Is loyalty something that can be enforced? Should it?

It’s time to start “naming and shaming” Americans who give their primarily allegiance to Israel.

We obviously have a huge problem in this country with loyalty, or more precisely the lack of it. The Israel-Firsters, financed and goaded by the Israel Lobby, retain a massive and disproportionate influence on our democratic institutions. These people show through their words and actions that their primary allegiance is to Israel, not the United States. This is obvious, I repeat, not through any calumnies being spread about these folks (e.g. “anti-Semitic” propaganda), but through their own actions.

Let's not mince words. They are traitors.

Enough said on that front. The title of this post addresses the next logical question: what can honest Americans do about this?

The ancient Romans used to throw traitors off an 80-foot cliff called the Tarpeian Rock. Is this a solution to treason? There’s a problem with it, and I’m not just talking about the fact that death by chucking would be considered a cruel and unusual method today. The larger issue is that there is a huge conceptual problem with “convicting” and “punishing” someone for treason in the traditional sense because, except in a few obvious cases, deciding what is treason and what is not is more of a judgment call than a straightforward decision of fact, like deciding who murdered someone. Something that appears disloyal on the surface may in fact be a patriotic act; conversely, what seems at first glance to be loyalty may in fact be treason. I haven’t the slightest doubt that many of the people cast off the Tarpeian rock in their day were not so much disloyal to Rome, as irritating to a particular emperor or public official. Likewise, England’s Henry VIII made execution for treason his chief method for dealing with political enemies.

So the “emperor,” or the government, cannot necessarily be trusted to decide what is treason. Of course, our justice system can and does do exactly that; but it generally gets involved in extreme and relatively straightforward cases involving espionage or collaboration with enemies to commit violence on U.S. soil.

The case of the Israel-Firsters presents a less obvious or prosecutable sort of treason. If you agitate for calling up U.S. kids and draining U.S. taxpayers to launch a new war, claiming it’s for U.S. national security, when in your heart you know your real motivation is to help out Israel—is that treason? Yes, but it’s hard to prove the motivations of any single individual. If you supported Israel’s prime minister when he humiliated the U.S. president following a policy dispute between the two governments, is that treason? To me, right now, it is. Yet the Israel-firsters are themselves adept at turning broadly similar arguments against their enemies, often using some modern analogue of the argument that disagreement with the Emperor equals treason against country. Therefore, when you have suspicions of treason not involving some sort of simple, provable conspiracy, getting the authorities involved would create a dangerous precedent and a slippery slope.

Many common sorts of treason, therefore, are for practical purposes unprosecutable.

However, they can still be contained—through social pressure.

Social pressure takes the judgment out of the hands of the government and puts it into the hands of the people, who must their apply their knowledge and common sense. In doing so, they may be forced to sort through what sometimes is a thicket of charges and counter-charges, and they may come to a wrong decision. Nonetheless, it is incumbent on everyone to make this mental effort, since the alternative is to accept turncoats in our midst.

Social pressure is precisely the weapon that Israel-firsters most commonly use against their own enemies. The Israel-firsters brandish the charge of anti-Semitism rather than treason, but the basic tactic is the same. You blacken your opponent's reputation in any way you can, through letters to the editor, columns, blog posts, demands for dismissals or resignations, or any number of well-known techniques. The Israel-first community even has a term for this tactic: “naming and shaming.” It has been extremely effective for decades, only starting to lose its potency in recent years, like a drug, thanks to its rampant over-use and abuse (as we know, the anti-Semitism bludgeon is used against anyone offering even the mildest criticism of Israeli policies.)

Israel-firsters have long realized that “naming and shaming” techniques needn’t necessarily achieve their stated objectives, such as the dismissal of a particular person, to be successful. They understand that the true goal of “naming and shaming” is the act of pressure itself—the sense of siege and intimidation created in its targets. Achievement of the stated objectives is just icing on the cake. Nor is it necessary that charges leveled through “naming and shaming” remain uncontested to be effective. Even if the targets fight back and find supporters, they are still affected, which is why Israel-firsters continue to brazenly target people. Even though the general reaction is increasingly just widespread laughter, in some circles and against some people it still works.

It's time for “America Firsters,” patriotic Americans, to start naming and shaming “Israel Firsters.” Why not start writing letters to the editor questioning X’s loyalty? Why not follow X to work with picket signs demanding their resignation for treason? Why not launch a letter-writing campaign to Senator X?

And why not start by targeting the leadership and board of AIPAC?