton - Pro-Israeli
Gephardt - Pro-Israeli
Lieberman - Pro-Israeli
Mosely Braun - Pro-Israeli

or is it:

Kucinich - Pro-PA
Kerry - Pro-Israel
Edwards - Pro-Israel
Dean - Pro-Israel
Clark - Pro-Israel
Sharpton - Pro-Israel
Gephardt - Pro-Israel
Lieberman - Pro-Israel
Mosely Braun - Pro-Israel

[Darranar]

11. Because the mainstream candidates ARE "pro-Israel"...

while Kucinich is NOT pro-PA (as far as I know).

[_Jumper_]

13. Sharpton

Isn't Sharpton pro-Palestinian?

Every major politician in America is pro-Israel. That is amazing and certainly isn't a result of conviction.