Please back up your abstractions with concrete examples-- of let's say a lefty dominated university not hiring a professor solely on the basis of his/her views of Israel.
We certainly have examples of attacks, smearing, lies about professors simply based on their oppositions to Israel's policies-- and not because the professors are advocating wiping the Israeli's off the map. As for the Nazi analogy-- when a state practices collective punishment in response to acts of resistance-- when it enforces deprivation and immiseration on another people because of their claims to property from which they've been expelled-- well if the foo shits wear it-- those are things Nazi's practiced. As I told my beloved orthodox sister (lives in Houston, married to a doctor, keeps kosher, sheds a tear and says a prayer every night for the poor beleaguered Israelis), if Hitler were still around, the Israelis would be selling him ovens. Let me ask you something, David, sarcastically and flamingly, is your grasp of reality really this tenuous, or are you putting us on? ----- Original Message ----- From: "David B. Shemano" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[email protected]> Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2007 2:28 PM Subject: Re: [PEN-L] U. of Michigan pressured to halt publication of Joel Kovel book > Michael Perelman writes: > > >> David, as a libertarian, I would expect you of all people to agree that people should > >> not coerce others to prevent his views from being articulated. Should people have > >> thr right to prevent others from saying anything good about Israel? > > Of course they should. I can say that because I believe in the state/private distinction and support the 1st Amendment as a restriction on state action but not private action. I support the right of a Lefty dominated university department to decide not to hire a pro-Israel professor, and I support the right of pro-Israel supporters to make the decision public and try and convince alumni to withhold money from the university. Of course, the fact that I support somebody's right to say something doesn't mean I support them saying it. > > I did want to note the irony (if that's the right word) of Doug Henwood complaining when anti-Israel critics are accused of being Nazis, and Jim Devine contemporaneously calling Israel "one of the worst kinds of ethnic nationalist regimes currently on earth," which I think a reasonable reader would interpret as a Nazi analogy. So apparently it is unfair rhetoric for somebody to call your side Nazis, but okay rhetoric to call the other side Nazis, and if anybody calls you a Nazi for calling them a Nazi, that proves they are a Nazi. > > David Shemano >
