Category: politics

On 10/7, a Reminder Why the Christian Should Stand With the Jew

~ penningink ~ 1 Comment

Earlier this summer I was walking with my wife in a pleasant waterfront area in Michigan when a man pointed at me and smiled. I was puzzled for a minute, and then I looked down at my t-shirt.

An illustration featuring a Christian cross and a Jewish star of David overlapping on a light blue background.

I was wearing a shirt that had the American and Israeli flags together. He walked over and introduced himself. He and his wife are American Jews and were visiting the area. My wife and I are Americans and Christians.

The four of us spoke for quite some time. The conversation kept going because we have so much in common. 

I am thinking of this conversation today, October 7, the third anniversary of the heinous attack by Hamas on Israel. I know several pastors and others who went to Israel after this attack. The Israeli government showed them in private some details of this attack on video—taken by the sick Hamas attackers—that was too abhorrent to be shown to international media. A description in words is bad enough—taking civilians of all ages captive, rape, sodomy, murder of parents in front of children, putting babies in ovens in front of their parents, beheadings. And the recorded this themselves and celebrated and sent messages that they had “killed Jews” to their parents who praised them. The evil murderers praised Allah as they did it, a demonstration of demonic deception.

But what is most stunning and egregious in all of this is the large numbers of the world population who responded with anti-semitic hatred, blaming the Israels and Jews for the incident and their response. It is reminiscent of the inhumanity to man against the Jews during World War II and the fact that some deny the holocaust.

But hatred of the Jews is prophesied, it is ancient, it defies logic, and it is on the rise in our day.

It is why now, more than ever, on this day especially, the Christian must stand with the Jew.

It is not only mandatory, but easy to do this, given the truth of our faith. The Jewish and Christian sacred texts overlap. The Torah is the first five books of the Old Testament, and the prophets and other writings in the Old Testament are shared with Christians. In the New Testament, Christians read the genealogy of Jesus through Jewish history, how Jesus is the promised messiah, and how the non-Jews (gentiles) may also receive salvation in Jesus.

Christians have a shared heritage and potential future. In fact, at the time of Christ, the Bible records that many Jews came to believe in Jesus even as others rejected him. Today also, many Jews do not believe Jesus to be the messiah, while others are called “messianic” Jews because they have accepted Christ. I know some of them and have read books by rabbis who accept Jesus is the son of God and Messiah spoken of in the Hebrew prophets. When some of them write books, their deep knowledge of Hebrew as well as faith in Jesus gives a rich meaning to my Christian faith.

Much of the hatred of Jews today is focused on Israel as a nation, as well as Jews as a people. But this hatred of Israel—and parallel support of Hamas and Palestine—is born out of ignorance of important facts and perspective:

  • Gaza, also known as the Gaza Strip, is a territory that resulted in a land for peace deal. Israel gave up the land, but the Palestinians in Gaza did not keep the peace. In fact they used UNESCO and other international support funding to build expensive tunnels, accumulate weapons, and plot their hate-filled war.
  • Hamas, which means “violence” in several biblical references, is adept at propaganda that many Americans and global citizens routinely fall for. I heard about this directly when I visited Israel in 2018 and tour guides with military background explained this to us. Hamas launches an attack with weapons from a bunker in a school or residence, and when Israel responds they tell the world Israel attached civilians. A military officer with the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) explained that they are the only army in the world that sends leaflets out to an area to warn they will be bombing there soon. The goal is to destroy weapons and fighting positions, not civilians. I also know otherwise intelligent people who shared on social media a photo of an emaciated boy in Gaza and blamed Israel for starving Gazans. But the photo cropped out the boy’s well-fed mother and brother, and failed to mention the boy was thin because of a medical condition, and that the boy was at a medical facility to treat that condition, and that Israel paid for it. They also leave out that Hamas takes Israeli food and supplies away from the people for whom it is intended and uses them for themselves. No one expresses outrage over Hamas’ treatment of women or children in their care.
  • Palestinians are not an ethnic group. The term Palestine comes from Philistine, the people “of the sea” mentioned in Bible stories who attacked Israel. The giant Goliath, slain by David with a slingshot in a famous story, was a Philistine. The Roman empire referred to the region as Palestine, a derivative of Philistine. To the Romans, many different people groups lived in that region—Hebrews, Philistines and others. They were just designating an area in their vast empire in that era. So to chant “Palestine must be free” misses the point.
  • Speaking of that chant, the rest of it is “from the river to the sea.” Ask most useful idiots chanting this at rallies what it means, and they can’t tell you. It literally means from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, the area that borders Israel. It is a call to genocide and elimination of Israel. It is another form of genocidal mania that you used to hear from Iranian Mullahs who oppress and kill their own people and yell “death to Israel” in a sick evil posing as religious fervor. Israeli’s and Jews do not chant for the death and elimination or genocide of others, but other evil people and their useful idiots call for the genocide of Jews.
  • Israel is not an oppressor. Their claim to the land goes back to Abraham. It is the size of New Jersey situated in the vast Middle East that spans as far as the western United States. Today, it is the only democracy in the entire region and is appropriately pluralistic. Israel does not oppress its people or those around them. They share their national land with others who are not Jews. The IDF includes Arabs and Muslims and others, as does the Knesset, the national legislature of Israel. In Israel, there is dialogue and debate among many peoples as there should be in a democracy. In many of Israel’s neighbors, there is rule by one party, one family, one ethnicity, and short of debate, those who dissent are hanged or beheaded or shot. Yet advocates of these people bizarrely call Israel an oppressor?

The Jews and Israel have been maligned, mischaracterized, hated and killed for two thousand years. It is called the “ancient hate” for a reason. But because of my faith and my desire to consider truth, I can tell you this October 7 that I love the Jews, I pray for the peace of Jerusalem, and that Jews everywhere—along with gentiles— come to know Jesus as the promised savior who came into this world through the Jewish people.

America 250: An Idea Worth Knowing, Celebrating and Keeping

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Earlier this week, I spoke to the summer interns at the Mackinac Center. My topic was public relations at the time of the American revolution. This topic coincides with the fact that this decade is the 100th anniversary of public relations being called such as a full-time profession. But public relations scholars have long pointed out that forms of public relations were practiced in all of human history. In my remarks, using material from the PR Museum, I showed how this was so at the time of the American revolution when people throughout 13 colonies needed to be convinced that it was necessary and appropriate to declare independence from Britain. Of course, this topic was also timely given the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence is being celebrated this week.

Our yard is festooned proudly with patriotic ornaments.

My subject was to be an entire special topics class this fall semester at the university where I am a professor. Unfortunately, there were not enough students enrolled by a certain scheduling deadline and the class had to be cut. I don’t know if it was added too late and students had their schedules set, or if there is disinterest in history among college students Maybe some of both. The ones who had signed up had been eager to take the class and were disappointed.

The interns at the Mackinac Center, none of whom are even public relations students, showed keen interest in the subject and asked good questions. That was encouraging and fun. 

I am naturally passionate about public relations and its history. That would be expected from someone who has been a professor of public relations and published articles and chapters on its history among my other research subjects.

But I am also interested in American history and keenly appreciative of the uniqueness of our founding documents and the uniqueness of our form of governance. What we celebrate this week is 250 years of shedding oppressive control, forming our own government, and gaining national and personal liberty unlike any that has been achieved in the world with the possible exception of ancient Greece.

Therefore, education  and celebration on this subject has always been important. But it is more so now. That is because many today, in the grip of the re-emergence of a flawed Marxist ideology, actually deplore America and are “offended” by seeing reverence for the flag and celebration of national history. They see America as an oppressor, not a liberator. 

This is nonsense when as an abstract, socially constructed idea it is measured against experience and observation. 

Individual rights, liberty, and responsibility are the foundation of the US, and the ingredients for a system that has enabled more opportunity and prosperity than any nation in history. Yes there are flaws and imperfections, but that can be addressed by policy within our governing framework, not throwing out the system. Some today want the government to provide for them in the form of free health care, busses, education even universal income as opposed to embracing self-reliance and getting government out of their lives. Recently elected politicians in New York City and other local governments across the land are promising such things, and many are falling for it. This form of government as nanny, socialism, central planning, Maxism, call it what you will has never worked, and in fact is abusive. Read Road to Serfdom, written 80 years ago but applicable today.

The issue is, nothing is free. Those who succumb to accepting so-called free things from government lose their personal liberty. I once asked a student who thought free things from government was a good thing if he would live with his parents after graduation for the remainder of their lives. He said of course not. I said what if they gave you free rent, free food, free use of a car? He said no. I asked why. He wanted his independence. Exactly.

I once saw two families at the beach. Each had a toddler. It came time for both families to leave and they started gathering their things and trudging across the sand. The toddler in one family said “I carry!” He boldly dragged a beach chair to the family car. The other family’s toddler whined and said “carry me!” His father added the child to his collection of cooler, chairs and bags. The former child knows the joy of self-reliance and independence. The other is a malcontent destined for a life of dependence, dissatisfaction and marching at rallies with signs protesting the fact that he is “oppressed.” 

As former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher said of socialism: “it works until they run out of other people’s money.” Or eminent economics professor and author Thomas Sowell’s apt description of socialism: “favoring what sounds good over what actually works.”

America, at 250 is an empirical lesson in what works. Our republic as a system is not perfect, but it was precisely designed to manage those imperfections. It remains the best, most exceptional effort at self-governance that the world has known.

Bernie Sanders, a long-time U.S. Senator who champions socialism and decries millionaires and billionaires, has never held a job outside of government. Nevertheless, he flies first class and has three homes. When questioned about doing this as a public servant and having only a taxpayer-funded salary, he defends himself by saying he wrote books that sold well. So, taking personal initiative and being rewarded financially is ok for him, but not others. And all he generated was words, much as I love books. Meanwhile, those millionaires and billionaires he hates created millions of jobs, products and services people need, and numerous other positive outcomes. 

The Sanders story is just one. Look at the long history of socialism and see how its leaders become enriched and the people for whom they claim to serve suffer in terms of limited liberty, choice, opportunity and personal advancement.

The very things those who hate America are proposing are the very reason so many people are flooding our borders to get to America. They are not coming here to be “oppressed” by our federal republic—they are fleeing the oppression in the socialist states in which they live. While some Americans live in other countries as expats, and do so for the weather, family relationships, or other nominal reasons, there are few Americans who immigrate completely and take up citizenship in other countries for more personal freedom.

But an anti-American sentiment persists. That is because each generation must be taught about the unique and beneficial values of America. But our education institutions are actually teaching our young to hate America, and pushing socialism and communism on students. I know K-12 teachers who personally have stood up against curriculum that does this and they were reprimanded. Universities, often founded to train pastors and citizens with civic pride and professional abilities, now seem bent on conditioning the youth of the nation to turn against it. Read more about how a radicalized left has worked to undermine America in Christopher Rufo’s America’s Cultural Revolution. 

We have seen a rise recently of local and state candidates winning elections who are part of the Democratic Socialists of America. They claim to be for workers, but their website also makes clear they are a political activist organization, not a party. And they are less about the economic well-being of American workers than they are about flawed globalist ideologies, such as open borders and intensification of anti-Semitism. 

It is interesting to see some people today liken our current president to Adolf Hitler or a NAZI. This may be hyperbole or a literal assessment. Either way, in their emotional ignorance, they forget that the term NAZI is an abbreviation of the German word Nationalsozialist, which translates to National Socialist in English. It specifically refers to a member of the National Socialist German Workers’ Party (NSDAP), which was led by Adolf Hitler. The Democratic Socialists of America, with their fiery rhetoric, claims to be for workers, but its candidates’ unabashed hatred of Jews, disdain for individual initiative and propensity for violence seem far more like the NAZIs in 1930s Germany than any other party of movement in America today. Yet the re-programmed youth and others stirred to anger blindly vote for them.

Another unique and brilliant aspect of the founding of the USA is acknowledgement that rights come from God, not government. This was revolutionary and reformative, spoken of by Hobbes, Locke, and others. The government is merely other people, and who are they to presume the granting of rights. We have the rights as our founding documents say to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. The anti-Americans among us favor Marx over Locke and seek to eliminate faith from our culture. They devalue life with promotion of assisted suicide and abortion. They want the government to control everything at the expense of our individual liberty and choice. And rather than allow people the freedom of their own pursuits they would propose the government supply what they think will make people happy. Socialism runs its course is arrogant and elitist. The bedrock of America’s founding values is actual respect for individuals.

Another threat to our democracy from socialism is its intended divisiveness. We have on our currency the latin phrase “e pluribus unum,” which means out of many, one. This is a statement that even in our different races, philosophies, religions, and individual differences, we are still united on foundational national—and positive—principles as indicated above. Some today insist that all agree to certain moral and political perspectives based on hatred and anger, or face gaslighting and cancellation. 

I can end this essay with some hope as I think about America going forward. 

Occurring concurrently with our national 250th birthday is the World Cup on our soil. There have been many articles, such as this one from the BBC, about how these fans from many other countries realize they were lied to (one person interviewed actually said this) about the USA and are ecstatic about their actual experience. They are raving about everything from the splendor of suburban homes, to the vast offerings at supermarkets, to the kindness of average Americans. 

Most Americans are still in line with founding and other positive values, and are not on board with what socialists are pushing, according to some research by independent journalist Michael Shellenbarger shared in his Substack called “Public.” He notes: “Abolishing the police drew just 15% support even back in 2020 at the height of the power of Black Lives Matter. Seventy-four percent of Americans approve of the separation of powers, 90% favor co-equal branches, and only 9% want any one branch to hold more power. Eighty-one percent of Americans view free enterprise positively, while only 39% view socialism positively, and that 39% reflects the diluted Scandinavian sense of the word, not expropriating apartment buildings and other forms of housing. Seventy percent support closing the border, and 69% support limiting who can claim asylum.”

Perhaps reading the statistics and polls, more traditional Democrats are trying to save the party—and the nation—from the dangerous leftward tilt of Neo-Marxist communists in socialist clothes. As one example, New York Democrat U.S. Representative Tom Suozzi wrote an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal warning that “Democrats Need to Show Our Love for America.” 

Another reason for hope is the 15 or so young people I spoke to earlier this week. I am pleased to see they understand all of this. I encouraged them to speak positively about and advocate for our country as often as they can in their personal and professional lives.

On the occasion of the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, the world is showing love for America.  Some Democrats are standing up to socialists in their party who pose a threat to our unique democracy and national culture. A sample of young college students is showing respect and appreciation for our history. All Americans must maintain that view as well as we celebrate a quarter millennium of history. We need remain very mindful that ours is a country not based on geography or ethnicity but an idea. That idea brought positive change and centuries of benefits. The idea of America is worth celebrating and keeping.

We May Have Voted for a New Media Landscape

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After every election there is a lot of punditry. We are not in short supply about why the winner won and the loser lost. Polls are taken, strategies are evaluated, and plans are set for the next campaign season. 

But there is something happening now in post-election 2024 that seems to a tipping point with significant change in the media landscape and public relations practice. It is on the order of FDR’s fireside chats on radio or the televised debate between Kennedy and Nixon. 

There have been many articles about the role of media and changing media platform preferences of campaigns and voters in the last election cycle. This article in the Wall Street Journal reports significant viewership declines on election night and during the campaigns compared to four years ago. The conclusion is that legacy media have lost viewership, relevance and their traditional gatekeeping function. Candidates have found new gates, or even simply broken down the fence and the gate along with it to extend that theoretical metaphor. 

This is a non-partisan phenomenon. You saw one or both candidates eschew debates, abandon press conferences, move toward appearances with entertainers, and most significantly in my view sit down for interviews with podcasters, most famously the “Call Her Daddy” podcast with Kamala Harris and the Joe Rogan Experience podcast interview with Donald Trump. These are the number 1 (Rogan) and 2 (Call Her Daddy) podcasts on Spotify in terms of views, and drew a large and specific audience that exceeded the numbers of Saturday Night Live, CNN, Fox or any of the networks.

Unlike political pundits, I am not going to make specific predictions. But I do have a list of questions that will be interesting to watch going forward. We may find in 2028 and beyond that 2024 was our generation’s Kennedy-Nixon debate in terms of change to media landscape and resulting communication strategy.

  1. Who is in WH briefing room? Will podcasters and independent journalists get passes to be part of the White House press pool, given their impact on public attention and opinion? Will there even be a press briefing given the avoidance of press conferences and PIOs avoidance of details? It may be the White House and other political agencies post statements to their web site. This has been happening on the White House Briefing Room websitefor several presidencies and may be enough. Interested citizens can use an RSS feed to read these directly and avoid the media filter. This could be the case in both campaign and governance mode.
  2. What is the role of the White House press secretary? Will there even be a press secretary if changes in number one happen. Maybe they will be engaging new media outlets one on one, or focused on writing internal tactics and worried less if at all about taking the podium.
  3. Will media availability shift to podcasters and independent journalists as the norm? As noted above, will interview availability of politicians and their staff follow the audience and we’ll see more on socials and podcasts and Substack outlets than traditional media? I anticipate we will see more of that, but it may be the case that traditional media are an afterthought to a podcast in a reversal from today.
  4. Will media relations continue to be less of a priority in exchange for paid media and in-house tactics? Early PR practitioners from Edward Bernard to Arthur Page started saying 100 years ago that the profession was far more than news releases. Some still perceive of and practice public relations as if the term PR stands for press release. That may finally erode as professionals are buying ads and sponsored articles and posts or generating their own digital assets from blogs to podcasts to socials. This is happening already and may increase exponentially.
  5. Will media targeting be increasingly ideological vs demographic? Media theorists always argue about whether the media affect public opinion or respond to it. Regardless, we have long had a partisan media (even back in the 1700s if you study your history). The question is, going forward will there be more targeting of media on ideology than geography or demographics? Some of this targeting could be to enter “hostile” territory to not just encourage a base of like-minded but attempt to do some old fashioned persuasion. 
  6. Will we see a return of long-form interviews? The Kamala Harris interview on “Call Her Daddy” was 44 minutes. Trump sat with Joe Rogan for three hours. Both are longer than typical network TV or national radio interviews. It leads to another question….
  7. Will content strategy favor authenticity vs spin? Some reports and polls indicate that people responded favorably to details and rationale based on policy as opposed to vague and emotional performative statements. Perhaps political communication professionals will craft speaking points that get into depth and making a case as opposed to creating an image and maintaining a narrative. It would be refreshing. 
  8. Will the changes in media and public relations strategy extend from just politics to the business and nonprofit sectors? My background before becoming a full-time professor was public relations in the non profit and higher education sector. Such organizations have always had a media mix, but the balance may tilt even more away from media relations to other tactics and strategies. This is due not just to public media habits but the sad reality of a shrinking news room for local media who do not have the capacity to do as many interviews or stories as in the past. 

Shortly after the founding of our republic, the First Amendment was passed, granting a set of special freedoms to citizens. The most famous of them was “freedom of the press.” But this was never about journalism. It was a response to censorship via the Stamp Act, and afforded freedom to produce and distribute information to anyone who happened to own a literal printing press. They happened to be printers, who in addition to handbills and other documents printed a new form of media called a newspaper.

Today the means of production for information is ubiquitous. That freedom is embraced by many. And the public has freedom as well in terms of to what they will attend to. The public relations professionals guiding politicians, not to mention businesses and nonprofit organizations, are smart. They will respond to changes afoot. I am excited to watch how.