Exclusive: Alan Dershowitz Defends Sarah Palin’s Use of Term ‘Blood Libel’
by Publius
In an exclusive statement, famed attorney and Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz defended Sarah Palin’s use of the term “blood libel” from multiple detractors. As the Media Matters/MSM/Democrat narrative on the Tucson tragedy unravels, they are getting a lot more desperate in their attacks on Palin. Fortunately, there are still plenty of honest liberals around:
The term “blood libel” has taken on a broad metaphorical meaning in public discourse. Although its historical origins were in theologically based false accusations against the Jews and the Jewish People,its current usage is far broader. I myself have used it to describe false accusations against the State of Israel by the Goldstone Report. There is nothing improper and certainly nothing anti-Semitic in Sarah Palin using the term to characterize what she reasonably believes are false accusations that her words or images may have caused a mentally disturbed individual to kill and maim. The fact that two of the victims are Jewish is utterly irrelevant to the propriety of using this widely used term.
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235 Comments
OK LEFTIES…HERE YA GO:
The progressive “climate of hate:”
An illustrated primer, 2000-2010
http://michellemalkin.com/2011/01/10/the-progress...
Alan Dershowitz defending Sarah Palin tells me the lunatic left is just about of ammunition.
Alan Dershowitz? I thought he died along time ago. I know Sarah can and has lived without his validation just fine. I have, too. I'll think I'll go back to that.
So, the left is just "shooting their mouth off?".
Ok now I know the wheels just fell of the bus
Me thinketh they be shooting blanks……….
Hello old friend.
Long time, no see.
The world is spinning crazily out of control.
I can deal with people who are dead wrong. It's people who are intellectually dishonest and shift terms of debate so that they're always (in their minds) correct that make me grind my teeth.
Good on ya, Dershowitz. This time.
Dershowitz figured out a long time ago the left is full of crap. He's a perfect example of what I mean about those on the left who are true believers and those who are in it for the money.
He's in it because he believes it. A worthy opponent and a worthy ally when the stars align.
PROGRESSIVE SOCIALIST SLIME IMPLODE TIME!!! It is a pretty good day for CONSERVATIVES when liberals can no longer stomach the pettiness of the RABID PROGRESSIVE SOCIALIST MEDIA MACHINE.
That is a notable comment by Dershowitz . It surely separates him from Obama & the Socialist Democrats who would love to pin this whole thing on Republican Constitutionalists, aka, Tea Party Repubs. Obama is saying 'dam, I'm losing the Jews too' – - except for Mayor Bloomberg who is setting up a new Company in the Middle East! and Schumer, Weiner, Wexler, and the die hard group.
Yeah that's right Obama, Soros, Pelosi, Reid, etc. The mask is falling off of you Marxists and your toxic network of Anti-Americans who want to COLLAPSE America & install Marxism using Illegal Aliens and Islamists as your Army! You're losing to the Majority of America! and there are hundreds of Millions of U.S! That is Fatal to you obama!
It's not astounding, it's a sign that they perceive Palin as a threat.
Which for us is the signal to attack. Yes I said attack, in the political sense.
Meaning support Palin.
My goodness people- all of a sudden Alan Dershowitz is to be liked? The man defended OJ Simpson during his murder trial- part of the so called Dream Team that help get Simpson acquitted. You Tea Party types crack me up- you would side with ANYONE if it means destroying PRESIDENT Obama's historical legacy.
OJ Simpson defender- wow you people are a hot mess LOL
Cershowitz appears to be showing some integrity. Obama, Pelosi, Soros, Reid, Holder, and Valerie Jarrett, take note!
I agree with you.
I believe in never underestimating ones adversary.
Alan Dershowitz is a very worthy opponent.
You are right, he is a true believer.
I'd love to think that this would be the end of "Tragedy = Strategy". The narative doesn't fit their objective. If they can write off people who don't fit in their plan (ie conservative women or minorities) they'll write this off as a lunatics rambleings. Big G will probably be the only ones to see this. This will not show up in the media. Here's Yahoo's head line "Palin stirs new controversy" WHAT?!? Who stired it? My take (as well as Mr. Dershowitz) is that it's already been stired- Mrs Palin is just answering to it! These people won't give up and they WILL never report the news respectfully. The average "Joe Six Pack" will never see this.
No one is siding with anyone. We simply appreciate when one who is so often wrong turns out to have intellectual honesty and integrity in this case and feel it should be recognized for what it is.
Then there are people like you. Spit.
"if it means destroying PRESIDENT Obama's historical legacy."
Is this grandma Obama? Did they let you back on the computer again?
"PROGRESSIVE SOCIALIST SLIME IMPLODE TIME!!!"
This is not just hyperbole, Connie. I think they really ARE imploding. I wouldn't ever believe it if I wasn't seeing it.
But look at what's happening. The leftists "progressive" media decided to throw everything they have into destroying the right over this tragedy. And in the past, they might have succeeded.
But 2011 is not 1995. They can't control the narrative, and since they went "all-in" with this bet, when they lose, they're going to lose it all.
And who are the big winners? The American People and the alternative media.
Let's Roll!
There is no one here intent on destroying Kenya Slims Presidency.
Youse people on the lunatic left are doing that on your own.
It is such a wondrous sight to behold!
Wow, am I surprised. And he attended harvard – the finishing school for progressives and socialists. I don't know if I am able to survive the shock to my system…………………….. I'm OK now. Just took a long pull at my coffee mug.
"wow you people are a hot mess LOL "
Didn't you hear, the earth has a temperature? LOL
As Mr. Tuttle said, a little intellectual honesty from someone on the left is refreshing for a change.
Stay on the wagon though BT. Your ride is just about over.
SPIT?
You Tea Nut White Trash Uneducated Heathen!
They've gotten their well deserved vasectomy!
A lot of time, I see a tactic of shifting the focus into something unrelated in addition to making stuff up in their head and believing it to be the absolute truth.
Hope you like being ostracized, Alan… by the left.
Okay, whats in it for A.D.? There has to be an ulterior motive with him as no flaming liberal gives up so easily. Really, could he have seen the light of the right and stepped from the dank dark cave of the left?
If this isn't a tee-up for a home run, I will be surprized.
Dershowitz did his job as a lawyer. The prosecutors were incompetent in the OJ trial.
AD is opposed to gun ownership but opposes repealing the 2hd Amendment because he believes it would open the door to further revisions he doesn't want.
He is someone with whom one can disagree with honestly and get honesty in return. Proof that not all liberals are scum-suckers like you, BT.
"PRESIDENT Obama's historical legacy."
What are the odds that Obama beats out Jimmah Carter on that legacy?!! This nut will go down as the most incompetent (p)Resident this country has known in modern history. Do you need a list of reasons? Better yet, just keep sticking your head in the sand.
BTW, OJ is a murderer that was allowed to escape justice by incompetent prosecution. Oh well, I'm wondering if he's still selling his signature in that prison garb…..it appears you have no compassion for the family members he hurt due to those murders? Sounds about right for a libtard.
Shilling for Shekels……….
We could just sit back and do nothing. Obama is destroying his own "hysterical" legacy. In a sick kind of way, it's entertaining.
The term is entirely appropriate because the media was trying to get Palin killed.
Yes.
Yup, expect a few blood libels thrown in his direction for not following the commands of the Ministry of Truth.
They are far too arrogant to value wisdom pnipni.
Yup. It's confirmed. Liberalism has 'jumped the shark' with this one. The engine is still spinning, but the propeller has been broken off. While some keep desperately pumping the accelerator, the smart rats are jumping out with parachutes.
Sarah Palin is very capable of defending herself.
Alan Dershowitz's ammunition is like the rest of the RAT party's, old and wet.
Nothing grows, until Obama goes!
Thank you Mr. Dershowitz for saying this and being honest. I am really ashamed of some people that I usually like, like Paul Krugman and Chris Matthews, for just being GHOULS!!!
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
thank god someone is standing up for sarah! and a jewish person no less! is there somewhere we should be sending money so sarah can keep up her defense against these sexist assaults? we are all sarah today.
You said it Connie!
"I know Sarah can and has lived without his validation just fine."
Amen, Mikey!!!
Since WHEN do conservatives need the blessing of this ideologue.
Out of my face with this VERMIN FREAK!!!
Let him show up on MSLSDNBC to defend Palin. See where that goes?
.
Howdy Cowbboy
Nice to read you too
Been busy playing in the snow 8' at a swipe
Nice to see that someone who may not agree at all with conservatives can call out his side for a Red Herring.
awesome rhyme!
Right you are Connie. That was asking too much of a bunch of Marxists and a muslim. They just have to be removed. Period. Thank God we have the House of Rep.
I think the tide has already turned and some of the oceanic tsunami markers are just beginning to record it.
The "Palinophobia" is strong with trolls on the sites today.
When the LEFT begins to feel they are really losing the narrative badly, they always trot out Dershowitz
to repair their leaking hull.
Do not be distracted or impressed by this ''fixer''. He is merely buying time to help the Left rework their
approach.
I want to see their dingy sink to the bottom of the ocean!
.
Otraitor needs no help in destroying his legacy. He is doing a fine job himself doing it. Reminds me how the press treated carter as a genius when he was President and Reagan like A moron. Now 30 some years later the conventional wisdom is Carter was one crappy President and Reagan was great. Same for Otraitor years from now he will be seen as the brain dead Marxist he is.
He can't have missed the Obama message that Islam is in Judaism is out. Maybe he is also a wise Jew and sees who his real friends are. Call me an optimist.
Well like they say even a stopped clock is right twice a day. I put this statement from Dershowitz in that category. The slime still helped get OJ off after the gruesome murders he did. And Dershowitz knew he did them He got a murderer off just for fame. The man is scum.
"Obama's historical legacy."
Worst. President. Ever.
That said, the SOB may be your president but he is not mine and never will be.
Thank you, Alan and Publius.
That would be a very good question to ask people like Chris Matthews "Are you trying to get Sarah Palin killed with this rhetoric?" or Rush etc.?
Dershowitz is a lib, but he's not a progressive.
Maybe DailyKos will put a bullseye on him like they did on Gabrielle Giffords in 2008.
Thank you Harry. Well said.
Emperor Narcissus doesn't need anyone's help "destroying" that "presidency" of his. The only thing "historical" about That One is his multi-talented genius at building the scaffold, making up the slipknot and tightening the noose around his own scrawny little neck.
Oh please, Dershowitz hasn't been a leftist since he started supporting the use of "enhanced interrogation techniques" (read torture) by the Bush Administration in the early oughts and decided that anyone who criticized Israel should be vilified. Only people on the right think Dershowitz is a leftist. People on the left know he's nothing more than a Bush apologist.
Wait, now Breitbart readers like Jews? I though they were responsible for the Jew York Times that is destroying America.
I CAN"T HEAR YOU, PLEASE SHOUT LOUDER.
Yup, it's right on time… cue up the smear campaign against anyone who dares to depart from the straight and narrow of the fascist socialist "narrative!"
I was searching my memory for the first time I saw Dershowitz trotted out to mollify the ''rabid RIGHT''.
Haven't been able to access that memory, YET, but I can say unequivocally that SOB would not be
speaking out if the LEFT were winning this argument in the court of public opinion.
Any QUESTIONS?;-D
.
Are you saying this is their way of saying that they're not retreating, they're reloading? What dangerous rhetoric is this? I hope they don't have a bullseye on you….
Of course, this is already being dismissed as a fake statement, and that Dershowitz would never give such statement to a conservative blog.
Don't you know that the message of the day is to turn down the volume?
Get a grip! We are winning the debate. Back in the Goldwater days David Horowitz was a communist, now he's a fremarket conservative. It's GOOD when your intellectual opponents start agreeing with you.
Huh?
Smedley! Where you been you little scumbag? Frankly I was wondering if you were'nt in gaol in Tucson.
Sarah Palin's comments was one of the finest example of Presidential speeches I have seen for decades.
She put it directly back at the leftist media like ABC, NBC, CBS, NRP, CNN and the worst MSNBC.
She looked directly into the camera without a teleprompter and gave a speech worthy of remembering when an individual faces a barrage of hate delivered by leftist media and leftist politicians schooled in the hate rhetoric of Saul Alinsky.
Go Sarah, You just proved you are Presidential material and with only one policy speech.
Dripper, is that you?;-D
Didja think you might get away with a lil exchange? FYI I lived in the bullseye for eight years,
and that IS why you cannot ever have any effect on me…
Got that loser?
Back under your rock now!!!
.
Nope, but I'm sure your "dripper" will come back to you some day. The two of you are probably made for each other.
Oh look, the little weasel has poked its head up from its dung pile.
There's quite likely many more conservative Jews than you think. And likely many more Jewish "Big" readers than you think. I've been around long enough to know that when a liberal implies nasty criticism directly or through sarcasm, indirectly, they are reflecting their own view. . . the exact view that they pretend to abhor.
So this is all Bush's fault is what you are saying?
Proof?
Unhinged & Angry DemLibs are running amock. Want to know who these Political Pornographers hate more than Sarah Palin?
Honest Libs like Alan Dershowitz that dismaltle & deflate their contrived talking points!!!
I think we may have discussed Billy a while back, no? He used this one to snuggle up to YKW… One of many, each as obvious as the last…
Only the uneducated or those who seek to lie and distort the truth would have a problem with the term "blood libel" inferring a meaning not there. They call that a lie. I call it propaganda based solely upon political persuasion. So which is it, a purposeful lie or are they complete morons?
This is not the first time Dershowitz has gone against the left, he has become an outspoken critic of radical Islam in our country! Give him credit for pointing out the truth, and not following the Soros crowd.
Kudos to Dershowitz for stepping in. "Blood libel" has long-held idiomatic acceptance as that which may describe or relate to an ad hominem hatred wherein that hatred bears false accusations towards the hated party. Palin was spot-on in employing it so.
*And, thus far, at least three of the victims have been identified as Jewish (Phyllis Schneck, Gabe Zimmerman, and Giffords).
Are you being sarcastic? The media and the liberal elected leaders are the ones bombarding Sarah with blame. You sound desperate.
Once again Sarah Palin proves she's smarter than the people who critique her. Recall when the left tried to correct her when they thought she had the wrong date for the Boston Tea Party:
http://hotair.com/archives/2010/10/19/leftist-dul...
Stupid liberals. Don't even know their own country's history. Yet I'm sure they can recite the entire history of Islam from memory.
See Onecorn- I told you he'd come back to you!
How about this guy who was arrested today? http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2...
"In the first call, Habermann said he'd seen McDermott on television and was enraged by his comments opposing tax cuts for the rich.
"He's a piece of human filth. He's a liar, he's a communist, he's a piece of [expletive] garbage," Habermann said in the recorded message, according to the criminal complaint.
Habermann said George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and other U.S. founding fathers would "blow his [McDermott's] brains out" if they met him.
Habermann then threatened to kill McDermott as well as his friends and family, the complaint says."
I would certainly agree that to be accused of having supported Bush's torture policies is INDEED a terrible slander – if untrue. Fortunately, in Dershowitz's case it's quite true, so I'm not slandering him, but stating the facts. Glad you think it's a vile thing to be accused of.
"Fortunately, there are still plenty of honest liberals around." But still, far too few.
Good for Alan Dershowitz for standing against the left-wing haters. But beware Alan, you are now "in the sights" of these vile leftists like Olbermann, Matthews, Krugman, Et al.
Welcome to the fight!
Shut up and answer my question dumbass.
Yeah, I tried that with lefties on another forum. Their response – Malkin is a hack and not respected by many on the right (and the only evidence of that was some lady who supported Huckabee last time around).
Their heels are dug in.
I'm a lawyer and obviously have nowhere near the experience Dershowitz has. And even though I am a true believer in my side of politics and think I debate pretty well and know most of my stuff, I would be absolutey terrified to debate him.
He's smart.
Plus, he also came out in defense of the 2nd Amendment at one time.
That makes him even smarter.
We may agree on nothing else, he and I, but I respect someone who can debate rationally
Another good way to put it – You know Dershowitz is intellectually honest because he came out long ago in defense of the 2nd Amendment, I believe at least in the context of it being an individual right.
Where did I say that? I said Dershowitz is always being described by people on the right as some sort of big time liberal, when any liberal you ask is going to tell you he's a Bush apologist and quite the fan of right wing Israeli actions against the Palestinians. For a so-called liberal one never, ever hears or sees anything from Dershowitz on left-wing sites advocating policies beloved by liberals or progressives. He also seems to like the Patriot Act in addition to his refusal ever to acknowledge that maybe Israel might be wrong about anything. In short, he's a right winger. Someone ought to tell Breitbart.
Funny how HiPlains Drifter says he only wishes to be left alone, but then temptation overtakes
him and he somehow believes he can get away with his games. Too SAD!!! Poor little drippy
darlin', I sure hope he has a good supply of adult diapers on hand.
; )
I understand your sentiments and agree that conservatives do not need the blessing of this ideologue. However I would ask that you accept his statement graciously. My reasoning is that while conservatives do not need his blessing, we do appreciate his involvement in the discussion. We appreciate opposing viewpoints if only to hone our opposition to them in the same manner that the founding fathers held opposing viewpoints on issues and used them to hone the document that we cherish, The Constitution.
At least that is my $0.02
How is that relevant to any discussion going on in this particular thread?
Pirate Radio, an age old reaction to limits on Free Speech.
Pirate Net, a new age reaction to limits on Free Speech.
I'm wondering if there are those on the left who are embarrassed by the slanderous, unfounded accusations against Palin, et. al, by the media and some politicians to further their agenda. If so, could there possibly be a split in that party?
Just as the Tea party set the Republicans straight on fiscal responsibility, is it possible that a new, more JFK-like Dem could emerge and set a new, more defensible tone for the Dems? Outside of this latest embarrassment, there is also the spanking they got in the last election. If that party holds on to Chris Matthews and even Krugman, they lose credibility. I can think of a few Democrats I know that are not knee-jerk morons like the ones currently in the spotlight. I saw the tweets where LIberals called for Palin's murder, and I would not want to be associated with a party that encourages that kind of person. Of course, my opinion is that the right has rarely engaged in "hate-speech", it's always been the left, because they have few rational arguments for their policies. They've become lazy because they don't argue valid points related to issues, they just call their opponents names.
needless to say, I don't have time to play in your sandbox anymore. I do completely agree with your personal description GW was certainly under-rated. Hope you find your Drippy.
Be my guest Flame, be as ''gracious'' as you dare.
I will however refer to the Rush H Limbaugh handbook.
THIS IS WAR, and those who do not understand this begin the fight at a great disadvantage!
Kiss Dershowitz's ass to your hearts content, and GOOD LUCK with that strategy.
; )
Coffee = Lifer's Juice
John Adams defended British soldiers accused in the Boston Massacre, I guess that means we should distrust anything he said or write. Everyone accused of a crime is entitled to legal counsel, even O.J. Simpson. I've always like Dershowitz. I disagree with him on many political issues, but he's a reasonable man and not a total moonbat.
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