Arkansas GOP Senate Candidate Apologizes For Calling Schumer "That Jew"

Arkansas state Sen. Kim Hendren, who is currently the only announced Republican candidate for U.S. Senator against Democratic incumbent Blanche Lincoln in 2010, has apologized for referring to Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) as "that Jew," at a county Republican meeting last week.

"I don't use a teleprompter and occasionally I put my foot in my month," Hendren told Arkansas blogger Jason Tolbert.

"At the meeting I was attempting to explain that unlike Sen. Schumer, I believe in traditional values, like we used to see on 'The Andy Griffith Show,'" he explained. "I made the mistake of referring to Sen. Schumer as 'that Jew' and I should not have put it that way as this took away from what I was trying to say."

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/05/arkansas-gop-senate-candidate-apologizes-for-calling-schumer-that-jew.php?ref=fp3

Asshole Redneck GOP pig.

Is that the new euphemism for "I'm a big stupid bigot"?

Then what did he REALLY want to call him?

Arkansas who might feel that this asshole needs a better way to apologize since he can't control his bigotry?

Jews


Jews have always been a tiny minority of Arkansas’s population, yet their history in the state is long and deeply rooted. In the mid-nineteenth century, Jewish immigrants from Europe established communities and congregations throughout Arkansas. Despite their small numbers, Arkansas Jews have been committed to preserving their religious traditions even as they assimilated into the culture of their town and state. In the process, Jews became an active part of the state’s civic and economic life. As in many other Southern states and rural regions, the Jewish population has experienced significant decline over the past several decades, especially in small towns, though Jewish life and culture continues to flourish in Little Rock (Pulaski County) and the growing community of Bentonville (Benton County).

The first Jew to settle in Arkansas was Abraham Block, who opened a store in Washington (Hempstead County) by 1825, soon becoming one of the wealthiest men in the county. Block settled in Washington when Arkansas Territory had no Jewish congregations or institutions. He was a charter member of the region’s first synagogue, Congregation Gates of Mercy in New Orleans, Louisiana, joining in 1828. Yet the lack of any organized Jewish life in Arkansas took a toll on his family, and few of his children remained in the faith. Block’s life in Arkansas highlights the challenges Jews have often faced in a state largely isolated from the centers of American Jewish life.

These difficulties eased a little as growing numbers of Jews from central Europe began to arrive in Arkansas before the Civil War. They were part of the “German wave” of Jewish immigration, settling primarily in the large cities of the Northeast and the Midwest. But a significant minority of Jews from Germany and from Alsace-Lorraine settled in the rural South, including Arkansas. At the time of the Civil War, they had established small but growing communities in Little Rock, Fort Smith (Sebastian County), Pine Bluff (Jefferson County), DeValls Bluff (Prairie County), Van Buren (Crawford County), Jonesboro (Craighead County), and Batesville (Independence County). Despite their relatively short time in the state, Jews felt closely tied to their new home. Of the approximately 300 Jews in Arkansas at the time of the war, over seventy fought for the Confederacy.

After the war, as Arkansas became increasingly tied to national trading markets, Jewish peddlers and merchants were drawn to the state. With close economic connections to Jewish wholesalers in Memphis, Tennessee; St. Louis, Missouri; Cincinnati, Ohio; and Louisville, Kentucky, these merchants fanned out across Arkansas, helping to develop isolated parts of the state. Fourteen towns in Arkansas were founded by Jews or named after early Jewish residents, including Altheimer (Jefferson County), Berger (Pulaski County), Bertig (Greene County), Felsenthal (Union County), and Goldman (Jefferson County).

http://www.encyclopediaofarkansas.net/encyclopedia/entry-detail.aspx?entryID=2297

The only exception to this downward trend is Bentonville. In the twenty-first century, as Wal-Mart has encouraged major suppliers to open offices in its corporate hometown, Bentonville has seen its Jewish population skyrocket. In 2004, a dozen Jews founded Bentonville’s first Jewish congregation, Etz Chaim, which quickly became the state’s fastest-growing congregation. Most of the founding members of Etz Chaim are not Arkansas natives. Unlike the peddlers and merchants who initially settled in Arkansas, these twenty-first-century migrants are executives at large corporations. They represent the generation of Jewish professionals who have largely replaced the Jewish merchant class in the South’s metropolitan areas.

With this tremendous growth in Bentonville, the state’s Jewish population likely will remain steady, though small Jewish congregations and communities will continue to decline. Many Jewish children raised in Arkansas do not return home after college; they seek greater economic opportunity elsewhere, the same impulse that brought Jews to Arkansas in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Bigot Hendren stepped into this time with his pea brain and aligator mouth.

I guess he feels his only mistake was saying what he was thinking.

Moran!

He doesn't know who the fuck Andy is let alone the values they had on that show.

Matlock would whoop his ass.

Allowing for minor "time-displacement" from the 50s-60s setting for the show, it by no means has a "conservative" view or espouse "conservative" values.

a Flaming Progressive:fistbump:

Foot in the mouth... right.

If the republicans just keep talking, we'll be at 6/6 before long

oh well, in his area, this was probably not viewed as an insult, nor inappropriate...

I'm a Red Sea pedestrian, and proud of it!

Brian: Excuse me. Are you the Judean People's Front?
Reg: Fuck off! We're the People's Front of Judea

Brian: Have I got a big nose, Mum?
Brian?s mother: Stop thinking about sex!
Brian: I wasn't!
Brian?s mother: You're always on about it. "Will the girls like this? Will the girls like that? Is it too big? Is it too small? "

Brian: I am NOT the Messiah!
Arthur: I say you are Lord, and I should know. I've followed a few.

Reg: If you want to join the People's Front of Judea, you have to really hate the Romans.
Brian: I do!
Reg: Oh yeah, how much?
Brian: A lot!
Reg: Right, you're in.

Brian: I'm not a roman mum, I'm a kike, a yid, a heebie, a hook-nose, I'm kosher mum, I'm a Red Sea pedestrian, and proud of it!

Brian: I'm not the Messiah! Will you please listen? I am not the Messiah, do you understand? Honestly!
Girl: Only the true Messiah denies His divinity.
Brian: What? Well, what sort of chance does that give me? All right! I am the Messiah!
Followers: He is! He is the Messiah!
Brian: Now, fuck off!

Arthur: How shall we fuck off, O Lord?

Life of Brian, 1979

my favorite:

Brian: I am NOT the Messiah!
Arthur: I say you are Lord, and I should know. I've followed a few.

thanks for the laughs...

And HOLD ON A MINUTE...is he saying that the Andy Griffith Show would have agreed with him? Because let's admit, there were no Jews in Mayberry.

I'd guess that Hendren spends a lot of time spouting a general sort of bigotry, so it's nice to see some specificity for a change.

I AM SORRY! period the end I will take what criticism comes.

traditional values! I guess that is what he meant to say.

No surprise the GOP has only one Jewish person in the House and Senate.

(I love that he thinks this is an apology. Idiot).

:wtf:

Stupid GOP pig.

clever of him to work that into the standard issue Republican non-apology apology! :mad:

Well of course he would have to be a raging klansman then. No Repuke could possibly oppose her on her voting record, so bigotry would be the only way to get votes.

nt

Unless his constituents are all fucked up too

"...I meant to call him a kike."

:eyes:

These guys always, ALWAYS reveal their true colors.

:hi: I am fine, and hope you are too. :hug:

I am living and traveling thoughout South America... I may never leave. :D

:rofl: :hug:

Stupid asshole was sorry 'cause it took away from whatever he was trying to say!!??

:eyes:

that:fistbump: Lame.

So, why was it? (he still does not get that "that Jew" is not meant as a compliment).

Late Update: Hendren gave a further apology to the Associated Press. "When I referred to him as Jewish, it wasn't because I don't like Jewish people," he said. He also added: "I shouldn't have gotten into this Jewish business because it distracts from the issue".

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/05/arkansas-gop-senate-candidate-apologizes-for-calling-schumer-that-jew.php

I don't use a fucking teleprompter? So what... racist shit wouldn't come out of your mouth if you read from a screen? Bullshit! Fuck his apology!! He called Schumer "that Jew" precisely to draw attention to the idea that Schumer does not believe in "traditional" values because Jews aren't like real people. Bullshit! that the phrase detracted from the message. The phrase was essential to the xenophobic, racist, bullshit message he was trying to convey.

I am tired of bullshit non-apology apologies. If you aren't sorry for saying what you think then have the balls to say that and accept the consequences of your position. This crap about "Oh I was not really trying to be racist..." It is a bunch of crap!! YES YOU WERE! You were speaking to people who you thought think exactly like you do. It was exposed publicly and now you are backing away from it because the nation may not be as overtly racist as your primary constituency is. Pathetic piece of shit!!

I'm sorry, Mr Hendren, but referring to Sen Schumer as "that Jew" was not "putting your foot in your mouth". What it was, sir, was a revelation of your true character. I realize that being called a Jew if you are a Jew is not an insult, but to refer to someone as "that Jew" in the tone that invariably accompanies that phrase IS insulting.

Your apology, moreover, was not a proper apology, but the standard politician's "non-apology apology". Reasonable people expect you to try again, and this time you must apologize correctly. If you fail to do so, you will be unfit to hold public office and you should suspend your further political career indefinitely.

If I receive no reply to this, I shall assume that you have no idea what I'm even talking about, which would be sad -- sad for your immortal soul, sad for the people of Arkansas, sad for all people who are called to public service.

Sincerely,
(etc etc)

Now, kindly fuck off.

About a minute into Maher's interview...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CgbvIasKUA&feature=related

a particularly crotchety old person I once knew, said that the BEST thing about being old was this:

She could actually SAY the outrageous things she wanted to, and then could "explain" it away with a few tears, and an explanation of her age, and a "sorry"...but it felt SO good to say whatever she wanted to.. and get away with it..

This is the tack that republicans use all the time.. they SAY exactly what they MEAN, and then pop off with a tepid.."sorry if I offended anyone" non-apology.. Their meanspirited lackeys received the "message" though, and only feel sympathy for them for being "picked on", and the ones offended?..well they were never supporters anyway, so no one cares what they think..

He sounds like a disgusting RW nut.