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I don't think his comment was even 'noticing', I think it was literally playing to his audience. If Hanania calls them the "white elite" in a wignat (or substantially wignat) comments section, all the usual respondants will "well akshually..." him, so he says "self-hating white and jewish" to pre-empt those responses. It's no different to here, the only place where I make sure to always mention I'm Jewish along with white when I discuss it because otherwise SS or someone else will "well akshually" me and derail/ignore the rest of my point.
Oxford commas save lives!
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I think there's not much to notice here, everyone knows (oh no, consensus building!) that Democrats love to hate on Palin and that rather more of prominent Democratic elite [understood extensively, a la Karlin's Elite Human Capital meme, e.g. Colbert and Stewart and even their target audience] are Jewish. Indeed it is through their mean-spirited clowning1* 2** that I still have vaguely negative associations with her name despite paying roughly zero attention to US politics at that time.*** («Sarah Palin writing notes on her hand shows she's not like those elites and their memory» – the subtitle helpfully communicates the important dimension of the conflict; no better way to highlight your claim to status than in clever dispassionate hinting at anti-elitism as ressentiment driven by deficiency, or as some naive conspiracy theory).
It is also my gut feeling that back then they've been somewhat more shrill, catty and obnoxious with that elitist hate and affected condescending mockery of Palin than generic whites, as it tends to be. I allow that maybe that's just muh Verbal Intelligence and loud NY culture showing, and their hate was driven by the same forces as in regular «self-hating white elite» rather than some genuinely tribal sense of hostility for Palin as unashamed, fecund Christian; white liberals do despise right-wing Evangelicals. Those factors suffice to casually "notice" a disproportionate contribution.
But yes, I think you're correct that he has mostly preempting that sort of akshually from the audience. But so what? I imagine those two words – «and Jewish» – get pattern-matched to dog-whistling from a much more extremist cluster, are precisely what pushes this «revelation» over the limit of being dangerous for his career, and not-so-coincidentally are the clearest, most undeniable delta from his contemporary messaging; which in itself adds the power to the accusation of witchcraft – «he's learned to hide his power level». It's one thing to begin writing more obliquely about Ungrateful Le Blacks (his recent Killer King piece), it's another to drop a token altogether.
* Amusingly, the site showed me an insanely pronatalist ad for BreastmilkCounts.com before proceeding to Colbert, even bereft of heavy-handed race-coded messaging; I guess not all is lost with liberal culture if they allow this sort of placement.
** Stewart's criticism is oddly relevant to Hanania's case.
*** I am aware that Colbert is a Catholic Elite Human Capital akshually.
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