What Did Obama Stand For?
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What Did Obama Stand For?
with Norman Finkelstein
A major part of Barack Obama’s appeal to voters was his supposedly astounding intellectual acumen. But how much of this is backed up by the facts and how much of it was political myth-making? In this excerpt from this week’s episode, Norman Finkelstein and I ask whether there was any political or intellectual substance behind the public image of the former president.
This is a clip from the episode that went out to paying subscribers on Monday. To get access to the full episode, as well as an ad-free podcast feed, Q&As, and other exclusive content and benefits, click below.
What Did Obama Stand For?
Glenn, I know you did not cast yourself as a Middle East expert and provide a platform for free speech, not endorsing all views expressed. FYI, just so you’re aware, regarding the attacks on Israel in the last few days, in which families were slaughtered, children and the elderly were taken hostage, young women were subjected to sustained brutal assault, Finkelstein has commented. According to ADL (no darling of the Right):
“On his Substack, academic and activist Norman Finkelstein wrote that Hamas’ actions “warms [sic] every fiber of my soul” and compared the attacks to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising:
“.. if we honor the Jews who revolted in the Warsaw Ghetto—then moral consistency commands that we honor the heroic resistance in Gaza. I, for one, will never begrudge—on the contrary, it warms every fiber of my soul—the scenes of Gaza’s smiling children as their arrogant Jewish supremacist oppressors have, finally, been humbled.”
https://www.adl.org/resources/blog/anti-israel-activists-celebrate-hamas-attacks-have-killed-hundreds-israelis
I have a low regard for Finkelstein in his opinions or as a person when he opines on Israel (my grandmother said that worst ant-Semites are Jewish anti-Semites), however, no matter how or why he arrived at his feelings about Obama and in this, the Obama arena, he correct. To refute Finkelstein re Israel, you might have Dershowitz on, who he actually referenced.