Jew's Clues

It is hardly newsworthy that macaca-baiter George Felix Allen has just discovered that his maternal grandfather (from whom Felix got his despised middle name, no less) was a Jewish resistance fighter in Nazi-occupied North Africa. Though on the scale of things difficult to believe, it ranks right up there with the notion that he coincidentally made up a word to refer to a dark-skinned harasser that just happens to be identical to a francophone racial slur.

Things coincidental and not, the timing of Felix' iteration of his roots is odd, to say the least.

In a statement released by his campaign yesterday, Allen said he was proud to have recently discovered that his grandfather, an anti-Nazi resistance fighter in North Africa, was part of a well-known Jewish family.

"I was raised as a Christian and my mother was raised as a Christian," Allen, 54, said. "And I embrace and take great pride in every aspect of my diverse heritage, including my Lumbroso family line's Jewish heritage, which I learned about from a recent magazine article and my mother confirmed."

Allen's religious background has not been a campaign issue. But when the reporter asked Allen about it Monday, the exchange triggered a flood of critical commentary on Internet blogs yesterday, demanding that Allen clarify his ancestry.

The Jewish weekly newspaper the Forward recently explored Allen's possible Jewish roots and his connection to the Lumbrosos, a prominent Jewish family that settled in Italy in the 15th century. Allen's campaign spokesman did not return calls seeking confirmation, according to that article.

I don't think it's necessary or relevant that Allen "clarify his ancestry", just for the record. I really couldn't possibly care less. But after watching him flail for answers to the "macaca" question on Press the Meat last Sunday, this sure seems like a tenuous straw to grasp for, considering Felix' record and who he's chosen to stand with up to now.

What this really is is a cheap tactic to portray Jim Webb as an anti-Semite, because of Webb's characterizations of primary opponent Harris Miller (who is Jewish) as a money-grubbing lobbyist. But Miller's name is not recognizably Jewish, and "money-grubbing lobbyist" is about as redundant a phrase as one could imagine. It's right up there with "that asshole Cheney".

Felix also claims that he "abhors bigotry", and seems to be reaching into the well for some sort of exculpatory evidence for that. Good luck with that. People who truly abhor bigotry recognize the confederate flag for exactly what it is, understand the significance of nooses and their connotation to lynching, and know lowlife racist groups like the CCC for who and what they are. Felix' habits and actions speak for themselves; his cheap claims at youthful ignorance and rebelliousness notwithstanding. I was a rebellious youth as well, but it never would have occurred to me to get a confederate flag to express myself as such, unless I needed something to mop up cow shit with and then light on fire.

I think this little gambit will backfire on Felix, as well it should. Let's face facts and see things for what they are -- Felix has cultivated this redneck yahoo persona because, sadly, there is still a sizable contingent of southern mossbacks that reacts positively to the symbols and code phrases of their Lost Cause. There are not two sides to this issue for them any more than there are for sane people, paradoxically enough. Webb's genuine Virginia pedigree may actually sway these people from an increasing perception that Felix is exactly the sort of person these yahoos really hate -- a transplanted Los Angeles Jew, a fake redneck who wears cowboy boots where there are no cowboys, a person who persists in hiding his identity until he thinks it's tactically convenient to bring it up. Whether out of shame, fear, or just plain indifference, it matters not.

There's really nowhere left for Felix to run, though it would be more helpful and constructive if perhaps it were pointed out that what Felix really is is a dumber, less politically and intellectually astute Dubya. Yes, sadly, it is eminently possible, and right now it is in the incarnation of George Felix Allen, a destructive dim-bulb who grew up physically terrorizing his younger siblings and inciting post-Watts-riot racial enmity at his high school just a few miles away.

Allen's Jewishness, and his alternate distancing and defensiveness about it are tangential to the argument, though illustrative of the man's mentality in general. He's not utilizing his "newfound" lineage as some sort of mode to greater understanding or a richer experience in knowing life and the world; it's just something he can use to lamely try to paint his opponent as a noxious Jew-baiter, because no one's buying the "I just made up the word macaca" bullshit.

Then again, Virginia once nearly sent Oliver North to the Senate, so I suppose anything's possible. Short of leaked photos showing Felix balls deep in a macaca's ass, he's still got a chance, though as this latest episode shows, his flailing has taken on the distinct whiff of desperation.