Dec 11^th

You may remember that a few days ago Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu emphatically criticized Donald Trump’s idea to prohibit entrance into this country by people based on their religion. He spoke about Israel’s religious tolerance and pointed out that such a restriction as banning Muslims would be against Israel’s national values. Trump promptly changed his plans to visit Israel. Now Mona Charen has decided to add to the anti-Trump chorus.

Not that she hasn’t been anti-Trump all along, on July 24^th of this year Charen writes about what she calls the “Trump bump;” she claims that, “Progressives are panting to interpret his surge as evidence of Republican’s black hearts. Some Trump supporters say that his success such as it is/was…is an indictment of the limp “Republican establishment.” Then Charen tries to show that Republicans aren’t so viciously anti-immigrant after all. She says that 66 percent say illegal immigrants are “mostly honest.” And that only 19 percent said they were “mainly undesirable.” What an endorsement! I can see the Latino community flocking right back to the Republican Party. Then Charen says, “Trump’s moment is probably fading, but his little balloon ride is disturbing none-the-less.” Well, no one in July expected Trump to be where he is now so Charen can be excused for her tendency to make light of Trump.

Most of her column isn’t about Trump but is used to denigrate the “execrable leadership of the Democratic Party and its allies in the press. We have witnessed several years of stoked race hatred in America.” Shooting down fleeing black men, putting sixteen bullets in a teenager in fifteen seconds and other obscenities had nothing to do with this race hatred; it’s all just poor Democratic leadership.

We come to today’s column: Charen is mightily upset because everyone is talking about Donald Trump instead of the “disastrous fecklessness of President Obama and his party in the face of terrorism…” Notice that once again Charen makes no specific criticisms; The President is “feckless,” the Democrats are “unravelling” from Obama Care, just as back in July Charen talked about “execrable” leadership. As far as I can see, Charen has not, in any of her columns, managed to claim the President has done “X” when he should have done “Y.” Charen has developed a penchant for the vicious attack about nothing specific.

Then she claims that, “Far from targeting American Muslims for discrimination the U.S has been a haven.”  And she says, “(The most common target of religious bigotry in America? Jews.)” This “Haven for Muslims” has seen a 300 percent increase in attacks on, or incidents about, Mosques and a 23 percent increase in attacks on Synagogues. Again, two minutes on the internet and Charen could have discovered this for herself.

Charen’s concern with Trump is that everyone is talking about Trump instead of Democratic shortcomings. Not a word about Trump’s hopelessly un-Constitutional call to stop Muslims from entering the country. Other Republicans, including most candidates for the Republican nomination have criticized Trump’s proposal as being un-American, against our values. Charen’s only complaint is that his newsworthiness stops complaints about Democrats.