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The historian who uncovered the ADL’s secret plot against the far-right John Birch Society
(JTA) — A historian leafing through files in an archive discovered how a Jewish organization helped bring down an influential far-right extremist movement in the United States in the 1960s and ’70s by going undercover and acting as self-appointed spies.
The discovery of the Anti-Defamation League’s covert operation targeting the John Birch Society is the basis of a chapter in a new book by political historian Matthew Dallek of George Washington University. Published in March, “Birchers: How the John Birch Society Radicalized the American Right” is Dallek’s fourth book. It examines the roots of today’s emboldened conservative movement in the United States.
“Birchers” is a history of a group that at its height numbered as many as 100,000 members and “mobilized a loyal army of activists” in a campaign against what it saw as a vast communist conspiracy. He also examines how the Birchers’ mission to defend Christianity and capitalism morphed into a radical anti-civil rights agenda that groups like the ADL saw as an existential threat.
Dallek, who grew up in a Reform Jewish household in Los Angeles, recently sat with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency to discuss the rise of the Birchers, how the ADL infiltrated their ranks and whether such tactics are justified in the name of fighting extremism.
The conversation has been edited for clarity and brevity.
JTA: Before we get into the Jewish aspect of the book, meaning the chapter on the Anti-Defamation League’s relationship with the John Birch Society, let’s take a step back. Who are so-called Birchers? Why do they matter?
Mathew Dallek: The John Birch Society was a household name in the 1960s, becoming the emblem of far-right extremism. It didn’t have huge numbers, but it did penetrate the culture and the national consciousness. Its leader, Robert Welch, had argued at one point that President Dwight Eisenhower was a dedicated agent of a communist conspiracy taking over the United States. Welch formed the John Birch Society to educate the American people about the nature of the communist threat.
In its heyday, the group had about 60,000 to 100,000 members, organized into small chapters. They sent out literature trying to give members roadmaps or ideas for what they could do. They believed a mass education of the public was needed because traditional two-party politics was not going to be very effective at exposing the communist threat. They would form front groups such as Impeach Earl Warren [the Supreme Court’s chief justice] or Support Your Local Police. They tried to ban certain books that they viewed as socialistic from being used in schools. Some Birchers ran for school board seats and protested at libraries.
Critics feared that the Birchers were a growing fascist or authoritarian group and that if they were not sidelined politically and culturally then the country could be overrun. The Nation magazine wrote that Birchers essentially had given their followers an invitation to engage in civil war, guerrilla-style. Those fears sparked a big debate about democracy. How does one sustain democracy and, at the height of the Cold War and in the shadow of World War II, Nazi fascist Germany, and the Holocaust?
As you were researching, you came across a trove of historical internal documents from the ADL in the archives of the American Jewish Historical Society in New York. Why did you devote a chapter to what you found in those documents? What did those files reveal to you about the John Birch Society?
These papers are a goldmine. They’re this incredible and often detailed window into the far-right and, in particular, the John Birch Society. They show the ADL had an extensive, multi-dimensional counterintelligence operation that they were running against the Birch Society.
People knew at the time that the ADL was attending events where Birchers were speaking. But the ADL also had undercover agents with code names, who were able to infiltrate the society’s headquarters in Belmont, Massachusetts, and various chapter officers. They dug up financial and employment information about individual Birchers. And they not only used the material for their own newsletters and press releases, but they also fed information to the media.
Another layer is about a debate that’s been going on: Were the Birchers racist and antisemitic? The Birch Society always insisted that they did not tolerate white supremacy and didn’t want any KKK members. They said they accepted people of all faiths and races. And it’s true that they did have a handful of Jewish and Black members.
But what the ADL found was that a lot of hate was bubbling up from the grassroots and also leaking out from the top. The ADL was able to document this in a systematic way.
Some critics of the ADL today say the organization has strayed from its mission by focusing not just on antisemitism but on a wider array of causes. But from reading your work, it sounds like the ADL even then took an expansive view of its role, examining not just direct attacks on Jews but also how the political environment can jeopardize Jews. Am I getting that right, and why did the ADL devote so many resources to a group like the John Birch Society?
So, a few things: It’s the late ’50s and ’60s, and a civil rights coalition is emerging. Benjamin Epstein, the national director of the ADL, was friendly with Thurgood Marshall, the Supreme Court justice, and Martin Luther King. John F. Kennedy went to an ADL event and praised the ADL for speaking out very strongly in defense of democracy and pushing for the equal treatment of all Americans.
Isadore Zack, who helped lead the spy operation, at one point wrote to his colleagues that it was only in a democracy that the Jewish community has been allowed to flourish and so, if you want to defend Jewish Americans, you also have to defend democracy.
There certainly were other threats at the time, but the Birch Society was seen by liberal critics, including the ADL, as a very secretive group that promoted conspiracy theories about communists who often became conflated with Jews.
Would you consider the ADL successful in its campaign against the Birchers?
They were successful. They used surreptitious and in some cases underhanded means to expose the antisemitism and the racism and also interest in violence or the violent rhetoric of the Birch Society in the 1960s.
The ADL was at the tip of the spear of a liberal coalition that included the White House, sometimes the Department of Justice, depending on the issue, the NAACP, Americans for Democratic Action, labor unions, the union-backed Group Research Inc., which was tracking the far-right as well. The ADL was one of the most, if not the most effective at constraining and discrediting the society.
Clearly, however, the Birchers’ ideas never died. They lived on and made a comeback.
It’s somewhat ironic that you reveal the existence of this spying apparatus devoted to targeting an extremist and antisemitic group in the 1960s given the infamy the ADL would earn in a later era, the 1990s, for allegations that they colluded with police agencies in San Francisco to spy on and harass political activists. They eventually settled with the Arab American, Black and American Indian groups that brought a federal civil suit. I know you didn’t study these revelations, which are outside the scope of your book, but could you perhaps reflect on why undercover tactics were seen as necessary or justified?
It’s important to remember that in the mid-20th century, law enforcement in the United States was often led by antisemites or people who were much more concerned with alleged internal communist threats — the threat from the left.
From the ADL’s vantage point, one could not rely on the government entities that were by law and by design supposed to protect Jewish Americans. There was a sense that this work had to be done, at least in part, outside of the parameters of the government.
When I first discovered the ADL’s spying, I didn’t quite know what to make of it. But I realized they weren’t just spying to spy, they exposed a lot of scary things, with echoes in our own times — like easy access to firearms, a hatred of the government, a denigration and defamation of minority groups. And this was all happening in the shadow of the Holocaust and World War II. I became much more sympathetic; they were very effective, and they had a vision of equality of treatment for all Americans.
It’s obviously controversial. I try not to shy away from it. But they had a lot of good reasons to fight back right and to fight back in this nonviolent way.
That last thought brings to mind another, right-wing Jewish group that existed in this era of taking things into our own hands, that did use violence, explosives even.
You mean the Jewish Defense League, led by Meir Kahane.
Yes, exactly.
He was a Bircher. Toward the end of my book, I mention that he was a member for a while, under his alias Michael King.
Antisemitism is on the rise, and lots of initiatives are being organized to address it, both by existing groups like the ADL and new ones. The ADL’s budget has almost doubled over the past seven years. I am seeing Jews talk of fighting back and taking things into their own hands. And we are in this politically precarious movement in American history, all of which suggests parallels to the era you examined. What kind of wisdom can we glean from examining the ADL’s secret and public fight against the John Birch Society as people who care about the issues affecting Jews today?
A lot of liberals in the 1960s and a lot of the leadership at the ADL grasped the axiom that things can always get worse.
In 2015-2016, you’ll recall, there was Trump’s demonization of Mexican immigrants, and the so-called “alt-right” around him and his campaign and expressions of vitriol by people like Steve Bannon.
There was an assumption among a lot of Americans and among a lot of Jewish Americans that the fringe right — the antisemites, the explicit racists, the white supremacists — that there’s not a majority for them and they can never achieve power.
If you go back and you look at Trump’s closing 2016 campaign ad, it’s textbook antisemitism. He flashes on screen these wealthy Jewish international bankers, and he argues that basically, there’s a conspiracy of these global elites who are stealing the wealth of honest Americans. There’s also 2017, the white supremacists in Charlottesville, who said “Jews will not replace us” and Trump saying there are fine people on both sides.
The sense that democracy is incredibly fragile is not just a theory or a concept: It’s an actuality, the sense as well, that the United States has only been a multiracial democracy for not very long and a haven for Jews for not that long either.
The work that the ADL and the NAACP and other groups did to try to constrain and discredit as fringe and extremist still goes on today. It’s harder to do for all sorts of reasons today including social media and the loss of faith in institutions. But it still goes on. You see the importance of institutional guardrails including the Department of Justice that is prosecuting 1,000 Jan. 6 insurrectionists.
The last thing I’ll say is that one of the admirable things in the 1960s about the ADL and the liberal coalition it belonged to is that it built support for landmark legislation like the Immigration Act of 1965, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the Voting Rights Act of ’65. And a coalition eventually fell apart, but it was powerful, reminding us why Jewish American groups should care about or focus on issues that don’t directly affect Jewish people.
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The post The historian who uncovered the ADL’s secret plot against the far-right John Birch Society appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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How to Implement a Successful Casino Marketing Strategy
Your casino stands out in your market and attracts interest. But does your audience know that? With effective marketing, you can transform your casino from an average competitor into a top industry player. We will show you proven strategies to boost your business now and in the future. And when you have proven strategies like insights from a High Roller online casinos review in Canada, the possibilities are endless.
1. Improve Visibility
With stiff competition among casinos, being easily found online is crucial. Discoverability measures how simple it is for people to find your casino.
Put yourself in the shoes of one of your guests looking for a casino. How easy is it to find yours? Try searching on different engines, checking reviews on travel sites, and looking for your casino on social media. See how often your casino appears and how well it ranks. Use tools like Moz and SEMrush to get a clear picture of your current visibility.
To increase your casino’s online visibility, there are a number of strategies you can try. First, try to create distinct landing pages for each key amenity at your casino. Incorporate relevant keywords, high-quality images, and engaging headlines.
You can also use search engine ads carefully. Follow Google’s guidelines by targeting approved countries. These include responsible gambling information on your landing pages and avoiding targeting minors. Check local regulations and test ads with relevant keywords.
Don’t forget to set up social media profiles on platforms your audience frequents. Engage in discussions about gaming, your casino, local news, and community events.
Optimize your content with keywords about your amenities, location, unique features, and events. Highlight what sets you apart so visitors can easily find you.
Use beacons or proximity marketing to attract nearby guests, especially when competing with other casinos. This helps target customers in the real world, not just online.
Form partnerships with local businesses, entertainers, event suppliers, and food vendors to boost your visibility and word of mouth.
2. Focus on Events and Group Business
Your casino offers more than gaming. You might have a luxury hotel, advanced technology, event spaces, a spa, and great restaurants. So, think about the whole picture in your marketing.
Casinos are great for big events like weddings, conferences, and reunions. Make sure your marketing targets these opportunities to attract them.
3. Identify the Jobs to Be Done
Marketers used to rely mainly on demographics, like age, income, and education, to predict behavior. Understanding audience behavior based on demographics is useful. For example, Anderson Digital notes that Boomers and Gen Xers spend 80% of their casino money on gaming and 20% on food and entertainment. In contrast, Millennials spend 30% on gaming and 70% on food, entertainment, and other services. To attract Millennial and Gen Z customers, focus on better entertainment, food options, online game components, and mobile marketing.
However, demographics alone don’t tell the whole story. For instance, knowing a group of women outside your casino are in their late 20s, college-educated, and have high-paying jobs is helpful. But, it doesn’t reveal their reasons for being there.
These women might be on a business trip with some free time, in town for a family reunion, or celebrating a bachelorette party. With just their demographic info, it’s hard to know their motivations, challenges, or needs.
This framework helps marketers understand why customers choose their products or services. Women at a casino for a bachelorette party are looking for a fun atmosphere with entertainment, food, and drinks. But if they’re there for work, they need a stress-free environment with good Wi-Fi, charging stations, and quiet spaces for meetings.
Understand what your audience wants and how they see your role. This helps you tailor your messaging, marketing, and offerings.
4. Create Positive Feedback Loops
Casinos attract customers with fun experiences like gaming, dining, and entertainment. By enhancing these positive feelings, you can boost your casino’s marketing success and encourage repeat visits.
Feedback loops happen when the result of an action is used to influence the action itself. For example, if a child makes a parent laugh, they’re likely to repeat the funny behavior to get more laughter.
Positive feedback loops make it more likely that the action will be repeated. Negative feedback loops make it less likely. You likely use positive feedback loops in your casino already. Guests who win are happy and want to play again. Those who have a bad experience are less likely to return.
You can enhance marketing by using feedback loops. After a positive experience, like winning or a great meal, encourage guests to refer others or leave reviews. If a guest uses a discount, offer another deal immediately. If your casino has a hotel, send emails encouraging future bookings right after positive experiences, like upgrades or enjoyable events.
Reply to positive feedback and reviews with invitations for future experiences. Make sure to also reward loyal customers with special offers and exclusive perks. Don’t forget to address negative feedback by turning it into a positive experience.
5. Use Social Proof
People usually trust each other more than they trust your brand. They’re more likely to listen to recommendations from friends or online reviews than your own claims.
To build trust, you need endorsements from others. Social proof means people tend to follow the actions of those they admire.
Show positive reviews on your website and social media. Record video testimonials from satisfied guests and winners. Encourage guests to share their experiences online and tag your casino. Keep an eye on reviews and respond to feedback. Set up a photo booth in the casino for guests to take winning photos. Display pictures and videos of recent winners on screens around the casino. Think about your audience’s motivations and where they get their information to find creative ways to use social proof.
6. Keep Up With Gaming Trends
Casinos are changing quickly. Online gaming, e-sports, and new tech like virtual and augmented reality are key. To stay competitive, casinos need to understand and use these trends.
As you create your casino marketing strategy, consider these key trends. E-sports are growing fast, so partnering with teams can help you reach new audiences. Virtual and AR are changing how guests experience gaming, making it more engaging from anywhere. Online casinos are becoming more popular with relaxed regulations. So, keep up with industry changes to stay competitive. Finally, as gaming tastes shift, staying updated on new trends will keep you ahead.
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5 Essential Vaccinations Everyone Should Get for a Healthier Life
Vaccinations are a simple and effective way to protect ourselves and others from serious diseases. They not only safeguard our health but also make life a lot easier by preventing illness before it starts. Getting vaccinated is the same as choosing a verified online casino in Canada, instead of playing at the first unlicensed casino you come across. This increases your safety and satisfaction. In this article, we’ll talk about five essential vaccines that everyone should consider getting to stay healthy and avoid unnecessary complications.
1. Flu Vaccine: Flu precaution: How to Avoid the Seasonal Flu
Flu vaccination is one of the most convenient ways of avoiding a flu attack during the flu season. Seasonal flu virus actually changes every year, so the vaccines are developed also annually. This shot prevents one from contracting the flu and safeguards the Immunocompromised persons such as the elderly, children and those with low immunity.
Apart from preventing flu like symptoms that include fever, fatigue and body aches the flu shot also prevents one from having to stay home from work or school. In a nutshell, this vaccine will spare you those dreaded sick days during flu season of the year.
2. Tetanus Vaccine: Stay Safe from Infections
The tetanus vaccine is very essential for anybody should one encounter cuts or other related injury, especially if such a person is involved in outdoor activities, and comes across sharp implements frequently. The injury can be small and does not need medical attention for the bacteria, which is tetanus, found in the soil to attack the body and cause severe harm if the vaccine has not been used.
Children receive a DTaP vaccine covering tetanus as well as diphtheria and pertussis in their first years of adolescence though they should be boosted every ten years. And since tetanus shots are so easy to get, you can also save yourself a hospital visit and this deadly disease.
3. HPV Vaccine: Prevent Certain Cancers
The HPV vaccine is useful for prevention of cancers that are linked to HPV and these include cervical, throat or anal cancers. HPV is a STD through skin contact and therefore it will be impossible for any person, whether male or female, who is sexually active to have a HPV negative result at some time in his/her life.
Boy and girls should ensure that they are vaccinated for HPV beginning at the age of 11 or 12 or the latest before they engage in sexual activities. Apart from the cases of cancer being avoided at some other stage in life, it is a relief just to know that one has been vaccinated against some of the major causes of these cancers.
4. Measles, Mumps, and Rubella (MMR) Vaccine: Protect Yourself from Outbreak
MMR is actually a vaccine against measles, mumps and rubella which are conditions that have the worst effects ranging from brain damage, deafness and pregnancy complications. These diseases are known to have affected children a time past yet in the developed nations they are rare due to vaccinations.
If you never got the MMR vaccine as a child it is not still the right time to go get one. Today, there are measles and various other disease outbreaks around the world; getting the MMR vaccine reassures you are safe. It’s even one less thing to think about when in a plane, bus, or being surrounded with lots of people.
5. Hepatitis B Vaccine: Guard Against Liver Disease
Hepatitis B is a viral disease that affects the liver and perhaps cause long term liver cirrhosis or hepatocellular carcinoma. The Hepatitis B vaccine is essential for those in the health care line, though the vaccine is encouraged for use by everyone. It has body fluid contact transmission and therefore vaccination is necessary to avoid the occurrence of the ailment.
Not only does getting the Hepatitis B vaccine shield one from serious liver complications; it also ensures that an infected individual will not spread the virus to others without realizing it. It is a small thing that grants you lifetime immunity from a lethal disease all within the comfort of your home.
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Comparing European, American, and French Roulette at Canadian online casinos
Roulette is the most popular table game at online and land-based casinos alike. You can easily find a seat at the table, place your bets, and hope that the wheel turns in your favour. But you have surely noticed that the roulette section is quite rich, featuring at least a dozen different tables. Most of them come with a different design and different rules. The most popular roulette variants are American Roulette, European, and French Roulette. In this article, we will try to explain the main differences between each one.
French VS European Roulette
We’ll first compare the French versus the European version of roulette since they are the most similar. The layout of the bets and the wheel is basically the same. Even the table layout is pretty much the same at most online casinos. Depending on the provider some differences can be found, like the layout of the table or the order of the numbers of the wheel. But as far as the odds and gameplay are concerned, European and French Roulette are basically the same.
Both roulette variants have a single 0 on the board and the same number of slots on the wheel and numbers on the table. There are 36 additional numbers you can bet on, along with the standard Red or Black and Odd or Even bets. This means both games come with a house edge of 2.7%. So, the only difference comes from the introduction of two basic rules in French Roulette.
- La Partage
- En Prison
La Partage
This rule applies to even money bets, and in case the ball lands on the 0 slot. The term comes from the French word which means to divide. All even money bets are divided into half, and the player gets one half, while the other half goes to the house. This rule works greatly in your favour, especially if you’re playing on higher bets.
En Prison
The En Prison bet is also applied to even money bets and only when the ball lands on 0. Instead of counting as a loss, the bets are held on the table for the following spin, and if you win, you get your bet back. Even though you don’t actually win anything extra, the En Prison rule gives you a chance to get your money back without a loss.
The introduction of these rules lowers the house edge on French Roulette down to 1.35%. This is why many players prefer the French version, as the odds are better for the player.
French VS American Roulette
The main and pretty much only crucial difference between American and French roulette is the 00 and the layout of the slots on the wheel. The added 00 on the American version means that the house edge is higher. It climbs up to 5.26%, which is almost double the house edge on European Roulette and a massive difference from the 1.35% on the French version.
Since there is an added 00 number, the layout of the slots on the wheel is different. On the table, the 00 is next to the 0, so it doesn’t make a big difference to the layout of the table. But the rules in American roulette are quite simple. If your number doesn’t come up, you lose the bet. There are no extra rules like in the French version.
Conclusion
If you go by the odds alone, it turns out that the best roulette variant to play at Canadian online casinos is French roulette. But this doesn’t mean you will lose more when you play American or European Roulette. Many players prefer to play the American wheel as it’s faster and more exciting. With the right strategy and some luck on your side, you can easily make a profit on any type of roulette game.
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