Nicholas Kristof, "A Free Miracle Food!": The "Most Pig Like" Columnist of The Times

Old business before new business. Do remember Nicholas Kristof's infamous retweet?

As was reported by Adam Kredo of The Washington Free Beacon in January 16, 2013 in an article entitled "Nick Kristof’s Piggishness" (http://freebeacon.com/nick-kristofs-piggishness/):

"New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof is facing criticism after retweeting a controversial message that referred to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee and the National Rifle Association as 'the 2 most pig like lobbies' in America.

Longtime Israel critic M.J. Rosenberg, who was dumped by the liberal Media Matters for America for his use of borderline anti-Semitic language, authored the controversial tweet Wednesday afternoon. It called to mind recently unearthed statements by Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi that referred to Jews as 'pigs.'

The missive was then retweeted by Kristof and a slew of others.

. . . .

Kristof and a New York Times communications official did not respond to a Free Beacon request for comment."

Kristof, a hero in his own mind, then informed us in a January 31, 2013 New York Times op-ed entitled "Meet the Champs" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/31/opinion/kristof-chess-champs-and-charity.html?_r=0):

"This will be my last column for a number of months, as I’m taking a leave to work on a new book with my wife.

. . . .

The truth is that covering inequality, injustice and poverty can actually be inspiring and uplifting."

Why was I not surprised by Kristof's retweet? As I explained in an article entitled "Nicholas Kristof, Israel, and Double Standards" (http://www.jsantisemitism.org/essays/GrossmanJSA210(4).pdf) for The Journal for the Study of Antisemitism, Kristof routinely rails against purported Israeli injustices, while ignoring the improprieties of other democracies:

"Ignorance, however, has never prevented Kristof from foisting twaddle upon the Times’s readership, particularly with respect to Israel. In an August 2011 op-ed, “Seeking Balance on the Mideast” (http://www.nytimes
.com/2011/08/04/opinion/seeking-balance-on-the-mideast.html?_r=1&hp), Kristof lambasted Israel at a time when Assad’s tanks were massacring the inhabitants of the Syrian city of Hama. Kristof sought to excuse himself by observing:

'Whenever I write about Israel, I get accused of double standards because I don’t spill as much ink denouncing worse abuses by, say, Syria. I plead guilty. I demand more of Israel partly because my tax dollars supply arms and aid to Israel. I hold democratic allies like Israel to a higher standard—just as I do the U.S.'

True, Syria has not been a recipient of U.S. aid. But whereas Egypt has received billions of dollars of American aid, Kristof doesn’t write about the persecution and murder of its Coptic Christian minority . . . And while Pakistan, a democracy of sorts, has also benefited from billions of dollars of U.S. aid while abetting the Taliban in Afghanistan, Kristof has been seeking a reduction of tariffs on Pakistani garment exports to the United States, purportedly in order to fight extremism.

. . . .

According to the 'working definition of antisemitism' of the European Forum on Antisemitism: 'Examples of the ways in which antisemitism manifests itself with regard to the State of Israel taking into account the overall context could include: . . . Applying double standards by requiring of it a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation.'

. . . .

Kristof plainly has no problem ignoring the persecution of 30 million stateless Kurds, the oppression of Iran’s Baha’is, and the despair of Egypt’s Copts. He clearly holds Israel to rules unlike those that he would set for any other country, democratic or otherwise, be it Egypt, Pakistan, Turkey, or the United States. Kristof worries over whether he will be accused of applying a double standard to Israel, to which concern I would observe that there is an old Jewish maxim applicable to Kristof’s angst: 'The hat burns on the head of the thief.' In the best-case scenario, Kristof is guilty of applying double standards to Israel, notwithstanding his protestations to the contrary. In the worst-case scenario, Kristof is guilty of something far more insidious."

With his retweet of this insidious language labeling AIPAC "pig like" and his refusal to provide any explanation, Kristof demonstrated who is truly the "pig." (My apologies to any pigs who might be offended by including Kristof among them.)

Well, Kristof is back at The Times. Today, in an op-ed entitled "A Free Miracle Food!" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/11/opinion/kristof-a-free-miracle-food.html?_r=0), Kristof would have us know of the many benefits of breast-feeding, "including increases of several points in a child’s I.Q."

Thanks, Nicholas, but before continuing to traipse around the globe and to pretend that you are an inspired humanitarian, how about an explanation concerning that retweet?

But then, as Kristof himself noted when attempting to explain his outbursts against anything related to Israel, "I don’t spill as much ink denouncing worse abuses by, say, Syria."

Yup, let's ignore Syria, where more than 100,000 people have died and from which more than 2 million people have fled their homes (see: http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/un-lebanon-alarmed-by-over-1-million-syrian-refugees-and-numbers-rising/2013/07/10/8ba75d06-e978-11e2-818e-aa29e855f3ab_story.html). After all, Nick is a "man on a mission" to improve children's I.Q. by means of breast milk.

Yeah, right.