JustASC

JTA has the he said/she said/they said/we all said on the decision by the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations to disinvite Sarah Palin from their big anti-Iran rally

Lots of fingerpointing, and unanswered questions: Did Hillary Clinton politicize the event by backing out when she heard Palin would be speaking? Did the PresCon blow it by inviting someone from a party ticket at the height of the campaign? Did the National Jewish Democratic Coalition, in calling huffily for a nonpartisan event, do more to politicize the event than almost anyone else?  Is Matt Brooks of the Republican Jewish Coalition kidding when he says, “This is one of the biggest black marks on our community that I can remember in more than 20 years of working in the Jewish community”?

Why do I think this whole thing could have been avoided if someone at the PresCon had the following conversation:

A: Do you think we should invite someone from the campaigns to address the rally?

B: Do we really want this to be seen as campaign event? Won’t that turn the focus away from the bipartisan message? Won’t the candidates or surrogates be angling to prove who’s tougher on Iran and a better friend to the Jews? I can just see Hannity or Maddow discussing which side “won.” I’m also concerned, to tell the truth, that we unwittingly or not will be seen as buffing Gov. Palin’s foreign policy credentials. Is that distraction from the subject at hand — the threat of Iran — worth the intense coverage we’ll get out of this?

A: But Hillary is coming. Haven’t we essentially politicized the event? Shouldn’t we invite someone from the McCain camp as well?

B: She’s still a New York senator and has a record of standing with us.  But if we do want to make sure there is party balance, we can try to get someone with equal stature and standing on the other side, as opposed toone of the canidates themselves. Wouldn’t Joe Lieberman –pro-McCain, NY-Metro area — be perfect? How about Rudy Giuliani? Eric Cantor?

This entry was posted on Friday, September 19th, 2008 at 11:30 am and is filed under JustASC. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.