Who’s Pete Buttigieg?

He’s the mayor of South Bend, the worst city in Indiana. A scrap heap of blight, neglect and Notre Dame. Pete’s also running for president. Why? He’s a gay millennial, so shut up, that’s why.

Esquire interviewed Mayor Pete and didn’t ask him about why his city is a hellhole. Instead it asked him big picture questions to which he gave O’Rourkesque vague replies.

And occasionally showed his ignorance.

Q.  What’s a major national issue about which you’ve completely changed your mind since you entered politics?

A. When you actually go to the Middle East, you come away with more questions than answers.

Q. So when you went to the Middle East which way were you leaning and how was it adjusted? 

A. I just saw more of the complexity there. So, on one hand, really marveling at the achievements that have taken place in Israeli society. And on the other hand, seeing the extent to which no one can explain how you can have a democracy and a Jewish state at the same time unless there’s a two-state solution. And some of these other things that just cannot continue the way they’re going. Seeing it just kind of gave me a richer sense of it. I’ve noticed that often at home, the folks who have the most strident answers are people who have less of a connection to the place.

I like how the millennial mayor prefaces his show of ignorance with a whole, “I visited Israel once so I know much more than you.”

If Pete had spent more than 5 minutes in Israel, he would have realized that Arabs and Muslims don’t just live in the territories. A two state solution doesn’t address that fact. If he doesn’t believe that a country can be Jewish and a democracy, then he doesn’t believe Israel should exist.

This radical standard only seems to be applied to Israel.

Egypt, Turkey and Pakistan, we are told, can be democracies and Muslim states. Most of the world consists of countries dominated by one religion or ethnic group.