From issue #171 of the Letty Cottin Pogrebin Newsletter on Substack

* Jews duped again. Under the sardonic title, “As an American Jew, I Feel Completely Reassured for My Safety Now That Trump Has Targeted the Epicenter of American Antisemitism, Columbia University,” Andy Schocket’s brilliant piece in McSweeney’s, unmasks the ironies and cynicism behind the President’s charges against Columbia. We know he’ll say anything to justify whatever he’s done or wants to do. What’s shocking is the gullibility of American Jews and their willingness to allow exaggerated claims about antisemitism at Columbia to be politicized so the Liar-in-Chief can accomplish his goal—which is to starve elite universities of funds, control their curricula, and crack down on professors who refuse to sanitize our history. He punished Columbia not because of its handling of anti-Israel demonstrations, but to trump us in the blame game. When Americans start noticing that their kids’ educations are being short-changed and blaming him for colleges’ budget shortfalls and inadequate services, or that free speech of all sorts has been curtailed on campuses around the country, mark my words, he’ll put it on us. “The Jews made me do it,” he’ll say. “You know how they’re always complaining about antisemitism.” Then what?

*A recent story in the NYT posits yet another devious motivation: Revenge. He could simply be using antisemitism as cover for a vendetta dating back decades when Columbia was considering buying land to expand its campus. “It considered, and rejected, property owned by Donald Trump. He did not forget it. . .Donald Trump was demanding $400 million from Columbia University. When he did not get his way, he stormed out of a meeting with university trustees and later publicly castigated the university president [Lee Bollinger] as ‘a dummy’ and ‘a total moron.’” Interesting that $400 million was the amount in question in both instances.