THE MIND OF MARINE LE PEN

Here's another something to ponder that puts Marine Le Pen's dedication to a clear view under a question mark:

In a follow-up interview on French TV, Le Pen repeated her statements, adding, “Jewish skullcaps are obviously not a problem in our country,” but “what would people say if I’d only asked to ban Muslim clothing? They’d burn me as a Muslim-hater.” Le Pen has no qualms about trampling on the right to religious expression of both Jews and Muslims to advance her xenophobic and intolerant agendas.

I fail to see her logic here. She's not making clear whether it's the public opinion or the media she's worried about. And even the most demented of Europeans would surely admit that they've never felt physically threatened by Jewish men wearing kippas, not even Haredim. So what's she worried about anyway? And if she's got a problem with kippas, does that also include the similar caps worn by Catholic priests?

The sad part is that the Jerusalem Post themselves are blurring the differences here between Judaism and Islam, and may even be trying to defame Geert Wilders even if his party does have a flaw:

Europe’s Jewry cannot rely on politicians such as Le Pen. And Le Pen is not the only right-wing disappointment. Wilders’s Party for Freedom has reportedly included in its platform a prohibition of ritual slaughter – both Muslim and Jewish. And Dion Graus, a parliamentarian from the party, intends to continue efforts to ban the import of ritually slaughtered meat. Chief Ashkenazi Rabbi Yona Metzger has written to Wilders asking him to reconsider.

Despite this being bothersome, it somehow doesn't strike me as being as problematic as Le Pen's own galling mishmash, so I'm not going to just write off Wilders the way they want to. But a difference should be made clear - what's considered "halal" is not considered kosher: there's plenty of food manufactured under halal steps like seafood that's not considered kosher by Jewish dietary habits. Not even meat. And halal food isn't as good with health benefits as kosher is. Maybe those who think kosher food could be a problem might want to reconsider and just call for clearer labels on halal food packages?

Update: just brilliant, the moldy-old father of Marine, Jean-Marie, has defended her statements with no interest in distinguishing himself from how he handled his own beliefs before:

Jean-Marie Le Pen, founder and former leader of the far right-wing French party National Front (FN), on Wednesday came to the defense of his daughter and current leader of the party, Marine Le Pen, who called for the prohibition in public of Muslim veils and Jewish kippot.

In an interview with AFP, Jean Marie Le Pen said his daughter initially had spoken to the daily Le Monde about the veils, and that the matter of skullcaps was raised only by her interviewer.

“She didn’t put the two subjects on the same ground,” he said. “She [just] demanded that Jews wearing a kippa make a patriotic gesture not to wear it in order to more easily enable a prohibition against the veil.”

No, Le Pen, she didn't. She said they should be banned in public, not make a request to help make things easier. She didn't think over her response well either. Comparing such a pint-sized headwear to the veil and female to male garments was stupid too. As I'd implied before in fairness, if she wanted to make a case in that context, she could have asked religiously observant married Jewish women to refrain from wearing hair-scarves while telling the interviewer that she can't see how such teensy male headwear as a kippa counts because it doesn't hide identities. But she didn't, because she's so desperate to "cash in" on the platforms she allegedly supports. Likewise, her father's own defenses of her approach fall flat, and that includes the following groaner:

Le Pen added that Sarkozy’s center-right UMP party lost because it had always refused to form an alliance with the FN. In an interview earlier this week with the extreme right-wing newspaper Minute, he accused the B’nai B’rith of having “imposed” this stance on the UMP.

When questioned about this during his interview with the AFP, he said he himself had not witnessed this firsthand.

“But it was said 10 times, 100 times,” he explained. “It is not a scoop. It is a plausible explanation. It was not denied.”

He sounds like a 9-11 truther in the vein of Lyndon LaRouche and Ron Paul. This is just a form of Jew-blame, accusing the community of influencing political platforms for all the wrong reasons.