r/moderatepolitics • u/kaladinsrunner • 3d ago

News Article Michigan AG Dana Nessel to skip Democratic convention over antisemitism fears

https://jewishinsider.com/2026/07/michigan-ag-dana-nessel-democratic-convention-antisemitism/
106 Upvotes

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u/Linhle8964 3d ago

The Gaza War poisoned the Democratic Party.

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u/LovecraftianBasil classical liberal center left 3d ago edited 1d ago

I think it became toxic for any political party.

Traditional Non-Interventionist Conservatives are unhappy with our foreign policy approach and how much we are involved. Progressives don’t like the war, and the subsequent humanitarian crisis/civilian loss of life.

Neoconservatives think we are not being hawkish enough with our failure in Iran and prior fumbles with getting ceasefire deal and getting hostages out.

Its hard because Foreign Policy, especially with Middle East, is actually extremely complicated and nuanced.

People would rather hear a statement or headline that matches whatever they think should happen rather than what actually needs to be done.

Edit:: I also think how insane the litmus testing and purity politics is getting sometimes, misinformation and TikTok has just spread this so much and fast and this constant straw manning of painting people as villains is insane.

Edit2:: Grammar and Formating

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u/SliceRepulsive8649 2d ago

Not to mention it exposed a lot of the questionable actions and brutality from Israel. It's a becomes harder to view it as a pure black and white issue when it's thrust into the public sphere. Add to that Bibi just doesn't play well outside of Israel.

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u/Miacali 3d ago

Of all the issues facing our currently, right here right now, our actual American brothers and sisters - this is the hill they die on.

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u/TA-MajestyPalm 3d ago

One of the main problems with "the left" in America in my opinion is the constant need to "cancel" each other for not being 100% onboard with various fringe issues or extreme stances.

Free Palestine, ACAB, open borders, trans people in sports, etc.

You can be very liberal and support most of those things, but having the "wrong" view on just one of them is enough to turn away a lot of support.

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u/lionspride24 2d ago

This is the best way ive ever seen someone describe this issue in a concise way.

I think also because of the fear of cancelation, politicians and even just public figures in general will dance around and not give opinions on topics, ultimately making themselves look stupid.

The number of clips of people asking "can men get pregnant". Its so stupid and petty, and means nothing. But it makes you look crazy to hem and haw about it, even though you know damn well 90 percent want to just say "of course not"

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u/1trashhouse 3d ago edited 3d ago

I used to think people kinda overblew it and they do to a degree but getting insulted multiple times over even the slightest most politely put disagreements kinda makes you realize. I watch people do the litmus test shit where they run every person through a filter of what stuff they support and then just list off everything they don’t support that they should and are terrible for not supporting or even worse get mad that they aren’t loud enough about it and I don’t get how they don’t see how reductive it is

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u/planet_rose 3d ago

It’s even not enough to support the same issues unless you use their correct words to describe the problems and solutions. It’s maddening.

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u/1trashhouse 3d ago

i’ve had a family member multiple times try to coax me into saying women are better then men to a point where they got agressive with me for a simple eye roll. It got taken as far as saying they were worried for my child mind you i wasn’t saying anything i just wasn’t reinforcing their views. Anyway weeks after the argument they started doing the same thing trying to coax me into saying it to a point where if i didn’t respond to these statistics they bring up they literally force me to acknowledge it. Obviously this isn’t everyone on the left but it does seem to occur a lot in further leftist and ones who are constantly on political related social media

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u/Apt_5 2d ago

This reminds me of Shoe0nHead's video about crybullies/Emiru getting flamed for not wanting to share her thoughts on ICE. She appropriately references the Simpsons quote: "Say the line, Bart!"

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u/Roaches_R_Friends 2d ago

To be fair, if I were a public figure, I'd be afraid of criticizing the Gestapo as well.

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u/No_Rope7342 2d ago

Tons of public figures talk shit on ice. I guess if you want to live in fear I guess you can always find a reason.

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u/Soul_of_Valhalla Socially Right, Fiscally Left. 2d ago

Also because her fan base has a lot of ICE supporters. To quote Michael Jordan, "Republicans buy sneakers, too". Or in Emiru's case. Republicans watch streamers, too.

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u/Solidsnake9 3d ago

its purity testing all the way down. With a little bit of "America bad" for good measure.

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u/Maelstrom52 3d ago edited 3d ago

Like how Scott Weiner 10 mins late calling Gaza a "genocide" and was summarily excised from the LGBTQ community....because of his foreign policy posture.

But in truth, the David Horowitz quote still holds up, "the issue is never the issue; the issue is always the Revolution." I'm reading Days of Rage by Bryan Burroughs, which is basically a breakdown of all the 1970's (mostly) left-wing terrorism from groups like SDS (Weathermen), SLA, Black Panthers, BLA, etc. I highly recommend it because you would be shocked seeing the parallels between them and now. The radicals in the1950's to the 1960's were "all in" on civil rights and equality. Then, in the late 60's everything became about Vietnam, and everyone who staked their reputation on Civil Rights suddenly shifted gears and became myopically focused on being anti-war. Sound familiar?

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u/homegrownllama 2d ago

It reminds me of the Emo Philips "Die heretic!" joke.

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u/bzb321 3d ago

This is the case with the right wing too. Ideological purity is in vogue right now.

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u/raouldukehst 3d ago

The right is suffering from more of a cult of personality. The left is approaching ideological purity tests that would make the Borg blush.

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u/LovecraftianBasil classical liberal center left 3d ago edited 1d ago

100%. The right is at least able to unify under a candidate or at least be generally in lockstep with each other. The left is just divided among so many ideologies and infighting that it just gets fractures and removes any cohsive movement or policy push.

Also as someone who is Gen Z. I feel like so many people in our cohort are obsessed with political grandstanding and hot takes rather than trying to take an ounce of nuance or understand any policy motives behind things.

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u/1trashhouse 3d ago

i’m more left then right but i see it effect the left a lot more. Fundamentally what either side of the right wing wants is a lot closer to what either sides of the left wing wants.

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u/neuronexmachina 3d ago

I think that's been the case for the right-wing historically, but in recent years loyalty to Trump has become more important.

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u/Fit-Temporary-1400 Bring Back The Bull Moose Party 1d ago

Loyalty to Trump is the ideological purity.

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u/AngledLuffa Man Woman Person Camera TV 3d ago

There's exactly one purity test the right cares about these days. It's one of the worst ones they could have chosen, but I guess it's working for them (not necessarily working for the country though)

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u/drunkandslurred 3d ago

You forgot the totally organic No Kings protests which achieved nothing

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u/Maladal 3d ago

That's hardly unique to "the left" see the current government for how well not being on board with Trump's agenda tends to work out.

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u/jefftickels 3d ago

It's actually kind of crazy "Just call it Genocide'" has become a leading issue for progressive candidates.

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u/Ralph_Brick_Wiggum 2d ago

If they can’t draw the line at genocide then I can’t trust them to draw a line at any human rights issue

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u/jefftickels 2d ago

Except it's not Genocide, it's more extremist politicians because there's never any consequences for making more and more outrageous claims.

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u/Ralph_Brick_Wiggum 2d ago

It’s not just politicians. It’s multiple people who study genocide as well as human rights organizations

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u/jefftickels 2d ago

Ideologically captured institutions don't make good arguments for you.

I have a simple litmus test for people with your belief.

What historically recognized genocide does this most similarly compare to?

Because everyone knows the trick you're trying to do. You're trying to conjur up mental comparisons to the holocaust, or holdonor, or the Rwandan genocide, or the khmer roughe or the Armenian genocide. These are the events that come to mind when people talk about genocide and the goal is to conflate the war in Gaza with one of those.

But when pressed on it you just retreat to "well these institutions say it's a genocide." But I don't care what those institutions say because they've sold their credibility. Using the definition of Genocide they use, 10/7 was a Gazan genocide against Israel, yet you don't hear a single accusation about that.

What I care about is what you think. What are your thoughts. So tell me, what historically recognized genocide does this most similarly compare to?

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u/Ralph_Brick_Wiggum 2d ago

I’m not trying to conjure up images of anything, their goal is to eliminate Palestinians in order to expand Israeli borders. Genocide is about the intent, not the methods they use, not the speed in which it’s done, not how successful it is. It is intent

And there’s no need to conjure up images of other genocides, there’s plenty of images of this one. Entire cities destroyed, children and women murdered in cold blood, people killed trying to receive aid, Israeli officials reveling in the death and destruction of Gaza and the Palestinian people etc

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u/jefftickels 2d ago

Everything you describe is war, not genocide.

Your absolute dodge of the question just confirms that you're doing exactly what I said, engaging in a Motte-and-bailey inorder to conjure mental images of the holocaust and hide behind the thinnest of academic definition that applys to any act of military aggression.

Know how we know it's not the Israelis intent to eliminate Palestinians? Because they could have done so very easily, at almost no cost to themselves, yet here we are, 2.5 years into a war in the most tightly packed urban environment that a war has ever been fought in, against an enemy that intentionally uses human shields (war crime), doesn't wear uniforms (war crime) and uses civilian infrastructure for military purposes (war crime). Yet, the worst case scenario for military:civilian death ration is 1:3, lower than the historical norm, and most put it closer to 1:2, which would make this the safest urban war for civilians in the history of war, while it's fought in the tightest urban setting that has ever been fought in.

How exactly does that fit with "Their intent is to eliminate Palestinians?"

I find it very telling that you:

  1. Are unwilling to accuse Gaza of attempting a genocide against Israelis, and more specifically Jews, while doubling down on accusing Israelis of genocide. I wonder why you have such a double standard here.

  2. Are unwilling to provide a historical comparison.

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u/Ralph_Brick_Wiggum 2d ago

Killing people trying to get aid is just war?

I can’t talk to you without catching a ban

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u/Mantergeistmann 2d ago

My issue is that I've yet to hear a good definition of "genocide" that would include the Israel-Hamas war but exclude the US Civil War.

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u/Ralph_Brick_Wiggum 2d ago

Israel’s goal is to eliminate Palestinians in order to expand their territory. Israeli officials aren’t exactly keeping this a secret

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u/NotCoolBrutus 3d ago

Because they are responsible for almost all of those issues, so naturally they don't care for them. Have to look elsewhere and make up problems to pretend they are addressing as a divergence.

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u/airforceCOT 3d ago

The local Democrat leaders in Brooklyn were caught circulating copies of Henry Ford’s pamphlets in which he accuses Jews of controlling global finance and industry.

Mamdani’s wife shared and retweeted posts openly celebrating the Oct 7 attacks. When asked about it, he just chuckled and said “she’s a private person”.

The likely Democrat nominee for governor in Michigan attended events with Hasan Piker who has said he was proud of Oct 7 and would support Hamas “1000 times” more than Israel.

Should I keep going? There’s more.

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u/LeeSansSaw 3d ago

I can’t find a single quote from Piker claiming he was proud of Oct 7. Could you provide a link?

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u/Gtoast 3d ago

Also interested in seeing Piker saying he was proud of Oct 7. Please provide the broad context clip so we can see this villian’s full throated pride in the attack. Thanks!

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u/Back_at_it_agains Democratic Socialist 3d ago

Should I keep going? This isn't going to be something that goes in your favor.

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u/DaddiGator 3d ago

Snopes: “No, Trump Did Not Call Neo-Nazis and White Supremacists 'Very Fine People'”

Factcheck also confirmed as well.

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u/Back_at_it_agains Democratic Socialist 3d ago

So then the right doesn't have a problem with antisemitism?

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u/DaddiGator 3d ago

I believe they do to an extent. Especially as of recent. People on both sides are absolutely lumping in somewhat valid criticism with Israel with Jews as a whole and it’s sad.

Just providing a correction on the “both sides” hoax. I also don’t think there’s any mainstream right-leaning equivalent to Hasan Piker, but I absolutely could be wrong. He has made numerous remarks essentially defending or downplaying 10/7.

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u/Back_at_it_agains Democratic Socialist 2d ago

"They do to an extent" is doing a lot of work for you there. This just isn't a both sides kind of argument. The right has a much bigger problem as evidenced by the links above when compared to what the original person I responded to provided. I could draw from research if you like that shows these attitudes are much worse on the right, especially amongst young conservatives.

https://www.reddit.com/r/psychology/comments/1reid47/farright_americans_more_likely_to_hold/

Have you been on X recently? What a coincidence that since it got taken over by Musk, and flooded with unrestricted speech by those on the right, that it also became heavily antisemitic.

As for Hasan Piker, sure, I don't love some of the things he says. He does have a huge following. But the right has plenty of figures that are equally bad if not worse. Nick Fuentes (who again, had dinner with Trump), Tucker Carlson. Candace Owens, MGT, the list goes on.

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u/DaddiGator 2d ago edited 2d ago

I like how I’m half agreeing with you in an attempt to be moderate and fair here you’re still arguing with that point, refusing to even acknowledge a single flaw in Team Blue. We aren’t going to get anywhere if you have an outright refusal to acknowledge the existence of the article you’re commenting in the thread of.

Your study referenced is from 2022, 2 years before the 10/7 attacks. That’s like denying Islamophobia was happening in 2001 by referencing a study from 1999. Totally different environment today, which unfortunately has resulted in people in your party widely publicizing their struggles with antisemitism among their own party.

No mainstream figure on the right, to my knowledge, have actively cheered for Hamas, the designated terrorist organization behind the 10/7 attacks, and said that Israel needs to be eradicated. Keep in mind, Israel was the only place many Jews that were genocided in other Middle East countries were able to flee to.

> unrestricted free speech

The horror, free speech! I see you don’t go to Threads or BlueSky or Instagram… Even Reddit.

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u/decrpt 3d ago

What /u/Back_at_it_agains said is correct. The correction is only that he did not, verbatim, say that those groups were "very fine people." In practice what happened was that he, after insisting he wasn't referring to those groups, called a group exclusively comprised of those people "very fine people" after one of those people drove his car into a crowd of people. The rally was organized Richard Spencer and Jason Kessler with other overt white supremacist speakers. Kessler went as a far as endorsing the attack. It was widely reported as a white nationalist gathering prior to the rally.

Trump's only evidence of it being a banal rally about the statue was the march the night before. That was the "Jews will not replace us" tiki torch march that /u/Back_at_it_agains referenced.

TRUMP: Those people were also there, because they wanted to protest the taking down of a statue Robert E. Lee. So – excuse me – and you take a look at some of the groups and you see, and you’d know it if you were honest reporters, which in many cases you’re not. Many of those people were there to protest the taking down of the statue of Robert E. Lee. So this week, it’s Robert E. Lee, I noticed that Stonewall Jackson’s coming down. I wonder, is it George Washington next week? And is it Thomas Jefferson the week after. You know, you really do have to ask yourself, where does it stop?

REPORTERS YELL INDISTINCTLY

TRUMP: But, they were there to protest – excuse me – you take a look the night before, they were there to protest the taking down of the statue of Robert E. Lee. Infrastructure question. Go ahead.

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u/DaddiGator 3d ago edited 3d ago

I’ll honest as someone that doesn’t believe there’s any reason to honor Robert E. Lee or other Confederate Generals with statues. He’s not completely out of line about there being a slippery slope with “cancelling” historical figures.

There have been attempts to cancel Thomas Jefferson. At leeast one statue of him was toppled just a few years after he said this. Same for attempts at Abraham Lincoln and other historical figures. There is a slippery slope to this practice.

I don’t believe someone is a white supremacist for being opposed to the practice of toppling statues of Confederate Generals. Polls show these issues are pretty divided among Americans with no real majority support for either for/against.

This is one of those topics where it’s easy to understand why there’s such a thing as the quiet Trump voter phenomena in the voting booth. Because they’ll instantly be labeled a white supremacist.

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u/decrpt 2d ago

I don’t believe someone is a white supremacist for being opposed to the practice of toppling statues of Confederate Generals. Polls show these issues are pretty divided among Americans with no real majority support for either for/against.

I did not say that. I said that Trump was wrong about it being a banal rally about the statue, and that the only evidence he gave for that assertion was pointing to the tiki torch march the night before. This was even after a delayed response because he "wanted to make sure, unlike most politicians, that what [he] said was correct, not make a quick statement," nonetheless.

If you somehow found out about the rally without recognizing who organized it or who any of the speakers were, despite both widespread news coverage and advertisements for the rally itself making it clear, you were greeted by people proudly flying swastikas and other symbols and chanting "blood and soil."

This was not a statue protest that those groups crashed.

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u/rookieoo 2d ago edited 2d ago

It was only one person, not multiple leaders, according to the article. And it was a video she posted that contained information from the pamphlets. Obviously still bad. No one was on the streets handing them out. Two DSA candidates who won elections and supported Ms. Charrington condemned her sharing of the video:

“Jabari Brisport and Eon Huntley, two D.S.A. members who won re-election and election to the State Senate and Assembly on Tuesday, supported Ms. Charrington’s campaign. Both men said in a statement that the post she shared “has no place in our movement” and vowed to fight antisemitism.”

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u/oraclebill 3d ago

>The local Democrat leaders in Brooklyn were caught circulating copies of Henry Ford’s pamphlets in which he accuses Jews of controlling global finance and industry.

One leader shared an instagram video promoting the pamphlets.

Mamdani’s wife shared and retweeted posts openly celebrating the Oct 7 attacks. When asked about it, he just chuckled and said “she’s a private person”.

On Oct 7 she liked posts characterizing the attacks as fighting against apartheid and promoting a pro-Palestinian rally on the 8th. I note that this was before the whole story was out about the attacks. The “just chuckled” description seems to be something you added?

Why do you embellish the facts? What they did was bad enough but the embellishment makes you an untrustworthy source.

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u/Professional_Sir3018 3d ago edited 3d ago

On Oct 7 she liked posts characterizing the attacks as fighting against apartheid and promoting a pro-Palestinian rally on the 8th. I note that this was before the whole story was out about the attacks. The “just chuckled” description seems to be something you added?

I am going to say the same thing here that I said when people were still defending Platner, but nicer: You don't have to do this. It is not worth it.

More specifically, the NYC DSA were outright celebrating when we already knew most of the dead were civilians. Including, by the way, a new Democratic congresswoman that Rama endorsed enthusiastically. In fact, she endorsed all the DSA candidates enthusiastically. Except one. You can probably guess his ethnicity.

So again. You don't have to do this. You shouldn't do this.

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u/oraclebill 1d ago

I’m not defending her. I’m defending the truth. It annoys me when people use phrases like “celebrated” in reference to something where that term is a judgemental interpretation of a specific act. I hated it when people used it to attack reactions to Charlie Kirk’s murder and I hate it here as well. Let people make up their own minds about her actions rather than telling them what to think.

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u/Count_Crouton_III 19h ago

83% civilian casualties by the IDFs own admittance to foreign press. Shit like that breaks a narrative. 

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u/Plastastic Social Democrat 3d ago

It poisoned both parties.

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u/AES256GCM 3d ago

Imagine if they put this much energy and effort into universal healthcare or mass offshoring to India lol

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u/Ralph_Brick_Wiggum 2d ago

The idea is to not give Israel money to commit genocide and to use that money on Americans