Matt Yglesias

Dec 19th, 2008 at 12:22 pm

Why Choose

Scott Reynolds Nelson writes about the panic of 1873:

In Central and Eastern Europe, times were even harder. Many political analysts blamed the crisis on a combination of foreign banks and Jews. Nationalistic political leaders (or agents of the Russian czar) embraced a new, sophisticated brand of anti-Semitism that proved appealing to thousands who had lost their livelihoods in the panic. Anti-Jewish pogroms followed in the 1880s, particularly in Russia and Ukraine. Heartland communities large and small had found a scapegoat: aliens in their own midst.

Surely the correct answer was to pin the blame on foreign Jewish bankers, right? Those are two great tastes that taste great together. Rothschild, etc.






41 Responses to “Why Choose”

  1. david Says:

    Matt, your link is bad

    Correct link to article

  2. scythia Says:

    The address you requested has expired, or contains a typo.

    Oh, if only all Matt’s posts could pass through this filtration system.

  3. Njorl Says:

    Those are two great tastes that taste great together. Rothschild, etc.

    As I recall, the Rothschild candy of the 1970s was chocolate and caramel, so yes, it was indeed two great tastes that taste great together, but they would have been sued if they used it as a slogan.

  4. JimboSlice Says:

    When you look at it the two key players in the situation who are Jewish are:
    Barnie Frank, Alan Greenspan, Ben Bernake, James Cayne (Bear), Richard Fuld (Lehman), Maddoff, and on and on. Also look at where this crisis started – arguably Florida (condos) and New York City were the two main areas at fualt, and where do Jewish people tend to coagulate? FLA and NYC.

    Now I am not saying that it is some conspiracy of the Jews to destroy the financial system and profiteer, but rather that as we rebuild we need to look outside the traditional banking community that has propagated nepotism. That exists among both Jews, WASPs, and others. We need to learn that just because your last name is Greenspan and you come from NYU doesn’t make a whiz at banking.

  5. Doogan Says:

    Is there any validity to these conspiracy theory docs like “Zeitgeist” or “Freedom to Fascism” that always seem to top the Google video/Youtube most viewed lists? I really have heard no real reporting on whether or not any of their claims are true: is there a private international bank cartel who like OPEC, turns on and off the supply of their respective commodity, for the benefit of their private shareholders. Is the Federal Reserve this enterprise? Do income taxes go towards profits for these banks who profit off of, and control our money supply? If this is true, and is common knowledge, I was unaware and do apologize, but this would be insane to me. It just seems strange that no one in the msm or blogosphere (Besides crazy libertarian sites) ever talks about or refutes any of these claims? I hear more and more people talk about these documentaries everyday but I never find anything I can trust that validates or proves them wrong?

  6. Jasper Says:

    Glad to see JimboSlice has revealed his true colors. Always nice to know what we’re dealing with.

  7. M. Carey Says:

    It is amazing just what crawls out of the underbrush, is’nt it?

  8. Jasper Says:

    Now I am not saying that it is some conspiracy of the Jews to destroy the financial system and profiteer, but rather that as we rebuild we need to look outside the traditional banking community that has propagated nepotism.

    Right. I definitely think we should impose strict limits on the number of Joos allowed to work at banks.

  9. Pete J Says:

    Ok- Prof. Nelson’s arguing that perhaps the Great Depression is not the best historical model to use when we think about our current crisis. Instead, there are much closer parallels to the Panic of 1873 because it was based on land speculation wrapped in complex financial instruments which rippled through the economy in profound ways. (1873- difficult to pick up and sell the railroad tracks you purchased from a company that is now bankrupt. 2008- difficult to sell those 400 low cost “luxury” foreclosed homes that you have a minute stake in) We don’t have WPA photographs of people standing in bread lines from the 1870s, but Nelson wants to show how uncertain and bleak those times were. Thus people turned to scapegoats, and because of antisemitism at home and in Europe, this was the Jews. The contemporary “aliens in our midst” could represent Islamic extremism or illegal immigrants, but his point was that there probably will be a scapegoat if times continue to get bad.

    Arguments he’s not making:
    -The current financial crisis is the work of Jewish bankers.
    -That being Jewish makes you better or worse at banking.
    -That there is “a private international bank cartel who like OPEC, turns on and off the supply of their respective commodity, for the benefit of their private shareholders”
    -That our income taxes go towards some sort of Illuminati banking concern which controls the globe’s money supply.

    MattY’s excerpted selection is not representative of the article or Nelson’s work in general.

  10. JimboSlice Says:

    # Jasper Says:
    December 19th, 2008 at 5:27 pm

    Now I am not saying that it is some conspiracy of the Jews to destroy the financial system and profiteer, but rather that as we rebuild we need to look outside the traditional banking community that has propagated nepotism.

    Right. I definitely think we should impose strict limits on the number of Joos allowed to work at banks.

    No, if you understood the English language you would see that no where did I say limit the number of Jews, rather that we should limit the influence of nepotism. We should realize that Jews are no better or worse at managing banks, and therefore we should not have a disproportionate amount of them at banks.

    The reason that we do have a disproportionate amount of Jews running banks is the system of nepotism that promotes those who are most like their bosses and leads to coagulation of particular ethnic groups in particular areas. We should try to be a little more diverse in our banking executives as we go forward in the future.

  11. JimboSlice Says:

    Being an AA, I would probably blame the Republicans. It is senseless to blaime a religious group for the recent housing problems. Although you can point out that there exists a disproportionate number of individual at fault who are members of said group.

  12. GiantDuck Says:

    Does it make an eliminationist anti-Semite to think Bernie Madoff’s kind of a dick?

  13. Richard Steven Hack Says:

    DTM: The “New Anti-Semitism’ (look it up in Wikipedia) is that ANY criticism of Jews is “anti-Semitic”. And ANY criticism of Israel as the alleged home of the Jews is also automatically “Anti-Semitic”.

    It’s a “Get Out of Jail Free” card for Zionist politicians, Jewish-Russian Mafia, rich fraudulent assholes and every Jew who is more concerned about getting ahead of everybody else than in being a responsible member of society.

    President Harry Truman on Jews:

    Then the president vented his spleen on the ethnic group trying desperately to escape from Europe’s hatred: ”The Jews, I find are very, very selfish. They care not how many Estonians, Latvians, Finns, Poles, Yugoslavs or Greeks get murdered or mistreated as DP as long as the Jews get special treatment. Yet when they have power, physical, financial or political neither Hitler nor Stalin has anything on them for cruelty or mistreatment to the under dog.”

    After equating the cruelty of Jews with that of Hitler and Stalin, Truman waxed philosophic about ingratitude: ”Put an underdog on top and it makes no difference whether his name is Russian, Jewish, Negro, Management, Labor, Mormon, Baptist he goes haywire. I’ve found very, very few who remember their past condition when prosperity comes.”

    This diary outburst reflected a longstanding judgment about the ungrateful nature of the oppressed; in a letter to Eleanor Roosevelt, he repeated that ”Jews are like all underdogs. When they get on top they are just as intolerant and as cruel as the people were to them when they were underneath.”

  14. JimboSlice Says:

    Oh I hate Israel. This discussion was not about Israel, but I hate them with a fiery passion. What they have done to the Palestinians is despicable. It is a modern day apartheid that no US President has ever had the guts to speak up against. Because if you criticize Israel you are immediately labeled an anti-Semite.

  15. Vivisfugue Says:

    It is a modern day apartheid that no US President has ever had the guts to speak up against. Because if you criticize Israel you are immediately labeled an anti-Semite.

    Um, Jimboslice…

  16. JimboSlice Says:

    Jimmy Carter was a former President by the time that he began to stand up for Palestinian rights and against the oppressive Israelites. And BTW, he was labeled an anti-Semite by many http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=epvvYrgqXjA

  17. JimboSlice Says:

    A nation is defined by its policies and actions – especially a democracy.

  18. Reality Man Says:

    Wow, I thought JimboSlice was being ironic with his first post. Then he just turned creepy.

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