Jim Geraghty on "Blood Libel"

http://www.nationalreview.com/campaign-spot/256955/term-blood-libel-more-common-you-might-think




The Term ‘Blood Libel’: More Common Than You Might Think
By Jim Geraghty 
Posted on January 12, 2011 9:51 AM 
The use of the term “blood libel” in non-Jewish contexts is out of bounds, eh?
Andrew Sullivan, October 10, 2008:
A couple of obvious thoughts. Paladino speaks of “perverts who target our 
children and seek to destroy their lives.” This is the gay equivalent of the 
medieval (and Islamist) blood-libel against Jews.
Ann Coulter’s column, October 30, 2008:
His expert pontificator on race was The Washington Post’s Eugene Robinson, who 
said the Pittsburgh hoax was “the blood libel against black men concerning the 
defilement of the flower of Caucasian womanhood. It’s been with us for hundreds 
of years and, apparently, is still with us.”
From the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, September 30, 2009:
Almost immediately following the aftermath of the shooting, the Military 
Religious Freedom Foundation was the unlikely voice that called for the 
safeguard of Muslims in the armed forces. 
>Within hours of the news breaking, MRFF founder and president Mikey Weinstein 
>called upon President Barack Obama to “immediately issue a statement as 
>Commander-in-Chief making it clear that there would be a zero-tolerance policy 
>against any member of the U.S. military inflicting harassments, retribution or 
>reprisal against an Islamic member of the U.S. military.” . . .
>He criticized former Alaska Governor and vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin 
>for saying that she was “all for” profiling against Muslims.
>“We’re not painting all Jews as thieves for Madoff’s economic crimes,” said 
>Weinstein, comparing Palin’s comments to a “blood libel.”
During the recount in 2000:
Florida Democrat Peter Deutsch last night on Crossfire:
>Let me just talk a little bit about the whole, I guess, spin from the 
>Republicans about — which has been to me the absolute most — the worst 
>statements I have ever heard probably in my life about anything. I mean, almost 
>a blood libel by the Republicans towards Al Gore, saying that he was trying to 
>stop men and women in uniform that are serving this country from voting. That is 
>the most absurd thing and absolutely has no basis in fact at all.
In the grand scheme of things, the idea that Palin used a phrase associated with 
one particular, egregious, and historically recurring false accusation to rebut 
a modern false accusation seems like little reason for outrage. For perspective 
on what really is worth outrage, the services for 9-year-old victim Christina 
Taylor Green are tomorrow.
 
UPDATE: Some more examples, from my side of the aisle:
Jed Babbin, September 8, 2004:
When, in April 1971, John Kerry testified to a Senate committee that “. . . war 
crimes committed in Southeast Asia [were] not isolated incidents but crimes 
committed on a day-to-day basis with the full awareness of officers at all 
levels of command,” he said that the average American soldier who fought in 
Vietnam was a war criminal. Kerry’s statement was false, a blood libel that 
hangs in the air to this day.
Michael Barone, November 15, 2004:
And the argument against Michael Dukakis, which he never effectively countered 
because there is no effective counter, is that giving furlough to people who 
have life without parole is a position that Dukakis defended over 11 years as 
governor of Massachusetts or governor candidate, is a crazy law, and he 
supported it over 11 years. You don’t have to be a racist to want a murderer, 
whatever his race, to stay in jail and not be allowed outside on the weekend. To 
say that the American people were racist and they just want black people in, is 
blood libel on the American people.
John Hood, September 23, 2003: “A ‘Blood Libel’ Against the News & Observer.”
ANOTHER UPDATE: Either Joel Roberts or Andrew Cohen of CBS News (both names are 
listed), February 9, 2005:
Ward Churchill still doesn’t get it. Even though he has tried to clarify and 
backtrack upon the worst of his intemperate remarks about the victims of the 
terror attacks on America, he persists in hanging a blood libel on thousands of 
victims and, by clear implication, you and me.
Andrew Cohen of CBS News, May 7, 2008:
So-called “judicial activism” occurs, in other words, when it’s your side that 
lost the case and it is nothing short of a blood libel against judges to accuse 
them of operating by fiat.
Alex Beam in the Boston Globe, January 14, 2005, discussing the accusation that 
an official had used the “n-word” in meetings overseas:
My two anonymous sources were making charges that amounted to ‘blood libel’ 
against former colleagues; that raised the bar for ethical publication.
John Derbyshire, April 28, 2008: “A Blood Libel on Our Civilization.”
AP, July 28, 2008:
Just before Obama spoke, Newsday editor Les Payne had called “blood libel” the 
argument that African-American journalists could not objectively cover Obama’s 
candidacy.
ANOTHER UPDATE: Frank Rich, New York Times columnist, October 15, 2006:
The moment Mr. Foley’s e-mails became known, we saw that brand of fearmongering 
and bigotry at full tilt: Bush administration allies exploited the former 
Congressman’s predatory history to spread the grotesque canard that 
homosexuality is a direct path to pedophilia. It’s the kind of blood libel that 
in another era was spread about Jews.
PERMALINK

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