90210 Persians for Hillary

While Barack Obama snags the Hollywood limelight this week (and the movie stars' mega bucks), his fellow frontrunner in the Democratic presidential sweepstakes will be cozying up with the Persian Jews of Beverly Hills.

Barack gets Denzel Washington, Jennifer Aniston, Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg. Hillary Rodham Clinton gets Nina Ansary, Hassan Nemazee, Rashel Pouri and lots of other people you've never heard of. Another way to look at it: Obama attracts the stars to his fundraiser in Hollywood, but Clinton is the star of her fundraising gig in Beverly Hills.

Or reframe it this way: While the minority candidate gets to hobnob with the crème de la crème of the silver screen, Clinton is seeking out one of the most obscure voting blocs imagineable.

The Clinton event (take a gander at the invitation here), slated for Thursday night at the home of Nina Ansary and Ali Saffari, is expected to draw a Who's Who among Persian Jews living in Los Angeles, many of whom supported George W. Bush for president. (Ansary herself contributed $2,000 to Bush in 2004. Her husband, Saffari, gave $2,000 to Bush, though he also gave $2,000 to John Kerry and $1,000 to Howard Dean.)

Beverly Hills Vice Mayor Jimmy Delshad said in a e-mail to friends last week that Sen. Clinton "has asked to meet us as the Persian Jewish leaders."

Makan Delrahim, a Jewish Iranian-American who worked at the Justice Department for the current Bush administration, isn't at all surprised that the Persian Jewish community is embracing Clinton. He joked, "If Bill Clinton could be the first black president, Hillary can be the first Jewish Iranian president."

But Delrahim, who works for the Brownstein, Hyatt, Farber, Schreck law firm, won't dare speculate on what this may forebode for the GOP's ability to woo Jewish Persian voters in the '08 presidential election.

"As one who spends half his time in L.A., half in Washington, I'm going to do all I can to make sure my party is still the favorite with my community," he said.

Comments

I think the Clinton campaign is extremely surprised at the strength of Obama and I can smell fear in the air in their camp, no matter how much money Hillary raises. I live here in Austin, TX and Obama is about to have a gargantuan rally of 20,000+ people at the local park tomorrow, Friday. If Hillary came, she would be lucky to have 4,000. I think Hillary has the angry, bitter old woman vote locked down and Obama has all the young hotties and their friends in his camp.

Posted by: Robert Morrow | February 22, 2007 7:14 PM | Report abuse

Barack Obama certainly has an actors charisma and I even like him myself. But that does not replace savvy experience from long time and high level exposure in the political field. Especially of someone so revered and loved by our world leaders as Ms. Clinton. Sure, new faces are needed in government, but not in positions of "Commander-in-Chief." It will be interesting to see how Americans may be swayed away from such an intellect as Hillary Clinton. If anyone has opportunity to actually be heard with respect from foreign leaders after all the lies, betrayals and profiteering thus far, no one presently running can supersede Ms. Clinton. Such discussions were even being held abroad prior to the first G.W. Bush administration, who in his own words proclaimed the title of "War President." How many coffins must be sent across the land before the tears of protest take a stand? As majority rules we must ask ourselves, "what kind of people are we really, and what have we done?"

Posted by: Spectrum | February 23, 2007 3:19 PM | Report abuse

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