Comments on: Campaign urges Americans in Israel to vote in U.S. election

By: David

David — Mon, 18 Jun 2012 03:16:43 +0000

With each passing day, Israel becomes a bigger piece of doo doo on America’s shoe, a millstone around its neck. Fortunately, Americans are waking up and realizing what a huge geopolitical and economic liability Israel is. What goes around, comes around. The “special relationship” must and will end.

By: Peter H

Peter H — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 00:38:56 +0000

“Shmuel Rosner correctly points out that to be “pro-Israel” has consequences regarding policy. For example, to support a vote in the UN against Israel can NOT be considered in any way, shape or form to be Pro-Israel (something J-Street did).”

So, basically, by XYZ’s definition, every country in the world is anti-Israel except for the United States, Canada, & Micronesia.

By: Kolumn9

Kolumn9 — Tue, 12 Jun 2012 20:24:31 +0000

@Richard, more Republicans this and Republicans that. It is impressive that you can write a long post that supposedly defends Obama’s record and not even mention his name once. The amazing thing here is that it is 2012 and not 2008 and Obama has been president for 3.5 years. Obama, not a random faceless Democrat is running for REELECTION. Obama, whose failure you blame elsewhere, but whose failure you seem to accept as real and whose future failure is almost assured if he wins a second term. So, your ideal president for the next four years is a man who achieves nothing as long as he can find someone else to blame? Now there is a strong case for reelection. “Vote for me because I already have a record of failure I blame other people for”. How about “Four more years of failure that I swear will not be my fault”. Or “Obama. Four more years of the buck stopping elsewhere.”
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@XYZ, agreed.

By: Shmuel

Shmuel — Tue, 12 Jun 2012 09:09:42 +0000

Rehmat – you are wrong. Michael Oren and all members of knesset must give up their US citizenship to hold office. Michael Oren even wrote about it being emotional to give him his US citizenship

By: XYZ

XYZ — Mon, 11 Jun 2012 14:33:09 +0000

Kolumn9-
Every President since Kennedy has said he is a “friend of Israel”. What does it mean to be a “friend”? What does it mean to be “pro-Israel”. Today, anyone who says Israel has a “right to exist” even while excoriating Israel for everything it does will say he is “pro-Israel” or is a “Zionist”. Shmuel Rosner correctly points out that to be “pro-Israel” has consequences regarding policy. For example, to support a vote in the UN against Israel can NOT be considered in any way, shape or form to be Pro-Israel (something J-Street did).
TO be a friend means to be willing to go out of your way to help another friend in trouble. THus, I am mystified as to why George W Bush is considered a “good friend” of Israel. During the massive suicide bomber campaign his acolytes such as Colin Powell were constantly hectoring Israel to show restraint and they refused to criticize Arafat. Condi Rice was comparing Israel to the Jim Crow South. How is that being a friend? AFter the Democrats won the 2006 Mid-term elections, Bush dumped Donald Rumsfeld and adopted the policies that Obama merely continued after he came to office. The best true friend Israel ever had in the White House was Lyndon Johson who refused to force Israel out of the territories conquered in the Six Day War and greatly increased arms sales to Israel. He also pushed UN Security Council Resolution 242 which is quite favorable to Israel.
Other Presidents who did not have particularly strong sentiments to Israel have helped when help was needed. Nixon sent the arms air lift during the Yom Kippur War, against Kissinger’s wishes. Gerald Ford, another person not particularly sympathetic to Israel greatly increased economic aid after Israel was bankrupted by the Yom Kippur War and gave assurances of American support for Israeli control of the Golan Heights.
Even Obama vetoed the condemnation of Israel’s settlement policy.
Thus, expect things to remain more or less the same no matter who wins.

By: Richard H. Schwartz

Richard H. Schwartz — Mon, 11 Jun 2012 12:31:40 +0000

I have presented many facts and quotes above. No one has disputed then, while making many unsupported accusations.

I wonder if anyone can dispute any of the following statements:

A key concern is how will Israel avert renewed conflict, effectively address her economic, social, and environmental problems and remain both a Jewish and a democratic state without a resolution of her conflict with the Palestinians. Of course this will not be easy to obtain, but I believe it should be a priority, with conditions to provide security for Israel a prime concern.

Additional factors that Jews should consider related to mainly domestic issues:

1. Republicans are promoting policies similar to or often worse than those that had such disastrous results during the Bush administration, including converting a three-year major surplus, which was on track to completely eliminate the total federal debt, into a deficit, creating very few jobs, and leaving the country on the brink of a depression, with an average of 750,000 jobs being lost during its last three months.

2. Republicans have obstructed efforts to get our country out of the tremendous ditch they left us in by voting no on and sometimes filibustering many Democratic proposals, some of which they previously supported and sometimes even co-sponsored.

3.. Republicans support continued tax breaks for the wealthiest 2 percent of Americans and highly profitable corporations, while basic social services are being cut.

4. Republican legislators have voted against providing funds to save jobs of teachers, police officers, and fire fighters, providing unemployment benefits to long-time unemployed people, and providing medical benefits to 9/11 responders.

5. Republicans are generally in denial about the tremendous dangers from climate change, in spite of a very strong consensus in peer-reviewed articles in scientific journals and statements by scientific academies all over the world, as well as the many wake-up calls we have been receiving in terms of severe storms, tornados, floods, heat waves, droughts, and wildfires, that climate change is a major threat, largely caused by human activities. Anyone who thinks that climate change is a hoax promoted by liberals should visit the website of the conservative “Republicans for Environmental Protection.” (www.rep.org)

6. The Republican Party has moved far to the right under the influence of the Tea Party. There are very few moderate Republicans in Congress today.

7. While far more needs to be done, Democrats have enacted policies that have turned the economy away from the possible depression that the Bush administration left the U.S. on the brink of. More net private-sector jobs have been created already during the Obama administration than during the entire eight years of the Bush presidency.

While Democratic policies have not always lived up to our hopes, largely due to Republican obstructionism, a return to Republican rule would be a nightmare. Hence, it is essential to vote Democratic in 2012.

By: Mitchell Cohen

Mitchell Cohen — Mon, 11 Jun 2012 11:58:10 +0000

As an dual American/Israeli citizen living in Israel, I have ALWAYS told my family and friends (Jewish and not) living in the States to vote for whoever is best for America. I also did not vote in 2008, nor will I vote in these elections either. I guess the reason I will not vote is a combination of laziness (I am no longer registered to vote in the American elections due to my parents moving to another county) and being disconcerted with both (main) candidates. This is the same reason I didn’t vote in the last elections. When I did vote in the past (both in America and in Israel) I held no affinity towards either (main) party and voted back and forth between Democrat and Republican. In principle, if there was a candidate that WOWed me (i.e. a candidate that would be good for America) I would vote, as the rest of my family lives there and will probably die there. However, that candidate has not stepped up to the plate as of yet.

By: Kolumn9

Kolumn9 — Mon, 11 Jun 2012 08:17:04 +0000

XYZ, yeah. The similarities are striking… When Obama gets voted out of office I expect him to enjoy a long post-presidency Carter-like career of pretending to be relevant.
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I think you are right on the presidents. It is like there is a Middle East presidential handbook written by Dennis Ross that hasn’t been updated in 30 years. Every president tries to follow the handbook and eventually realizes that it is just a hazing ritual by previous presidents. What liberals don’t seem to realize is that Republican presidents actually have more leeway on Israel. In any case, even leaving the whole hating Israel thing out, Obama has been an absolutely terrible president both domestically and internationally. Domestically he has been frittering away several borrowed trillions with no result, and internationally he has been busy pissing away American influence. I have no idea how 64% of American Jews can think that a second term would be a good idea even on domestic considerations alone. How is it that a well educated, affluent community can be so obtuse when it comes to voting for a president?

By: XYZ

XYZ — Mon, 11 Jun 2012 06:32:05 +0000

Kolumn9-
What you wrote about Obama reminds me of a joke the Reagan people said during the 1980 Election campaign (Reagan vs Carter). They said
“Carter’s election slogan should be ‘Vote For Jimmy Carter and give him four more years of on-the-job-training’”.
Same applies to Obama.

By: Kolumn9

Kolumn9 — Mon, 11 Jun 2012 03:27:46 +0000

@Richard, deflect, deflect, pretend, pretend. That is all that you can find as justification for an Obama second term? Reading it looks like a laundry list of blaming all problems elsewhere. It is almost like Bush is still president and Obama hasn’t been in power for three and a half years. Apparently being president is a job that Obama had no idea how to do up until now and failed miserably at it but it “wasn’t his fault”. He was just too incompetent to understand that all his promises before the election were hollow. So he promised and promised but delivered nothing but failure. Was this a warm up presidency? Is this the argument? “I only had four years and besides even if as president I failed it wasn’t my fault and if you give me another four years I promise to try to fail less.” You are arguing for Obama by justifying failure rather than demonstrating any actual real signs of success.
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As to Obama’s support for Israel. Wait, so for all his support for Israel the president hasn’t bothered to visit Israel since getting elected and instead has been downright nasty to Israel and her leaders for the first two years of his presidency? Here we get more deflection. A president that attacks Israel for two years is justified by arguing that he is doing it out of the best of motivations. Really? Perhaps a better argument is that Obama preferred to improve relations with the Muslim world while throwing Israel under the bus? That might perhaps explain why Obama went to Egypt but decided not to fly two hours to Israel. Perhaps it would also explain why the Palestinians have been using the president’s own words as justification for their intransigence? Or is it simply that Obama and Abbas happen to think alike on issues of Israeli national security? Now there is a hardy pro-Israeli endorsement.
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You think I am ignoring what Obama has done?
Consistent pressure on Israel for the first two years of his presidency? Obama
Demands that Israel agree to an indefensible borders? Obama
Demands for the entirely new condition of a settlement freeze? Obama
Promises to the Palestinians of a state within a year? Obama
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Tell me again what Obama has done. Maybe this time I will believe your election year fairy tales.