I forgot to mention. It's pretty awful when our Democratic frontrunner is worse on this key issue than Romney or even Brownback. Holy shit.

at our core, we strive for goodness. We seek wisdom, compassion, and humility. We aspire for moral excellence.

Which way the vomitorium?

McCain: ... the League of Democracies that I have proposed

Remember the America-Abroad "concert of democracies" ?

Guess who's picked up on the idea? Yes, John McCain! I'm just laughing my head off!

AA acting as a Repub think tank! Too funny for words!

Is AA dead anyway? RIP

The thing I found amazing (and discouraging) was how many far right U.S. respondents there were in the talk-back. Most were far more interested in getting the candidates to endorse a united Israeli Jerusalem than they were about how the candidates might go about achieving peace.

Telling.

Know your enemy well, for in the end that is who you become. ~~Old Chinese Proverb

Ah, the Jerusalem Post. It's got a smaller circulation than the Michigan State University "State News" daily, but it's flypaper for rightwing bigots of all stripes -- and, of course, groveling presidential candidates.

I'm a bit surprised that Hillary Clinton's statement presupposes a purely Jewish Israeli audience. I don't see terribly much that is concrete in it, though- it assumes that the audience's political views are at best tenuously committed to a bargaining process. There's acknowledgment and some validation given to the paranoia and violence-proneness that passes for political 'thinking', and nothing much else. (I do hate the word "nourish" in political speech, though. She likes and uses it often. It doesn't work, imho.)

Obama's view is very meticulous, nuanced, and interesting. But it's cerebral- you don't get the sense that he would knock heads together when it's called for or greatly invest himself in the problem. A disappointment is that he doesn't invoke concepts of majority and minority rights.

As for the Republican views, it's mostly old hat I have trouble taking seriously. Romney's is perhaps the most sensible.

As for the JPost reader commentary...grotesque.

I will repeat what I stated in an earlier posting by MJ.

Virtually all Presidents since 1967 follow the SAME policies on the Israeli/Arab conflict, regardless of what party they belong to.

(1) All Presidents aspire to getting Israel eventually to withdraw to the pre-1967 lines.
(2) All Presidents aspire to creating a so-called "Palestinian" state within those borders.
(3) Pending a withdrawal to those borders all Presidents oppose Israeli building in Judea/Samaria but simply can't invest enough political capital to FORCE Israel to go along with this officially. Bush did succeed in getting Sharon to destroy Gush Katif, but it is unclear whether any Israeli government will attempt to do this again.

(4) No President can FORCE the two sides to reach an agreement based on the outline I gave above. The US has tried to force a government to its liking on Haiti and failed. Making "peace" between Israel and the Palestinians is a million times more difficult.

(5) No President can afford to alienate the Saudis and the other Gulf Arab potentates, no matter how abhorrent their anti-American propaganda is, no matter how much they spread virulent anti-Jewish/Chrisitian/Western Islamism around the world and no matter how they treat the millions of foreign workers in those countries as slaves with no rights.

(6) No President can force the supposedly "moderate" Arab states like Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia and especially Egypt to lean on the Palestinians to make a reasonable "peace agreement" with Israel. Clinton tried this at Camp David and failed miserably.

Thus the bottom line is, for those of you out there who spend a lot of time worrying about how to get a US President who will "finally" force the sides to make peace....forget it. The Arabs will never agree to make peace on these terms and any President will be aware that US public opinion is generally friendly to Israel and would oppose any attempt to force Israel to make concessions that would endanger its existence. It can't be done and it makes no difference who the President is regarding this matter.

I've been reading your postings over the last weeks, and what bothers me is not so much that you think that any kind of "peace" is impossible, but that you seem so pleased by that.

I went on the 'long hard slog' through all of that rhetorical gobbledygook, and was unable to discern any meaningful difference between the statements. Further, I think they're all a bunch of corporate tools, so voting for any of em would be a waste of time and effort. Can we have an out-of-the-box thinker, someone like Nader, please? I don't care if you're an Israel fan or not, someday, a lot of other countries, Israel included, need to stand up, pull their socks up, and start behaving as though they were both willing and competent to start solving their own problems, for a change. You know, surprise us.

Our country has its' own problems, 9 trillion in red ink, public accountability long-ago lost in the dust, a runaway war party looking for any excuse under the sun to keep that party going, illegal immigration, an oil habit that won't quit, yeah, there's a lot of stuff to do on the home front, maybe if we, and other countries, spent more time, effort, and energy on dealing with those domestic hurdles, rather than just building up more mega-debt, we'd be a little farther along globally, as a byproduct. A lot of what seems to be going on in the world has a lot to do with the stupid oil, so the sooner that we get oil-independent, the further we'll be along in having our economic and political independence back from all the nice people around the world that see fit to draw our country into their problems. In other words, we can change channels away from the global Jerry Springer show, and start doing things like making sure that american high school kids graduate knowing how to read, add, and generally be something else than future welfare recipients. But, none of this particular batch of 'candidates' appears as though they'd be willing to lay a finger on that remote, too much money involved, most likely...

You could ask the same about Denmark or Holland or S. Korea for that matter -- so why are we allied with them?

What you mean is as soon as the Palestinians accept your reality will progress to peace be made. Unfortunately, your reality is that the Palestinians give up any and all rights to justice, equity and humane treatment and do as they're told.

Every single charge you made about the Palestinians could be said with equal fervor by the Palestinians about the Israelis - the outside world is fueling the violence by giving aid to Israel, the flow of weapons to Israel is aiding and abetting the daily violence againt the Palestinians by the Israelis, the Israelis are undermining the Temple Mount and partitioning Jerusalem to cut off Muslim access to their holy sites and on and on and on.

The problem isn't outside forces determining the fate of the Israelis and the Palestinians, the problem is that both sides like the situation just as it is, and hope that by attrition they can wipe out the other side.

It would be refreshing.

Are you suggesting a policy that goes beyond GW Bush's "benign neglect" to include withdrawing military, political and diplomatic support from all sides until they have exhausted themselves and are ready to come to the table?

a policy that goes beyond GW Bush's "benign neglect" to include withdrawing military, political and diplomatic support from all sides until they have exhausted themselves and are ready to come to the table

Interesting. This is pretty much what Bill Clinton said he did with Bosnia and Kosovo. He acknowledged that when you intercede is critically important to success, he called it the arc of conflict, and noted that only when the 2 sides are exhausted from fighting can you truly make a difference and have a positive outcome. While he took flak for not interceding sooner he understood and asserted that to have done so would have resulted in a long drawn out slog with the USA bogged down in a civil/sectarian dispute, with no hope of securing the peace which is what we have in Iraq.

that's a good point and Lebanon is another good example. After a bloody war, every side understands violence will never resolve their differences.

iraq is headed for a civil war -- the only question is the scale. an NPR report this week with an Iraqi official who suggested the US is only delaying the inevitable, and that Iraqi's were going to have to deal with their harsh realities themselves.

Israel is very aware of the limits of force. Hamas, on the other hand, remains committed to the belief they can make a country of 6 million disappear with suicide bombers.

They are all cowards on this issue.  The reasonable stand is to tell Israel that if they do not cooperate with the Palestinians in short order they will cease to receive American foreign aid at all and will no longer receive American protection at the UN.

no the connecting dot is my wallet and yours because that's where the money comes from ultimately. Military aid to South Korea costs way more than we give to Israel, and if you add up the colllective direct aid/military we give to Egypt and Jordan -- it's on par with Israel. Throw in our commitment to Taiwan which also requires a constant naval prescence. Unreimbursed assistance for a nation's economic or political security is direct aid to me, it doesn't matter which US budget it comes out of.

If elected I will

o close all military bases outside of the US and bring those troops home except for one division which I will station in Israel with instructions to defend Israel against any invasion and to assist it in immediately entering adjacent Palestinian territory to destroy any site from which bombardment of Israel takes place.

o provide $10,000 to each Palestinian refugee
family that moves from a camp in Lebanon or elsewhere , and $5000 to the country which
agrees to accept it as full citizens. Repeat payments for the two following years declining 50% each year

o have full diplomatic relations with the Palestinian Government no matter what party is in control.

o provide financial support for the Palestinian medical system.

o announce the US supports the right of the Palestinian Government to be located in East Jerusalem .

o support UN resolutions which condemn Israeli
actions when we believe such condemnation is called for and not insist that it be "balanced" by a condemnation of some Palestinian or other Arab action.

o announce that Israeli settlements outside
the 1967 borders are illegitimate unless approved by the Palestininan government and that
our garrison in Israel will not assist in defending those settlements other than to
assist the settlers in leaving if attacked.

o condemn any Israeli air strikes against population centers including strikes intended to kill individuals who are known enemies of Israel
except for "smart bomb" attacks targetted against the specific residence of such enemies-even if others live there.

o state that we see no moral difference between
suicide bombing against Israel and such Israeli
air strikes against populated areas.

o provide visas for any Palestinian or Israeli
who wishes to study in the US provided in the case of the Palestinians that they pass a reasonable security check .

o make annual visits to both Israel and Palestine.

Signed

Someone who will be roundly condemned by both sides

.

Good 4 A Merica,

You make no sense. Korea, Taiwan, etc. are all about a confrontation with China.

The same China who enjoys perpetual renewal of its Most Favored Nation status with the US.

Our aid to Egypt and Jordan is part of our aid to Israel, it is a bribe to keep them out of Israel. Take your blinders off.

Which only makes sense if Egypt and Jordan get Israeli approval for what they do with their US aid.  According to this kind of reasoning, China's MFN status is a bribe to keep them out of Taiwan.  "Blinders..." funny.

Its not a bad set of ideas. I see a lot of promise here... except for one item:

o close all military bases outside of the US and bring those troops home except for one division which I will station in Israel with instructions to defend Israel against any invasion and to assist it in immediately entering adjacent Palestinian territory to destroy any site from which bombardment of Israel takes place.

Neither the Israelis or the Palestinians or Al Quaeda would let you stick a division of US troops on any Israeli or Palestinian territory. Frankly, nobody but Neocons and Robber Oil Barons wants US troops stationed in the Middle East, even for peace-keeping. Certainly Israel doesn't. Reagan was smart enough to realize this in '83 and if it wasn't for the Bush family we would have stuck with that...

If you think we are not still locked in the Cold War confrontation with China, you must have no interest in foreign policy at all.  You are simply a proponent of Israel.  I previously assumed you lived in Brooklyn and occasionally commuted to Israel.  But to offer this view suggests that you live in Israel and occasionally visit the US. 

In any case, the roots of our policies in South Asia, anywhere north of the Philippines (a former US protectorate after the Spanish-American War) except Japan (defeated by the US in War and thus, temporarily, a US dependency) involved the CONTAINMENT of China after WWII.  You might have heard of the Domino Theory?  It was the justification for both the Korean and the Vietnam Wars.  US infusion of resources in South Asia north of the Philippines except in Japan is specifically in confrontation of China.

As to BRIBES to Jordan and Egypt.  Why would you expect the use of the BRIBE be subject to approval by a third party? The US has absolutely no interest in Jordan except with respect to bribing it to leave Israel alone.  It does have some interest in Egypt with respect the the Suez Canal, but no more so than dozens of other countries.  If Israel didn't exist, their would be no motivation to donate more than the same token amount we donate to any country.  Our foreign aid to Egypt is a bribe to leave Israel alone.   So, effectively, both the aid to Jordan and Egypt is indirect aid to Israel.

I cannot imagine why you think any of these US relations concepts are controversial.  It is with great restraint that I have avoided asking about your intelligence.  Could you, for example, compare US foreign donations to Egypt with those to Panama in the last 5 years, and explain the differences without referring to Israel?

No dictating.  Let them live without our money or our protection at the UN.  Israel is an insignificant country.  One day we talk about the Democrats not being able to win without the South.  The next it is Democrats cannot win without the Israeli faction.  Too bad we don't have Democrats who worry about progressive policies in the US.  Israel has been the instigator of bad action for 50 years.  They are a rogue nation.  They have official apartheid.  Yet Democrats won't take a courageous stand against them and interfere when other nations do.  Time to say No.

Who started the Korean War? To suggest the Koreas would be a big, happy re-united country if not for the US is an idea i haven't heard any serious analyst propose.

There are about 200,000 political prisoners locked up in a gulag the size of Rhode Island, which gives North Korea the prize for the worst 3rd-world hell on Earth. You really need to study the psychology of dictators.

Jordan is one of the most important moderate Arab governments in the Middle East, which would make them very important to us as an ally with or without Israel.

Egyptian aid was part of the deal Carter made, which is one reason Carter made a one-term exit, but we agreed to it and have to follow through. The more substantial aspects of the package required Israel to pull out of the Sinai, which they did. It's a historical example that Israel is ready to make serious compromises, if they have a serious partner for peace.

If you actually believe the "peace and unity" message coming out of Pyongang, i've got a few authentic antiques available on ebay.

Don't be so sure that a nuclear umbrella is that expensive. Once you amortize the weapons development cost, which the US was going to do anyway, the weapons, in overall terms, aren't that expensive. Something like a B57 nuclear depth charge and tactical bomb, for use on a P3 antisubmarine warfare aircraft, might indeed cost a million or two.

Compare that with the costs of feeding, maintaining, and training an armored infantry brigade for a year, along with its equipment and support costs. It surprises many people that the incremental cost of tactical nuclear weapons weren't that high. In some case, it may even be that the more effective "smart" weapons may actually cost more.

--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]

My cousins and the millions of Israelis who survived Nazi death camps to found a democratic haven for the Jewish people are not rogues.

As politely as I can muster: people like you make Henry Ford's anti-semitism look good.

So what Israelis really want is an excuse "...to exterminate every single Palestininan in the West Bank and Gaza..."?

Did I read you correctly, Emet18?

Dear Good 4 America, I have better things to do that debate a dolt. Just go to the library and read how Israel defeated four Arab armies in 1948 and the Egyptian Army in 1956 without a dime of U.S. aid, and defeated three Arab armies in 1967 with far more limited U.S. aid--essentially a couple of F-4's which it paid for-- than what Israel receives today. If you doubt that Israel has the resources to kill every single Palestinian in order to survive you are more of jerk than is now apparent.

Your beloved Palestinians had better hope that U.S. aid to Israel never stops, because the day it does is the day that Lieberman and Netanyhu using the IDF will feel entirely free to kill them all and annex all of the West Bank--if that is what it takes for Israel to be secure-- without blinking an eye.

Of course you didn't read Emet18 correctly, Red Planet. What is clear, however, is that you will read into anything that which supports the conclusion to which you want to jump.

Howard,

Odd. If it is a haven for the Jewish people, why are there significant Jewish populations in other countries, of which they consider themselves loyal citizens?

Perhaps because history does not happen all at once, and that all individual Jews really don't "speak in one voice" and tend to have two stong legs each and minds of their own.  Nevertheless, Jews have historically taken their lumps in groups.  Consider as well the demographic reality whereby the two largest Jewish communities in the world, at roughly 6 million apiece, are currently found in Israel and the US.  Consider as well that a US Jewish community of any significant number is older than the state of Israel, and that it lacks the history of persecution (at best) that had been common in other diaspora communities.

The rather frequent refrain that Israel speaks for all Jews is equally anti-semantic.

Exactly how frequent, really?

Apparently you are not reading Emet18 correctly.  He is clearly advocating genocide.

We do not disagree that Israel is a perceived haven for those Jews that fear persecution. If you said it was the state for those Jews who chose to go there for reasons of culture, religion, or safety, I would have no objection.

Whenever you describe it as "the" Jewish state, I get a strong sense of your belief that all Jews have a moral obligation to support it. I get a strong sense that, at some level, you want all Jews to emigrate there, regardless of conditions in their home country.

--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]

I make this suggestion from time to time and get
this same sensible reply.

Against that is my feeling that for Israel to alter its security procedures (for example its bombing of Beirut last summer) it needs to be convinced it is really....secure. That while it may , will , continue to suffer atrocities its conflict with its Islamic enemies will cease to be "existential".

And my feeling that it does need to alter those security procedures in order to end that conflict - or at least change it into a cold peace.

Yes stationing US troops in Israel is a bad idea. Maybe it's the least bad idea.

BTW by accident as I write Thomas Ricks in Baghdad is calling to "This American Life" and suggesting that the least bad idea for what we should do in Iraq is something along this same line: remove most of our troops and end our attempt at national building but leave behind a 30,000 person US force to remain as a security guarantee.

take the parent away, the child will figure out how to get along with the other children.

Been there . Done that. Six million people were killed.

I've taken up enough space in this thread.

By dispossessing other people.  One genocide does not justify another.

Oh, the old "moral equivalency" argument.
All I know is that Rachel Corrie's parents went to Rafiah to "identify" with their daughter's terrorist friends. In the last year, non-Arabs have become targets for kidnappings, even extremely pro-Arab, anti-Israel non-Arabs like this BBC journalist Johnston who was kidnapped a couple of months ago and is still being held. A couple of Arab "friends" of the Corrie's tried to kidnap them. Their host managed to rescue them and told them to flee to Israeli controlled-territory....YES, ISRAEL,
in order to be safe, they weren't safe in Palestinian-controlled territory. Isn't that odd? Israel is the incarnation of evil in their eyes, yet they have to flee to Israel in order to be saved from their Palestinian "friends".

"Stop killing people"

Was that to me or the Hamas leaders?