October 9, 2008
NJ Jewish News is asking Jewish community leaders what issues they would like to hear the candidates address and what questions they want to have answered in a presidential debate. For previous installments in the “What’s at Stake” series, see www.njjewishnews.com/whatsatstake.
“What’s at Stake” will be a regular feature between now and Election Day.
Sharon Falkin, president of National Council of Jewish Women, Essex County Section:
How will the next president pick nominees to fill anticipated court vacancies that will ensure personal rights and freedoms, including reproductive choice?
Over the past eight years, we have seen jurists with very conservative views being elevated to federal judgeships. Rights are interpreted and enforced by courts. The next president’s picks for lifetime seats on the highest courts will exert influence over our people’s rights for the next 25 years or more.
The incoming president must make responsible choices that will ensure a fair and balanced judiciary in order to protect personal rights and freedoms that are so important.
We have already seen with the resignation and replacement of Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, who was the fifth vote in many cases involving women’s lives, that a majority of this new Supreme Court no longer upholds the premise that the regulation of abortion must protect the health of the woman.
The National Council of Jewish Women has long held that women are capable of moral decision-making and should have the right to make their own personal life choices. NCJW knows that this is not the role or responsibility of any branch of government. In short, women have a lot at stake concerning their own well-being and that of their families. This year the vote will matter more than ever before as the fate of the Supreme Court hangs in the balance. There is little doubt that the next president will have the chance to make key appointments that are critical to our future.
Warren Grover, board member, New Jersey Historical Society; cofounder, Newark History Society; author of Nazis in Newark, former president, Jewish Historical Society of MetroWest:
Our energy policy, particularly our dependence on oil, is one of America’s most pressing political and economic issues. The next president must substantially change that policy to better protect our country. I would pose the following questions to the candidates:
Do you believe there is a better solution to energy self-sufficiency than destroying pristine ecological sites to harvest small amounts of oils that won’t be available for more than a decade?
What is your position on mountaintop removal, the practice of blasting off the tops of mountains to easily extract coal and then dumping the rubble in valleys and streams? Would you ban the practice or would you favor its expansion as the Department of the Interior recently suggested?
What is your attitude toward the rapid expansion of nuclear power? What safeguards do you recommend if we build more nuclear plants?
Other than nuclear power, what do you consider the most practical and efficient alternate sources of fuel, and how would you promote their use?
Should the government subsidize alternate energy sources until they become competitive?
What immediate steps, if any, would you take to induce manufacturers of motor vehicles sold in the United States to increase energy efficiency in their products? Would you recommend government subsidies to achieve this?
Would you take action to reduce America’s dependence on truck transportation and increase the amount of freight carried on our railroad system? Where would you get the money to pay for new engines and stock and new and/or retrofitted freight terminals? What would you do to compensate the tens of thousands of truck drivers who would lose their jobs?
Would you take action to rebuild the track beds of the nation’s major rail lines in order to accommodate high-speed passenger trains and to lessen the amount of automobile and bus traffic? How would you fund this project?
What will you do to relieve congestion at high traffic airports, where airplanes waste enormous amounts of fuel waiting to take off and land?
Since we will be dependent on foreign oil for the near future, are there any foreign policy changes you would implement to lower the cost per barrel of imported oil?
Do you agree that the “special relationship” between America and Saudi Arabia has corrupted the Washington political process during administrations of both Republicans and Democrats, and that Saudi Arabia has used petro-dollars to foment radical Islam throughout the free world, including our country? If so, what steps would you take to rectify this situation?
Azriel Fellner, writer, film critic, former religious leader, Temple Beth Shalom, Livingston:
My question to the candidates is: How do you define the responsibility of government to the people it governs? When you believe in laissez faire in government, what do you do when you think of 47 million people without health insurance, retirees who cannot get by because their funds have dried up because no one was regulating a market, young people unable to get hold of a mortgage, or the middle class wondering about being able to send their kids to college? What are the fundamentals of a government that is supposed to tell the people the truth, make certain that everyone shares the burden of all costs, from education to military defense?
How do you as a candidate truly understand the preamble to the Constitution, which proclaims the requirement of government to “promote the general welfare,” not the specific welfare or the individual welfare or the ethnic, religious, or political welfare of a certain group of people?
Don’t talk to us about lipstick and pigs. And please stay away from the lies that somehow seep out in a campaign. The prophet Isaiah had it right when he declared that the purpose of government and the individual responsibility of each citizen is to feed the hungry and take care of the oppressed. Well, there is plenty of that around!
Tell us not the details in governance but your vision for the re-creation of the concept of “general welfare” and how your moral view will cover not just those who are in favor of a specific policy or narrow religious belief, but rather the full embrace of all who seek protection and righteousness from government.
In other words, how are you going to lead so that this nation will feel that the government cares about more than vested interests but the people’s interests?
Etzion Neuer, director of the New Jersey region of the Anti-Defamation League:
The hope that a new millennium would mark an end to the bigotry that has plagued our people for so long has not yet been realized; the last eight years have been marked by a surge in anti-Semitic attitudes and violence around the world. In Europe, Canada, and elsewhere, there have been too many shocking incidents in which Jews and Jewish institutions have been attacked.
Anti-Semitic propaganda continues to thrive in the Muslim and Arab world and is then disseminated around the globe. Anti-Semitic stereotypes of Jews are regularly featured in print and broadcast media, in a television series, and in popular fiction.
Will the United States take a leadership role in mobilizing government efforts to confront and denounce anti-Semitism, racism, xenophobia, homophobia, and all forms of hatred and bigotry? Will it continue to use intergovernmental forums and international organizations to encourage action to fight anti-Semitism and the improvement of data collection of anti-Semitic hate crimes? Will the United States make it clear to leaders in the Arab and Muslim world that they must condemn and combat anti-Jewish propaganda in their media and popular culture?
A nuclear Iran poses the greatest threat to the United States, the West, Israel, and our other allies in the Middle East. By supporting terrorism and cultivating extremist forces, Iran has defied the international community while its leaders repeatedly make incendiary threats against the United States, call for Israel’s demise, and propagate base anti-Semitism, including the denial of the Holocaust.
Iran’s current nuclear program does not have a peaceful purpose, and for several years, Iran has refused to comply with its obligation to allow the International Atomic Energy Agency to ascertain the extent and purpose of its nuclear program. Will the United States work with our international allies to convince Iran to abandon its development of a nuclear weapons capability through incentives for cooperation and sanctions for non-cooperation?
Will the United States continue its efforts to convince international businesses to avoid trade, investment, and business development in industries of strategic importance to the Iranian regime — such as oil and gas, military equipment or technologies, and dual-use equipment or technologies?
On the domestic front, we believe that improving our system of education should be a top priority for government at the local, state, and federal levels. ADL does not believe, however, that vouchers for private and religious schools are the antidote to the ills of the American education system. Religion has flourished in this country precisely because of our tradition of strict separation of church and state and commensurately strict enforcement of the protections of the Free Exercise Clause.
At a time when voucher initiatives abound, including here in New Jersey, we must assert that vouchers pose a serious threat to values that are vital to the health of American democracy. Most often, vouchers would be used in schools whose central mission is religious training. These programs subvert the constitutional principle of separation of church and state and threaten to undermine our system of public education.
What will the candidates do to reaffirm the commitment to separation of church and state mandated in the First Amendment, which ensures the preservation of religious freedom for all?
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