Oh, I know all about Mr. Benjamin. Truth be told, I've been fascinated by the Confederacy and Mr. Benjamin ever since I read Mr. Benjamin's Sword. Painted a very different picture of the Confederacy for me than what I learned in school. Later research showed me that, while undoubtedly racist, 19th century Southern States were -not- anti-Semitic. In fact, Jews seemed to integrate much better there than the North and were accepted as part of the community. In fact, it was only until well after the War that the South began to turn anti-semitic for the next few decades. Largely related to the rise of the KKK probably. I continue to study it idly every now and again. The problem was, since the major wave of Jewish immigration (at least numerically) came in the 19teens and 1920s, the Jews remember that period, and not the good ol' days (so to speak). Cultural imprint that's hard to change.
But with proper education and access to a full spectrum of sources, it's not an unfeasible longterm goal. ;)
Actually the Midwest was where Jews assimilated the most seamlessly, back when. Senator Alan Specter, from Dole's tiny town of the prairie, Russell, Kansas, is an example. He maybe a bit too liberal, but he is totally Midwestern, in accent and style. Feingold is another, and that genial stupid senator named Wyden (who brings the average Jewish IQ down all by himself), from the Yankee WASP diaspora area known as Oregon is another. When I meet some unaffected genuine person in California, of about my age, sans the BS, someone of whom I think I can trust their word, I find more often than not, that they are from the Midwest. Just another anecdote.