[Peace-discuss] More about The Lobby

Wed Mar 11 23:56:53 CDT 2009

You dodge the point that Ray McGovern, and others, are making in a  
kind of obsession to  attack the U.S.—and now seemingly Obama policies 
— (which in other contexts deserves your condemnation), overlook the  
influence of the Lobby who the more astute (like McGovern) recognize  
as pernicious and effective, and excuse Israeli policies by suggesting  
that they are simply puppets of the U.S.  It's bait and switch, once  
more.

Your concluding paragraph leaves the impression that Israel does not  
have its own vicious agenda relative to the Palestinians, Iraq, Iran,  
Syria, Hezbollah, or Hamas, which seems to me arrant nonsense.

Stop worshipping Chomsky; even he has his blinders.. --mkb

On Mar 11, 2009, at 9:52 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote:

> If it weren't such an indication of pathological denial and refusal  
> to note the
> simple facts, it would be funny -- the insistence of American  
> liberals that the
> US crimes in SW Asia are the fault of the Bad Jews and their Lobby  
> who have
> somehow manipulated and misled the Good Obama.
>
> What will it take for them to recognize that the murderous policies  
> that the US
> follows from the Mediterranean to the Indus are American (not  
> Israeli) policies,
> pursued in the interest of American elites?  Obama had been feverishly
> auditioning to work for them for years: see "The Audacity of  
> Hope" (an honestly
> self-referential title).  He's the jumped-up button-man of the  
> American
> ascendancy, a Mob lawyer whose client is the greatest Mob of all --  
> the American
> ruling class.
>
> Israel sold its soul to the American Devil years ago -- ca. 1967 --  
> for the mess
> of pottage (about $4B/yr) that the US provides. The result has been  
> the
> corruption of Israeli government and society -- perhaps predictable,  
> because of
> the roots of that society in what has been accurately termed a
> "settler-colonialist" ruling class.
>
> --CGE
>
>
> Brussel Morton K. wrote:
>> From Ray McGovern:
>> http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/03/11-13
>> /…Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-New York, led Lobby boasting just minutes  
>> after the
>> Freeman debacle was announced. Schumer was clear: "His [Freeman's]  
>> statements
>> against Israel were way over the top. ... I repeatedly urged the  
>> White House
>> to reject him, and I am glad they did the right thing."/
>> /And, as Glen Greenwald has noted, "Lynch mob leader Jonathan Chait  
>> [of The
>> New Republic and author of //an influential op-ed/ <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/27/AR2009022702485_pf.html 
>> >/for
>> the Washington Post] who spent the last week denying that Israel  
>> was the driving force behind the attacks on Freeman," now concedes  
>> the obvious./
>> /Greenwald quotes Chait: "Of course I recognize that the Israel  
>> Lobby is powerful, and was a key element in the pushback against  
>> Freeman."/
>> /Neoconservative Daniel Pipes offered an anatomy of the crime, blog- 
>> bragging
>> about how it was conducted:/
>> /"What you may not know is that Steven J. Rosen of the Middle East  
>> forum was
>> the person who first brought attention [on Feb. 19] to the  
>> problematic nature
>> of Freeman's appointment. ... Within hours, the word was out and  
>> three weeks
>> later Freeman has conceded defeat. Only someone with Steve's  
>> stature and
>> credibility could have made this happen."/
>> /The same Steve Rosen who is currently on trial for violations of  
>> the Espionage Act involving the transmission of classified  
>> information intended
>> for Israel? One and the same! This has to be the purest brand of  
>> gall that
>> ever came down the Pipes./
>> /This "morning after," I find myself wondering when White House  
>> chief of staff Rahm Emanuel - another staunch supporter of the  
>> Lobby who reportedly
>> was Schumer's go-to guy on the get-Freeman campaign - saw fit to  
>> let Admiral
>> Blair in on the little secret that no way could he have Freeman.  
>> And why
>> Blair tucked tail./
>> /In //a March 8 letter/ <http://www.consortiumnews.com/2009/031009a.html 
>> >/ to
>> Admiral Blair, we Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity  
>> (VIPS)
>> endorsed his appointment of Freeman and decried the campaign to  
>> derail it./
>> /We seven signatories (with cumulative experience of 130 years)  
>> noted that
>> the Freeman case was the first time we witnessed such a well- 
>> coordinated
>> campaign to reverse the appointment of an official to an  
>> intelligence job not
>> requiring Senate confirmation./
>> /In other words the influence of the Israel Lobby is seeping ever  
>> deeper into
>> the ranks of the intelligence community.…/
>> Ending with:
>> /On Oct. 5, 2007, I published //an article/ <http://www.consortiumnews.com/2007/100507a.html 
>> >/ about Israel's deliberate
>> attempt on June 8, 1967, to sink the USS Liberty in international  
>> waters off
>> the Sinai, killing 34 of the Liberty crew and wounding over 170 in  
>> the
>> process./
>> /The lead was:/
>> /"So Who's Afraid of the Israel Lobby? Virtually everyone:  
>> Republican, Democrat - Conservative, Liberal. The fear factor is  
>> non-partisan, you might
>> say, and palpable. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee  
>> brags that it
>> is the most influential foreign policy lobbying organization on  
>> Capitol Hill,
>> and has demonstrated that time and again, and not only on Capitol  
>> Hill."/
>> /The point? In June 1967, the Israelis learned that they could get  
>> away, literally, with murder and still not endanger their influence  
>> in Washington./
>> /Events of the past weeks demonstrate that they and their Lobby are  
>> equally
>> good at character assassination. It is embarrassingly shameful to  
>> watch
>> President Obama acquiesce in all this./
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
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