After months of ignoring my Buddy so that I can spend my time on something useful I’ve started emailing back and fourth with him again. That has led to new emails twitting “liberalism” of one sort or another. No. Its not my Buddy twitting liberals. Its the posts of Righty pundits and bloggers. I suppose I deserve it because I love beating up the Grand Old Party that threw me over for flat Earth types but really. I need something better than Powerline’s snit over John Maynard Kenyes
Here’s what my Buddy sent me:
On Sat, Dec 31, 2011 at 8:19 AM, Victor D. Ulmer wrote:
Beware the authorities that you cite for your arguments?
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2011/12/keynes-was-right-about-the-jews.php
If I’m going to use up half an hour writing my Buddy a riposte then I’ll go back to offering it to my blog readers as well. This was my reply to my Buddy:
[Buddy], Can you give me any evidence that this statement of Powerline’s is correct?
“…anti-Semitism has become almost wholly the province of the Left today.”
Keynes was arrogant. From what I’ve read of him he was an elitest. During his time there were lots of British upper crust types who disdained the Jews. It seems to be much more a condition of their milieu than partisanship. Some like Keynes were lefties. Many of them gravitated toward Lord Haw Haw. If, as I suspect, Powerline wants to discredit something persuasive like Keynes’ economic theories by pointing out that his racism was crude Powerline might also consider panning Democracy because Thomas Jefferson was a slave owning hypocrite. Do you think Jefferson’s lefty fans of Democracy have tried to sweep Sally Hemmings under the rug of history? Maybe I should be grateful that Powerline didn’t try discrediting Kenysian economic policies because John Maynard was a homosexual.
I think that economic truths lie midway between Hayak and Kenyes. How about you? Do you think that everyone should give up the Keynes part because of John Maynard’s 100 year old racial views? I’m not sure he even meant that as anything other than the kind of snide put down you hear from dishy high school girls.
Powerline is treating this historical tidbit like a great gotcha proving that liberals are all dipshits. Other than his economic theories what does Keynes mean today? I’d suggest that anything other than his economic theories are only footnotes, interesting though they may be.
As for Right wingers being champions of the Jews isn’t there a distinction between being unhappy with Israel and Jew baiting? I know the Right would like to conflate the two. But its worth remembering that the backbone of the GOP today are the Christian right which believes Jews must control all of King David’s Biblical lands to make the prophesy of the rapture come about. Unrepentant Jews would all die and go to hell when that happens. With friends like that …
Harry
