Jewish Group Condemns Biden’s Offensive Reference to ‘Shylocks’

The word is from “The Merchant of Venice,” in which the villain Shylock is a greedy Jewish moneylender who asks for a “pound of flesh” as payment

Jewish group chides Biden for using 'offensive' term (CNN)

Vice President Joe Biden "should have been more careful" in a speech when he used a term that some consider anti-Semitic, the national director of the Anti-Defamation League said Tuesday.

At a conference marking the 40th anniversary of the Legal Services Corporation, Biden recalled anecdotes from his son's experience serving in Iraq and meeting members of the military who were in need of legal help because of problems back at home.

"That's one of the things that he finds was most in need when he was over there in Iraq for a year," Biden said, "that people would come to him and talk about what was happening to them at home in terms of foreclosures, in terms of bad loans that were being...I mean these Shylocks who took advantage of, um, these women and men while overseas."

Video files
Full
Compact
Audio files
Full
Compact