Barack Obama's family is way too diverse
Speak On Topics —
... to power in Chicago, including some of the city’s wealthiest and most prominent families. But the Illinois senator has struggled to overcome suspicions in some parts of the Jewish community, including skepticism about his stance on Israel and discredited but persistent rumors that he is secretly a Muslim.
Funnye, who described himself as an independent, said he has not been involved with the Obama campaign but that he has donated money and was cheering it on.
http://www.forward.com/articles/14121/
A rabbi in the family
Ben Smith's Blog —
While we're on the Jewish politics topic, a moment for a perennial from the Forward: Turning up the unexpected Jewish relative:
While Barack Obama has struggled to capture the Jewish vote, it turns out that one of his wife’s cousins is the country’s most prominent black rabbi — a fact that has gone largely unnoticed.
Michelle Obama, wife of the Democratic presidential nominee, and Rabbi Capers Funnye, spiritual leader of a mostly black synagogue on Chicago’s South Side, are first cousins once removed. Funnye’s mother, Verdelle ...
Funnye. He Doesn't Look Jewish.
Is That Legal? —
Michelle Obama has a rabbi in her family.
Going after Rabbi Funye
Ben Smith's Blog —
... relative."
"That’s your money Obama’s using. That’s unethical. Helping his friends with your tax dollars," continues the narrator.
The line is a reference to the report that Obama, as a state senator, sent $75,000 in grants for adult literacy, counseling, and youth programs at a non-profit run by his wife's first-cousin once removed, Caspars Funnye.
Funnye is much better known as America's most prominent black rabbi, as the Forward reported.


