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Subject: Obama Won't Answer Holocaust Question
Softwar    7/24/2008 3:59:38 PM
Debbie Schlussel: ABC News' Jake Tapper: Obama Won't Answer Holocaust Question ByDebbie Schlussel On the heels of John McCain's strong statement to Israel and the Jews that he would "not allow a second Holocaust" to happen, Barack Hussein Obama was asked whether he'd prevent a second Holocaust by reporters during his trip to Israel. The setting for the question is notable. It was just before he made a photo op visit to "Yad VaShem," the Holocaust museum in Israel. What is also notable was Obama's "response" and how it was "covered" by the Mainstream media. While the Wall Street Journal's Jay Solomon and Cam Simpson noted the question, they did not note the response. Why not? Well, ABC News' Jake Tapper did, and it's telling and frightening (thanks to my friends Sean and Frank at WCBM for the tip): Yarmulke-wearing fraud Obama Won't Say No to Holocaust Upon arrival at Yad Vashem, Obama was greeted by Avner Shalev, chairman of Yad Vashem. An Israeli journalist called out to Obama: "Can you ensure that there will be no second Holocaust?" Obama walked into the museum's main building without responding.. . . In the "Hall of Remembrance," Obama put on a white yarmulke, lit the "eternal flame" and placed a white chrysanthemum wreath on a stone slab. Obama then went to the museum's Janusz Korczak Plaza, where he signed the guest book. Jake Tapper goes on to quote Obama's BS speech about how terrible he feels about the Holocaust. Blah, blah, blah. Then, this: Once again an Israeli journalist asked the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee how he'd help prevent a second Holocaust. "Senator can you assure Israel that there will be no second Holocaust despite Iran's threat to wipe us off the map?" he asked. Obama demurred, saying that it wasn't appropriate to answer the question there. "This is Yad Vashem!" the journalist responded. Obama said he would answer the question at a later press availability. And, of course, Obama never answered the question. Disgusting. The question is a no-brainer. If you don't have an automatic, "I will assure that there won't be a second Holocaust," response, then you don't deserve to occupy a square foot of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. John McCain initiated the conversation about a second Holocaust, brining it up himself and saying he'll assure it won't happen. Barack Obama had to be asked, and he still couldn't bring himself to answer. G-d help us. Hey, Barack Obama, don't put on your phony white satin yarmulke again. Sadly, we know what's inside the head it covers.
 
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CJH       7/27/2008 3:48:31 PM
Well, as long as Obama doesn't promise to rebuild the temple of Solomon also, then he won't excite my worst fears about him.
 
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Hugo       7/28/2008 1:56:25 PM

Hugo,

           Thats just a fancy way of saying that the Jewish population of the former Soviet union is decreasing rapidly. And is not this population assimilating in herds, and marrying the blond blue eyed aryan local beauties? The main reason I wouldn't is the thought that their grandfather might have shot down my uncles' Lancaster bomber - well he would have been my uncle if the bomber he was navigating hadn't vanished over the North Sea. Of course, the greater likelihood is that their grandfathers did much worse things, but this is personal.

 That's a fair statement but I think an argument can be made against it.  The Soviet Jews arriving aren't all that Jewish in a religious or cultural sense.  That is changing a little when they arrive in Berlin because they quite evidently aren't German.  So they're drawn to a newly establishing community.  There is some conflict with the German Jewish community who resent the Soviets who haven't shared their history but I imagine the same can be said in your country.  I have no idea what the assimilation rate is but I doubt it's that high between the locals and the Russians.  The recent Russian immigrants post 1991 (I'm not referring here to Soviet Jews) have a terrible reputation and aren't likely to be the sort of person a pretty local girl is going to bring home to meet the parents..  I know a dutch girl dating a Russian guy and she has ruled out introducing him to her parents..
 
 
Anyway, I was wondering how is the pilot or navigator of a Lancaster Bomber aiming for the civilians of Hamburg  morally superior to the guy shooting him down?  And actually the likelihood of a local girl's grandfather having done anything worse (apart from the fact that a "girl's" grandfather is likely to have been born after the war) is actually quite narrow.

 
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battar    Four merlin engines   7/28/2008 3:24:35 PM
Hugo,
           Do you think the 21 year old navigator of a 4 engined bomber was concerned with morals? He was probably concerned with finding his way back home in the dark. (No easy task). His commanders didn't tell him he was bombing children in their beds - he was told he was winning the war by bombing the factories making parts for German submarines. (And the factory workers homes (and their children)).  I don't think he took part in the Hamburg raids. That was 1943, wasn't it? I'm talking 1944 and only 6 months or so of duty. Arthur Harris, chief of Bomber command, was considered a hero at the time, but by today's moral standards he would be a war criminal.
From what you describe, the Russian Jews in Germany are not so much Jews as they are Russian. You get the same effect with the Russian immigrants to Israel.
 
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Hugo       7/28/2008 6:12:16 PM

Hugo,

           Do you think the 21 year old navigator of a 4 engined bomber was concerned with morals? He was probably concerned with finding his way back home in the dark. (No easy task). His commanders didn't tell him he was bombing children in their beds - he was told he was winning the war by bombing the factories making parts for German submarines. (And the factory workers homes (and their children)).  I don't think he took part in the Hamburg raids. That was 1943, wasn't it? I'm talking 1944 and only 6 months or so of duty. Arthur Harris, chief of Bomber command, was considered a hero at the time, but by today's moral standards he would be a war criminal.

From what you describe, the Russian Jews in Germany are not so much Jews as they are Russian. You get the same effect with the Russian immigrants to Israel.


I agree with you but it's also likely that the 21 year old manning the anti-aircraft gun was also thinking he was doing the right thing and thus the reasoning for you not wishing to date a German girl could perhaps be justified emotionally but is hardly justified.

 
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FJV    Zero Sum   7/29/2008 12:18:56 PM
I kindof understand the reasoning behind it. 
 
I knew one guy who wouldn't work for Japanese, because his mother was in a Japanese concentration camp during WW2.
 
Personally I think a lot of it depends on the severity of what was done on a personal level during WW2 on how much you would want to interact with Germans or Japanese right after WW2.

 
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battar    Hello, Mum!   7/29/2008 2:36:44 PM
Hugo,
           What you say makes perfect sense, apart from the fact that it was far more likely to have been a nightfighter aircraft and not AA that got the Lanc.
However, I could never have brought home a German girl to meet my Mother. (The missing navigator was her sisters' husband - they were married only 6 months). Many English people of her generation harboured a lingering resentment of the Germans. Some of them would never drive a German car, for example. Did the Germans feel the same about the British? Thats for you to tell me, Hugo. However, the average German had plenty of other good reasons for not driving a British car. (I wouldn't want one either).
 
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jastayme3       7/29/2008 5:38:23 PM

You might be wrong here.

The Diaspora is becoming extinct.

Many thousands-years old communities have been wiped out by emigration to Israel and to the West, not only in places of suffering and persecution, but also in rather nice and tolerant ones such as India and the Carribean.


In the West, namely in the Americas where Jews stand a chance of physically surviving the onslaught of Jihad for a while longer, their numbers are severely dwindling due to intermarriage and assimilation, and their culture is devolving into a wishy-washy, politically correct, liberal creed that will last as long as fashions do.

Israel is fast becoming the only Jewish place on Earth, and this makes us exceedingly vulnerable to a nuclear Holocaust. 




I disaggree there. If Israel is destroyed by a nuclear holocaust, it will immiediately become a Lost Cause.
And will therefore be more popular then ever. 
 Which will have lots of implications, including(probably) Jewish terrorist groups seeking revenge. But more to the point, Jews  will have more sense of ethnic loyalty, not less.
Population is not necessary to keep an ethnic group going. The Hmong do quite well in America and there are probably more Jews then Hmong.
 As for Battar's point that Judaism might fade away and become an antiquity, that is simply impossible. Judaism is to ingrained in Western culture no matter how many times certain elements try to squeze it out. Even the goyim often think like Jews, sometimes without thinking, sometimes openly and even gratefully. Even if you ask a neopagan if he wants a slave burned alive with him to help him when he reaches Valhalla, his immiediate reaction will be, "Ew, gross." Which seems obvious but would not have been so obvious two thousand years ago and is not obvious in some parts of the world.
  Judaism also  is, as few other cultures are, based on litarary traditions and so can easily be revived at any time. Besides if Ezekial(and me in another sense) are right well that makes it literally impossible, and not just improbable. Ahimijab cannot really reach into heaven and eliminate Moses. And if we are not, he cannot eliminate him from our minds.
 Now arguably the same could be said of Greece and Rome, which are also embedded in Western Culture. And they are arguably now antiquities. On the other hand that didn't happen until 1453.
Of course you are probably worried about the Jewish nation proper, not it's cultural influence. However, I really doubt that there needs to be more then ten-thousand Jews to continue it as a nation. It simply has to much baggage attached to it. As for the State of Israel that is a different story. Though it might be remarked that Zionism was originally intended as a survival strategy. In the end it brought more dignity then security(a little bit of glory goes a long way among Homos Sapiens Bellas). But the point is it was a strategy. And when one strategy fails you find another. And at least no one will take the helplessness of Jews for granted for a long time.
Even there, there is more comfort available then might seem. Moslem politicians make their way by exagerrating their craziness. And even if Ahimajabad is willing to destroy Iran to destroy Israel, it is reasonably plausible that his aides are not and will overthrow him. They will still want a nuke of course-it would be quite congenial to Iran's rational interests. But that does not mean they will use it.
 Of course they said the same thing about you-know-who. But frankly, un-PC though it is to say it, he was an aberration. The guess that he was a hypocrite gathering support by simulated extremism was not irrational. It was simply wrong. The chance that Ahimajabad is like him, and that his courtiers will obey him, must be taken into account. But it must not be assumed to be the only possibility.
And even if he is all he claims to be, there is a chance that he can be squashed by US or Israel. I once read an article which said that it was possible to fry Irans infrastructure with a computer virus that could prevent a launch. Or he might just die accidently. Or even "accidently". 
 Probability does not take away worry. And even if the extinction of the Jewish people is unlikly, there are still individual Jews, and Israel still has emotional value in any case. But I think it highly improbable that the Jewish people will be eliminated, no matter how few Diasporas there are left.
 
 

 
 
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jastayme3       7/29/2008 8:29:26 PM




Hugo,



           Do you think the 21 year old navigator of a 4 engined bomber was concerned with morals? He was probably concerned with finding his way back home in the dark. (No easy task). His commanders didn't tell him he was bombing children in their beds - he was told he was winning the war by bombing the factories making parts for German submarines. (And the factory workers homes (and their children)).  I don't think he took part in the Hamburg raids. That was 1943, wasn't it? I'm talking 1944 and only 6 months or so of duty. Arthur Harris, chief of Bomber command, was considered a hero at the time, but by today's moral standards he would be a war criminal.



From what you describe, the Russian Jews in Germany are not so much Jews as they are Russian. You get the same effect with the Russian immigrants to Israel.







I agree with you but it's also likely that the 21 year old manning the anti-aircraft gun was also thinking he was doing the right thing and thus the reasoning for you not wishing to date a German girl could perhaps be justified emotionally but is hardly justified.




Thinking one is doing the right thing is not necessarily doing the right thing.
Be that as it may, it may be that the anti-aircraft gunner was in fact doing the right thing. Take an anology. Suppose, at about the same time an Italian peasant resisted some Allied troops who were foraging in his fields. Leaving aside the fact that the action might be imprudent, would we consider him wrong to do so? Even if the action redounded to Germanies benefit? No, because the right of self-defense is not taken away by the wickedness of regimes that happen to profit by it; on the contrary said regime would be compounding it's wickedness by not properly assisting in the defence of  those under it's rule.
 In any case neither the bomber pilot or the antiaircraft gunner were likly worried about doing the right thing. They were worried about Nationalism, Unit Pride, and above all Not Looking Like Wusses. And survival of course. But to think people then fought for The Right Thing is ahistorical. Very few did. Most did fight for such "primative" things as mentioned above and The Right Thing, while it existed, wasn't what kept them fighting.
Which brings one to another point. And that is the ungracious modern tendency of judging people solely by their cause. The Confederate Flag thing is another example of that.  The antinationalism and bellicose pacifism that is fashionable today did not make people love each other more, it made them hate more. Old-school nationalists would, once the smoke had dissapated, accept each other as human. But when the only value for judging human conflict is the morality of the cause(often only assesable in retrospect-if that)and not of the adherant then no mercy or graciousness can be allowed. It brings forth a self-righteousness that judges people for the group they belong to and judges with great severity.
I would hardly blame a Jew or a Russian or a Pole to much for not wishing to date a German. But such things are known among people who have no such excuses. And it is regularly encouraged by more and more books showing how guilty people were and expanding the accusations ever farther until it covers the entire world. Arguably the entire world was guilty to some extent. But most people were ordinary folks trying to survive, not really much different from anyone else. Given the results, that is a very good argument for Original Sin. But it is also a good argument not to talk to much about it: we are all imperfect and it might come back to bite.
 

 
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jastayme3       7/29/2008 8:59:24 PM










Hugo,







           Do you think the 21 year old navigator of a 4 engined bomber was concerned with morals? He was probably concerned with finding his way back home in the dark. (No easy task). His commanders didn't tell him he was bombing children in their beds - he was told he was winning the war by bombing the factories making parts for German submarines. (And the factory workers homes (and their children)).  I don't think he took part in the Hamburg raids. That was 1943, wasn't it? I'm talking 1944 and only 6 months or so of duty. Arthur Harris, chief of Bomber command, was considered a hero at the time, but by today's moral standards he would be a war criminal.







From what you describe, the Russian Jews in Germany are not so much Jews as they are Russian. You get the same effect with the Russian immigrants to Israel.

















I agree with you but it's also likely that the 21 year old manning the anti-aircraft gun was also thinking he was doing the right thing and thus the reasoning for you not wishing to date a German girl could perhaps be justified emotionally but is hardly justified.











Thinking one is doing the right thing is not necessarily doing the right thing.

Be that as it may, it may be that the anti-aircraft gunner was in fact doing the right thing. Take an anology. Suppose, at about the same time an Italian peasant resisted some Allied troops who were foraging in his fields. Leaving aside the fact that the action might be imprudent, would we consider him wrong to do so? Even if the action redounded to Germanies benefit? No, because the right of self-defense is not taken away by the wickedness of regimes that happen to profit by it; on the contrary said regime would be compounding it's wickedness by not properly assisting in the defence of  those under it's rule.


 In any case neither the bomber pilot or the antiaircraft gunner were likly worried about doing the right thing. They were worried about Nationalism, Unit Pride, and above all Not Looking Like Wusses. And survival of course. But to think people then fought for The Right Thing is ahistorical. Very few did. Most did fight for such "primative" things as mentioned above and The Right Thing, while it existed, wasn't what kept them fighting.


Which brings one to another point. And that is the ungracious modern tendency of judging people solely by their cause. The Confederate Flag thing is another example of that.  The antinationalism and bellicose pacifism that is fashionable today did not make people love each other more, it made them hate more. Old-school nationalists would, once the smoke had dissapated, accept each other as human. But when the only value for judging human conflict is the morality of the cause(often only assesable in retrospect-if that)and not of the adherant then no mercy or graciousness can be allowed. It brings forth a self-righteousness that judges people for the group they belong to and judges with great severity.


I would hardly blame a Jew or a Russian or a Pole to much for not wishing to date a German. But such things are known among people who have no such excuses. And it is regularly encouraged by more and more books showing how guilty people were and expanding the accusations ever farther until it covers the entire world. Arguably the entire world was guilty to some extent. But most people were ordinary folks trying to survive, not really much different from anyone else. Given the results, that is a very good argument for Original Sin. But it is also a good argument not to talk to much about it: we are all imperfect and it might come back to bite.


 





Before someone bristles at this, remember, it is this sort of thing that caused the mistreatment of
 soldiers returning from Vietnam, the assumption that the fact that Hippies regarded a cause unjust
 gave them the right to dispise those who fought for it.
I am not contending that
 
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Hugo       7/30/2008 2:38:19 PM

Hugo,

           What you say makes perfect sense, apart from the fact that it was far more likely to have been a nightfighter aircraft and not AA that got the Lanc.

However, I could never have brought home a German girl to meet my Mother. (The missing navigator was her sisters' husband - they were married only 6 months). Many English people of her generation harboured a lingering resentment of the Germans. Some of them would never drive a German car, for example. Did the Germans feel the same about the British? Thats for you to tell me, Hugo. However, the average German had plenty of other good reasons for not driving a British car. (I wouldn't want one either).

  I can understand personal animosity, it is natural and I respect those who try to overcome it.  Many English people still harbour resentment against the Germans though I have my own theory for that and it has little to do with the events of the Second World War.  The Germans don't resent the British in the least despite what happened in places like Dresden.  Whether the Germans respect the British is another matter but I would certainly say they have a soft spot for them.
 
As for not buying English cars, actually come to think of it the Germans don't respect the auto making abilities of any of their former wartime enemies, whether that be Lada or Lincoln.

 
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