Best of the debate: Ron Paul v. Michele Bachmann
Presidential debates allow voters to hear how candidates differ, and there are few policy differences as great as that between Rep. Ron Paul and Rep. Michele Bachmann on Iran. Take this exchange from last night:
Bachmann:
“Without a shadow of a doubt, Iran will take a nuclear weapon, they will use it to wipe our ally Israel off the face of the map and they’ve stated they will use it against the United States of America.”
For what it’s worth, Politifact has looked into Bachmann’s claim and rated it “false.”
Paul responded:
“I think this wild goal to have another war in the name of defense is the dangerous thing, the danger is really us overreacting.”
Netanyahu on Obama ties: Under the bus? What bus?
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu refused to take the bait on Sunday when asked if he agreed with Republican presidential candidates that President Barack Obama is not pro-Israel enough.
He was asked on NBC’s “Meet the Press” about former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney’s recent comment that the Democratic president “threw Israel under the bus.”
“You are trying to throw me under the bus of American politics and, guess what, I’m not going to be thrown there,” Netanyahu joked.
The Israeli leader has had a strained relationship with Obama and in May criticized his vision of a Palestinian state based on 1967 borders as leaving Israel “indefensible.”
Some of the Republicans hoping to challenge Obama in the November 2012 election, including front-runners Romney and Texas Governor Rick Perry, have pounced on the issue and raced to proclaim their allegiance to the Jewish state.
Netanyahu, who called Obama’s speech on the Palestinian bid for statehood at the United Nations last week a “badge of honor,” did not cede an inch to partisanship.
“I think the important thing to understand is this and this is the truth about America: Israel enjoys tremendous bipartisan support, tremendous,” he said. “And I think that bipartisan support is expressed by any person who happens to the president of the United States, including President Obama.”
What else could Bibi say? There are 18 months during which Obama could do enough damage to put Israel into misery! He remembers how Clinton unseated him with the Limosine Socialist Barak, a failed Prime Minister, only to experience a replay with the Soros funded NIF and the newly purchased tents, this time a “social protest movement”, designed by the same Clinton operatives to finish him off. Bibi is a survivor, betting on Obama’s presidency disintegrating. he does not have to say a thing, Obama has switched the suicide button before he became president-he is not up to it. Time will prove me right.
Who’s afraid of Mitt and T-Paw…
It turns out that Mitt Romney and Tim Pawlenty are the scariest pair of presidential prospects in the GOP field today, judging from a new Democratic ad and remarks by some Democratic Party hierophants.
Priorities USA Action, a political group founded by two former aides to President Barack Obama, targets Romney as a flip-flopper in a South Carolina TV ad that wields Republican Paul Ryan’s Medicare reforms like a political cudgel.
The 30-second black-and-white spot begins with Newt Gingrich’s “Meet the Press” remarks opposing what he called radical right-wing social engineering on Medicare. The ad then recounts Republican South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley’s defense of Ryan before turning finally to Romney: “Mitt Romney says he’s ‘on the same page’ as Paul Ryan … but with Mitt Romney, you have to wonder: which page is he on today?”
The New York Times says the ad will run this weekend while Romney visits South Carolina.
Pundits view the ad as evidence that Democrats have locked on Romney as the GOP frontrunner, at least for now.
Ed Rendell, a leading Democrat who served as Pennsylvania governor and DNC chairman, put it this way on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe”: “What really is instructive here is that this group’s trying to knock out Mitt Romney in the primaries. We don’t want to face Mitt Romney. A Romney-Pawlenty ticket is the most credible general election ticket.”
A monster twosome, perhaps. But that doesn’t mean top Republicans aren’t still baying at the doorsteps of Mitch Daniels and Chris Christie in hopes that one or both will take the plunge.
Glad to see serious (though flawed) GOPers running. The more Palin, Trump and Newt just muddy the waters.
Washington Extra – The choice
President Barack Obama wants the “Arab spring” to bloom.
And that means having choice. The United States supports “the right to choose your own leaders — whether you live in Baghdad or Damascus, Sanaa or Tehran,” he said in a much awaited Middle East speech.
For Syria: “President Assad now has a choice: He can lead that transition, or get out of the way.”
In Libya, Obama didn’t think leader Muammar Gaddafi would be left with much choice. “When Gaddafi inevitably leaves or is forced from power, decades of provocation will come to an end, and the transition to a democratic Libya can proceed.”
On Israeli-Palestinian peace (something many U.S. presidents before him have tried to broker) the choice was left up to them. “Ultimately, it is up to the Israelis and Palestinians to take action.” And Obama saying any future deal should be based on Israel’s 1967 borders drew a swift Israeli retort that this was no choice at all.
Across the entire region, Obama said, was “a choice between hate and hope; between the shackles of the past and the promise of the future. It’s a choice that must be made by leaders and by the people…”
But when all is said and done, the evolving reality of the younger generation may leave no choice but change. “Cell phones and social networks allow young people to connect and organize like never before. And so a new generation has emerged. And their voices tell us that change cannot be denied.”
Live: President Obama’s “Arab spring” speech
President Obama will lay out a vision for his policy toward the Middle East at 11:40 am ET.
Mideast peace veterans and handshake diplomacy
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton repeatedly referred to them as “veterans” of the Middle East peace process.
That description is probably one thing everyone can agree on. The process to bring Israelis and Palestinians to a lasting peace agreement has been going on for decades and every U.S. president hopes he’s the one who will finally achieve what those before him tried and failed.
President Barack Obama is the latest to take up the baton. He’s already won the Nobel Peace Prize, but will he be The One to triumph on Middle East Peace?
“We are under no illusions,” Obama said on Wednesday when he met with leaders ahead of today’s talks. “Passions run deep. Each side has legitimate and enduring interests. Years of mistrust will not disappear overnight.”
That last sentence is another thing that probably everyone can agree on.
But if the Israeli-Palestinian leaders’ handshakes over the years are any kind of indicator, perhaps there is a glimmer of hope.
Seventeen years ago in September 1993, President Bill Clinton practically forced Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat to shake hands at the White House while observers held their collective breath wondering will they or won’t they?
Of diplomacy and baseball…
Timing is everything in diplomacy and baseball.
After months of prickly talks aimed at coaxing Israelis and Palestinians into direct peace talks, U.S. envoy George Mitchell finally had news to share. But when the U.S. mediator par excellence took the stage for questions Friday at the State Department, reporters tossed him one out of left field.
“As tempted as I am to ask you about Roger Clemens…,” his first questioner began, to chortles from reporters and State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley.
Mitchell, of course, between peacemaking stints in Northern Ireland and the Middle East, took a stab back in 2007 at resolving the conflict between Congress and Major League Baseball over the use of performance-enhancing drugs.
Clemens, one of the best pitchers in baseball history, was named in Mitchell’s report as having taken drugs, but he denied it in testimony before Congress.
The seven-time Cy Young Award winner was indicted by a federal grand jury Thursday on charges of perjury, making false statements and obstruction of Congress. He faces a $1.5 million fine and up to 30 years in prison.
So it was tantalizing to wonder what the former Maine judge and senator might have to say about Clemens.
U.S. lawmakers wonder, where did our love go? with Turkey
It almost sounded as if U.S. lawmakers felt jilted by Washington’s long-time NATO ally Turkey.
“How do we get Turkey back?” demanded Representative Gary Ackerman at a House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing exploring “Turkey’s New Foreign Policy Direction.”
“Why is Turkish public opinion … perhaps one of the most anti-American of any of the countries of the world?” asked the committee’s chairman, Representative Howard Berman.
With a panel of experts on Turkey listening, Berman and other lawmakers listed their worries about recent Turkish policy turns on Iran, Israel and the Palestinians.
Concerns about Turkey had hit a new peak with its support of an aid convoy of ships that tried to run the Israeli blockade of the Gaza strip this summer, Berman said.
Turkey’s contacts with the Islamist group Hamas — which won the 2006 Palestinian parliamentary election — are “deeply offensive,” Berman continued, and show Turkey doesn’t respect Washington’s list of foreign terrorist organizations (Hamas is on it).
And Turkey effectively dissed the United States again this week when its finance minister said it would boost trade with Iran, while ignoring non-United Nations sanctions, said Berman, the author of recent tough new unilateral U.S. sanctions on Tehran.
Where is berman getting his info? Israel created the rift between turkey & zion state; turkey aware of israels terrorism and they need to acknowledge Hamas as representative of the Palestinians; israel can’t go around picking who THEY like to represent Palestine. Israel is a terrorist apartheid state=RACISM usa gives billions to israel as they ethnically cleanse palestinians.Iran & the whole region need to protect themselves against Israel!-Crimes in internatl.waters, massive murders of Turkish citizens, trying to help Palestine!
When seen from Capitol Hill, Jerusalem looks a bit different
What’s the U.S. policy toward Israel? It may depend on which branch of government you ask.
On Capitol Hill, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu got a warm reception during his Washington visit this week. Eric Cantor, the only Jewish Republican in the U.S. House of Representatives, says Congress is on “a different page” than the Obama administration over Jewish settlements in Jerusalem and the overall U.S. relationship with Israel.
Netanyahu got a less obviously effusive welcome from the Obama administration. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met him at a hotel on Monday and his White House meeting with the president on Tuesday took place behind closed doors, without photographers present.
But on Capitol Hill he was warmly, openly and officially received by leading lawmakers. Cameras clicked and rolled as Netanyahu was greeted in ornate reception rooms, first in the House of Representatives, then in the Senate Tuesday. In between, he lunched with lawmakers.
The Israeli prime minister got to hear his own words echo around the hallowed halls of Congress as well. At the morning meeting with Netanyahu, “Many of us said, Jerusalem is not a settlement,” Cantor told Reuters afterwards.
This had been Netanyahu’s line in a speech to the influential pro-Israel lobby group AIPAC on Monday evening, where he struck a defiant note after new criticism from Clinton of Jewish home construction in disputed territory in and around Jerusalem.
Cantor, the third-ranking Republican in the House, said he and House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, a Democrat, are circulating for lawmakers’ signatures a letter to Clinton expressing concerns about the direction of U.S. policy. ”We are writing to reaffirm our commitment to the unbreakable bond that exists bewteen our country and the State of Israel and to express to you our deep concern over recent tension,” the letter says.
Different enough to tell them to stand on their own two feet? Cut ties and stop policing the world. We cannot afford it any longer
No “no” is final, U.S. mideast peace envoy says
President Barack Obama’s mideast peace envoy George Mitchell is an unlikely optimist.
Ten months into an assignment that has confounded generations of U.S. diplomats, Mitchell said on Wednesday he remained upbeat about bringing Israel and the Palestinians back to peace talks — thanks in part to his experience resolving another once-intractable crisis, the dispute between Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland.
Mitchell, credited with shaping the 1998 Good Friday Accord that ended that long and bloody conflict, said the key was not to lose heart.
“Over a period of five years, I chaired three separate sets of discussions. The main negotiation lasted for nearly two years. For most of that time, there was little or no progress, and our effort was branded a failure,” Mitchell told a news briefing.
“But then, after two years of saying no, both sides said yes. In a real sense, we had 700 days of failure and one day of success.”
Mitchell, a former Senate majority leader, has thus far had little success in shuttle diplomacy aimed at resuming stalled Mideast peace talks, which have seen the two sides still bitterly divided over the issue of Israeli settlement construction on Palestinian lands.
You have to give the man credit for trying. I still think there will never be a solution unless there is a clear winner. He then sets the rules and life can go on.
I don`t think that we should have a war with iran because the U.S. does not have that kind of money just to spend on having a war with iran. What we need to do is that, we need to allow Israel to handle it for them selves more than we should help them. We need jobs and protect kids from going into bad schools where there`s drug smugglin into class. And america needs to shut off all the beer factorys and stop selling beer in stores too as well. And america needs to stop going against Same-sex marriage too as well. And america needs to aband straight marriage and only allow same-sex marriage. Nobody is really following the Bible anymore, so please keep on allowing gay marriage more please