From my new VDARE.com column:
The Cuban Compromise—A Sustainable Model for The Jewish Lobby
By Steve Sailer
Two quotable quotes:
"The fact that a great many Jewish neoconservatives—people like Joe Lieberman and the crowd over at Commentary—plumped for this war, and now for an even more foolish assault on Iran, raised the question of divided loyalties: using U.S. military power, U.S. lives and money, to make the world safe for Israel."
Joe Klein, Time, June 24, 2008
"Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence (I conjure you to believe me, fellow-citizens) the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake, since history and experience prove that foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of republican government. … Real patriots who may resist the intrigues of the favorite [foreign nation] are liable to become suspected and odious, while its tools and dupes usurp the applause and confidence of the people, to surrender their interests."
—George Washington, Farewell Address, 1796
(Links helpfully added by VDARE.COM).
As survivors of one of the great historical crimes of the mid-20th Century, this American ethnic group has gained a veto power over American foreign policy toward their historical homeland—with seriously detrimental impact on America's reputation in that important part of the world.
Moreover, out of concern for their co-ethnics abroad, they have obtained strong influence over America's immigration and refugee policy.
I'm talking, of course, about … Cuban-Americans!
Who'd you think I was talking about?
The best thing about Cuban political power in America is that you're free to talk about it. (Well, at least outside of Miami.) Heck, Cubans want you to talk about how much clout they have. It makes them seem stronger than they may actually be.
Moreover, they are upfront about their motivations. If you say, "You want to extend the trade embargo on Cuba because Fidel stole your grandfather's sugar plantation," they'll reply, "Well, duh."
Do Cuban-Americans display "dual loyalty?"
Well, first, let's toss in all the caveats about the diversity within any ethnic group.
That said, the answer is, more or less: Sure.
(Cuban-Americans are seldom loyal to the present government of Cuba, of course. Instead, they tend to be loyal to their vision of the future government of Cuba.)
Is this pattern of Cubans promoting Cuban ethnic interests through our political system good for America as a whole? Probably not. But it has been so narrowly focused that it hasn't been a disaster for the country.
American policy toward Cuba has been knuckleheaded, but less so than Castro's policy toward Cuba. Only this year, for example, Fidel's brother Raul finally allowed microwave ovens to be sold in Cuba—three decades after they went on sale in the free world!
The relevant point: any single foreign country, even one as nearby as Cuba, isn't all that important to America's national interest.
What is important is that our political and intellectual life not be sapped by a single ethnic group's determination to promote its interests at any cost. The Cuban-Americans have played by the rules, at least on the national stage (as opposed to in Miami, where they've intimidated local critics). They've won on the trade embargo through reasonably open and transparent activism because they just care more about it than anybody else does.
Most importantly, Cubans don't inflict on the national debate their intellectual paranoia about slippery slopes. Lenin said: "He who says A, must say B." By this logic, nobody can be allowed to say A. Fortunately, Cubans aren't obsessive or powerful enough to impose this kind of reasoning on the rest of the country.
For example, you can write "The subprime mortgage meltdown shows the need for more government regulation of the financial industry," without fear of being shouted out of the Main Stream Media by all the Cubans in important positions in the business who worry that if anybody is allowed to say that in public, it will inevitably lead to the government expropriating the sugar plantations and banning the sale of microwave ovens.
Perhaps some anti-Castro Cubans would like to ban all criticism, no matter how tangential. But they don't have the mojo to impose their taboos on the rest of American society.
Similarly, on immigration, Cuban-American political muscle has mostly been exerted to get special treatment for Cubans, rather than to open our borders in general.
By the way, if you want to be able to keep reading articles on VDARE.com like this that you can't many other places, please help VDARE's summer fundraising drive.
My published articles are archived at iSteve.com -- Steve Sailer
Posts
32 comments:
I definitely think it would be a lot better for America and for Jews if Jewish Americans would focus narrowly on Israeli and Jewish interests, rather than promote universal agendae (democratisation, immigration, non-discrimination) presumably intended to benefit Israeli and Jewish interests, but often having the opposite effect (eg mass Muslim immigration leading to Muslim attacks on Jews). A wish for your group to survive and prosper is natural enough, and so are multiple loyalties (eg to birth country & to country of residence) but framing these in Universalist ideological terms has the potential to be hugely destructive.
Hey Steve,
We have a counter offer. Why don't we just keep using out domination of the media and the greed and cowardice of the gentile elite to do whatever we want?
He's right. I'm becoming a Baptist as soon as my mother dies.
Simon Newman does have a point: nobody complains when the Irish want to support Ireland. The ideological part probably has to do with too many Jews in the universities and not enough in the real world.
There's also the fact that Israel's enemies happen to sell us a lot of oil. Now I don't see any reason to make an illiberal part of the world any richer than it otherwise is, but right now we need the oil from the Arabs. Not that it wouldn't be good to get off the oil pipe and stop funding our enemies, but until then...
Since you may take a lot of flack for this article (took
a lot of courage to write it, balanced though it is) here's another
angle you might pursue next week which could partially call off the
dogs, at least the ones on the right.
"America needs a wall like Israel has"
You've said this before, but that point is one of the strongest for
the patriotic immigration reform coalition. It should be the leading punch
in any debate with Tamar Jacoby et alia.
I've always been amazed that every single "right winger" who gets
the influence of the Ashkenazim starts taking a left-wing line on Israel
(like McConnell and Buchanan at AmCon for example). This is stupid as it's pushing
them to be "consistent" from a leftist standpoint, i.e. left-wing in Israel
and left-wing in the US. But while I understand vexation over spying,
etc. why does AmCon want more leftists? Moreover, once you start expressing sympathy for the poor fundamentalist Palestinians in Israel (example: http://www.amconmag.com/2006/2006_06_05/buchanan.html) , it's hard to turn around and then say that you wouldn't offer them asylum in the US!
Why isn't there anyone pushing them to be consistent from a rightist
standpoint, i.e. right-wing in the US and right-wing in Israel? That should be a much more frequent talking point than it is. I can
attest to the efficacy of this (unexpected) tack in quite a few
personal debates.
--foobarbaz
Steve,
As an aside. I recently read a resume of a famous German pundit's new book. The guy's name is Sholl-Latour. He predicted the Iraq quagmire, but not because he is overtly anti-American or anti-semitic. He seems pretty level-headed. In his new book he says America will lose it stature as world power to China, and that Russia and Europe will be playing more enhanced roles again.
I wonder whether the damage caused by multi-culturalism, illegal immigration, unleashed capitalism, and the wars in the ME which to some extent are related to AIPAC have something to do with this? Plus, what will Israel's deal be with China, a stronger EU and an emerging Russia? I read that jewish organizations are starting to strongarm the EUrocrats in Brussels so I can imagine they will pull off another AIPAC in Europe. But how are they going to strongarm the Chinese or Russians? Just curious to hear your opinion.
Yeah, you are free to talk about it, but does that do any good? The Cuban lobby still has a stranglehold on Cuba policy.
BTW, I don’t think they are the victims of a great crime. Cuba under Batista was a mob-ruled sinkhole of corruption and vice. There's a new book out about it: HAVANA NOCTURNE.
While I generally agree with your statement, I believe it fails to account for a wider scope of Jewish opinion and influence. I propose that there are two general categories of Jewish thought, the nationalists(and by nationalist I mean Israeli) position represented by neocons, chicken hawks, Likud supporters, and such; and the internationalists along the lines of George Soros and company. While there's considerable ideological overlap (such as zealous support of mass immigration), there is also a great deal of conflict between these two groups.
While we gentiles really don't have the ability to dislodge jewish influence altogether, we do have an opportunity to choose which group (deeply planted in their respective parties) has the upper hand. For the last eight years, the Bush administration has given the (numerically inferior) neocon movement an overwhelming mandate to dictate policy, which threatens even now to foist us into a war with Iran.
I suggest that, lacking some sort of credible strategy for actually asserting our own agenda, that gentiles would be wise to rally behind the Democratic Party in the coming election, while seeking out and disproportionately supporting with money and votes the DNC candidates who are tough on immigration. Doing so would pluck the keys to our military from the warmongers and pressure the GOP to court the nativists.
The problem for the Israel lobby and its supporters is that if there's an open debate their dual loyalty will come under scrutiny.
They know that they face the real risk of being accused of playing toy soldiers with Americans GIs' lives in Iraq and now Iran.
America's interests plainly aren't the same as Israel's, and so there can't be a debate. They can hold this line because virtually America's entire political class has acquiesed in this betrayal, most damningly the journalists who've again and again have chosen to look away. As Philip Weiss says on his superb MondoWeiss blog, 'America's journalism is broken'.
It'd be nice to think that the blogsphere could shame the political class into discussing some of these issues, but I'm not optimistic.
James Woolsey's comment on W and M's book is the best: "Reading [Walt and Mearsheimer's] version of events is like entering a completely different world." Foreign policy is conducted in the national interest. Period. If you can't see how Israel is in the national interest, you're being blinded by your domestic antisemitism.
Sorry, SS, you've struck out on this one. But you usually do on Jews.
clearly its not sustainable, clearly it is wrecking America beyond repair, but why comprimise when you dominate so thoroughly. Do you honestly expect the Jewish elite to have a crisis of conscience like the WASPs had when the jews confronted them? Look what happen to the WASP elite - you could almost here the jews snicker 'ha sucker' as they took over.
As you mention the Jewish elite may be 'intelligent' but they are also high strung and paranoid and very very unfair. The only way they will ever listen to reason is when she raps their knuckles as ben franklin might say.
And what about Cuban Jews, Steve? Which model are they to follow?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_Cuba
Feith, the other neocons, and Cuban-American organisations display dual loyalties?
How often do they side with US interests when they conflict with the perceived interests of Israel and Cuba? I don't see anything dual about their loyalties.
The kindest thing that can be said is that some of the members of the Israel/Cuba lobbies are probably being sincere when they say there is no conflict between what they lobby for and American interests. But that just shows how ethnic interests can determine their overall worldview and blind them to how others see them.
Well, "The Jews Said", I guess you could do as you suggest, but in the long term it probably won't work out.
The cowardly gentile elite will cut you loose as soon as your support becomes problematic -- i.e. as soon as the gentile masses focus on how you enable the gentile elites to the detriment of the gentile masses.
Go read "The Fatal Embrace" by Benjamin Ginsberg
(http://tinyurl.com/5lmex4)
Ginsberg teaches that it's dangerous for Jews to suck up to the cowardly gentile elite, particularly once they have achieved a high profile (think federal law: "disproportionate representation = prima facie racism/discrimination").
Seems like assimilation would be easier and safer, but, hey, that's just my opinion and I'm a dumb goyishe kopf.
Steve, your analogy is wrong in all sorts of places.
1. The Cuban Community is united, Jews in America divided. Some Jews call for the end/destruction of Israel. Others for it's continuing survival, others for a "grand bargain" with Syria or Saudi or whoever. Cubans all want the hereditary rulers (the Castro family) gone from kingship on Cuba.
2. Cuba is an enemy of America. Not a powerful one, but still an enemy ruled by a King (and his successor in the family) in the classic Big Man style.
3. Iran is an enemy of America. A real enemy, who has blown up a lot of Americans (Khobar Towers, Beirut Barracks and Embassy), kidnapped and tortured to death CIA Station Chiefs (Buckley) and has promised to "end America" repeatedly while pursuing nuclear weapons and building up it's Hezbollah tool.
Iran is a VERY dangerous enemy, because like the Imperial Japanese they believe "fighting spirit" will overcome other disparities, know America only through CNN and stuff Dems/Media/Celebrities say, and think that "a decisive blow" as Ahmadinejad put it, will cause America to collapse in it's "own sin." Hezbollah has trained AQ before and after 9/11. With nukes, and with Pakistan also a credible source for nukes, ANY terrorist nuking of the US could be done with by their lights, low risk of retaliation by pointing to Pakistan (or vice versa). They might even be right.
America's problem is not "Jews" and it is the sign of a weak mind to point to a scapegoat. It is rather nuclear proliferation, weakness in American response to 30+ years of provocations, excessive legalism, encouraging proliferating third world regimes to attack America with as they see it, no real comeback.
"The Jews" are simply too divided to offer any real influence on US policy.
One more thing, "The Jews Said". You might be tempted to think that it can't happen here, because the gentile masses will appreciate Jews for the wonderful things you have done for us (and you have). That's a bit dangerous, though. Take a look at Africa, for example.
White Rhodesians were incredibly generous to blacks. They gave them medicine, education, clothes, jobs, books, libraries, etc.
Common sense says the Africans ought to have compared their spear-chucking loincloth lives of 1880 with their modern urban lives of 1980 and fallen on their knees thanking the white folks for all they did.
But they didn't did they? For some strange reason, they wanted to control their own lives and put their own people in charge of everything, even if they made a total cock-up of it. At least it would be truly African. Even though they are utterly degraded and brtalized under Mugabe, I have yet to hear any of them ask for the return of white rule.
I think that is called human nature.
I think that rejection of rule by anyone else also happened in Israel, where it is called "Zionism".
I think it could happen here in America for the American nation, too.
Everybody wants their own homeland -- the Africans, the Jews, and us Americans, too.
As a member of the Jewish nation and a die hard supporter of your own national homeland, Israel, I am sure you feel the same.
In fact, that's why I donate to Nefesh b'Nefesh. As Herzl felt and I feel, all the sons and daughters of Israel should return to their homeland, Israel, the only place on earth where they can be truly redeemed and fulfilled. It may feel nice in the galut, but money isn't everything, you know. Good luck!
Steven Rose is fanatically anti-Zionist. As such, his anti-IQ position and his anti-racism are not a grand conspiracy against white gentiles nor ideological hypocrisy as SS implies. I think Rose is s a nut, but let's be fair: SS has used Rose's person to prove a rhetorically inconsistent point.
'America needs a wall like Israel has.' This is rhetorically disingenuous, and not really clever at all. Whether or not American needs a wall (I'm for it, but who cares), it would still not be 'a wall like Israel has'. Israel's wall was built due to basic security concerns. Whatever their record of mischief, llegal aliens in the USA are not, as yet, blowing themselves up on busses. I suppose, though, that that would be the day!
""The Jews" are simply too divided to offer any real influence on US policy."
HA, I love this guy!
You're right, a country with an economy the size of Miami's on the other side of the world that hasn't invaded anybody since the time of the movie 300 should have us shaking in our boots!
As far as "weakness" in the face of provocation, see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Liberty_incident
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lavon_Affair
The thing that's always ironic to me is that a very solid majority of Jews were not in favor of the Iraq War...Jews are not ideologically monolithic the way American Cubans are.
I would add to testing99's comments. We had a special relationship with England in 1942 not only because our institutions and much of our culture are descended from GB, but because we believed her cause to be right. Americans were also descended from Germans, Poles, Italians, Swedes, etc, but we did did not respond in the same way to the actions of those nations. And we have not always believed the UK to be right in all things, but have been generally loyal even when disagreeing.
I ache for Christians in Africa not merely because they are co-religionists, but because I believe their causes to be very frequently right.
Not keeping this distinction in mind when discussing Israel is reductionist. Many people, Jews and gentiles alike, support the continuance of Israel, and believe American treasure should go to supporting it because they are pretty generally right in their goals. They are a democratic, free-market nation, unfairly accused at every turn.
That it sometimes seems that we lose advantage and alliance with other nations in the ME because of our support of Israel, I believe this to be an illusion. If Israel were moved to Montana next week, we would notice only the briefest of respites before the same cast of characters in the ME started acting up again. Once it is understood that complaining about Israel is merely a cover for these tribal nations, a clearer examination of the benefits and losses to us of Israel's existence can be made. To these eyes, it is much plus, little loss.
Steve, you've caused the scales to drop from my eyes yet again. I stand in awe of your courage to mention the unmentionables and thereby help me to see the truth.
How old are you? What am I going to do when you die?
"I definitely think it would be a lot better for America and for Jews if Jewish Americans would focus narrowly on Israeli and Jewish interests"
They ARE.
The rest is not that important.
It always amazes me that Jewish neocons switched from being Trotskyists (a branch of communists) to (supposedly - only in America, folks) the republican party and being right wingers.
Israel comes first, the rest is window dressings.
Disclaimer - not all Jews are like that, but enough so that the stereotype is basically correct.
what will Israel's deal be with China
This is probably one of the most important questions of the 21st century.
You might want to read this 120 page document from the Jewish People's Policy Planning Institute, based in Israel:
www.jpppi.org.il/JPPPI/SendFile.asp?DBID=1&LNGID=1&GID=456
Excerpts don't really do this justice. You really need to check out the whole thing, fascinating reading. A few samples:
----
What should be the Jewish policy goals?
None of these potential problems should impede efforts to pursue key Jewish policy goals,
which are:
■ Strengthening the links between China and the Jewish people and broadening China’s
knowledge of Jewish culture and history, to facilitate a better understanding of current
events;
■ Responding to false stereotypes imported from abroad;
■ Emphasizing common interests and perspectives between the Chinese and Jewish peoples,
including shared geopolitical and other global concerns.
----
No single policy can respond to all these goals, but a mix of policies might. This mix should
include approaches to decision makers and communication with scholars and students-
members of future elites — as well as with a broader public. The consent of Chinese
authorities and experts will obviously be essential. It must also be understood that this is a
long-term endeavor; not everything can be implemented quickly. But it is important to make
a start now, taking up at least some of the following recommendations:
1) A permanent delegation of main Jewish organizations speaking for large parts
of the Jewish people
Because there is no indigenous Jewish community, no Chinese citizen can speak on behalf
of Judaism or the Jewish people, in contrast to Chinese Moslems and Christians. The State
of Israel cannot and should not represent the entire Jewish people. A permanent delegation
of World Jewry, maintaining relations with the appropriate Chinese government authorities
and institutions, should help improve information flow between China and the wider Jewish
world, as well as mutual understanding and cooperation. Such relations do exist between
Jewish organizations and other countries and continents.
----
In regard to China, a long-term policy
strategy will require at least three steps:
■ A definition of the difference between Jewish people and Israeli state policies. Obviously,
the two are not the same, although sometimes they will be closely coordinated and often, cooperative. This report deals with Jewish people policies.
■ An indication of the specific tasks of the main branches of the Jewish people. With regard
to China, American Jewry is clearly of paramount importance (Chapter 3.3). American Jews are able to achieve things that no other
branch of the Jewish people can achieve.
■ A priority-setting mechanism, or at least an agreement on major priorities. This is a dif-
ficult step. Priority setting and a comparative cost-benefit analysis of recommendations
are essential for a rational policy, but they
are sensitive and often politically impossible
or irrelevant because independent decision
makers and funding sources will do what
they consider most important.
-------
Would it be more productive to have two or
three leading Jewish policy makers visit China
for a couple of days for discussions with senior
Chinese officials, or to have three important
Jewish books translated and printed in Chinese
for scholars and students, in editions of three
to five thousand copies? The financial implica-
tions would be of the same order of magnitude
for both options — approximately U.S.$ 20-30 thousand...
------
...Some Chinese experts have indicated that they
prefer initiatives towards strengthening the rela-
tions between China and the Jewish people as
a whole, Israel included, over one that aims at
Israel only. Together, World Jewry may be able
to exert a stronger leverage than Israel could
do alone. The different branches of the Jewish
people have different perspectives and to a large
degree, independent policies, but they can also
act as a cooperative and complementary body.
Big Bill:
They may go there, but they won't stay there.
http://www.forward.com/articles/13523/
A recent survey by the Jerusalem-based Menachem Begin Heritage Center found that 59% of Israelis had approached or intended to approach a foreign embassy to ask for citizenship and a passport. (Interestingly, though, only 22% acknowledged actually considering leaving the country for even a limited period of time.) The 41% of Israelis not lining up for a second passport presumably either cannot prove sufficient parental roots in a new Eastern European member state of the European Union like Romania or Hungary, or find this to be an unpatriotic or tainted act, somehow akin to Olmert’s taking first-class flight tickets and hotel suites from Talansky....
I also have an acquaintance or two who are trying to collect third and even fourth nationalities, based on their parents’ origins and children’s places of birth — just for the sport of it. Does all this rush for passports diminish our identity as Israelis? Is there something sleazy about it, like Talansky slipping Olmert an envelope holding $5,000 in greenbacks?
I doubt it. On the contrary, one could probably just call it another national characteristic.
Yossi Alpher, a former senior adviser to Prime Minister Ehud Barak and former director of the Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies at Tel Aviv University, is co-editor of the bitterlemons family of online publications.
Simon Newman does have a point: nobody complains when the Irish want to support Ireland.
If that's true, then let me be the first. I'm sick of arrogant Irish-Americans who don't know where their loyalties lie and who would put the interests of illegal Irish immigrants ahead of their own country.
Ted Kennedy, I'm looking at you.
Matt Parrott,
To some extent your "plan" would be like froth on the wave, but you do realize that with the Dems ascendant you will have more Jews in higher offices than under Bush, right? For all the huffing and puffing, there wasn't even one Jewish cabinet secretary under Bush. Yeah, you had the number two and three guys at Defense as Jews at one point, but they're both long gone.
On the Dem side, you've got Jews like Rahm Emanuel and Chuck Schumer, who cleverly went around the country recruiting gun-toting whites that the proles would vote for -- Heath Schuler, Jim Webb, etc. Schumer and Emanuel lap those guys in IQ and political skills and will drive the agenda for all their recruits.
"Steven Rose is fanatically anti-Zionist. As such, his anti-IQ position and his anti-racism are not a grand conspiracy against white gentiles nor ideological hypocrisy as SS implies."
Sailer's point is that guys like Rose take anti-IQ positions out of fear that it will result in anti-Semitism. Simple.
Nobody likes a Strawmanner.
"anonymous",
You're almost certainly right that my proposed "strategy" would amount to little more than froth on the waves. I do, however, believe that unconventional democrats like Jimm Webb and Heath Schuler have an opportunity to combine immigration restriction and rejection of the Iraq War to provide an outlet for paleocon frustration.
I understand that the democratic party is significantly more beholden to jewish interests, and that jews would retain disproportionate influence, but that's sort of beside my point. My point is that, for lack of a credible strategy for reducing jewish influence to proportionate levels, we do maybe have the ability to select which flavor of disproportionate jewish influence we end up with.
There's a lot to despise about George Soros and his ilk, and they certainly don't represent my interests, but they don't want to instigate a global bloodbath in the name of Israeli interests, and that's a start. Not to get Machiavellian or get into a tangential game theory debate, but I believe that refusing to vote or voting for some third party candidate could jeopardize an opportunity to take the keys to the pentagon away from the neocons.
BIGOTS 4 OBAMA!
If that's true, then let me be the first. I'm sick of arrogant Irish-Americans who don't know where their loyalties lie and who would put the interests of illegal Irish immigrants ahead of their own country.
Or when then championed the cause of the IRA back during the Troubles. But while I can understand why they would do that, entirely incomprehensible to me was how Mario Biaggi was even more pro-IRA than the Irish. He didn't even have the excuse of the Christian Zionists of thinking that he was helping bring about the rule of Christ on earth.
Congrats Steve, you found a way to introduce a topic that's about as fraught and intellectually dangerous as they get in our society at the moment.
You did it of course by jumping right to your solution, rather than first dwelling on evidence of the degree of disproportionate influence.
In that way you demonstrate that your intentions are limited and not grandly hostile, or likely to "snowball".
I don't see any evidence that the Cuban lobby is powerful. America's policy toward Cuba is exactly the same as our policy toward the rest of Latin America.
America violently opposes economic leftists. Cuba is the most extreme leftist country in Latin American history, therefore our reaction has been more extreme. But our reaction fits perfectly into the spectrum of our historical behavior in Latin America.
Furthermore, our policy towards Cuba was formed before the Cuban lobby existed, and it hasn't gotten more harsh. If anything, our policy has gotten milder since the Cuban lobby became powerful. We once invaded the country, we sent waves of terrorists at it, and we tried out biological weapons on them. We hardly do any of that any more.
America violently opposes economic leftists. Cuba is the most extreme leftist country in Latin American history, therefore our reaction has been more extreme. But our reaction fits perfectly into the spectrum of our historical behavior in Latin America.
While I do think this country has an unhealthy love affair with unrestrained capitalism, a lot of this had to do with a rival Great Power funding revolutions in our backyard. I think a lot of the reason we don't really pay attention to Cuba that much anymore is that it's no longer a threat.
Post a Comment