Republicans, Jews, and Jim DeMint

"There are some people out there who just aren't very good at compliments," said Alex Koppelman in Salon. Take Edwin Merwin and James Ulmer, the county chairs in the South Carolina Republican Party who wrote a letter to a local paper defending the fiscal conservatism of Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.). But, clearly, saying that DeMint is like a Jew "watching our nation's pennies" was not the best way to express their support.

This has to be "one of the more idiotic political defenses in recent memory," said David Paul Kuhn in RealClearPolitics. Sure, Edwin Merwin and James Ulmer made their dumb remark to a small-town newspaper—but it won't be "well received by the national Republican Party," which is trying to "make inroads into the Jewish vote" and portray itself as a more inclusive party. This small story won't hurt much—but it certainly won't help.

There's no denying that this was "a stupid statement," said William A. Jacobson in Legal Insurrection. "The penny-pinching Jew part of it, that is," not the bit about how Jim DeMint is helping our nation succeed by reining in spending. But let's hold all people who make hateful statements about Jews—are you listening, Al Sharpton?—to the same standards.

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