Once upon a time, Slate got very upset by any hint of a Jewish stereotype. But that was before Vice President Joe “Archie Bunker” Biden’s latest doozy complaining “unscrupulous bankers” were a bunch of “Shylocks.”
There is not a mention (so far) of Biden’s latest gaffe to be found at Slate today.
That wasn’t the case when George Lucas introduced us to the slave trader Watto in Star Wars: The Phantom Menace.
In a piece headlined “The Merchant of Menace,” Slate was quick to attack Watto:
There, they attempt to repair their broken spaceship but are stymied by the hook-nosed owner of the local parts shop–Watto–who also happens to have a thick Yiddish accent! (To hear an example, click “Great.”) Psychological manipulations that work on almost everyone fail with Watto–“Mind ticks don’ta work on me … only money! No,” he cries–and the heroes get what they want only through the bravery of a gifted slave boy (Anakin Skywalker). At the end of the desert planet sequence, Anakin is emancipated but separated from his mother, who still belongs to Watto. Even in a galaxy far away, the Jews are apparently behind the slave trade.
By now the hypocrisy of the legacy and left-wing (but I repeat myself) media is no surprise. When a Democrat vice president brazenly uses “Shylocks” as a slur to condemn bankers, and thereby conjures the most sinister anti-Semitic narrative of the last 500 years, Biden gets a pass. Perhaps if he had added that the “Shylocks” also “control the media” or have horns, there might have been some attention paid at the once vigilant Slate. Perhaps not.
The same sort of hypocrisy is on display at Talking Points Memo. TPM features an attack on a Republican candidate for U.S. Senate for website plagiarism. Just a month ago, TPM was busy defending Fareed Zakaria. Thanks, guys, you make posts like this one so easy to write.
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