Rick Perry Continues Making Weird Comments About Jewish Life

[TexasTowelie]

Former governor Rick Perry (say it with me) has been swinging through Iowa like every other white Republican man running for president. This weekend, he stopped in at Maccabbee’s Deli in Des Moines (try the corn kasha), which produced the picture you see above, to speak with less than twenty members of the tribe who cared to hear what he had to say. Of course, he laid it on heavy about how much he relates, and mentioned a trip he made to Poland.

“The trip to Auschwitz … it’s like having the president come to the border of Texas and Mexico,” he said. “If you’ve never really seen what’s going on, it’s hard to get your arms” around it.

Hmm. While it’s discernible what Perry meant to convey, it’s also clear that Perry likes to use facets of Jewish existence to make political points. This president-on-the-border thing one of his most public gripes with the White House: the chief executive won’t agree to a Perry-led tour in the Rio Grande Valley. Astoundingly, such a great “friend of Israel” seems utterly unaware that no Jew would ever compare Auschwitz to the border. Few would be comfortable with a fundamentalist Christian making that comparison, given that Perry’s belief in end times rests on Israel’s existence so Jesus can destroy it, kill all Jews and other non-Christians, and take the fundamentalists with him to hang out with a deity.

It’s not the first time Perry has said something similarly strange about Jewish life. Late last year, Perry compared Hannukah to the Boston Tea Party, which he certainly appears to think has something to do with the current astroturf conglomeration. In so doing, he managed to misunderstand both stories while striking a very strange tone.

In Texas or outside of it, Rick Perry will be somewhere making news, at least until he (probably, but who can be certain) loses the presidential primary again early next year.

Source: http://www.burntorangereport.com/diary/29412/rick-perry-continues-making-weird-comments-jewish-life

[MosheFeingold]

1. Perry is an idiot, but

I could think of other things to get upset about.

His comment re: Auschwitz is true --- my parents had the good fortune to see the changing winds and barely escaped Europe and I fought in WWII. But I didn't understand the scope of the Shoa until I went to Dachau and later Auschwitz. Comparing the Shoa to the problems are the border is extremely ham-handed, trite, and out-of-scope but his point of "you have to go see it" is correct.

Not sure I understand the Hannukah comment. It was revolt against secularism, which, in some ways, is what the Republican Party stands for. The TEA party people are, however, all about taxes and size of government, which, while I disagree with them and believe a robust and centralized government is a good thing, is a secular issue.


In short, Perry is not a rocket scientist. In fact, he is an idiot. But I don't really have a problem with any of this.