“Clearly O’Donnell is not familiar with the concept of diaspora as it applies to many people of the world.”

Well there’s that….and the fact that Rosie O’Donnell is clearly insane.

LOL, Who let this gas bag out of her cage……

Colby this is a fair article, and I agree. Helen has a right to say what she said, as Rosie states. She must though realize that people have the right to protest what she said. Rosie is just another one of those ultra-liberals.

Liberty – Not Redistribution says:
June 10, 2010 at 10:16 am
Don’t pin this one on us, we hate Rosie as much as Mahmoud Ahmadinejad hates….everything.

Is Ms. O’Donnell really that ignorant of history of Jews in Europe for over a thousand years? And how they were driven out of many countries? The pogroms,the repression, the denial of basic liberties?

And why they went to the Middle East after the Holocaust?

Didn’t we all learn about this in 6th grade? Junior high school?

Anyway, I don’t hate Ms. O’Donnell. As I understand it, she does great work for charities.

As to her views: Yeah, I hate them. Or, at least, this one.

Dear Rosie…
“What you’ve just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard. At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.”
–Billy Madison (1995)

Offcourse it’s not hate speech. You say something the Jews don’t like, they call for ya head.

the Jews

Ah, here we go: the Jews. Substitute “the blacks” or “the gays” or “the Hispanics” and see how that sounds to you.

People who think like this don’t see individual human beings. They just see a group – the Jews, the blacks.

There are no “the Jews” my friend. Just people who are Jewish.

@SteveMG
So the Europeans persecuted them as you said, but the Palestinians have to bear the consequences by having their homes destroyed to make way for the immigrants. Right! right! right! I see, so Paul hurts peter, then everyone says its nice to take it on Jonah. Unn , interesting.

@SteveMG
Right so if there are no people who are the ‘Jews’ . Why do I hear the term Jew hater. Right I see, it can be used by you but not anyone else. Almost sounds like the ‘N’ word.

One can only imagine the horrible outcry, were someone of prominence make a comment that “all gays need to go back to the closet”.

.

Another lib takes off her mask to prove her bigotry!

@marigrace
What a silly statement. The gays and black should be offended by these stupid comparisons. The gays nor the blacks did not create a country for gays, nor for blacks. I haven’t seen gays and blacks go to a state or a country, kicked the people who are living there out and invite all gays or blacks to a country that is specifically for them. You jokers that try to make a similarity with this analogy should hang your head in shames. The gays and black people should be offended by these moronic similarities that are been made.

What did Thomas say: That Jews should go back to Germany, Poland… and the United States. In fact going back to Germany, Poland and the United States does not in any way imply going back to the ovens, since the torture or killing of Jews does not take place in Germany, Poland, … or the United States.

Kam Fet: I neither have the time nor temperament to explain the history of the establishment of the Jewish state.

People who view groups of individuals as a single entity: “the Jews” or “the blacks” or “the gays” or “the Muslims” deny the individual humanity of the people within those groups. If one doesn’t see an individual Jew or an individual gay person or an individual Muslim but, instead, see a member of a group, you can then ascribe the “bad” things that that group does (in your view) to all members of that group.

You don’t like the “bad” things that Israel does. You then ascribe all of those bad things to all Jews.

Acts by Jews are not Jewish acts.

If there’s anyone who can bring a calm, rational viewpoint to this issue, it’s Rosie O’Donnell.

@SteveMG
I completely understand your point, and am not attributing the actions of Israel to all Jews. Heck, I see some individual Jews, even in the media the most outspoken in regards to what Israel is doing to the Palestinians. Diane Feinstein, recently said an investigation needs to be done. Maybe I should have said the Jewish state or just Israel. You do know that anyone that says anything, even minimal of Israel action is called a Jew hater, anti-Semite etc.

They want to black mail the people and not have the news out there.

I really hate wading into this subject because there are some who feel very passionately about it and now there’s an entire contingent of right-wingers, who see Helen Thomas as some kind metaphor for the press corps in general, but…

I would like to point out that Stephen Colbert’s desk guest last night was the Israeli Ambassador to the United States, who was born in New York and raised in New Jersey. A man who didn’t emigrate to Israel. A 55 year old man, who didn’t emigrate to Israel until he was 24, immediately enlisted in their army, then returned to the United States to further his education and where he taught at various colleges, before accompanying George W. Bush as part of a delegation in 2008.

IOW: Though I understand the shorthand of Poland and Germany may have struck some as insensitive, I’m not really sure the issue is so cut and dried. After all, I’ve questioned the concept of dual citizenship, Israel’s religious-based government and some of their choices a few times, myself.

Whoops! Skipped a few words… Amb. Oren “didn’t emigrate to Israel” until he was 24.

Darn it. I filed my correction before reading the next sentence. I really need to work on my proofreading and this site should really look into giving us threaded conversations, the ability to edit and some way to flag inappropriate comments.

Mags?
And I want a corner office and a window with a view!
You think they are listening?

@Puter Boi: Well, maybe if we were to buy an interstitial, we could get the message across.

@Megister

this site should really look into giving us threaded conversations, the ability to edit and some way to flag inappropriate comments.

100% agreement with ya there….

Though I understand the shorthand of Poland and Germany may have struck some as insensitive, I’m not really sure the issue is so cut and dried.

But you do know that there are hundreds of thousands of Jews who live in Israel who went there from other Middle East countries? They were driven out of their Egypt, Syria et al?

Look, there’s no doubt that during the beginning of the establishment of Israel that many Arabs then living in that region were horribly mistreated by Jewish groups (the terror group Irgun terrorized many Arabs) . The Palestinian Exodus wasn’t undertaken simply as a tactic to allow the Arab nations to attack Israel. Sure, some of it was. But some of it was because of the terror policies by some Jewish groups.

Israel doesn’t come to the table with clean hands.

Maybe I shouldn’t have posted this because this isn’t the place for a discussion of the history of the Israeli/Palestinian tragedy (and it is a tragedy; both sides have legitimate and deep grievances).

@SteveMG: Sure, I know that settlers emigrated from throughout the world to Israel and I also realize that it’s understandable for the Israeli face in the United States to be mostly populated by people with dual citizenship, who probably went to Israel to increase the likelihood of becoming a big fish.

But, if I might walk it back from my anecdote about the Israeli Ambassador to something more inline with Rosie’s statement, which Colby highlighted in the original post.

While I understand the position of those who feel passionately, I also find it somewhat ironic that many of the people who have devoted hours of their television and radio programming or who have flooded this and other blogs with comments condemning the “thought police”, limited discussions, labels and politically correct language have jumped on the bandwagon they’ve preached against, all because a liberal opinion columnist expressed her opinion.

I’m not a big Oprah fan but to equate her with Rosie O’nutjob is just plain mean. Some people call her the next Oprah? Who? Danny Glover? She’s a wingnut. Poor Oprah.

@Magister
I’ve been having this discussion with them all week. Its freedom of speech and of the press, until you touch on a particular topic they don’t want to hear or hear anyone else criticize.

Kam fet says…
The gays and black should be offended by these stupid comparisons. The gays nor the blacks did not create a country for gays, nor for blacks. I haven’t seen gays and blacks go to a state or a country, kicked the people who are living there out and invite all gays or blacks to a country that is specifically for them.

Sorry but you comments, as well as the Helen Thomas comments, show lack of knowledge concerning Jewish history. FYI Israel has been the homeland of the Jews since Bible times and the Jews coming back to Israel, was foretold in the Bible. The Helen Thomas comment that the Jews should go back to where they came from: that is exactly what they are doing, going back to their homeland, Israel.

.

Israel isn’t my country. I can’t believe GOD told them this was their land. There are many opinions and I can listen, but ISRAEL DO OR DIE doesn’t make sense to me.
Helen Thomas used unfortunate words, ok, she never minced around her opinion on this…but she didn’t say anything that awful. It’s a ridiculous SHOW, I don’t buy into it.
Israel was wrong to attack the flotilla in the middle of the night, firing shots and not expecting people to defend their ship in international waters. Let’s not lose sight of that. All these interesting smoke screens deflecting from the fact that Israel came on board and shot people IN THE HEAD!

marigrace writes: “One can only imagine the horrible outcry, were someone of prominence [to] make a comment that “all gays need to go back to the closet.”

————————————————————————————————————————

Uh… guess you never heard of “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.” Isn’t that about going back to the closet?

Bob Amsel says:
June 10, 2010 at 1:15 pm

marigrace writes: “One can only imagine the horrible outcry, were someone of prominence [to] make a comment that “all gays need to go back to the closet.”

————————————————————————————————————————

Uh… guess you never heard of “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.” Isn’t that about going back to the closet?”

No, it mean s stop “flaming.”

Hi, i think that the oven thing is a bit too much… But still, it’s good to see that there are two sides to this story.

It did feel like a witch hunt.

I think this article is pretty unbiased… which is really hard to come by these days:

http://www.entertainmedaily.com/2010/06/helen-thomas-deserves-a-punch-in-the-face-but-rabbi-david-nesenoff-should-be-kicked-in-the-balls/

What do you guys think?

Yes, another lib ploy to misplace the blame.

The rabbi made her say it!

I am not clear, notsofast, why is it you are offended by what Thomas said?

@marigrace
I’m always amazed when Jews and their Fundamentalist Christians/Evangelicals quote the bible in regards to this issue. I don’t think you want to go there, don’t even think about it. You chose to refer to the bible when it suits your purpose, but in general way of life you ignore its rulings. You don’t want me to start quoting verses that warned the Jews, or the promises of punishment if they persist in certain ways. I don’t know how you remind yourself of that, but you sit there and say its God’s land to ya.

Right! How many atheists are living in Israel? If that doesn’t break the first commandment I don’t know what does. It was given to Abraham and his offsprings because they were beloved to God for their devotion to him. If I remember well Arabs are also children of Abraham . So whoever follow Abraham in worshipping God deserve the land, not a bold claim that God gave it to us. Someone forgot to send the Romans that memo centuries ago.

@Kam Fet
You don’t know anything about me or my beliefs so don’t purport to know if I follow the bible’s rulings or not. Neither did I say it is God’s land, but that Israel was the land of the Jews, long before they settled in Germany, Poland and America. They were there since Bible times.

I think you and others misinterpreted my prior statement about gay people. Let me restate what I meant. Helen Thomas made a bigoted, stupid statement about Jews, and it was akin to saying that gay people need to go back to the closet.. If anyone would understand being the target of bigotry, it is gay people, which is why I am surprised Rosie defends Thomas.

.

To Notsofast: Go back under your bridge, troll, and flame out.

Wasn’t it this same tub of guts who defended Roman Polanski by saying “well, it wasn’t ‘rape’ rape?”

To marigrace: to get serious, Rosie craves attention, isn’t overly bright, and seldom thinks before she runs her mouth. In this instance, she’s totally clueless regarding the implications of what Helen Thomas said. If Rosie isn’t too stubborn to listen to anyone else, someone has probably explained everything to her by now.

As for Helen Thomas, I suspect she may be getting paranoid dementia and I’m sorry she didn’t retire before now because her bigoted comments will have tarnished a long and illustrious career in which she didn’t shy away from asking tough questions to those who ran the country (or sometimes, ran the country into the ground).

To pyrope: you’re confusing Rosie with Whoopi Goldberg, who on “The View” was actually referring to the criminal charge brought against Polanski rather than what he actually did with the underage girl. Whoopi is not a Polanski supporter.

There is no moral equivalence between Israel and any Arab state.

“There is no moral equivalence between Israel and any Arab state.”

Could you explain what that means?

You’re right. Most Arab states haven’t burned civilians alive with White Phosphorous.

You asshole.

Wasn’t it Rosie who said “Steel Dosen’t melt!!!!” in regards to the twin towers and the blaming BUSH rhetoric. What i would like to know is, if steel dosen’t melt, then how is it made(smelting), shaped (autos, guard rails, ect). and used. Sorry been waiting to ask this one.

Remember Rosie doesn’t like guns. But, yet she liked Star Wars, Tom Crusie (Mission Impossible).

The guns in Star Wars aren’t real, ya know. Moron.

@marigrace
I think politicians like John McCain who are defending “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” are saying “all gays need to go back in the closet and stay there”..

To esd2000: That’s exactly the point I was trying to make to marigrace as well before some homophobic troll attempted to intervene. DADT is all about staying deep in the closet and losing your job should you leave it.