Notes & asides.(Letter to the Editor)

* Dear Mr. Buckley: Herewith Abe Foxman in his new book, Never Again. He is speaking about "circumstances in which an American military leader ... might be tempted to abandon our Israeli allies in a time of crisis." He goes on: "This is why I have paid such close attention to the signs of latent anti-Semitism--or of flirtation with anti-Semitism--in such prominent public figures as Pat Buchanan, Jesse Jackson, William F. Buckley Jr., and Al Sharpton. In time of personal crisis, latent attitudes become explicit, and individuals with influence and authority can do real damage if their attitudes are marred by prejudice and hatred."

Comment?

Joseph De Feo

New York, N.Y.

Dear Mr. De Feo: You have to understand this about Abe Foxman. It is his business to find anti-Semitism, actual or inchoate or non-existent. If anti-Semitism departed from the scene, the Anti-Defamation League would be out of business. I published a book about anti-Semitism a dozen years ago, and had from Foxman a note pertaining to my exoneration of the Dartmouth Review: "[Your] piece clearly reflects your well-deserved reputation for ... intellectual honesty and will enlighten all who take the opportunity--and show the good sense--to read it." Not very long after that, the ADL gave an award to the president of Dartmouth for denouncing the Dartmouth Review,which, Foxman had said after reading my book, was not guilty.

The thing of it is, the ADL under Foxman (his predecessor, the late Nathan Perlmutter, was scrupulously honest, and wrote occasionally for NATIONAL REVIEW) has these days a Left agenda. I told him as much a few years ago in a letter which I published in this space. "I am pleased," I wrote, "that the ADL has recorded my very long opposition to anti-Semitism. But the ADL is about all kinds of things and you should understand the resentment some who back the basic aim of the ADL feel at being coopted, as you try to do, to such causes as: opposing English-only legislation, resisting a Colorado plebiscite that sought to prevent legislation giving gays special rights, challenging the Catholic bishop's right in Boston to specify what groups could participate in the St. Patrick's Day parade, deploring this & that involving the ...