With the end of this week came news of two potentially game-changing events which might influence the results of the endlessly fascinating race for the 39th Councilmanic-depressive. The first was the endorsement of the New York Times, the second was an outbreak of hate speech.
The intended beneficiary of each of these events was Brad Lander; the former event will surely inure to Lander’s benefit, while the latter, whatever its intent has become the occasion for damage control.
In the same week, another candidate, John Heyer, also received a press endorsement (The Brooklyn Paper), and was also revealed to be the beneficiary of a similar spewing of hatful bile. In Heyer’s case, it seems likely that both the endorsement and the revelation of iniquity will each prove far less significant.
Mr. Lander, a favorite of the Working Families Party and its allied series of shell organizations, shell corporate entities and shell games is claiming that an ad run in his name in, “Der Blatt,” a Yiddish language newspaper, on August 27th, was not his doing, nor his campaign‘s, and he is asking for an investigation.
This would appear to be unnecessary.
Despite all the dissembling, a story in City Hall News seems to have perfectly captured the sequence of events, although I’m not sure the story’s author realizes this.
The ad, which indicates it was paid for by Lander’s campaign, is in the form of a newspaper article. The “article” states, among other things, that Lander “strongly opposes various types of abominations (“toeivah” in the original Yiddish) and immoral laws that are major issues in the current elections.”
In the Brownstone Brooklyn area of the 39th Council District, it is generally considered an abomination that same-sex couples cannot be legally married, and the law forbidding this is considered to be immoral. Paradoxically, public opinion in the Borough Park section of the district is exactly the opposite; in fact, in those precincts, same sex activity, with the exception of dancing, is considered a capital offense, though learned opinion does vary on the question of whether execution is a state responsibility, that of the outraged individual, or to be left in the hands of a higher authority.
In Israel in 2005, the use of inflammatory language similar to that found in Mr. Lander’s ad was deployed in an effort to stop a Gay Pride parade in Jerusalem and probably helped to inspire the stabbing of three young man at a Gay Rights march by an unbalanced ultra-Orthodox fanatic (who coincidentally, comes from the same ultra-Orthodox Moshav as the cousin with whom Domestic Partner’s mother spent four years living with in an attic during the holocaust).
The anti-parade activists, using buzz words like “abomination” and “degenerate,” comprised both Americans (including Lander supporter Gershon Tannenbaum who also defended the use of similar language which helped to inspire the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin) and Israelis. Recently, many in the press, both here and in Israel, have blamed the use by the Ultra-Orthodox Israeli Shas Party of language similar to that which appeared in Lander’s ad for an incident in Tel Aviv, where a masked gunman walked into a community center for gay Israeli youth and opened fire, killing two and wounding ten more (an incident, which ironically enough, Lander condemned on his blog).
Of course, such a thing could never happen in any Arab country, as gay community centers would have been prohibited at penalty of death. That being said, it seems clear the perpetrator or perpetrators were Jews. While Hamas is both wildly homophobic and motivated to destroy Israel’s efforts to improve its image among liberals by appearing to be a beacon of social tolerance (which, in the context of the Middle East, it surely is) an Arab perpetrator would surely have used a suicide bomb.
After outing the abominators, Lander’s ad goes on to note “it would be a desecration in the name of God to support the other candidates who support laws permitting abominations … even if such candidates happen to be Jewish themselves.” One of those Jewish candidates, Bob Zuckerman, is openly gay, though the ad does have the good taste to omit that information, perhaps in an effort to prevent a recap of what occurred in Tel Aviv.
I do not intend this to be a hit piece; there is no doubt in my mind that Mr. Lander undertook this race without any intention of engaging in such tactics. However, based upon the various accounts of this incident as reported in the press, and my own two decades experience dealing with the politics of the Ultra-Orthodox, I have developed a theory of what most likely did occur.
To simplify, the race in the 39th is between four Democrats (including Mr. Lander) who occupy various spaces on the left/liberal end of the political spectrum and one who is somewhat culturally conservative (Mr. Heyer). It has been Mr. Heyer’s hope that, in a five way race, he could combine the old remnants of formerly Italian Carroll Gardens and formerly Irish Park Slope and Windsor Terrace with the Orthodox Jews of Borough Park and Kensington (plus a few voters he could fool) and eek out a narrow victory.
The problem for Mr. Heyer was that ultra-Orthodox votes were generally earned on a wholesale basis and in a transactional manner. Borough Park’s tribal chieftain, Assemblyman Dov Hikind, may indeed be a reactionary or worse, but in local races he rarely lets ideology interfere with doing business. Business in this case being a combination of being with winners and hakoras ha tov (Yiddish for dancing with those who brung ya”).
Hikind was likely dubious that a social conservative could win the 39th, and was also likely dubious of doing business with a candidate with whom he had virtually no useful relationships.
By contrast, two of the liberal candidates, Lander and Josh Skaller, had allies with whom Hikind had done business in the past. However, both Lander and the incumbent Councilman, Bill DeBlasio, were top priorities of the Working Families Party, and DeBlasio had delivered large for Borough Park. While DeBlasio has made no endorsements in the race, it has been made crystal clear to anyone capable of delivering a vote where his sympathies lie. In addition, Lander, while not reflexively pro-development (sorry Mole, but I will not lie), was clearly a more sympathetic ear to the sort of unbridled development traditionally favored in ultra-Orthodox communities (which, by virtue of their lifestyles, face dire housing shortages) than was Skaller.
Hikind endorsed Lander; likely, their pre-endorsement conversations avoided discussions about social issues and concentrated on questions of access and programmatic funding. As a liberal, I should make clear that these are exactly the sort of priorities I find most useful to encourage among social conservatives. And with Hikind came the support of his followers, as well as that of the opportunists who saw upon which side the challah was buttered and the cream cheese (and cash) schmeered: Tannenbaum, Menashe Silber, Pesach Greenberg, Yakov Daskal, and political operatives Ezra Friedlander, DeBlasio’s Yeruchim Silber, Bernard Freilich and Rabbi Yitzchok Fleischer, who ended up running Lander’s Borough Park operation.
Given what transpired, it seems unlikely that Hikind and Lander discussed Israel before the endorsement. This was likely because Hikind probably assumed that all the race’s Jewish liberals favored the wishy washy left-Zionist, Rabinish territorial compromises and two-state solutions he disdained as both ungodly and naïve.
But while Hikind’s assumptions concerning the views on Israel of Josh Skaller and Bob Zuckerman were indeed correct, if Mr. Hikind also attributed such beliefs to Mr. Lander, he was to be proven wrong. Mr. Lander had a paper trail and that trail included an article published in a largely anti-Zionist anthology which recounted the speech Mr. Lander read at his son’s circumcision, in which Lander pretty clearly repudiated the idea of a Jewish state.
Lander seemed surprised to be confronted with the issue, which would be problematic not only among the Orthodox and the Avigdor Lieberman loving secular Russians of Kensington, but also among the Reform and Conservative Jews of Park Slope and Cobble Hill, who, like myself, were largely wishy washy left Zionist Rabinites who think that Jews are entitled to a Jewish state the way the French are entitled to a French one, and generally favor a two-state solution.
While Israel might normally not be much of an issue for such folks in a race for City Council, the lack of many discernable differences on issues between the four liberal candidates certainly facilitated the elevation of the importance of even the most seemingly trivial distinctions. While Lander claimed to also favor such a two-state solution, a look at his essay begs the suspicion that those two states would be the West Bank and Gaza, but would not necessarily include Israel.
When he realized the matter would not just fade away, Lander’s solution was to obfuscate. He could have said that his views had changed, but did not. Instead, Lander claimed that he was always pro-Israel, and the speech was merely the regrettable product of a mistaken impression that his son’s non-Jewish mother made his child ineligible to become an Israeli.
Having read the entirety of Lander’s pompous and sanctimonious speech repudiating the claims to our people to the same right to nationhood recognized for virtually every other on earth but the Kurds, I am compelled to conclude that Mr. Lander is either suffering from a premature bout of Alzheimer’s or is lying through his teeth. His article does not even imply any objection to Israel’s definition of whom it considers to be Jewish.
My personal conclusion is the reason Lander refuses to acknowledge the real meaning of his prior position is not because of expedience; he could have easily apologized and said he had seen the light. I believe the reason he did not is because of shame. The only remaining question is whether he is ashamed of his past position, or his present one.
While Lander’s non-apology apology probably killed the matter as an issue among Brownstone Jews, however, it had the opposite effect among the ultra-Orthodox, some of whom were themselves non or anti-Zionist (although even most of those regard anti-Zionist politicians as probable anti-Semites, and have security concerns about their relatives who reside in the Zionist entity whose authority they do not themselves recognize).
Lander had not only repudiated Jewish nationalism, he was now publicly questioning their definition of what constituted a Jew; which means he was questioning their religious doctrines, which they considered the moral equivalent of saying “yo momma.” Lander’s mea culpa (perhaps not the best choice of words) had only thrown gasoline on the fire.
Hikind, a far right wing Zionist, was clearly appalled: “He said some things that were really beyond the pale…It was enough to really say I cannot support someone like that.”
Though Hikind stayed put, support for Lander in Borough Park, even among Rabbis close to Hikind, including some who had proffered endorsements, began to hemorrhage, especially as the sparking of their curiosity caused some to explore Mr. Lander’s stances on other issues. Last week, there were letters in the Jewish Press attacking Hikind about Lander. This week, the letter they ran vigorously defending Hikind managed to compare Lander to Hamas.
Most of support moving away from Mr. Lander has gone to Mr. Heyer, with a small residual going to Mr. Skaller.
Most of this support seems to have accelerated after June 20, when an ad for Mr. Heyer, virtually identical to the one later run on behalf of Mr. Lander, appeared in “Der Blatt.”
Mr. Heyer’s campaign is now expressing shock about the ad‘s contents in much the same manner as Captain Renault in Casablanca expressed the same after discovering gambling at Rick’s Café. However, like Renault, Mr. Heyer has been presented with his winnings and pocketed them without protest (until he got caught over two months later). The unlikely and unexpected support Mr. Heyer has attracted in Borough Park has made him a credible candidate.
Mr. Heyer’s campaign manager, Jesse Adelman, now claims that during the interview preparatory to the article Heyer paid for in “Der Blatt,” Heyer spoke only about “potholes and parking meters” and that other than an oblique reference Heyer made that he “agreed with the community’s values,” social issues did not come up.
Frankly, this assertion seems to be incredible.
If things had gone as they normally do in Borough Park, it would have been Mr. Skaller who was best positioned to benefit from the Lander meltdown. Borough Park likes to be with a winner, and unlike the other possible frontrunner, Mr. Zuckerman, Mr. Skaller is married to a member of the opposite sex, and while Ultra-Orthodox Jews have been known to make their peace with gay incumbents, they are unlikely to prefer gay candidates for an open seat (perhaps not the best choice of words).
Moreover, unlike Mr. Zuckerman, Mr. Skaller had supporters (Assemblyman Jim Brennan and District Leaders Jake Gold and Lori Knipel) with decent and long-term relationships with the Orthodox community; true, Skaller’s friends were was not what Borough Park considered A-list support, but they were certainly considered much stronger references than those proffered by Mr. Heyer.
The only plausible explanation for Mr. Heyer’s surge is that Heyer won them over on the basis of his position social issues (though it surely didn’t hurt that Heyer is even more pro-development than Mr. Lander), a strategy previously breached by Heyer’s campaign to reporters. Since the pragmatic leadership of the community was still backing Lander, albeit with far less enthusiasm, the door had swung wide open for an alternative manner of appeal. Mr. Heyer’s campaign had been getting its brains bashed in all across the Brownstone part of the district for his stance on social issues. One can easily understand his campaign coming to the conclusion it was time to make some lemonade from those lemons.
For instance, despite Mr. Adelman’s assertions to the contrary, it boggles the mind to believe that Heyer did not discuss tuition tax credits at the Der Blatt interview, since the video taped evidence provided by Heyer’s campaign indicates that he is talking about it constantly to anyone with a beard. Since Heyer only provides these short excerpts, we cannot be sure exactly what else Mr. Heyer told those Rabbis.
Moreover, “Der Blatt” had to find out Heyer’s positions from somewhere, and it seems unlikely that they got them from a source other than Heyer or his campaign. Der Blatt is the official news outlet of the Aroni faction of the Satmar Hasidim. The local weeklies containing articles detailing Heyer’s positions on abortion and same sex marriage are not widely read among Borough Park Hasidim, nor are the political websites covering the campaign.
Moreover, Satmar are prohibited from using the internet, except for email. Heyer, until recently, was not wired into the Hasidic community, except in the most indirect manner. There can be no other plausible explanation concerning how “Der Blatt” learned about Heyer’s positions than that they did so from Mr. Heyer or those in his employ.
At most, Mr. Heyer can possibly assert that he was unaware of the harsh and dangerously inflammatory language used in his Der Blatt ad, but it is laughable for he or his campaign to assert that they were unaware of the article’s substance.
Although, as I’ve previously written, I believe a victory by Mr. Heyer in a district so socially liberal would be harmful to the prospects of passing same-sex marriage, I do not believe his position, based on sincere religious belief, makes Mr. Heyer a bigot (although his seeming belief that his religious activities as a member of the Catholic laity are sufficient in and of themselves to make him the preferable candidate—the only possible conclusion one can draw from one of his pieces of literature—is deeply distressing, as is his campaign’s seeming effort to exacerbate cultural conflicts in Brownstone Brooklyn). In a less socially liberal district, I might even support a candidate who has not come in favor of marital equality (in fact, perhaps against my better judgment, I am rooting for Rock Hackshaw to win his Council race).
But there are limits of decency.
During the 70s, plenty of basically decent politicians, including Joe Biden, opposed busing for racial balance. Some did it to cover their asses, and some did it because they concluded, however well intentioned, its public policy impacts were ultimately negative (and I'm not so sure they were entirely wrong). Today (and then), some basically decent politicians oppose affirmative action for the same reasons (my opinion here is nuanced and case by case, but since I favor it in certain instances, I qualify as a supporter of affirmative action). Nonetheless, decent politicians (unlike the 1970s version of Dennis Kucinich) did not and do not make opposition to busing or affirmative action the centerpiece of their campaigns, no matter how sincere and well motivated their opposition. Those who do so are playing games with fire and gasoline.
And those who base their campaign on opposing the rights of a group which has faced continuing discrimination and violent harassment, and do so because it will gain them votes, are guilty of the same crime and will have blood on their hands if and when, as in Israel, such actions lead to death or physical injury.
And, certainly, the comments of blog threads by members of sects not prohibited from the web indicates that Heyer’s supporters have been beating these issues as if they were Gene Krupa or Ginger Baker and doing so using the dangerous language of extremists.
In his way, Heyer is running three campaigns. In Brownstone Brooklyn he trumpets himself as a liberal. Without using any ellipses, his website’s reprint of the Brooklyn Paper endorsement omit’s the original’s reference to his conservative positions on abortion and same-sex marriage.
His website also makes no mention of tuition tax credits and trumpets the support of people like Joan Millman, a former teacher public school administrator, and an outspoken opponent of tuition tax credits, for whom Heyer used to work. Millman is so committed to the idea that the best way for middle class parent to improve a mediocre local public school is to send their kids to there and then work to improve it, that she and her staff refuse to provide even friends and supporters with advice on how to obtain a variance.
Heyer’s website also includes statements saying how supportive Heyer is of public education from several present and former teachers, and an elementary school principal.
I have to ask the Assemblywoman and Principal Laura Scott, both dedicated public servants, if they have watched the videos of John and the Rabbis discussing his support for tuition tax credits or if they have read the Brooklyn Eagle interview (not on the web) with Heyer where he hails tuition tax credits as a great means to open up space in the public schools.
I never thought I’d see the day where people so dedicated to public schools could lend their credibility to someone who so nakedly advocates the planned shrinkage of public education. I wouldn’t believe my own eyes if my stomach weren’t churning so harshly.
The second Heyer campaign, as manifested in the videos, is the traceable English language version of his Borough Park operation. Hide the tuition tax credits stuff where the liberals won’t find it, but make it accessible to those who would find it a reason to support him.
The third Heyer campaign is the Yiddish version and sock-puppet version . Repugnant ads that no one in Brownstone Brooklyn can read, and the mouth to mouth and computer to computer spread of hate speech.
John Heyer believes that because the city Council will not be voting on them, abortion and same sex marriage are not legitimate issues in this campaign—EXCEPT SOUTH OF FORT HAMILTON PARKWAY (and in front of churches on Sundays). Not coincidentally, Brad Lander’s position as articulated by his Borough Park supporters like Ezra Friedlander, is exactly the same, but geographically reversed.
But it is Heyer‘s strategy that is working. Working so well, in fact, that Lander’s supporters are in a panic.
According to City Hall News, sometime after the Heyer article ran in Der Blatt and Heyer began to surge, Yitzchok Fleisher decided he needed a response in kind. He contacted Der Blatt on August 26 about placing what he called “something almost similar” for Lander.
Fleisher said that the deal was made at the last minute, and that the reporter at Der Blatt who wrote it essentially copied the Heyer piece, with some slight variations, which meets the definition of “something almost similar.”
Fleisher now claims to be surprised by what appeared. Given his long history in Borough Park politics, this assertion is even less credible than Adelman’s.
When interviewed by City Hall News in the wake of the ad’s revelation, Lander said he had no idea that the ad, which included photos of both him and de Blasio with prominent local rabbis, even existed. He also denied that he had authorized Fleisher to place it, “He’s got no authorization. He can’t do anything on my behalf…I have hundred of campaign volunteers, and none of them are authorized to spend money for my campaign.”
By contrast, Fleisher, when initially contacted by City Hall News, said that Lander had sent over various pictures of himself with rabbis and DeBlasio intended to run in the newspaper. Four days after the ad ran, the Lander campaign sent a letter to the Campaign Finance Board stating that they “did not request, see, authorize, approve, or pay for this advertisement.”
Sorting out who is culpable for what in the Lander ad is a somewhat more complicated matter than it is in the case of Heyer.
According to a story in the Courier-Life papers, Lander first blamed Fleisher for the ad, but later, in a Politicker NY article by Azi Paybarah, Lander changed his story and said that his campaign had nothing to do with it, and he's now asking the Campaign Finance Board for an investigation. As of today, Lander’s still sticking with that story. In the Courier, Fleisher says that he authorized an ad, but not that content, which he left up to Der Blatt.
Given the evidence, it boggles the mind to believe that Fleisher was not authorized to place an ad, and Lander is a fool to deny it. However, the question does remain what kind of ad the campaign had authorized Fleisher to place, and what kind of ad Fleisher authorized Der Blatt to run. .
As such, it is hard to see what there is to investigate.
Is Fleisher now saying that Blatt purposely screwed him, or that he never authorized an ad?
It is now being insinuated by Lander supporters that Der Blatt, which is supporting Heyer, ran the Lander ad on purpose to hurt him. But seriously, why would Heyer supporters facilitate publication of an ad which could only help Lander in Borough Park? Moreover, why would Heyer supporters have any interest in hurting Lander among the liberals who the ad would outrage? It wasn’t as if Heyer had any chance of picking up that support himself.
Finally, why would Der Blatt want to screw Fleisher?
Yes, they were supporting different candidates, but there were years here of a mutually beneficial working relationship not worth sacrificing over the differences between a Park Slope Apikoris and a Carroll Gardens Tallaner, each of whom would ensure Borough Park got its money. Business was business, it went on before the election and it would go on afterward; in fact, a little healthy competition fattened everyone‘s wallet.
On September 16, once the liberal and the gentiles went back home, Borough Park would go back to being Borough Park; one might jeopardize business relationships over something important, like who was going to be the Rebbe, but one was not going to do so over something as trivial as who was going to be the Councilman. The editors of Der Blatt knew they would have to deal with Yitzchok Fleisher in the future; it seems unfathomable that they would print something other than what he had authorized.
At best, it is perhaps possible that Mr. Fleisher had no knowledge of the piece’s exact wording. Under the circumstances, that would seem cold comfort at best.
In 2001, Mark Green’s Mayoral campaign distributed in white southern Brooklyn a piece of literature informing the public that think that Al Sharpton had endorsed Fernando Ferrer for Mayor. During Green’s race for Attorney General, I argued that, however stupid the strategy (it cost Green a close general election) and however offensive the piece (it contained a cartoon of Ferrer kissing Sharpton’s outsized buttocks), informing voters of this endorsement was not in itself racist. Green, for his part, argued that he had no prior knowledge of the literature. In a citywide race, this assertion is highly credible, but in a race for City council, it seems far less likely.
It may surprise Mr. Lander to learn that I find it highly unlikely that he had any prior knowledge of the contents of the Der Blatt ad. At worst, I think Lander, or the people he deferred decision power to, decided they needed to do something, and that Lander decided he didn't need to know more, but was caught off guard when he learned what had happened.
I am not sure that I can extend my belief in Lander’s innocence to those at the top level of his campaign, but it seems perfectly credible for them to have given Yitzchok Fleisher a free hand without realizing what the ultimate result of such laissez-faire management would be.
Given the well known history of Yiddish ads coming to bite candidates in the butt (ask Joan Millman or former Assemblyman Dan Feldman to tell you their stories) I think that a campaign’s not knowing exactly what is being said in a Yiddish language ad, especially one being placed in response to attacks concerning controversial social issues, is a lot like driving blindfolded. It is an act bordering upon depraved indifference.
But, I am willing to give Mr. Lander some benefit of the doubt. If he really had nothing to do with contents of that ad, he needs to dismiss Rabbi Fleisher from his campaign immediately and condemn him in the strongest terms using words like “bigotry” and “hate speech.”
Dismissing Fleisher in such a manner will not prove Lander’s innocence, but not doing so will prove that even if Lander was ignorant of Fleisher’s actions, he still facilitated and continues to facilitate them. Moreover, his failure to dismiss Fleisher will send a message that such actions are essentially going to be winked at. That would be the wrong message.
If Mr. Lander fails to undertake such a course, then his defeat will become a moral imperative, if only to show the world that our communities will not tolerate the exploitation of bigotry for political gain.
At this juncture, I am undecided what course to recommend in the event of Mr. Lander’s failure. A vote for Mr. Zuckerman would send by far the most powerful message, but Mr. Skaller currently seems in a better position to give Mr. Lander the lesson he may well have earned by a failure to take immediate remedial action.
I’ll think this out a bit longer while Mr. Lander ponders his course of action.