You are free to criticize George Soros without being anti-Semitic (Part II)
[NOTE: Please see Part I here.]
I ended Part I in the following way:
…accusing Soros of being a “formenter of social dissent” and an “agitator funding and masterminding protest” is simply the truth about Soros. If it’s the truth, it’s the truth. Nor do you have to be a white supremacist worried about the “undermining of a white, Christian social order” to worry about a leftist with a ton of money funding leftist activists.
But is Soros “malevolent” and “sly” about it? And does he actually fund the caravan?
Not every conspiracy theory rumor about Soros is true, of course. But there is no question that Soros has indeed funded much leftist activism and other leftist causes; it’s a matter of public record. These are facts, not rumor:
…[D]uring the 2003–2004 election cycle, Soros donated $23,581,000 to various 527 Groups (tax-exempt groups under the United States tax code, 26 U.S.C. § 527). The groups aimed to defeat President George W. Bush. After Bush’s reelection, Soros and other donors backed a new political fundraising group called Democracy Alliance, which supports progressive causes and the formation of a stronger progressive infrastructure in America.
Soros also has donated plenty of money to Obama and Hillary. He’s promoted democracy in Eastern Europe (not everything Soros does is bad, as far as I can tell). But whether a person believes that he’s used his money mainly for ill or mainly for good, it is clear that it is absolutely correct to say that Soros “foments dissent” and “funds and masterminds protests,” whether the WaPo thinks that feeds too well into anti-Semitic memes or not. The rest of this post will detail some of his activities in that direction, as well as other causes.
Soros has funded various campaigns to decriminalize marijuana, and supported legalized suicide for the dying, Regarding Israel:
“I don’t deny the Jews to a right to a national existence – but I don’t want anything to do with it.” According to hacked emails released in 2016, Soros’s Open Society Foundation has a self-described objective of “challenging Israel’s racist and anti-democratic policies” in international forums…
On Soros and George Bush:
On November 11, 2003, in an interview with The Washington Post, Soros said that removing President George W. Bush from office was the “central focus of my life” and “a matter of life and death.” He said he would sacrifice his entire fortune to defeat Bush “if someone guaranteed it.”
You may recall that in an earlier quote it was stated that Soros donated about 25 and a half million dollars to effect that particular defeat. It didn’t work, but that’s an awful lot of money, and an awful lot of influence for one person to buy. And that statement has nothing to do with anti-Semitism, either. I would say the same thing no matter what Soros’ ethnicity or religion.
There’s much more, including Soros’ instigating and then profiting from a financial crisis (see this). No less a man of the left as Paul Krugman wrote of Soros (or actually, of financiers like Soros whom he refers to as “Soroi”): “these days there really are investors who not only move money in anticipation of a currency crisis, but actually do their best to trigger that crisis for fun and profit.”
In 2006 Soros wrote that “the main obstacle to a stable and just world order is the United States.” This is a man who is willing to put his money exactly where his mouth is. Is there any wonder people on the right would fear and despise him? They don’t have to invent conspiracy theories—although some do—to believe he is dedicated to using his money and the vast resources at his command to undermine that “main obstacle” as well as advancing the progressive causes in which he believes and that he has supported for a long time.
Is it any wonder that many people on the right assume that Soros may be funding all kinds of leftist causes more secretly, in addition to the leftist causes he funds in plain sight?
Soros is not EveryJew. He doesn’t stand for Jews in general, he stands for himself.
As far as the theory that Soros is funding the current caravan from Central America goes, I’ve seen no direct evidence that this is the case. However, I can’t really blame anyone for imagining that perhaps he is the source of the funds and organization that are obviously coming from somewhere. And that’s basically what Trump said:
As the White House administration increases its pressure on the caravan of migrants heading to the United States from Central America, one reporter asked the president if he thought someone was paying for it.
Trump replied: “I wouldn’t be surprised, I wouldn’t be surprised.” A reporter then asked: “George Soros? Who’s paying for it?” to which Trump replied: “I don’t know who, but I wouldn’t be surprised. A lot of people say yes.”
Again—as with so many of these controversial Trump quotes—it was the media that brought it up, in what they thought was a “gotcha” question. Trump’s answer—“I wouldn’t be surprised”—is my answer, too, and it simply makes sense. That doesn’t mean it is true, but it means it is very plausible (or perhaps we should say that it’s credible, which seems to be the MSM’s new favorite word).
That article I just linked is from Newsweek. In it, they don’t mention who might be funding the caravan instead. Nor do they describe Soros very well, although they describe him in a way that suits their purposes. First, they call him a “prominent Democratic donor. Then, they say this:
Soros, a Holocaust survivor and a billionaire philanthropist, was among the targets of mail bombs sent to key Democratic figures last week, allegedly by Trump supporter Cesar Sayoc.
Just a nice nice guy, and a victim of the right. Nothing about his activist activities around the world, or about something that’s even more relevant, Soros’ Open Society Foundation and its activities. I’ve said that there’s no evidence that Soros has funded this particular caravan, although it’s a possibility. But there certainly seems to be bona fide evidence that he helps illegal immigrants once they’re here as well as encouraging illegal immigration to this country and open borders:
Both the NILC [National Immigration Law Center] and its offshoot, United We Dream, get big bucks from Soros’ Open Society Foundations (OSF). In fact, both nonprofits list OSF as a key financial backer. In the United States Soros groups have pushed a radical agenda that includes promoting an open border with Mexico and fighting immigration enforcement efforts, fomenting racial disharmony by funding anti-capitalist black separationist organizations, financing the Black Lives Matter movement and other groups involved in the Ferguson Missouri riots, weakening the integrity of the nation’s electoral systems, opposing U.S. counterterrorism efforts and eroding 2nd Amendment protections. OSF has also funded a liberal think-tank headed by former Hillary Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta and the scandal-ridden activist group Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), so corrupt that Congress banned it from receiving federal funding.
Incredibly, the U.S. government uses taxpayer dollars to support Soros’ radical globalist agenda abroad. As part of an ongoing investigation, Judicial Watch has exposed several collaborative efforts between Uncle Sam and Soros in other countries. Just last week Judicial Watch published a special investigative report that exposes in detail the connection between U.S.-funded entities and Soros’ OSF to further the Hungarian philanthropist’s efforts in Guatemala. The goal is to advance a radical globalist agenda through “lawfare” and political subversion, the report shows. Much like in the United States, OSF programs in Guatemala include funding liberal media outlets, supporting global politicians, advocating for open borders, fomenting public discord and influencing academic institutions.
That article is by Judicial Watch, which bases its work on access to records it obtains through requests and court orders through the Freedom of Information Act (there’s also this article that appeared in the NY Times in 2014, back when Obama was president and such things didn’t need to be denied).
It seems that Soros’ activities are often connected not just with direct grants to political candidates and the like, but are accomplished through his Open Societies Foundation. Reading about the Foundation and what it does,the first thing that strikes me is the huge scope of the thing (worldwide) and the amount of money involved: for example, $873 million in 2013.
The description of what the Foundation promotes is very general, and some of it actually sounds good: early on, goals were ending Communism in Eastern bloc countries and fighting HIV and AIDS, for example. But then there are things like this, which clearly qualify as leftist activism:
OSF reported granting at least $33 million to civil rights and social justice organizations in the United States. This funding included groups such as the Organization for Black Struggle and Missourians Organizing for Reform and Empowerment that supported protests in the wake of the shooting of Trayvon Martin, the death of Eric Garner, the shooting of Tamir Rice and the shooting of Michael Brown.
Back to the Foundation’s Wiki entry:
NGO Monitor, an Israeli NGO, produced a report which says, “Soros has been a frequent critic of Israeli government policy, and does not consider himself a Zionist, but there is no evidence that he or his family holds any special hostility or opposition to the existence of the state of Israel. This report will show that their support, and that of the Open Society Foundation, has nevertheless gone to organizations with such agendas.” The report says its objective is to inform OSF, claiming: “The evidence demonstrates that Open Society funding contributes significantly to anti-Israel campaigns in three important respects: 1. Active in the ‘Durban strategy;’ 2. Funding aimed at weakening U.S.support for Israel by shifting public opinion regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and Iran; 3. Funding for Israeli political opposition groups on the fringes of Israeli society, which use the rhetoric of human rights to advocate for marginal political goals.” The report concludes, “Yet, to what degree Soros, his family, and the Open Society Foundation are aware of the cumulative impact on Israel and of the political warfare conducted by many of their beneficiaries is an open question.”
That’s actually pretty interesting. It shows how difficult it is to prove the extent of Soros’ involvement in any one policy. Since it is his enormous Foundation offering the assistance— rather than Soros himself giving a grant out of his own pocket, cause by cause—it is always possible for him to preserve some degree of deniability, and for the left to characterize his critics as anti-Semites making stuff up.
Readers interested in the many organizations receiving funds from Dr. Evil should consult the well-documented entry at the website Discover the Networks. The same leftists who dismiss the concerns over Soros as some kind of “conspiracy theory” (a convenient means of distracting attention away from unpalatable facts) generally describe the Koch brothers as conservative when they are, in fact, libertarian (and, as a result, mostly hostile to sensible policies on immigration).
I have been trying to figure out why Soros does some of this stuff. I doubt pure philanthropy is behind it. I thought he at one time had an estate in Central America but I am unable to find any links to the story.
If some person or group funds and organizes the migrant caravan, how are they different from someone who abets human trafficking? They must be breaking laws. If their office is in New York or Washington, that’s where the arrests should be made.
Well, yet another case of “it ain’t broke so we’ll fix it good & proper!” To wit:
https://Discoverthenetworks.org
Sorry, j e. :>((
I went there looking for something else, and when I got there, wham! what a nasty surprise.
. . .
Neo, you’ve done a little research there, haven’t you. *g* It’s interesting and you’ve backed it up well. Thank you.
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I suppose I got the link to J.E. Dyer’s piece on the Facebook Purge here? There’s a long section devoted to an analysis of Soros’s strategies and aims there. I have no idea as to its validity, but if the facts are as she states, it’s an interesting theory.
https://libertyunyielding.com/2018/10/17/the-great-facebook-purge-soross-signature-tactics-and-the-crisis-in-social-media/
In particular, the section entitled “The signature pressure tactics of George Soros.”
I, for one, believe that Soros did a ton of good in the 90’s in Eastern Europe. He pretty much by himself set the basis of civil society there. Every kind of organization, from newspapers to children’s charities to civic associations to watchdog groups, got some small grant from his foundation, not to mention invaluable information about non-profit best practices. Before him there was nothing. He created some breathing room for an alternative to the often authoritarian and corrupt governments.
But many things can change in 20 years. Is it due to a brain tumor, like in McCain’s case, or just the natural effect of old age? Or is it Conquest’s second law of politics? (but that applies to organizations, not people, so it doesn’t explain Soros’s change of heart).
Actually, I seem to remember a time when Amnesty International, Doctors without Borders, the Red Cross, and many other such organizations stuck to their primary missions and at least tried to maintain an appearance of impartiality. But those times are long gone.
The worst part, for me, is that those who dealt with the Soros Foundation in its heyday are now embarrassed and to some extent compromised by this association. The worst rabble-rousing media, echoing with anti-semitic and xenophobic cliches, are having a field day demonizing Soros and all his former associates (which, in the 90s, included every pro-Western personality; even Orban, before his change of course).
Many brave people stuck their necks out. It looks like they got played. How and why? It’s still a mystery to me.
It’s my understanding that Soros collaborated with the Nazis. Turning in other Jews to them and then robbing the Nazi’s dead victims. If true, his motivation is simple; guilt. His entire embrace of open borders with its inherent goal of the elimination of national and cultural identities, i.e. transnationalism is an attempt at atonement for his earlier mortal sin of collaboration with evil. His enmity toward America is simple as well, the United States is the foremost exemplar of nationalism, he has no alternative to imagining the United States to be “the main obstacle to a stable and just world order.”
In his willful blindness to his continuing to support another form of evil… the irony is literally Shakespearean.
Geoffrey Britain:
Your understanding about that “collaborator” business is wrong, IMHO, although it’s a common meme on the right.
Did you read Part I? I dealt that both in the body of the post (including links) and in several comments, in an exchange I had with other commenters (my most relevant comments are here and in particular here).
@MB – Conquest’s Second Law “Any organization not explicitly right-wing sooner or later becomes left-wing.” Also called O’Sullivan’s Law. Examples given are the Ford Foundation and the Girl Scouts. I included Habitat for Humanity a decade ago.
As for people being secretly or slyly antisemitic in their dislike of Soros, that is doubtless true for a few. Hell, some of them aren’t even secretive about it on some sites. But these sort of “change the subject” accusations are nearly always in the direction of branding conservatives as not simply wrong, but evil people.
If we’re not evil, they have very few other arguments.
To clarify: I was referring to Eastern European media.
O/T: Nice piece on the Caravan & the President at Legal Insurrection, Neo. :>)
https://legalinsurrection.com/2018/11/cnn-reports-and-what-trump-actually-said-about-the-migrant-caravan/
I wondered why Soros hated Bush so much, and the answer to that may explain the changes that MB wonders about. Basically, he was opposed 100% to the invasion of Iraq and the mishandling of that war, and the way in which the politics of the country were also mangled. It is not a very interesting speech, being totally unremarkable in it’s opposition to Bush, which was almost boiler-plate in 2004; it is, however, enlightening as to Soros’ own state of mind
https://web.archive.org/web/20090922223629/http://www.commondreams.org:80/views04/0928-16.htm
<iI, for one, believe that Soros did a ton of good in the 90’s in Eastern Europe. He pretty much by himself set the basis of civil society there.
I agree and was distressed to see his swing into leftist politics here.
Forgot to add: I think he has simply transferred his hatred of Bush to the Republican Party and then to the US conservatives in general.
Opposing Bush meant supporting Democrats, and he kept it up after Bush was gone, because he sees the Left as more in line with his views (which they are) and discounts the conservatives who ALSO objected to the war in Iraq.
Interesting that no one seems to be going after Catholics on this caravan thing:
And this from the pastor of a Catholic church in El Paso:
But Soros makes for a such handy bogeyman, doesn’t he?
Ann:
But the issue is not whether other groups are assisting the caravaners as they come towards the border, or whether they are planning to support and assist them after they get to this country. No doubt they are; the left certainly is, and many church groups have a history of that sort of thing. If people on the right are criticizing these groups for that, you probably wouldn’t read about it as news because it’s really not news. It’s ho-hum.
The reason the criticism of Soros is covered is because the left thinks they can make a propaganda point with it. The propaganda point is: the right is anti-Semitic! This sort of thing is the charge: “By saying Soros is supporting the caravan throughout its journey, people on the right prove themselves to be anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists of a classic kind.”
I engaged Soros in a short debate on his site back in 2004. His views are similar to those of Obama. And similar to many idealistic lefties. Their theme is that of the song, “It’s a Small World After All.” They believe that an “open world” where people mix freely and don’t threaten one another can be achieved. At least that’s what Soros told me. And Obama acted like he believed much the same.
On the other hand, much of what they (Soros/Obama/ and other lefties) are enabling sounds more like the plan to destroy America as delineated by Dick Lamm in 2003. If you aren’t familiar with Lamm’s ideas you can read them here: http://michellemalkin.com/2008/02/09/i-have-a-plan-to-destroy-america-by-richard-d-lamm/
Basically Lamm sees open borders, multiculturalism, political correctness, stifling of debate, pitting various groups against one another, and the use of foundation money to drive the agenda as the plan that will eventually destroy America. Soros seems to be pretty much enabling the plan. He would be nuts to tell people what he was really up to. Wouldn’t he?
J.J.:
If Soros (or anyone else) declares that the US is the “main obstacle to a stable and just world,” of course that person would want to destroy the US as it is now and/or change it very very radically.
How strange that Soros was so opposed to George W Bush, considering how committed W and the entire Bush clan are to open borders. He seems to have profound misperceptions operating within his psyche.
Moreover, drastic misperception leading to intense demonization of conservatives is common among leftists.
“Quantum of Solice” was aimed at George Soros, as his first hedge fund was the QUANTUM FUND.
Soros is anti-society.
Chris Farrell of Judicial Watch; “Soros-occupied State Department.”
Do I need to explain why this is anti-Semitic?
Yes, Manju, you “need to explain why this is anti-Semitic,” since it isn’t. Neo has extensively documented Soros’s clearly expressed views, which are congruent with the leftist orientation of large numbers of State Department career personnel.
Heh:
https://dailycaller.com/2018/10/31/george-soros-fusion-gps-trump-funding/
If nothing else, you’ve got to love those names (cf. Wikipedia):
“Open Society Foundation”
“Open Society Initiative”
“Democracy Integrity Project”
“Democracy Alliance”
“Friends of Democracy”
“Jewish Funds for Justice”
“Global Witness”
Interesting stuff. I am one of the first people to debunk conspiracy theories. I don’t believe in them primarily because the chances of maintaining operational security in a conspiracy involving more than only a few people are slim. Those involving hundreds or thousands of people are essentially zero.
However, there is the phenomena of “fellow travelers” assisting and cooperating with one another. That appears to be the case with George Soros. He seems to be a profligate buyer of “progressive intellectual” credentials.
On the issue of “Zionism”, I find myself uncomfortable. I understand completely the motivations of the European Jews in forming the state of Israel in the wake of WWII an the Holocaust. I admire what they have achieved there. Furthermore, the various nations and cabals that are opposed to Israel are despicable and hypocritical in what they do to advance their cause. So, my emotional sympathies are with Israel.
Having said that, Israel was formed as a non-secular state exclusively for those of Jewish descent. Purely by definition, this is racism and Israel is a Theocracy. I fear that so long as Israel remains non-secular and exclusive, they will continue to be a lightning rod for attacks.
Soros is not a Holocaust Survivor. He evaded it by pretending to be gentile and then turned in Jews,
He is kapo scum.
Having said that, Israel was formed as a non-secular state exclusively for those of Jewish descent. Purely by definition, this is racism and Israel is a Theocracy.
Denmark was formed as as state for those of Danish descent, Sweden for those of Swedish descent, England for English descent. All have national religion. Are they also racist theocracies?
Are you aware that Jewish national history is older than all of those three combined?
I’m sure Israel being a lightening rod for antisemitic countries has nothing to do with it being chock full of people who fled antisemitic persecution in those countries. (Sarc)
Being a Zionist and finding myself at times in conversation with anti Zionists, it’s fascinating how easily they ignite with rage in the subject. Although I’ve been told “You won,” by onlookers, it’s really exhausting and makes me concerned for my safety. So I’ve learned to watch for certain tells and slip away if I sense a confrontation.
In fact, the whole anti Zionist thing is what caused my political conversion, since ‘progressive’ is one of the tells.
Interestingly, Soros hid for over two years that he was the money behind the pseudo ‘pro Israel’ J Street Lobby. He’s none too popular with a lot of Jews.
Israel is a foundationally Jewish state, but not an exclusively Jewish state. There are Christian and Druze and Muslim citizens who have full civic rights including the right to vote.
Israel is surrounded by Arab majority states whose minorities are not treated as well as are Israeli minorities. For most of the area, sharia law is considered the foundation of law, although in some states it is more strictly applied than in others. If Israel were entirely secular (as many of its Jewish citizens are), it still would be hated by its neighbors, and this hatred is ethnic and religious, specifically aimed at Jews, whether observant or non-observant.
Roy, I find no evidence that Israel was founded as a theocracy; still less that it is so today. And it certainly is in no sense “a state exclusively for those of Jewish descent.”
The Foot of All Knowledge tells us https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theocracy :
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From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel#Government_and_politics :
Following a link in that article to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_Laws_of_Israel , we see that
These laws are listed further down on the page.
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On the Israeli Declaration of Independence, as linked above:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_Declaration_of_Independence
The whole page is of considerable historic interest.
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Must one be Jewish (whether by religious practice or in virtue of Jewish ethnic ancestry)? See the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ page on this:
http://www.mfa.gov.il/mfa/aboutisrael/state/pages/acquisition%20of%20israeli%20nationality.aspx
The page discusses each of these categories.
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Further: Israel is a Jewish and democratic state (my boldface):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_and_democratic_state
A Halachic state might be a theocracy:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halachic_state
But note that below that, the section entitled “Definition of a Jewish state in Halakha” is in fact without content; Wikipedia invites someone to present the, or a, definition.
There is some support for (at least partial) governance according to Jewish religious law; see both of the articles just above. But as it stands currently, Israel is not even close to being governed by anything like Jewish religious law, let alone by clergy.
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By the way, some of the McDonald’s in Israel do serve non-kosher food.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonald%27s_Israel
Neo — I just left a rather long comment discussing what I believe are a few misapprehensions about Israel. But it appears to be in Spam Limbo. Could you please soothe the Spam-bot, if that is the problem (and if the comment is OK with you, of course).
Thenks — Julie
Shoah ‘survivor’ that worked for the SS? — Worse than a kapo?
That’s not my idea of survival. Complicity is closer to the mark.
blert; Avi:
Have you read the links here? “Worked for the SS” is not what Soros did.
Avi–are you aware of how many Jews evaded death by pretending for a while to be gentiles? Are you condemning them? It amazes me that anyone would think that was wrong under the circumstances, particularly if it was temporary.
What’s more, Soros wasn’t raised as a Jew at all. So why should it matter to him?
Lastly, Soros was born in August of 1930. When the Nazis invaded Hungary in March of 1944 he was thirteen years old. He turned fourteen during the war and was still fourteen when it ended. That is the period we were talking about.
Read the links here if you want to deal with the facts.
I can’t stand Soros, but I would rather deal with the facts about him, which are bad enough.
Julie near Chicago:
Done.
Roy Nathanson:
No, you are wrong.
Israel has plenty of non-Jewish citizens.
You are actually talking about the right of return, which means that people who are Jewish are allowed to emigrate there and become citizens. That’s all it means. And it is not racial at all. Here’s how it works:
You can read much more detail about it here. It includes converts, by the way, even Reform converts (although Orthodox rabbis don’t recognize those as proper conversions).
Not racial.
And by the way, if you look at this site, you’ll see that MANY countries have a right of return, many of them based totally on ethnic origin. But no one seems to give a hoot about that, or calls them racist.
And Israel is not a theocracy.
There are a LOT of misconceptions about Israel, and Jews, floating around.
Avi:
And please stop calling people “kapo” who are not kapos. Please read my post on using “kapo” as a word of insult.
And this from the pastor of a Catholic church in El Paso:
These caravan journeys are almost mystical in their total trust in the presence of an accompanying God. These prophetic journeys call us to an active hope, to transform our love into political action
Many years ago, when I still attended Mass, my Catholic Church had a fund raiser. I was asked to contribute by a friend and fellow parishioner. I did and hoped that the money would go to help build a Catholic school as the planned city of Mission Viejo, CA had a parcel of land dedicated to churches and the Catholic church occupied only half of the parcel. There was plenty of room for a school, at least an elementary school. Instead the donations went to Santa Ana to support Mexican children, probably many the children of illegals although that was 40 years ago.
I told my friend and the pastor, who I knew quite well, that the next time they asked for money, aside from the weekly collection, it had better be for a school if they wanted anything from me.
Eventually, my children attended a private school organized by an Episcopal priest who was a retired headmaster. About 20 years later, the Catholic parishes began to build schools as they realized parents were willing to help fund them. My children, by that time, were adults.
The Catholic Church has gone overboard on leftist politics and I do not doubt that the present Pope told Michael Moore that Capitalism is a sin, as he reported.
Israel has plenty of non-Jewish citizens.
There are Bedouin and Druze in the IDF.
Soros yms aided and abetted the killing of Jews and the confiscation of their property.
He was not like Schindler’s Stern.
On your prior posting you incorrectly conflated Kapos from concentration camps with death camps.
If you don’t like kapo I’ll use the more appropriate term – Feld Hure.
“It is not a very interesting speech, being totally unremarkable in it’s opposition to Bush, which was almost boiler-plate in 2004; it is, however, enlightening as to Soros’ own state of mind”.
Indeed, it’s a very relevant read. Now I see when he changed his mind, some time between 2001 and 2003.
I don’t understand, though, why the Iraq war had such a big impact on him. The war was badly managed, true. But the decision to go to war was bi-partisan, being supported by the New York Times and Blair as well as Bush.
The Times wasn’t enthusiastically in favor, but gave it as much approval as they could muster for any right-wing policy initiative; as if, for example, Bush had restarted the space program and put a man on Mars.
Maybe this is what Soros meant by writing “For 18 months after 9/11 he managed to suppress all dissent”? This is mere hyperbola. The opposition to the war was quite strong from the beginning, though maybe not among the serious people.
And when writing “I am afraid that he is leading us in a very dangerous direction. We are losing the values that have made America great” he’s just repeating leftist boilerplate. There is no comparison between Bush and, say, Putin. There was no atmosphere of intimidation against leftists at that time, nothing comparable to the hounding of rightists in US universities and big companies nowadays. They were just pissed because not everyone agrees with them.
Sounds like Soros gave in to the temptation of thinking that US democracy is in danger and only he can save it. And because, after all, he is a multi-billionaire and genuinely smart, nobody could persuade him that he was wrong, once he set his mind to it.
I’m still curious, though, what led to this. Brain tumor? Traumatic divorce? Was he misled by his entourage or peers? Did Democrat grandees make an irresistible offer? Did Kerry beg on his knees? Or did they treat him with just the right amount of contempt, to induce a desire to prove himself (reverse psychology)?
Or was he already a Democrat sympathiser, the Democrats pulled on his heart strings (democracy under threat, it’s now or never) and he succumbed to their siren song and went all in?
From his speech I can tell that he considers himself an original and independent thinker. Maybe such people are the most suggestible, but I’m still curious how they got to him.
Avi:
If you read the links I gave I don’t see how you could keep making that claim. I am going to put some of the relevant parts right here in this comment, and I have bolded some of the most important parts:
Avi:
No, I did not confuse death camps with other concentration camps in that post of mine on kapos. The post is not about death camps. The post is about the kapos in the work camps, where people were not gassed immediately but where death and torture were extremely commonplace and always a constant threat.
And no, it’s not just that I “don’t like” the term “kapo.” Using it in any context except for actual kapos, or someone in a similar extremely dire position, is an abomination.
And if “kapo” is the wrong word for you to use—and it is—then “Feld Hure” is just as bad. These are people for whom the only proper emotion is deep sympathy and horror at what they were forced to go through.
As I wrote in my post on kapos:
For Jews during WWII (except for the ones who were fortunate enough to leave Europe entirely, or to be in a neutral country) survival very often required at least some degree of collusion and definitely some degree of deception. Soros, a 13 and then 14 year old boy, colluded to a remarkably small degree.
As far as the distinction between work camps and death camps goes, please see this:
Can we still be mad at Bernie Madoff?
For a year or two before she escaped from Anschluss Austria – first to Yugoslavia, then Palestine – my mother’s light brown hair and blue eyes allowed her to sometimes passed as gentile, ride Vienna streetcars, etc. One of her brothers somehow survived 3 years in various death camps. None of us ever asked him how he managed this. One did what one had to do.
Just curious, do we know for sure 1930 was the year he was born?
Paperwork was a bit iffy in that era.
Manju – I would love for you to explain why that is anti-Semitic. As far as I can see, Chris Farrell didn’t say anything about Soros being Jewish, but people writing the story up kept inserting it.
Maybe the problem is that you don’t read very closely, and can be easily dragged around by the nose by clever writers.
As the saying goes – if you can hear the dog whistle, you’re the dog.
No, the problem with manju is that he is a dishonest troll. Not holding my breath waiting for him to condemn Obama for repeatedly inviting the murderous anti Semitic demagogue Al Sharpton to the White House for private meetings.