Boker tov, Boulder
May 16, 2010
You cannot imagine how angry I am. So I told you before about the rabbi here, how he had an "interfaith dialogue" event with the local imam - at the synagogue and mosque. How he invited the most anti-Israel Representative in all of Congress to join them.
Oh, and did I mention that he called the local newspaper and invited them too?
So the most anti-Israel Representative in all of Congress, the No. 1 Recipient of Money from CAIR in all of Congress, got a big color spread on the front page of the local paper... Pictures of him in a synagogue for the first time in his seventeen terms in Congress. Oh, and by the way, this isn't even his district.
So now, NOW, what's going on? I'll let him tell you, because I can't talk or write about it yet without sputtering.
This is what the "rabbi," a "leader in the Jewish community," wrote on his Facebook page:
More on my White House Visit.Let me know if you want to join us.Today at 12:41pm
As almost all of you know by now, for the last month, I have been involved in a series of meetings at the White House. I have had the unique opportunity to have conversations with members of the Administration: Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, Ambassador Dennis Ross, who runs Obama's Iran policy; Dan Shapiro, the deputy national security adviser who supervises policy for Israel and its neighbors; Susan Sher, the chief White House liaison to the Jewish community
The meetings were put together shortly after Passover at the request of Rahm Emanuel himself. He attended a seder at the home of an old friend, Rabbi Jack Moline of Alexandria, Virginia. Moline has known Emanuel for years and serves as the Director of Public Policy for the Rabbinical Assembly (the Conservative Movement’s Rabbinical Organization). They were discussing the slippage of support among Jews for Obama, based primarily on what seemed to be happening between Israel and the United States. Emanuel asked Moline if he could put together for him a very small but diverse group of rabbis: men, women, Reform, Conservative and Orthodox to meet in the West Wing, the Roosevelt Room for an honest conversation. He didn’t want people who spoke on behalf of an organization but rabbis who could speak honestly and independently.
There were 15 of us; according to Moline, we were the “A-list.” (How I got on that list will be one of great mysteries of human history!)
We were asked to prepare statements in advance if we wished, offer our honest assessments and concerns about this Administration, as well as give suggestions on how to move forward.
They heard from us and we heard from them.
These were intimate conversations. After our first meeting, we were kept regularly informed about things that were being said and done regarding Middle East policy and brought back this week for a “check up”.
It has been an extraordinary month.
These meetings were to kept as secretive as possible to afford the group and the Administration an opportunity to talk openly and without feeling the need to figure out what to say to the press or what to say to our congregants (I did not have to worry about people saying: “Hey, you tell Rahm and those guys on behalf of me that…”.) We were different than some of the other “official” groups. We were not there for photo-ops, came with no agenda, and represented no constituency. We spoke as rabbis who had our “ears to the ground”. They didn’t want mouthpieces delivering messages and we didn’t want to hear talking points that we could recite by heart.It was a conversation.
I have pages and pages of notes. And now that the “embargo” has been lifted, this amazing chapter in my life has ended and I want to share it with you.
What I will be doing in the next couple of weeks (before I head to XXXXXX XXXX for the summer!) is arrange to have evenings where I can tell you what happened, from what was said at those meetings, what I said when I had my chance to speak, my impressions and what I believe came out of those meetings. I am preparing a Power Point presentation of what the Administration feels they have gotten right (and gotten wrong), as well as what questions were asked, answered, and left unanswered. To paraphrase Rabbi Moline, I want to be neither an apologist nor a cynic, but an honest broker. I want to fully brief you (as well as members of the press and the larger community) and then have a conversation, something we can’t do with a sermon.
You will just need to come to one of these evening sessions but I am ready to speak at more than one session because obviously, schedules are different and I want to offer what I have learned to anyone who wants to listen. I want to share and then hear from you.
Check your e-mails next week for the times of these special presentations.
& Wait! There's MORE:
HOT AIR
Jerusalem Post
After Words
by Caroline Glick:
"Moral blindness in the face of evil is depravity."
