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 The Lieberman Tolerance Test

Dennis Fox

August 17, 2000

Al Gore's gotten good mainstream press for picking the Orthodox Jewish Joseph Lieberman as his vice-presidential running mate, but the gutsiness and glitz can't hide the Connecticut Senator's pro-corporate politics and conservative instincts. Yet the choice does offer something worth watching: a test of mainstream America's tolerance of diversity. That test may prove tougher than expected, though less tough than it might be.

A lot of voters will fail the mid-level test once the voting booth curtain is pulled shut and their polite open-mindedness evaporates. Despite public proclamations that "Lieberman's religion is not an issue," closet anti-Semites--and there are a lot of them--will opt for George W. Bush or Pat Buchanan. Lieberman's candidacy has already brought out the uncloseted right, gleefully reminding us of the worldwide Jewish conspiracy.

Even Ralph Nader may gain some votes. With many on the left as turned off by Lieberman's God-heavy talk as by the Gore-Bush Battle of the Born-Agains, Gore's decision to drop his token populism may enhance progressive willingness to abandon the Democrats.

And though generally proud they finally have a national candidate, many Jewish voters know that public scrutiny in a country that's 97 percent non-Jewish can be dangerous. Often embarrassed by those for whom religious rituals are central to daily life, some Reform, Conservative, and unaffiliated Jews worry that the nation's highest-profile Jewish politician will set a standard for religious observance that most of them rejected long ago. Most will stick with Gore, but some may switch to Bush or Nader.

Overall, the Orthodox candidate's tolerance test is harder than the test a more assimilated Jew would offer. The public is used to Jews who have turned their religion into just another variant of the Great American Religion. Jewishness that doesn't go much further than Sunday morning bagels and just-like-church temples wouldn't be much of a test at all. Lieberman's Orthodoxy--shared by only seven percent of US Jews--offers a greater challenge to mainstream sensibilities.

Yet despite all the hoopla and the real risk of backlash, the Lieberman test is easier for the public and safer for Gore than it might have been. On the surface, Gore's selection of someone differing both ethnically and religiously from the vast majority lets America trumpet its growing maturity. Beyond labels, though, Lieberman is reassuringly bland: an average-looking, intelligent, white male lawyer known for traditional morality and conventional politics. He doesn't even wear a yarmulke.

Importantly, Lieberman's moral and religious persona coincides with the era's dominant cultural norms. Even most politicians remind themselves these days not to call the United States a Christian country. On the verbal level we've had a "Judeo-Christian heritage" ever since the religious right sought across-the-spectrum legitimacy.

More substantively, Lieberman will appeal to many new traditionalists. The past two decades has seen an increase in born-again Christians, observant Jews, and strict Muslims as well as in adopters of New Age spiritual forms. Those who seek communal religious expression often share with segments of the left a rejection of excessive individualism, consumerism, alienation, loss of community, and other hallmarks of modern life. Traditional religious institutions too often reinforce regressive public policies, but even if God isn't the best answer, the left might benefit from comparing notes and exploring occasional alliances with others who ask some of the same questions.

A tougher test of the nation's tolerance level would have been someone like Nader's running mate, Native American Winona LaDuke, whose racial and cultural departure from US norms has more fundamental implications for public policy than Lieberman's Sabbath observance. Or someone who would make us ponder whether we're ready to be a "Judeo-Christian-Muslim-Buddhist-Hindu country" now that Muslims outnumber Jews and Asian immigrants inexorably alter our religious balance. Even Buchanan picked an African American woman running mate.

Still, a middling public prejudice test is better than none. Ideally it could lead to serious discussion about religion and morality in American life, though so far we're awash in cliched affirmations of traditional moral values and self-satisfied Democratic congratulations for finally doing the right thing.

Ironically, Lieberman's unconventionally conventional religion inoculates him against serious mainstream critique. If he's moral, he must be right.

It's easy for the left to point out in response where Lieberman's gone wrong. Easy and accurate. The guy's a hawk, a corporate toady, an inconsistent purveyor of situational moralism. Common assumptions to the contrary, politically progressive observant Jews do exist. It's just too bad Lieberman's not one of them.


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