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ADL Condemns Limbaugh’s ‘Bankers’ Remark

Foxman: ‘borderline anti-Semitic’

by
Marc Tracy
January 22, 2010
Limbaugh at the White House, January 2009.(Mark Wilson/Getty Images)
Limbaugh at the White House, January 2009.(Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

Regarding President Obama’s attacks on alleged greedy bankers (no ethnicity specified), Rush Limbaugh had this to say: “To some people, banker is a code word for Jewish; and guess who Obama is assaulting? He’s assaulting bankers. He’s assaulting money people. And a lot of those people on Wall Street are Jewish. So I wonder if there’s—if there’s starting to be some buyer’s remorse there.” Er, Rush? Thanks, but no thanks.

The Anti-Defamation League’s Abe Foxman called the comments “borderline anti-Semitic” and suggested that Limbaugh apologize:

Limbaugh’s references to Jews and money in a discussion of Massachusetts politics were offensive and inappropriate. While the age-old stereotype about Jews and money has a long and sordid history, it also remains one of the main pillars of anti-Semitism and is widely accepted by many Americans. His notion that Jews vote based on their religion, rather than on their interests as Americans, plays into the hands of anti-Semitic conspiracy theorists.

Limbaugh put the cart before the horse: what Obama said is offensive to Jews only if he was making the connection that bankers are Jews. But, of course, he wasn’t. Instead, Limbaugh made the (offensive) connection himself, and then tried to cut-and-paste it into Obama’s prior remarks. It doesn’t really work that way. Sometimes a banker is just a banker.

Marc Tracy is a staff writer at The New Republic, and was previously a staff writer at Tablet. He tweets @marcatracy.