Farrakhan: Influential Despite His Irrelevance

"...I'm afraid that you [Jewish people] will come to regret the day that I offered you a chance to let us sit down together and dialogue and you, in your emotional reaction, rejected that offer...You will [regret it] because if my influence and growth and power in America does not diminish and it will not, by the help of God, then what benefit would it be to you not to sit down and dialogue with me when the racial problem is not getting any better..."
Louis Farrakhan, Fox News Sunday interview, 3/30/97. Source: Jewish Virtual Library

That is the question -- just how influential is Louis Farrakhan, the Antisemitic leader of The Nation of Islam?

J Street: From Blocking Back to Quarterback?

"Our No. 1 agenda item is to do whatever we can in Congress to act as the president’s blocking back."
J Street co-founder Jeremy Ben-Ami, "The New Israel Lobby," September 9, 2009

And in order to do whatever they could in Congress to support Obama, J Street took -- and continues to take -- a different approach than AIPAC.

AIPAC supports the policy of whoever is elected to lead Israel. In order to do that, AIPAC backs the idea of bipartisan support:

AIPAC is not a political action committee (PAC) and we do not rate or endorse candidates for elected or appointed office. AIPAC members in all 50 states are encouraged to be politically active and develop relationships with their members of Congress to help educate them about the importance of U.S.-Israel ties.

J Street is different on both counts:

"Tablet" Listed 8 Antisemitic Candidates. What Does Their Performance in the Midterm Elections Suggest About Antisemitism in the US?

One of the issues in Tuesday's midterm elections was the prominence of Democratic candidates who are anti-Israel, thus raising with it the question of Antisemitism. That latter issue was all the more prominent following the massacre of 11 Jews in Pittsburgh.

Perhaps with that in mind, Tablet Magazine concentrated on 8 candidates a week before the election in an article analyzing "eight candidates who have expressed blatantly anti-Semitic views, or who openly associate with anti-Semites." Tablet focuses on 4 Republicans and 4 Democrats and followed up with a second post, reviewing how the 8 candidates faired.

Here are the candidates that Tablet selected: