The following is a prepared statement by Alaska blogger Shannyn Moore, threatened with legal action by Sarah Palin for reporting allegations of impending federal corruption charges against Palin. The statement was delivered by Moore in front of Palin's Anchorage office July 5, before reporters and news cameras (see Mudflats, Shannyn Moore, KTUU, Huffington Post):

"On the Fourth of July, when Americans everywhere were celebrating our most sacred national holiday with parades and barbeques, Governor Sarah Palin was busy having me, Shannyn Moore, declared an Enemy of the State.

"In a rambling quasi-legal letter, the most powerful person in this state accused me of defaming her for pointing out the fact that there have been rumors, -rumors- of corruption, rumors that have been around for years.

"When Sarah Palin gave her three-weeks notice to the people of Alaska, aborting her term as Governor, a lot of people wondered why she quit. Mid-level managers turn-in their notice, not elected public officials. It didn't make sense. It still doesn't. People have been trying to guess why she really quit, and everyone in Alaska has been playing the guessing game. They're rumors. There are a lot of rumors. And with all the corruption we've had here in Alaska, of course we wonder what's really behind her resignation.

"Governors don't just quit. But Governor Palin did.

"The governor's massive overreaction -on the Fourth of July no less- should make any reasonable person wonder what's wrong with her. The Lady protests way too much. Eventually we'll all find out why she really walked off the job.

"Sarah Palin is a coward and a bully. What kind of politician attacks an ordinary American on the Fourth of July for speaking her mind? What's wrong with her? The First Amendment was designed to protect people like me from the likes of people like her. Our American Revolution got rid of kings. And queens, too. Am I jacked-up? You betcha.

"Sarah Palin, if you have a problem with me, then sue me. Shannyn Moore will not be muzzled!"

Go, Shannyn! I look forward to seeing you on Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow Monday night!

(photo: Mudflats)

Mark C. Eades
http://www.mceades.com

On the eve of the July 4 weekend, Alaska governor and national laughingstock Sarah Palin announced her intention to leave office more than a year early in a rambling, confused speech of which we are still struggling to make sense. Appearing rushed and nervous, Palin gave a litany of supposed reasons for her decision, including the suggestion that only losers serve out their elected terms of office when there are better things to do, that she and her family have been unfairly singled out by the wicked liberal media for attack, and that she has now been called to a higher purpose than that of serving the good people of Alaska who elected her in the first place. In her speech Palin suggested that being a lame-duck governor wouldn't be any "fun" now that she has decided not to seek a second term, and that therefore she might as well leave now rather than waste any more time doing that dull little job Alaska voters elected her to do. All this, of course, makes perfect sense to diehard Palin fans like Bill Kristol, who assume that Palin's bizarre actions must be some shrewd political move, aimed perhaps at a 2012 presidential run. After all, they don't call her the Barracuda for nothing, do they?

Observers far less enamored of Palin than Bill Kristol are, of course, reading her actions quite differently. While Alaska GOP senator Lisa Murkowski blasted Palin for her decision to "abandon the state," other Republicans as well as Democrats are suggesting that, if Palin's decision is indeed a move toward a presidential run, then it will likely prove to be a disastrous one. Palin defended her actions in a Facebook message, saying: "...Though it's honorable for countless others to leave their positions for a higher calling and without finishing a term..., for some reason a different standard applies for the decisions I make." Of course the suggestion here is that, if it was okay for first-term senator Barack Obama to resign his seat to become President of the United States, it should also be okay for first-term governor Palin to resign her office in pursuit of the same. It is worth noting, however, that Obama resigned his Senate seat only after being elected president, as required by law, which Palin would likewise have been required to do had she been elected vice-president in 2008. Such is obviously not the case for Palin today, nor in any place even remotely resembling the real world.

Meanwhile, rumors that Palin may have announced her resignation in the face of an even greater scandal to come have been greeted by a threat from the Palin camp of legal action against bloggers who publish "defamatory" material about the soon-to-be former governor. These rumors concern possible federal charges of embezzlement against Sarah and Todd Palin stemming from the alleged use of publicly-purchased materials from the construction of the Wasilla Sports Complex to build a new home for Palin and her familiy while she was mayor of Wasilla, Alaska. Palin's ire seems to be directed particularly at liberal Alaska blogger Shannyn Moore, who also appeared on MSNBC with these allegations, but her threat of legal action extends also to other bloggers and news outlets deemed unfriendly to her. Obviously designed to intimidate and silence Palin's critics, this threat seems to have little grounding in legal reality, since there is no law against reporting allegations of possible wrongdoing against a public official if such allegations exist. There is also a little thing called the First Amendment right to free speech and a free press which the would-be Queen of America appears to have forgotten about (see Anchorage Daily News, Daily Beast, Huffington Post, Brad Blog).

I for one find it hard to believe that Palin's abrupt resignation from office could be any sort of calculated political move. Her announcement July 3 had a desperate, eleventh-hour feel to it that understandably suggests some further scandal may be in the works, though anything such as federal embezzlement charges have yet to be confirmed by any official source, and even a Palin gets to be considered innocent until proven otherwise. Maybe she really does think that abruptly quitting one executive office early will convince voters to elect her to another, higher executive office. On the other hand, as some have suggested, maybe Palin is leaving office early simply because there's more money to be made in talk radio, on the lecture circuit, and in selling copies of her upcoming book to her starry-eyed admirers than in being Governor of Alaska. Maybe she really believes that media elitists and bloggers have singled out her and her family for special abuse just because we hate them. Maybe she's just crazy.

Whatever the case, it appears increasingly unlikely now that Sarah Palin will ever see the inside of the Oval Office. 

(image: Mudflats)

Mark C. Eades
http://www.mceades.com

Details are emerging from the investigation into the Arizona murder of a nine-year-old girl and her father tying two of the three accused both to national Minutemen groups and to the white supremacist group Aryan Nations. Since the murders Minuteman groups have tried to distance themselves from the accused, describing them as lunatic loners without genuine Minuteman ties. The facts, however, would seem to indicate otherwise.

San Diego's East County Magazine links accused ringleader Shawna Forde as well as accused shooter Jason Eugene Bush, both pictured here, to the Minutemen Civil Defense Corps (MCDC) founded by Chris Simcox. According to this report, Forde briefly attended a San Diego County MCDC training camp known as "Camp Vigilance" in August 2008. Forde showed an MCDC badge upon arrival, indicating that she had been vetted by the group.

Meanwhile, the Colorado Independent links Forde to former Colorado congressman and immigration firebrand Tom Tancredo, observing that Tancredo's 2008 presidential campaign participated in a July 2007 event in Washington State organized by Forde's group, Minuteman American Defense, in association with conservative group The Reagan Wing. Minuteman Project founder Jim Gilchrist delivered a speech at the event, as did Forde herself, and California congressman Duncan Hunter spoke to the audience by phone (Everett Herald). Representatives of Fred Thompson's 2008 campaign were also slated to participate.

The Colorado Independent notes that Forde and Tancredo also share ties to the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), designated as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC). Tancredo has a long and well-known relationship with FAIR, and Forde participated in a televised 2006 town hall meeting in Yakima, Washington at which she was repeatedly identified as a FAIR representative (Tancredo has come under fire recently for his harsh attacks on Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor, including his charge that she is a "racist" and that a respected Latino organization to which she belongs, the National Council of La Raza, amounts to a "Latino KKK." In 2008 Tancredo staffer Marcus Epstein plead guilty to charges of assaulting an African American female passerby in Washington DC, calling her "Nigger" and striking her on the head. Epstein remains executive director of Tancredo's PAC, "Team America.").

Additionally, the Arizona Daily Star reports statements from Forde's immediate family indicating that Forde was actively recruiting members of the Aryan Nations to rob "drug cartels" and to start "a revolution against the United States government." Accused shooter Bush also has long-standing ties to the Aryan Nations, according to a police statement cited in this report.

Materials including photos recently removed from the MAD website also place Forde at an April 15 "tea party" event in Phoenix at which Forde's favorite protest sign was one reading, "Stop the Obama-Nation of America." Forde, Bush, and a third suspect were charged June 12 in Pima County, Arizona, for the murder on May 30 of nine-year-old Brisenia Flores and her father Raul, allegedly in the commission of a home-invasion robbery targeting Mexican Americans thought by Forde to be involved in "drug cartels" or "the Mexican mafia."

Pictured here with the murder victims is wife and mother Gina Flores, who was also shot but survived (KOMO):

(see also Daily Kos, Firedoglake)
 

Mark C. Eades
http://www.mceades.com

New York Magazine videographer Jonah Green shot some unforgettably insane video of Sarah Palin supporters at a less-than-successful "Fire David Letterman" protest this week outside Letterman's studio in New York. According to CNN a crowd of about 15 protesters gathered outside the Ed Sullivan Theatre on Tuesday (June 15), outnumbered more than two-to-one by at least 35 members of the media who were there to cover the event, badly organized to protest jokes about Palin and her family for which Letterman has now twice apologized.

Jonah Green's video is reminiscent of videos shot at Palin rallies during the 2008 presidential campaign, with Letterman standing in this time for Barack Hussein Obama and the wicked liberal establishment as object of indiscriminate hate. The strange, angry lady in yellow pictured here first calls Letterman's child a "bastard" and his wife a "slut," than goes on to demand, "Close the borders!" (David Letterman is an illegal alien!). Among her fellows is a young man who confesses that he has never seen Letterman's show because he only watches Fox News, while another man shouts about "fascists" and "communists" and tells bystanders, "Wake up! Socialism is evil!" (David Letterman is a fascist, a communist, and a socialist!). Another lady shouts, "Keep your children safe from David Letterman's mouth! He will rape them with his mouth! He is a child abuser! He is a verbal pedophile!" (David Letterman ought to be listed on the Sex Offender Registry because of what his mouth said on TV! Oh my God it's his mouth!).

All protesters seem to agree that Jay Leno is a better, funnier talk-show host than the pariah David Hussein Letterman (I'll bet Jay's real happy about that!).

My goodness....

(see also Huffington Post).

Mark C. Eades
http://www.mceades.com

Sickened at the prospect that a victory for reformist Mir-Hossein Mousavi in the Iranian presidential election might have led to better relations with the United States, neoconservatives here and their fellow war hawks in Israel are celebrating the dubious victory of hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Yes, this is true: Right-wingers in America and Israel don't want peace with Iran, nor do they want anyone to get the impression that President Obama's efforts at engagement with Iran might actually work, nor do they give a damn about the Iranian people. Mad Mahmoud is the man neocons love to hate, and they're as happy as clams that their guy found a way to steal the election.

Had Mousavi won the Iranian election as many in Iran and around the world hoped, it would likely have signalled a new and more positive direction for U.S.-Iranian relations as well as providing support for the "Obama Doctrine" of engagement with Iran and others in the Muslim world with which America's relations have been troubled. Such a development would at the same time have undercut the neocon attitude of hostility and suspicion toward Iran, as well as undercutting the right-wing Israeli government's aggressive stance toward Iran. As we know, neocons can tolerate peace only when it is imposed with an iron fist or the heel of a jackboot, and the prospect of peace through diplomacy in the Greater Middle East must surely have given them nightmares the rest of us could scarcely imagine.

In the run-up to the Iranian election last week, Daniel Pipes of the right-wing Middle East Forum came right out and admitted in a speech at the right-wing Heritage Foundation that he would actually vote for Ahmadinejad if he were allowed to vote in Iran (video). This speech was followed by a June 12 blog post by Pipes in which he reiterated that he was "rooting for Ahmadinejad" based on the twisted logic that the fundamentalist clerics who really rule Iran will always be our enemies and it's better to have an Iranian president we can really hate than "a sweet-talking Mousavi" who lulls us into thinking we can be friends. Never mind the aspirations or even basic human rights of the Iranian people; never mind anyone's desire for peace in the Greater Middle East. I've long had a pretty strong distaste for Daniel Pipes, but following this admission I'm more convinced of his utter vileness than ever. This is, after all, a man who has publicly advocated for the profiling and internment of Muslims in America, and who considers Israeli and Palestinian existence mutually exclusive (see Sourcewatch). As we leave the age of the neocons behind, I look forward to watching Pipes and others like him slide into the bitter, drooling irrelevance and oblivion they deserve.

The American Enterprise Institute's equally malignant Michael Rubin likewise told Kathryn Jean Lopez at the National Review that it might be better for Ahmadinejad to win, because a Mousavi win might give Obama and the rest of us the impression that diplomacy was actually working. Painting Iran as inherently and hopelessly evil, Rubin said of the Iranian election that should Mousavi win "it would be easier for Obama to believe that Iran really was figuratively unclenching a fist when, in fact, it had its other hand hidden under its cloak, grasping a dagger." James Taranto strikes a similar tone in the Wall Street Journal, warning against the "eagerness to see Obama's feel-good foreign-policy approach succeed."

Now that the Iranian election appears to be over, right-wingers will be tripping over themselves in the rush to use Ahmadinejad's victory against Obama. In fact, once and future Republican U.S. presidential candidate Mitt Romney has already piped up, saying that Ahmadinejad's win is proof that Obama's "policy of going around the world and apologizing for America is not working." These losers obviously have nothing left but the hope that Obama will fail, or can at least be said to have failed. I look forward to watching Romney and his party lose again in 2012.

Right-wingers in Israel, meanwhile, have been making noises very similar to their American bedfellows, and appear to see nothing good for themselves in any warming of relations between the U.S. and Iran, as observed by M.J. Rosenberg at TPM. From Israel in the run-up to the Iranian election Yaakov Katz wrote in the Jerusalem Post that members of the Israeli defense establishment were "silently praying" for an Ahmadinejad victory, fearing that a Mousavi win would result in decreased pressure on Iran and its nuclear program. Now that Ahmadinejad appears to have successfully stolen the election, Israeli officials and their allies in America are calling for renewed pressure on Iran. Meanwhile, Amos Harel and Avi Issacharoff write in Haaretz that an Ahmadinejad victory is actually preferable for Israel because a Mousavi win would only "paste an attractive mask on the face of Iranian nuclear ambitions."

I suspect we'll hear more of this in days to come from eager neocons on both sides of the Atlantic. Obama's policy of engagement will work, however, and is working, as evidenced by the overwhelmingly positive reaction to his Cairo speech, by the Lebanese election results, by the reform movement in Iran, and by the likelihood that Ahmadinejad kept his office only through vote-rigging, suppression, and intimidation. Obama will succeed, and once he has neocons like Daniel Pipes can take up residence in the dustbin of history where they belong.

Mark C. Eades
http://www.mceades.com

Shawna Forde, leader of Minutemen American Defense, is one of three individuals arrested June 12 by sheriff's detectives in Pima County, Arizona, for the murder of a Mexican American man and his nine-year-old daughter.

Based in Washington State, Forde's group is one of several border militia groups nationwide that refer to themselves as "Minutemen," including also the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps, of which Forde is also a former leader. Profiles on Forde and her anti-immigrant activities are available from the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Anti-Defamation League.

According to authorities, Forde and her two accomplices, Jason Eugene Bush and Albert Robert Gaxiola, broke into the home of Raul Flores and his family in Arivaca AZ on May 30th, apparently in the commission of a robbery. The invaders reportedly shot all three members of the Flores family who were present at the time, killing the father and daughter and leaving the mother wounded. While Bush is the suspected gunman in the shootings, investigators say Forde was the mastermind of the operation. Nine-year-old murder victim Brisenia Flores is pictured here from the local Green Valley News:

Forde is listed as the National Executive Director of Minuteman American Defense on the group's website, and the Arizona Daily Star reports that Bush, nicknamed "Gunny," is the group's Operations Director. The three are charged with two counts of first-degree murder in addition to burglary and aggravated assault charges.The Minuteman American Defense website and blog contains numerous photos of Forde and friends at Minuteman and "Tea Party" events, including an Apr. 15 event in Phoenix at which Forde's favorite protest sign was one reading "Stop the Obama-Nation of America." The site also includes descriptions of immigrants as violent criminals, drug addicts, and "Subhuman Mexicans." Here is a photo of Forde in full border vigilante gear from the Anti-Defamation League:

Forde's mother tells the Everett WA Herald that she was not surprised to hear of her daughter's arrest since she had previously talked of staging home invasions: "She sat here and said that she was going to start a group where they went down and start taking things away from the Mexican mafia...," Forde's mother recalled, "...She was going to kick in their doors and take away the money and the drugs." Forde's mother also says that her daughter called her a few hours after the shootings May 30 and reported that she was taking refuge in a "safe house" in Arivaca: "I'm in hiding," Forde told her mother, "You won't believe what is going down here.... The mafia, they are kicking down doors and they are shooting people and they are looking for me."

Pima County sheriff's lieutenant Michael O'Connor told the local Sahuarita Sun that the killings were an "assassination," and said the killers were also looking for Flores' other daughter, who was not at home at time of the killings. Sheriff Clarence W. Dupnik, meanwhile, said that Forde as "at best a pyschopath" (KOLD, KOMO, KVOA, Seattle Post-Intelligencer).

Mark C. Eades
http://www.mceades.com

As Iranians go to the polls to elect a president, American neoconservatives are openly rooting not for moderate reform candidate and former prime minister Mir-Hossein Mousavi but for anti-U.S. hardliner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. This is an obvious sign both of the neocons' preference for conflict over peace between the U.S. and Iran and of the generally bankrupt state of conservatism in America, reduced now to banking on failure for the Obama administration (see Huffington Post, Rachel Maddow).

Should the reformist Mousavi win the Iranian election and become president, it would likely signal a new and more positive direction for U.S.-Iranian relations as well as providing support for the "Obama Doctrine" of engagement with Iran and other adversaries. Such a development would at the same time undercut the neocon attitude of hostility and suspicion toward Iran, as well as undercutting the right-wing Israeli government's aggressive stance toward Iran. Indeed right-wingers in Israel like those in America appear to see nothing good for themselves in any warming of relations between the U.S. and Iran, as observed by M.J. Rosenberg at TPM and Yaakov Katz at the Jerusalem Post.

The unpleasant fellow you see pictured here is Daniel Pipes of the right-wing Middle East Forum, a raging neocon who said in a speech this week at the Heritage Foundation that he would vote for Ahmadinejad if he were allowed to vote in Iran (video). The American Enterprise Institute's Michael Rubin likewise told Kathryn Jean Lopez at the National Review that it could be better for Ahmadinejad to win, because a Mousavi win might give Obama the impression that diplomacy was working. Painting Iran as inherently and hopelessly evil, Rubin said of the Iranian election that "should someone more soft-spoken and less defiant -- someone like former prime minister Mir-Hossein Mousavi -- win, it would be easier for Obama to believe that Iran really was figuratively unclenching a fist when, in fact, it had it had its other hand hidden under its cloak, grasping a dagger."

Without so openly rooting for Ahmadinejad, other neocons are playing down the significance of a possible Mousavi victory, obviously worried that a shift in power will signal a fresh start for U.S.-Iranian relations that could leave American and Israeli hawks out in the cold. The same right-wing pundits who constantly point out Ahmadinejad's bad behavior as reasons to confront Iran now argue that it doesn't matter who the president of Iran is. Martin Peretz wrote at the New New Republic: "We've known for a long time that elected leaders do not carry the weight of those who have been anointed." Ilan Berman likewise wrote at the American Spectator: "Whoever ends up becoming president will have little real power -- and even less influence over Iran's geostrategic direction."

The prospect of peace in the Greater Middle East must give sociopaths like these nightmares the rest of us could scarcely imagine.

Mark C. Eades
http://www.mceades.com

Under pressure from the private medical industry Democratic Senator Mary Landrieu of Louisiana has flip-flopped on the public health care option she once supported. In a letter to Health Care for America Now (HCAN) dated April 11, 2009, Landrieu clearly stated her support for a public insurance option. This week, however, Landrieu withdrew her support for the public option, saying "I don't think it's the right way to go."

Landrieu's reversal on the public option can only be the result of pressure from the medical industry, including the American Medical Association (AMA), insurance, and pharmaceutical interests dedicated to keeping health care in for-profit hands. As the Huffington Post observes based on figures from the Center for Responsive Politics, Landrieu has collected a career total of $1,668,693 in campaign contributions from private health insurance and health care interests. This total includes $607,616 from "health professionals" (i.e., the AMA), $401,731 from insurance interests, $269,645 from hospitals and nursing homes, $224,696 from the pharmaceutical and health products industry, and $165,005 from health services/HMOs (see also Think Progress, Blue Herald).

Tell Senator Landrieu what you think of Democrats who act like Republicans, betraying the people they are sworn to serve in favor of big-money special interests. Louisiana residents can use a contact form at Landrieu's official website. Residents of other states and/or those who don't want to mess with the form can e-mail Landrieu directly at: senator@landrieu.senate.gov.

Mark C. Eades
http://www.mceades.com

Progressive journalists Max Blumenthal and Joseph Dana have posted an astonishing video shot in Jerusalem on the eve of Barack Obama's Cairo speech, in which a crowd of drunken youths tells us how they really feel about the U.S. President. Most of the youths interviewed by Blumenthal and Dana are obviously Americans, in Israel for some education and/or indoctrination program and feeling an all-new sense of swaggering macho entitlement and self-importance fueled by alcohol and testosterone.

This picture is one far darker than that of simple youthful exuberance "gone wild," however: Epithets including "nigger" and "faggot" as well as other obscenities are hurled at Obama by the youths, leading one to wonder how much of their hate was brought with them from America and how much was drilled into their little heads after their arrival in Israel. One young man states clearly that in his opinion Obama "deserves to get shot" and then exclaims "white power, fuck the niggers." Another says, "We're coming for you, Obama." None of the interviewees seems exceptionally bright, one young lady revealing her ignorance by first calling Obama "a Muslim" and "a terrorist" then boasting that she knows what she's talking about because she's a political science major although she doesn't even know who Benjamin Netanyahu is ("Who's Benjamin Yahoo?"). Watch and be astonished:



I sincerely hope that the parents of these spoiled, ignorant little brats will see this video and be deeply, deeply embarrassed by their children's behavior. Then I hope that each of these youths will be dragged back home to America by the scruff of the neck, grounded with no allowance for life, and given a lecture on bigotry that s/he will never, ever forget. And sent to bed without any supper or beer. Finally, I hope that these parents and others will take a serious look at what their children are learning in education/indoctrination programs such as that which these youths represent (I gather from Blumenthal and others referenced below that Birthright Israel is a likely candidate). Minus only the wet white-sheet-and-hood contest, whatever program this crew represents looks to me like some strange combination of a Wahhabist madrassah and Spring Break in Klan Country.

See also: Max Blumenthal, Haaretz, Mondoweiss. Blumenthal's and Dana's video has been censored by The Huffington Post.

Mark C. Eades
http://www.mceades.com

From progressive Israel/Mideast peace group J Street:

President Obama is getting ready to set his course for achieving real peace and security in the Middle East.

But some are telling the President to go slow and take a hands-off approach to negotiations, rather than taking the immediate action needed to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian and Israeli-Arab conflicts. 

This Administration's first year is crucial to promoting peace in the region - and the President needs to know that he has strong support in Congress if he chooses a path of leadership and real action.

Representatives Steve Cohen (D-TN), Charles Boustany (R-LA), and Russ Carnahan (D-MO) have authored a bipartisan letter backing President Obama's strong leadership in pursuit of the two-state solution and a regional comprehensive peace.  

Click here to take action and ask your Representative to sign the Cohen-Boustany-Carnahan letter supporting Obama's bold leadership in the Mideast (When you click here J Street takes you to a form which automatically sends an editable letter to your U.S. Representative urging him/her to support "strong American leadership to achieve a two-state solution and comprehensive peace and security for the Middle East." J Street also has a separate letter of support to President Obama for his "freeze means freeze" approach to Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank).

Mark C. Eades
http://www.mceades.com

Much is being made in the media of the current tension between the Obama administration and the right-wing government in Tel Aviv on the issue of Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, and I fully expect that coverage of Israeli reaction to the tough line on settlements taken by Obama in his Cairo speech will focus on the negative. Equally important but likely to receive far less attention is the applause and support Obama is receiving from Israeli progressives, many of whom are as critical of the settlements as their counterparts in the West.

A sampling of progressive Israeli opinion on Obama and his stand on the settlement issue includes the following from Gideon Levy in Haaretz, predicting hopefully that Binyamin Netanyahu and his right-wing government will ultimately have no choice but to acquiesce to Obama's demands:

"Washington will decide the fate of the West Bank settlements, and we can only hope it insists on their evacuation. Obama standing firm beside the revolutionary Mideast policy he has begun will light the torch of hope here, too. The battle of the titans, Netanyahu and Obama, is little more than a farce - let us recall the fable of the elephant and the bee, or the frog and the ox. Not all creatures can become as great as they think. Let's also be realistic: An Israeli prime minister has no option of saying no to America once Washington has dug in its heels. Netanyahu knows this better than anyone, and the time has come to explain as much to his 'patriotic' coalition allies.... Time is short but the keys are in the ignition, President Obama. Drive on to peace."

Barak Ravid also in Haaretz provides the following comments from progressive Members of the Knesset:

Kadima MK Ze'ev Boim said that "Obama's speech is yet another proof that Netanyahu miscalculated the foreign policy of the new American administration."

"The President's take on the Palestinian question is similar to Kadima's, and it's a shame that narrow political considerations prevented the Israeli government from espousing the two-state solution which is the only one that can ensure a Jewish and democratic existence in Israel."

Kadima MK Yohanan Plesner said that "Israel could benefit from the America's improved image in the Arab world and leverage it to forge a regional coalition, together with the moderate Arab countries, to counter Iran, but instead the government is engaged in marginal debates on outposts."

Minority Affairs Minister Avishay Braverman (Labor) said that Obama was right that the world's common enemy is extremism and that finding a common strategy is the way to defeat it.

"We should adopt a similar strategy in Jewish-Arab and religious-secular relations, as well as vis-a-vis the Palestinians," Braverman said. "We are committed to the two-state solution."

Meretz leader Haim Oron, for his part, welcomed Obama's speech. He said it was filled with inspiration, optimism and vision.

"The speech is the feat of enlightenment," he said.

Negative reaction to Obama's speech from right-wing Israelis, meanwhile, has been predictably harsh. Most outspoken in their opposition to Obama are settlers themselves and their leaders, whose hysterical, lowbrow rhetoric strongly echoes that of right-wing Americans. Like their teabagging U.S. counterparts, right-wing Israelis have taken to throwing Obama's middle name around as an epithet, accusing him of being a closet Muslim and of betraying Israel. Organizers of a right-wing protest outside the U.S. Consulate in Jerusalem had the following to say in a press release reported by Arutz Sheva:

"Barack Hussein Obama! Hands off the land of Israel! You cannot appease the Islamic lust for conquest by selling down the Jews and their Biblical homeland."

Settler leaders quoted in Y-Net likewise said that "Hussein Obama opted to adopt the Arab's bogus versions over the Jewish truth" and that Obama's speech "pandered to Islam." Sound familiar?

Reader comments in Haaretz and the Jerusalem Post make it clear that right-wing Israelis and right-wing Americans are finding each other and connecting online, sharing their hatred of Arabs and their contempt of Obama, and hatching all manner of hysterical theories on the coming end of civilization as we know it. Before long American news audiences may see images of their president burned in effigy not by Palestinians in a Gaza refugee camp but by right-wing Israelis in a West Bank settlement. On the other hand, the enthusiastic support Obama continues to receive from Israeli progressives sounds a hopeful note both for the peace effort and for the future of the U.S.-Israeli relationship.

Mark C. Eades
http://www.mceades.com

President Obama should ignore the recent letter from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), signed and forwarded to the White House by AIPAC's stooges in the United States Congress. Those members of Congress who refused to sign should be congratulated for putting the People's business first rather than bowing to Israeli demands. Those who did sign need to be reminded who is paying their salaries.

It is in the best interests of America and the world at-large to achieve an equitable peace between Israelis and Palestinians at the earliest possible date. This will require compromise and concessions from both sides, including both recognition of Israel by the Palestinians and an end to Israeli settlement expansion in the West Bank. It will also require, as all but the right-wing government in Tel Aviv agree, the establishment of a free and sovereign Palestinian state existing side-by-side in peace with Israel. As always, AIPAC seeks through its lackeys in Congress to ensure that Israel continues to receive unconditional U.S. favor in peace negotiations, that Israel's settlement project in the West Bank be allowed to continue unimpeded, and that a final peace agreement establishing a Palestinian state be delayed for as long as possible.

The letter, sponsored by Republican Eric Cantor and Democrat Steny Hoyer but obviously written by AIPAC, demonstrates just how bipartisan indeed members of Congress can be when it comes to groveling at the feet of AIPAC, which is basically the American arm of Binyamin Netanyahu's right-wing Likud Party. The true source of the letter is revealed by the fact that its sponsors either forgot or simply didn't bother to remove AIPAC from its filename when PDF copies were circulated to members of Congress ("AIPAC Letter Hoyer Cantor May 2009.pdf.").

What the letter demands of President Obama is patently ridiculous. First and foremost, the letter demands that the U.S. assume no more aggressive a role in the peace process than that required to ensure that Israel's interests receive paramount consideration, claiming absurdly that Israel "will be taking the greatest risks in any peace agreement." Furthermore, the letter demands that in peace negotiations America work "closely and privately" with Israel: not with the Palestinians or with other members of the international community, and not in public view. Here the letter also demands that in peace negotiations the U.S. act as "a devoted friend" exclusively of Israel. Finally, the letter places the burden of bringing peace squarely on the shoulders of the Palestinians, demanding nothing from Israel.

This letter does not deserve so much as a passing response from President Obama. Issued by AIPAC, the letter was rubber-stamped by members of Congress for no reason other than to keep pro-Israel campaign contributions rolling in and to avoid turning AIPAC's considerable influence against them. They know this, we know it, and President Obama knows it.

Mark C. Eades
http://www.mceades.com

Right-wing hack Glenn Beck has taken on his Fox News talk show to spreading paranoid fantasies of a coming totalitarian America, total economic collapse, and an armed citizens' uprising in defense of the constitution. On the Feb. 20 installment of his "War Room" segment, Beck and a paranoid panel of guests raised the spectre of the "bubba effect," a rise of individual militias across America in response to liberal tyranny, and suggested that America is on the verge of civil war.

The segment is pure melodrama, beginning with a warning that some might find the material disturbing and advising viewer discretion. Beck then opens with a nightmare vision of the year 2014 in Barack Obama's America: All US banks have been nationalized, Beck predicts; unemployment stands at between 12 and 20 percent; the Dow is trading at around 2800; the real estate market has collapsed; the government and unions control most business; and America's credit rating has been severely downgraded. As Beck and his guests continue, the picture gets worse: Since the Democratic victories of 2006 and 2008, the segment suggests, the USA we used to know has been transformed into the Islamic Socialist Republic of Obamistan, where income tax rates have risen to between eighty and ninety-five percent, and where we all must live in fear of the Obamist secret police who will soon be coming to take away our guns and bibles. Beck and his guests predict a Mad Max-like environment in America's cities, which have become no-go zones controlled by armed gangs presumably of angry blacks and illegal aliens. Meanwhile, the disenfranchised and betrayed "bubbas" of America's heartland have taken to setting up armed, self-sufficient communities hostile to outsiders, and to preparing for civil war.

Finally, Beck asks his guests how such a situation might be defused, and they suggest provocatively that perhaps it should not be defused at all but encouraged, since it is government that is at fault and such an uprising would be an uprising against tyranny in defense of the constitution. At this Beck feigns shock and surprise, though his barely-masked excitement at the prospect says he is really just playing along as his guests more-or-less openly advocate the armed overthrow of the US government. Indeed earlier that day on Fox, Beck had played the sad and fearful prophet of doom, showing us his shaking hands to prove how afraid he is at the prospect of civil war in America, and warning us: "You need to prepare."

I wonder how many "bubbas" who watched Beck's show are, even now, stocking up on guns, ammo, and survival supplies for the coming apocalypse: Ka-ching!

Mark C. Eades
http://www.mceades.com

President Barack Obama's interview this week with Arab news network Al-Arabiya appears to have been a success. The president's first interview since taking office, his appearance with the network's Washington bureau chief Hisham Melhem was an effort to extend a hand of friendship to the Arab and Muslim world, and included Obama's acknowledgment that Americans "have not been perfect" in their dealings with that world:

"My job is to communicate to the American people that the Muslim world is filled with extraordinary people who simply want to live their lives and see their children live better lives...," Obama told Melhem in the interview, "...My job to the Muslim world is to communicate that the Americans are not your enemy. We sometimes make mistakes. We have not been perfect. But if you look at the track record, as you say, America was not born as a colonial power, and that the same respect and partnership that America had with the Muslim world as recently as twenty or thirty years ago, there's no reason why we can't restore that. And that I think is going to be an important task."

Obama's interview included a re-statement of his committments both to the Israeli-Palestinian peace process and to follow through on his promise to address the Muslim world from a Muslim capital during his first months in office. It also included an aknowledgment of his own personal connections to the Muslim world -- connections for which Republican bigots viciously attacked Obama during the 2008 campaign, but which can hardly hurt him now as he begins the work of repairing US relations with the Muslim world:

"My job is to communicate the fact that the United States has a stake in the well-being of the Muslim world, that the language we use has to be a language of respect. I have Muslim members of my family. I have lived in Muslim countries.... And so what I want to communicate is the fact that in all my travels throughout the Muslim world, what I've come to understand is that regardless of your faith -- and America is a country of Muslims, Jews, Christians, non-believers -- regardless of your faith, people all have certain common hopes and common dreams."

Obama's interview with Al-Arabiya comes as his new Mideast envoy, former senator George Mitchell, heads to the region to restart a peace process long neglected by Obama's predecessor, and follows his contact with Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas immediately after his inauguration Jan. 20. Obama's overtures to the Muslim world are certain to offend many conservatives, who regard Arabs and Muslims with extreme hostility and suspicion, and who think that the only people in the Middle East we ought to be talking with are the Israelis. Many of these were deeply offended when Obama's first call to a foreign leader was to the Palestinian president instead of his Israeli counterpart, and are likely to be equally offended that his first interview was with Al-Arabiya instead of the Jerusalem Post.

I say tough cookies for them. Elections have consequences. While President Obama has neither said nor done anything to suggest that he is about to "abandon" Israel (as I'm certain his conservative critics would love to charge), he clearly recognizes that a Mideast policy based on an exclusive relationship with Israel and on callous disregard of Arab concerns has not worked. The time for change has come, and from where I sit it looks like President Obama is off to a damn good start.

See also Washington Post, Youtube. 

Mark C. Eades
http://www.mceades.com

(Your Tax Dollars at Work in the Middle East)

The state of Israel is facing charges of war crimes following the slaughter of innocent civilians including hundreds of children in its recent campaign against Palestinian militants on the Gaza Strip. Israel's powerful ally, the United States, also faces charges of complicity in the slaughter as Palestinians declare: "This Damage Made in USA."

UN human rights expert Richard Falk said on Thursday that the recent Israeli military operation on the Gaza Strip "raises the specter of systematic war crimes" and needs to be investigated. Falk told journalists in Geneva from his home in California that he had little doubt as to the "unavoidably inhuman character of a large-scale military operation of the sort that Israel has initiated... against an essentially defenseless population." Charging that "unlawful targets have been selected" by Israeli forces during the fighting, Falk insisted that Palestinian residents of the Gaza Strip including children and the wounded were effectively trapped in a war zone and prevented from fleeing.

Meanwhile, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has issued demands for a full explanation of "outrageous" Israeli attacks on UN facilities on the Gaza Strip including a school used as a refuge for civilians, killing dozens. The UN chief noted that Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert had promised to provide results of an Israeli inquiry into the attacks "on an urgent basis" and said he would then decide on "appropriate follow-up action." On January 12, the 47-member UN Human Rights Council voted by a large majority to launch an investigation into "grave" human rights violations by Israeli forces against Palestinians. Israel is also facing questions from human rights groups regarding the use of illegal weapons, including white phosphorus munitions, against Palestinian civilians on the Gaza Strip.

These charges come amid renewed calls for a global boycott, divestment, and sanctions against Israel from groups such as the Global BDS Movement. Recently, Canadian journalist Naomi Klein wrote in support of such a boycott: "The best strategy to end the increasingly bloody occupation is for Israel to become the target of the kind of global movement that put an end to apartheid in South Africa." Some are also calling for a boycott of US exports for its continuing support of Israeli actions against Palestinians.

The Palestinian death toll from Israel's recent war on Gaza currently stands at around 1300, most of whom were innocent civilians, and around a third of whom were children. Ten Israeli soldiers and three civilians were killed in Israel during the same period, an indicator of Israel's massively disproportionate response to Palestinian attacks on Israelis. A total of twenty-eight Israelis have been killed by Palestinian rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip since 2001, a tiny fraction of the number of Palestinians killed in Israel's recent Gaza actions alone. These numbers echo casualty figures from the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict which consistently show innocent Palestinian dead including children massively outnumbering Israelis.

Rocket attacks on Israel from the Gaza Strip deserve both condemnation by the international community and a proportionate response by Israel. The killing of one Israeli in a rocket attack does not, however, entitle Israel to respond by slaughtering twenty, thirty, or forty innocent Palestinian civilians. Such slaughter, furthermore, will no more stop Hamas' rocket attacks from the Gaza Strip than it stopped Hezbollah's rocket attacks from Lebanon in 2006. Just as Hezbollah could declare victory in the 2006 Israel-Lebanon war simply by surviving to fight another day, so Hamas can declare victory in Gaza this day. Meanwhile, Israel increasingly becomes a pariah state in the eyes of the world, as does the United States for its complicity in the slaughter. Ever-growing anger particularly in the Arab world serves America's national security interests no better than it serves Israel's.

Behold, America: Your tax dollars at work in the Middle East.

Out of the tragedy of Gaza, perhaps, will come renewed opportunity to hold Israel accountable for its actions, to press for a new US policy on the Middle East, for peace, and for an end to Israel's long and bloody occupation of the Palestinian Territories. Boycott, divestment, and sanctions efforts such as those promoted by the Global BDS Movement have a proven track record of success as in the case of South Africa, and deserve our support. UN efforts to hold Israel accountable for its actions also deserve our support, but are likely to require UN Security Council action of the type America with its power of veto most often and most notoriously obstructs. Pressure, therefore, needs to be applied to the White House and Congress for a new US approach to the conflict and a new US attitude in the UN Security Council. Whether our new ambassador to the UN offers active support with a "yes" vote or passive permission by abstaining on UN efforts to hold Israel accountable for its actions, our message to the new administration regarding these efforts can be stated clearly and briefly as follows: NO VETO!

Sources: Agence France Presse, Time, Los Angeles Times, Haaretz, New Straits Times, Bay Area Indymedia, B'Tselem, Human Rights Watch.

Slide show: Gaza Massacre by Sabbah.

Photo gallery: Child victims of Gaza violence.

Contacts:

The White House

US Mission to the UN

Contact your US Senators

Contact your US Representative

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Mark C. Eades
http://www.mceades.com