First he’s our first Gay President, now he’s our first Jewish president?
**Posted by Phineas
I mean, that’s kind of the idea when he told Conservative Jewish rabbis that he knows more about Judaism than any past president:
In the meeting, Obama reportedly boasted about his knowledge of Judaism, telling the leaders that he thinks he knows more “about Judaism” than all past presidents. He said he gained this knowledge of Judaism from reading.
“Obama … stressed he probably knows about Judaism more than any other president, because he read about it,” Haaretz reports. “[He] wondered how come no one asks Speaker of the House of Representatives John Boehner or Senate minority leader Mitch McConnel [sic] about their support to Israel.”
Similarly, he said to the group, “I [am] not going to tell you again how I even feel about Israel, but why [are] we still talking about it?”
He then suggested that he should not be questioned about his commitment to the Jewish state because “all his friends in Chicago were Jewish – and at the beginning of his political career he was accused of being a puppet of the Israel lobby,” Haaretz reports.
Get it? He read about Judaism (Once? Twice? How deeply? The menu at the local deli?), and, hey, some of his best friends were Jews, so of course he’s an expert on a nearly 6,000-year old religion.
What’s next, a production of “Guess who’s coming to (Passover) dinner?”
Bill Kristol responds:
And the claim that Obama knows more about Judaism than any president? His vanity boggles the mind. One could begin by citing Adams and Madison, who knew Hebrew, or Harry Truman, who knew Jewish history … but it’s silly to dignify this claim with a rebuttal. In thinking about the presidents since Truman, though, I’d guess the president who knew the most about Judaism was Jimmy Carter, who taught Sunday school and had a deep interest in religion. So let’s stipulate that of the modern presidents, Carter and Obama “know” the most about Judaism. But what is it they know? In Obama’s case, one could ask whether what he “knows” is what he learned from Rashid Khalidi (1) and Jeremiah Wright.
I know we’ve seen examples of his overwhelming ego again and again over the last 3-4 years, but each new one still leaves me saying “You’ve got to be kidding.”
Trouble is, he isn’t.
via Jim Geraghty’s Morning Jolt
RELATED: Jeff Dunetz isn’t impressed at all.
Footnote:
(1) That would be former PLO spokesman and Hamas sympathizer Rashid Khalidi, whom Obama toasted at a farewell dinner, the tape of which has been mysteriously suppressed by the LA Times. Never knew he was Jewish…
(Crossposted at Public Secrets)