Republican revolution among Jews

Looks like another of the democrat core groups is seeing the light. Howie (Dr. Demento) Dean is going to have his hands full trying to stop the bleeding. Of course, if Howie keeps makes little comments like the racist one he made a couple of weeks ago, there will be no way to stop the bleeding. - Sailor

Los Angeles Daily News
Republican revolution among Jews
By Bridget Johnson
Columnist


Wednesday, March 02, 2005 - On a recent rainy Sunday night, I added my umbrella to the stack outside the door of a Woodland Hills home and crept into the parlor to witness one small step in a revolution.

Larry Greenfield, director of the 3,000-member strong Republican Jewish Coalition of Southern California, canvassed the Southland before the last presidential election, speaking to audiences and participating in debates -- including single-handedly taking on Zev Yaroslavsky and Rep. Brad Sherman at Valley Beth Shalom in Encino.

But after President Bush kept the White House, Greenfield wasn't ready to rest. Feeding off momentum from a jump in the Jewish vote for Bush over four years from 19 percent to 25 percent -- a stat Greenfield finds, for lack of a better term, conservative -- the regional RJC director went back out into the community.

The parlor speech in Woodland Hills is shorter than his usual stump -- "GOP: Party of Liberty" -- but the mostly Russian crowd is paying rapt attention to Greenfield. The Encino native clutches a hand-scrawled sheet of notes in his hand, though his facts seem committed to memory; he's itching to tell these folks why Jews should go GOP, and the reasons roll off his tongue.

The Democratic Party, he tells the group, is no longer that of JFK but of Teddy Kennedy. Bush has gone on the offensive against terrorists. Pakistan is cooperating; Libya's WMDs have bitten the dust. Bush is driving the spread of democracy that is vital to the survival of the West and Israel.

Exit polls being what they are, Greenfield believes the Jewish vote was closer to 30 percent for Bush. He also eyes a much higher goal for 2008, which accounts for his hectic schedule and late nights at the RJC's Westside office.

The national RJC, happy that Bush is comfortably ensconced in another term, has also moved on to new goals, like taking new Democratic National Committee chairman Howard Dean to task for his statements on Israel in a current ad campaign.

As a gentile observer of this movement, I find that the most refreshing thing for Republicans sick of the GOP stereotype -- namely, rich WASP men -- is also the most worrisome thing for a Democratic Party that has counted on certain demographics to carry its agenda. Back in 1992, when the Jewish GOP vote was only about 11 percent, it was safer for Dems to assume Jewish support. But that firm backing is eroding with each election as a younger generation of Jews goes to the polls and some older Jews take a leap of Republican faith.

I also see that not only are radical Islamists ready and willing to die for the destruction of the U.S. and Israel, and Palestinian schoolchildren taught that Israel doesn't exist, but the insidious disease of anti-Semitism is once again creeping into the mainstream -- and not just in always-on-the-fringe France.

New York-based documentarian Evan Coyne Maloney chronicled some of this growing sentiment in his short film "Peace, Love and Anti-Semitism?" American war protesters tell Maloney about their disdain to outright hatred of Israel and Jews; "Israel is a death knell for many Jewish people," one calmly tells the filmmaker, an Arafat-esque scarf draped around his neck. Another man says that Israel should be "phased out" and the Jews redistributed. "I think they could be relocated," the peace protester says. "I've heard Madagascar mentioned several times." Maloney is quick to point out that it was the Nazis who mentioned Madagascar several times before forgoing that plan in favor of extermination.

So, in these especially troubling times, it's telling that so many Israelis support Bush. But will American Jews follow suit?

Greenfield sees Republican and Jew as completely harmonious terms. "The pre-eminent Jewish political value is liberty and the pre-eminent American value is liberty, and today Israel and America are confident brothers in the battle against Islamofascism," he told me.

Back at the Woodland Hills parlor meeting, the speeches are done and people are leaving. A woman pauses by me, her hand clutching a roll of informational papers left on a table for attendees to scoop up. On the outside is a voter registration card.

Maybe, just maybe, Greenfield scored a political convert this night. Something tells me that just one would make giving up his Sunday night and venturing out into the storm worth it.

Bridget Johnson writes for the Daily News. Write to her at bridget.johnson@dailynews.com.