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What is the deal with George Soros anyway and why is he such a bogey man to the far right?

The same reason the Kochs are the boogeymen of the left (not even the far left. Pelosi and others attended a conspiracy movie about the Kochs, and they have been chastised in the Will Ferrel movie "The Campaign." Not to mention how they were accused of things from Maddow & co back in 2009.)

People need a boogeyman because the real world is far too complex to comprehend, so having puppeteering bad guys is easier to deal with than reality of people actually having genuine beliefs that you don't agree with.

There definitely is some Antisemitism, though I don't think that's the main driver, the left also chastises Sheldon Adelson, who is also jewish.

This is a false equivalence. The Kochs are blamed by the left for the vast amount they spend in politics, which is something they actually do. The right blames Soros for insanity, like funding a migrant caravan from South American, or for funding crisis actors to pretend school shootings are happening. That's insanity. There's a clear difference here.

The only clear thing is your bias. People on the left also blame Kochs for insane consipiracies and people on the right criticize Soros for the money he spends on politics.

Which you get exposed to depends on your echo chamber. Echo chambers don't share the rational arguments of their opposition because nobody wants to think the outgroup has a point.

I'm always willing to hear outside opinions. I try to consume a variety of news sources. The reason I can so easily cite insanity coming from the right is because a man was moved to kill almost a dozen people just two weeks ago because of his ideas about Soros funding a caravan. That's not really something I picked up "in my echo chamber". Can you point to anything from the left even approaching that kind of level of insanity?

>Can you point to anything from the left even approaching that kind of level of insanity?

Unfortunately their go to right now, and probably for the next x number of years, is the guy who shot up the Republican baseball game. No doubt there are extremists on both sides, one side just seems to have way more

Man shooting up a baseball game of Republican congressmen while screaming "this is for healthcare!"

I'm not saying the there aren't nuts on both sides. Of course there are. This was about conspiracy theories. That some people in government are trying to take away healthcare isn't a conspiracy. That the Koch brothers are funding politicians who are trying to take away healthcare isn't insane.

That George Soros is funding a migrant caravan of invaders is a conspiracy theory. This theory was amplified by both the President and Fox News, so it's hard to claim it's not even a mainstream theory.

I don't know why you'd characterize that shooter as "the right". He really hated Trump. He was a socialist.

There are a lot of these cases, where a violent person is unjustly tagged as "the right".

When someone can't be crammed into that mold, they are dropped from the news. A prime example is the youtube office shooter, who was a female muslim immigrant. As soon as the demographics became clear, the news dropped the story like a hot potato.

Whether or not he hated Trump, he believed that Soros was funding a migrant caravan of invaders, a lie that both Trump and Fox News was pushing constantly, and continued to push even after the shooting. He didn't get those ideas from out of thin air. He got them from the right wing party establishment.

So, I'm curious, who exactly do you think is funding them?

That trip is not free.

Soros certainly has a history of funding exactly that sort of thing. For example, he paid to have boats pick people up right off the coast of Libya and take them to Italy. It would not be the slightest bit surprising for Soros to fund a mob of thousands to invade the USA.

If not Soros, then who? (and who paid that group, and who paid the payers... and does it not lead back to Soros?)

"If not Soros, then who?"

This sounds like if one cannot pinpoint the supposed funder (and prove that they act alone), then you'll feel free to assume it is Soros? This is nonsense.

I mean, if she shot up youtube because she got worked up by another alt-right 4chan conspiracy theory, then you'd have a point. But she wasn't, she was upset youtube wasn't paying her enough.

The point is that any violent person unable to be portrayed as "the right" is quickly dropped by the news. The shooting was on the way to being the big news story of the month... and then suddenly dropped out of the news entirely. This creates a bias in the news: all the memorable violent people are on the right because the non-right ones are dropped from news coverage.

Basically, the news wants an attacker who looks like their stereotype of an NRA member and/or Trump supporter. Anybody else is not deemed newsworthy.

the left also chastises Sheldon Adelson, who is also jewish.

I'm trying to connect this with the words preceding it. Do you think the left chastises Adelson for anti-Semitic reasons?

Apparently, if you decide to oppose someone and that person happens to be Jewish, then yes, you are now anti-semitic.

In some cases, maybe, I do think anti-Semitism is bipartisan. But I don't think it's the driving factor for either the left or right (in the US,) that's more of the fringe. I would be willing to bet most people who know of Soros and don't like him, have no clue he's jewish.

Except George Soros, and the Koch brothers are absolutely corrupt individuals who exert political influence to insure they don't get in trouble as they incite turmoil (both economic and environmental) around the world for their personal profit. Namely, Koch's being the owners of one of the largest oil companies, and Soros engaging in economic terrorism in south east asia.

he's rich and Jewish (yes, I'm implying antisemitism) and had a major hand in a (legal) monetary speculation that produced a currency crisis in the UK and since then conspiracy theorists of all sorts think he's the mastermind behind the world's economy and all kinds of nefarious plots.

Nonsense. If antisemitism played a significant role, Ben Shapiro wouldn't be the darling of the right. For example.

Soros would be the boogyman regardless, it comes down to the fact that he's pouring tons of money into political causes. Like the Koch brothers do on the other side. It's simple. No need to add additional theories.

Ben Shapiro’s facile arguments appeal mostly to younger, inexperienced politic fans and the right needs all of the youthful fervor they can muster. I am sure this has something to do with their embracing of Shapiro. He has followers.

I'm no fan of the right, but saying that Shapiro's arguments are facile is being intentionally blind to reality. There are not many who are better at debate and making strong arguments. He's one of the best and probably the best on the right.

At his events he asks the audience to disagree with him. He gets excited when a guest disagrees with him. He'll also call them out when they say something that can't be backed up. He's constantly sharpening his positions.

If you can make better arguments, then you should start doing so. Seriously. Because not many can.

> if you pay tuition, you're sponsoring the militant homosexual agenda. If you pay taxes, you're sponsoring the militant homosexual agenda. If your child majors in English, you're sponsoring the militant homosexual agenda. Tell Billy to major in math

- Ben Shapiro.

> Israelis like to build. Arabs like to bomb crap and live in open sewage. This is not a difficult issue. #settlementsrock

- Ben Shapiro.

> Renewable energy: dumbest phrase since climate change. See the first law of thermodynamics, dumbass. #tcot #teaparty

- Ben Shapiro.

Replace 'Ben Shapiro' with any political name and 'right' with the appropriate leaning and your comment carries as much weight applied to anyone.

had a major hand in a (legal) monetary speculation that produced a currency crisis in the UK

He did not produce the crisis. He observed, rightly, that the pound was massively overvalued and that this was not sustainable.

He bet the bank on this fact and won.

He certainly didn't produce the crisis.

Yep. And it’s worth pointing out in the wake of the 2008 recession, Peter Thiel made a similar bet against the US dollar and lost.

> he's rich and Jewish

i find this amusing. some of the right (those who aren't pro-israel) DO believe in social justice when it applies jews (who do in fact make up a majority of the top 1%), and the left believes in social justice when it applies to whites.

you should at least be able to discuss both sides without "racist!", "cuck!", or in this case, "antisemitism!". I don't use any social media so maybe there's something i'm not picking up on.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Society_Foundations

In particular, OSF backed the pro-Western side in Ukraine. This has resulted in a well-funded disinformation campaign against it and him by Russia.

waitwait, i thought this was 100% popular and no foreign intervention was happening on either side, except of course for evil putler who is clearly a spawn of satan and attempting to control the whole world

I've never seen a clear explanation of the right's grievances regarding Soros, but what I can put together contextually is that he is a wealthy source of finance or power brokerage for political action involving anything left of far-right. There is also a deep, non-explicit anti-semitic tinge to it all as well.

However everything I have heard him about his didn't come from credible sources. I've honestly wondered for a long time as well.

His short of the UK pound was used by a lot of talk radio nutcases to link him to various conspiracy theories (rothchilds, elders of Zion, etc). Many of the modern internet provocateurs seem to have been raised on a steady diet of late night talk radio.

The key thing about those sorts of things is that the lack of evidence is itself evidence of the grand conspiracy.

Because exploiting anti-semitism for political gain has a reliable historical track record, and for modern anti-semites he is the new face of the protocols of the elders of zion.

He's Jewish and a billionaire.

That must be why he’s been condemned by such noted antisemites as the Israeli foreign ministry...

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-israel-hungary-soros/isra...

Are you saying that it is physically impossible for the Israeli government to collaborate with antisemites?

Money and power have a way of seeing past such trivialities as prejudice and/or principles.

Case in point: Zuckerberg and Sandberg

Well I think most people would find it curious for the jewish state to be antisemitic. At that point I think we should then officially redefine antisemitism to the meaning it seems to have acquired today, which is any criticism or negative comment aimed at a person of jewish descent.

Netanyahu has denied (that the Nazis instigated) the Holocost.

https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/netanyahu-absolves-hitle...

But aren't most pro-Israel groups conservative?

They're pro-Israel because they're pro-apocalypse, not because they like Jewish people.

This is an interesting and strange viewpoint I have never heard before. Might you elaborate?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Zionism

Ah, that is an interesting idea, and worthy of more study.

I had always understood the Christian basis of friendship with the people of Israel was from Genesis 12:3, which suggests that those who "bless" the children of Abraham would be blessed.

I don't know much about it, but I think there's an old Christian prophecy about Jews dominating the Holy Land as one of several omens preceding the actual Apocalypse, the Second Coming of Christ. People who want the Apocalypse would presumably support Israel because if Jews lose control of the Holy Land, then we're not there yet.

it's true, i'm trying to remember. there's a couple things in the bible about Jews and some temples and some other things, that once built or once the right people have control then that marks the beginning of the second coming. ...something like that, i left Christianity a long time ago.

So is Zuckerberg.

In addition to other comments nearby: He has been an intellectual leader of the movement to integrate and democratize Europe, and he has been hawkish on Putin's intentions. You can read for yourself: he has written a bunch of articles at nybooks.com (e.g., https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2015/10/08/ukraine-europe-w...)

Because he funds tons of leftist causes. Sort of like how the Koch Brothers are the left's boogeymen.

Exactly. Billionaire’s funding political organizations are only bad if they don’t support your side.

I'd make a clear distinction b/t liberal causes and leftist ones. Soros is a very wealthy capitalist and he's not funding anything that would upset that order.

It's one thing to fund "leftist causes" that promote social good. It's another to fund climate change denial groups so you can mine more coal and build more coal plants and utterly destroy everything in the interests of making a few more bucks.

The Times actually did a great writeup on this exact thing recently: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/31/us/politics/george-soros-...

He's funding a lot of pro-migration and pro-open borders groups

Are there any groups that are actually in favor of “open borders”? It seems like that term has become co-opted to mean any border enforcement that’s anything short of what the extremists want.

The UN for instance supports open borders. This is obvious if you look at the views of those involved. The former director of the IOM was recently very involved in the UN migration compact. There's an interview with him on YouTube somewhere from the past year where he openly admits that he strongly supports mass migration into Europe, calling it "inevitable". Europeans are funding immigrantion into their countries, whether they like it or not.

I skimmed the UN migration compact and don’t see anything like “open borders” in it. It explicitly states, “We commit to manage our national borders in a coordinated manner, promoting bilateral and regional cooperation, ensuring security for States, communities and migrants, and facilitating safe and regular cross-border movements of people while preventing irregular migration.”

The compact itself is ideological babble. Carefully listen to this interview and his views:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88KuVlYFXsI

This guy was in many UN meetings in relation to the compact. If you watch the interview, his view is that Europe has colonized many places, so it only makes sense that Europe now open its borders. He specifically states in the interview he has no concern for nationalists or those who worry about mass migration. He says that they need to drive the fear of mass migration out of the people of Europe through public education programs. He says that it's a matter of people's viewpoints needing to change. He's very much pro-immigration. The view that mass migration into Europe is inevitable, and that the UN and its surrounding organisations need to facilitate that and make it "safe, orderly and regular", is widespread among the people writing and setting up these documents and allocating the money the UN and it's partner organisations spend. That's why I said, Europeans are funding the welfare behind the facilitation of mass migration into their countries. If you want to find out more, consider documents like these and their supporting studies. It is also largely filled with ideological babble, which is why I am less than optimistic about mass immigration and the supposed integrated Utopia that is supposed to arise from that:

http://www.unesco.org/new/en/social-and-human-sciences/theme...

We've seen how well integration works in Britain and Sweden...

I watched it. I didn't hear anything about open borders in there. He talked a lot about accepting refugees, which has been a standard part of international law for decades now, but that is very much not the same thing.

The part about how Europe colonized many places was just a description of how Europe itself was fairly insulated from the rest of the world for a long time, which can make it hard to suddenly start accepting a lot of people from elsewhere because it's a big change. There was nothing at all about this meaning Europe should open its borders.

> pro-open borders groups

Can you provide a link/source for these groups?

Is this not the thesis[1] of (and motivation for) the Pittsburgh synagogue shooter? Weird to see this drivel repeated on HN.

1. https://www.vox.com/2018/10/29/18037580/pittsburgh-shooter-a...

edit: added reference for downvoters.

He does not advocate "open borders". He does humanitarian aid for refugees. In Europe, he supports many pro-European groups. That means open borders by extension, because the EU has abolished borders. But it's not a specific goal of his to increase migration.

The "Open" in "Open Society Foundation" also has nothing to do with "Open Borders". A open society is defined by freedom of speech, equality before the law, high social mobility, more interested in trying new ideas than in defending the status quo, etc.

It's the same ideology that made him spend his first billion on fighting the communists in the 1980.

Puebla sin Fronteras, for one. Their name literally means no borders.

He’s one of the most wealthy contributors to left wing activism. It has absolutely nothing to do with him being jewish - those claims demonstrate the ignorance of the left regarding how right-leaning voters (who are overwhelmingly pro-israel due to their religious beliefs) think. Same thing the left says about Koch brothers, Sheldon Adelson (also Jewish, oops, there goes that theory), etc, just reversed.

The left’s complete failure to understand the other side is why they were so shocked that Trump got elected. And it looks like we are in for a repeat in 2020, since they’ve learned nothing.

It has a tremendous amount with him being Jewish. At least one person has shot up a Synagogue because of it.

If you can point me to a left-wing agitator violently attacking Jewish people over the actions of Sheldon Adelson I'd love to see it.

Otherwise this is just intellectually-lazy "Both-sides"ism.

One difference between the Kochs, Adelson, et al and Soros is that for the former there is a very obvious link between the causes they fund and benefits to their own business empires (this is particularly stark with Adelson). Soros is harder to pin down and seems to be genuinely interested in the causes he supports, not just out of personal interest.

The Kochs are libertarians, anything they do will be viewed as simply wanting to help their own business, even though that is not true when you actually evaluate what they have said.

I personally don't think the Kochs nor Soros are bad people, and likely want what they view as what is best for society. They put their money where their mouths are, nothing nefarious about that. If the Kochs were only for their own self interests their main focus right now wouldn't be criminal justice reform.

So a few donations to seemingly good causes make them good?

Don't be easily fooled by their "generosity" as it's not always as it seems to be, many times they fund "independent" organizations or think tanks which really are just foils for them to push their Conservative agenda.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/05/we-now-know-how-...

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2017/12/trump-koch-brot...

https://www.greenpeace.org/usa/global-warming/climate-denier...

https://www.ucsusa.org/publications/got-science/2017/got-sci...

I can keep going on, so please don't paint them as just some "nice" guys who give money.

You do know that Soros also funds think tanks, right?

Anyhow, you just cited 4 left leaning sites, so that's not helpful (and actually proves my point in other parts of this thread!) Charles Koch himself does not deny climate change (you can read about this in actual news sites like the Washington Post,) he is against corporate welfare like the government directly/indirectly subsidizing Tesla, etc. Which is perfectly in line with his libertarianism.

Even the one source you could argue is somewhat "real," was from an opinion writer. Here's the rest of his pieces, which uh, don't seem so unbiased. https://slate.com/author/mark-joseph-stern

You know conservatives can be generous and nice, right?

Except it doesn't matter what the Kochs have said, but rather what they have done for the past 50 years. Massive investments to overwhelmingly hardcore libertarian polices that have moved the needle of the nation to their ideals (except when those polices conflict with their business, like the amount of government deals they have taken and then block changes to).

They very much don't put their money where there mouths are, as they put their money through a massive chain of anonymous shell organizations to hide their involvement. This has given the appearance of many right wing "grassroots" movements appearing as by the people, though when donations have been investigated they are overwhelmingly from single donors traced back to the Kochs.

I don't really know that much about Soros, but the fact that people try to claim Soros is just the lefts version of the Kochs is very wrong on many levels. The most basic level is simply net worth, which is their influence ability. Soros is worth 8/9 billion, the Koch brothers are over 100 Billion. Their ability to buy politicians is that much greater.

I believe the Kochs believe they are doing what they think is right, but I also believe they are evil for the country. Their ideals are not what benefits the country in the long run, but continues this trend of money and influence being contained within a tiny minority.

The Kochs are very calculated people, they know what they are doing, and just being they are focused on criminal justice reform, doesn't mean they aren't also focused on other things that benefit them (and that criminal justice reform how they see it doesn't benefit them). The for profit prison industry owners are some of their peers who donate to their causes, they are playing every side they can.

You basically sound like Tucker Carlson, change every instance of "Koch" with "Soros" and you have the B block. Thanks for helping to prove my point. Every side needs a boogeyman, reality is too hard to comprehend.

That’s the same argument as saying “well the other side said this, so the truth must be some where in the middle”, when that has no bearing on the argument.

Please give Dark money a read. There’s a huge difference between media personalities spouting conspiracies and a well respected journalist spending years of there lives delving into something, whilst having their reputation under constant attack and being followed by private investigations hired to dig up any dirt on you.

The Kochs have given lots of money to non-self serving causes, from gay rights to stem cell research to black scholarships to PBS.

No. It doesn't count when the other side does it. They always only do it for insincere reasons, and our side always only does it for sincere reasons.

I think you're right about antisemitism not being that big of a factor outside of the more extreme right wing corners. But I do think the nature of the Soros attacks highlight the mainstream right's propensity for believing in, or knowingly disseminating, false conspiracy theories.

Yeah nothing to do with dog whistles of Globalists usually referring to wealthy men of "Jewish" faith in control of the world.

Also I don't think 2020 will be anything but a massive rebuttal to Trump and Republicans...

https://www.nbcnews.com/card/almost-six-10-americans-believe...

>those claims demonstrate the ignorance of the left regarding how right-leaning voters (who are overwhelmingly pro-israel due to their religious beliefs) think

Those right-leaning voters are not pro-Israel because they like jews, they believe that if jews return to Israel it will bring about the apocalypse and they will be saved [1]

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Zionism

He's the Koch of the left. He funds groups that agree with him politically, and has out-sized influence because of it. Since our own biases allow us to interpret people positively when they agree with us, and vilify them when they disagree with us, Soros and Koch are the various bogeymen and/or heroes depending on a particular point of view.

He also gave a very poor and ill-advised interview, where he once stated that (despite being Jewish) he helped Nazi's confiscate properties from Jews in a sixty minutes interview.

He stated that he didn't help later in the interview, but the damage was done.

Given that this went way up, and then way down, I'm curious who is working to vote this way? I find it kind of curious who gets offended by statements like this.

He's a Jewish banker. It's a dog whistle for the extreme right wing. Some people thinks he's the far right bogey man like the Koch Brothers are to the far left but there's an extra layer of anti-semitism attached when it's heard/read by certain groups. It's not just that he funds causes that are antithetical to the far right but the fact that he's a Jewish banker -- the favorite scape goat of various groups throughout history (both far left and right have targeted this group). It's gross and disgusting.

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