Neocon hack Dan Senor, who is best known for bungling the Iraqi occupation under Bush, bangs the war drum:
One of Mitt Romney’s top foreign policy advisors said Sunday that as president, Romney would respect Israel’s right to strike Iran to unilaterally prevent that nation from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
Dan Senor told reporters that Western nations partnering with Israel should “do everything we can” to stop Iran from developing weapons capability.
“And if Israel has to take action on its own, in order to stop Iran from developing that capability the governor would respect that decision.”
I do so love being an Israeli client state.
Amir Khalid
I’ve never understood why, to Americans on the right, Israel is the boss of their country. Especially on this point, when everyone who knows anything is well aware that a military attack on Iran is just about the stupidest thing you could do.
maye
If there were no other reason to vote Obama in November, the thought of reinstating the entire Bush/Cheney foreign policy team ought to get every sane or half sane individual to the polls to vote No on Romney.
the Conster
I’d love to see Romney running on war with Iran. Of all Bush’s greatest hits, neocon adventurism is probably the least popular, even with the tea party nutjobs.
maye
Yo – Chicago PR team – how about focusing on the Senor types that will be back in power should Romney win the election.
Schlemizel
Just got a tease for “Fellate The Nation” the Schaffer fella tells us Mitt gave Israel permission to bomb Iran. How can a washed up ex-gov do that?
Linda Featheringill
You know, if the fate of so many people didn’t ride on such decisions, those guys would be funny. What Senor said was not exactly support for Israel, it was an open invitation for Israel to start open hostilities with Iran. Encouragement, even.
One would think that those guys were trying to clear the way for Armageddon to happen.
Valdivia
An profile of Senor on Tablet magazine. Worth the read I think, because it opens a window into what is going on.
Not to keep pimping this but Haaretz did an article this am explaining Romney’s cancellation of a meeting with the head of Labor, and they actually describe him as following Bibi’s orders. In all this trip paints a very dire picture of how he would make decisions.
merl
Willard wants to outsource our Mid East policy to Israel. the chickenhawk bitch wants to outsource every damn thing.
Linda Featheringill
@Amir Khalid: #1
A lot of us in the US don’t understand that, either. And to be fair, I suspect that many Israelis are also confused.
Valdivia
One interesting bit in that Tablet magazine article is that Bibi’s team is all expat americans. They are bringing into Israel a way of doing politics (and economics) that is wholly against the grain there. As you can see by the constant rallies against the economic policies of his government which are erasing the safety net that was created as an integral part of the State.
Linda Featheringill
@merl:
“chickenhawk bitch”
Heh-heh. You covered a lot of ground with those two words. :-)
Linda Featheringill
I wish there were some way to assure the people of Iran that at this point Romney has more bark than bite and is likely to remain that way.
aimai
Who made Dan Senor a US official? What a scary, scary, amount of arrogance the Romney Team is showing.
aimai
Villago Delenda Est
By all means, let Israel take action on its own.
What’s a few nukes flying around the middle east after the rest of the countries there react to Israel’s arrogance?
Senor should not be allowed anywhere near the levers of foreign policy. It would be like putting an arsonist in a fireworks factory.
Valdivia
@aimai:
Kristol. No surprise there. If you don’t gag reading the Tablet piece it gives you a whole lot of info.
beltane
@Valdivia: It hasn’t been mentioned in the American media but there have been a least two incidents of Israelis self-immolating to protest economic conditions there. Netanyahu is not just a wingnut with regards to the Iranians and Palestinians, he is also like a Scott Walker with regards to his own people. The man is pure evil.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
For christs sake
We’re back to “make no mistake”. What the fuck are “moral defenses”?
wrb
@Amir Khalid:
It has mystified me.
The most pragmatic reason is a result of the state-by-state winner-take-all electoral college system and the concentration of Jewish votes in Florida- and Florida perpetual status as a (big, potentially decisive) swing state.
Every presidential election the numbers show that if the Republican could just scrape off enough of the votes of independent or Democrat-leaning Florida pro-Israel voters they could win the whole thing. So they promise anything.
So no Presidential candidate will ever be critical of Israel.
Under the electoral college system, If you have a concentration of voter who really care about an issue in a big swing state they will control policy on that issue.
Thus Jewish-Americans will control American policy toward Israel and Cuban American will control policy toward Cuba- forever.
In the case of Israel there is also the strange affinity between the fundie right and the Israeli right. And other weird stuff.
Valdivia
@beltane:
while perusing Haaretz today I saw an article about a guy who has been voting Likud since the 70s and was on a march against Bibi’s economic policies.
There is a lot of technological innovation coming from Israel–as the economic galtians like to point out–but surprise surprise a lot of these came from investments by the Govt (military technology), firm incubators that were supported initially by the govt, and also from…kibuttzim (that communist backbone of the Israeli state)!
Israel may be growing but the economic conditions for the population aren’t good. Lots and lots of cuts of programs and services that are considered part of the basic covenant in the country. You risk your life and that of your children everyday but the state takes care of you if you need it.
LosGatosCA
@Linda Featheringill:
Trying to clear?
I’d say they a full time committed to launching Armageddon as quickly as possible by any means necessary. The only real question is why they believe that’s a good thing? Purity of essence maybe. Otherwise, it makes no sense. The single unifying factor among Republicans seems to be that they are all batshit crazy – about something. Never ending war, tax cuts that balance budgets, Obama is Kenyan/Muslim/ET, womens having sexy time/abortions/free speech, the browns voting rights, guns generally, etc.
When they ain’t hating they are crazy and when ain’t hating or crazy they are crazy hating. Otherwise, they are depressed because they think they are losing the wars: culture, Christmas, Iran, austerity, racial, immigration, etc. So much mental turmoil and so few outlets to bomb people to death.
Todd
Brilliant. The resulting shithammer on gulf shipping driving oil to $200 per barrel is clearly in the national interest of the US.
Todd
Brilliant. The resulting shithammer on gulf shipping driving oil to $200 per barrel is clearly in the national interest of the US.
beltane
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: “Moral defenses” makes it sound like Romney feels he is in danger of being seduced by fundamentalist Islam, e.g. “Please, Mr. Ayatollah, don’t look at me like that or my moral defenses will crumble.”
tofubo
OT, of course
http://youtu.be/iarUHZJ9sCk
probably charged him on destruction of property also, too for ripping down that poster
aimai
@Valdivia:
Yeah, I immiediately read as much of that Tablet piece as I could gag through. It was horrific but very informative. I’ve always wondered where the fuck Dan Senor came from. Now I see that he is a jumped up toady who sucked his way to power by flattering the egos of wealthy and powerful men. “I’ve never met a young man that older, powerful men, wanted to mentor more than Dan” says Chris Heinz, admiringly. Its a total Horatio Alger style rise to wealth when you realize that Horatio alger always made his fortune, in the books, sucking up to power and basically doing whatever wealthy men wanted him to do. In Senor’s case he made his money fondling other people’s money for the Carlyle group. This is pretty much no different from Bush being “given” a huge stake in the baseball team. At that level of wealth the billionaires hand out as tip money for ego stroking the equivalent of shares in other people’s money managing.
aimai
jp7505a
@Amir Khalid: Stupid and GOP are synonyms
MonkeyBoy
SO basically it sounds like the US is supposed to be in an exclusive gay relationship with Israel but Israel is on top?
Villago Delenda Est
@beltane:
OvenMitt really should take the standard conservatard advice, and just lie back and enjoy it.
rikyrah
they’ve been dancing around this. I’m glad that there’s no more dancing. folks on our side on the aisle have said they wanted war with Iran for awhile, only to be poo-pooed. can’t wait to see how the MSM tapdances around this.
redshirt
@wrb: Good points, but I think you’re overthinking it. I believe the reason is far more simple, and disturbing: Unquestioning support of Israel has entered the “Tribe’s” list of set beliefs, and so everyone in the “Tribe” – here, Republicans – must believe it. Witness Half Term Governor Sarah Palin having an Israeli flag in her Alaskan office. What in the world does Israel have to do with Alaska? The answer is – nothing! But it’s on the list of Tribal beliefs, and so the flag goes up.
This is how to understand most all Republican “positions” – once set into the approved list of positions, everything becomes automatic and unquestioned, until of course the list changes and then that same position could be totally renounced.
For example, I’m sure if the Israelis started electing socialist loving liberal governments they Repukes would turn on them in a heartbeat and no longer would they give a fig about Israel.
beltane
@MonkeyBoy: Yeah, and Israel doesn’t even pay us for our troubles. This is really not a mutually beneficial relationship in any sense.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@Linda Featheringill: But see, that’s the problem. He would need some bite in order to keep Israel from doing something stupid. Right now, Israel is, I think, getting the correct impression from Obama that the administration will not back them in things like attacking Iran. Mitt doesn’t give off that. If Mitt cares at all about foreign policy, then he’s pretty much endorsing Bibi’s view that Iran needs to be attacked to prevent them from gaining nuclear weapons.
Lolis
I am glad Romney is pushing a new war. I doubt more than 27% of Americans like that idea.Newsweek has a cover calling Romney a wimp. Perfect timing!
Ben Franklin
I’ve never understood why, to Americans on the right, Israel is the boss of their country.
Because they comprise a significant nest of End-Timers who believe Israel is still God’s chosen People.
Americanus Ignoramus, is the genus, I believe.
Matt
One thing I’ve never seen a coherent explanation of: why is it that Israel’s allowed to unilaterally strike anybody developing nukes, but nobody else (certainly) would be allowed to unilaterally strike Israel for ALREADY HAVING THEM?
Villago Delenda Est
@redshirt:
Renounced? How about ignored? As in turned in to an unposition? The entire Oceania has always been at war with Eurasia routine…no acknowledgement of a change in position, and absolute denial that the position has ever been anything but the current one.
Palin exhibited this trait herself by simply ignoring her own previous positions on various issues when they became inconvenient for the needs of Tribe dogma.
Valdivia
@aimai:
By the end of the piece I really had to go drink a really strong cup of coffee (too early for the other stuff) because the tone was so adoring, but it indeed gives one a sense of who he is and how he got there (your assessment so totally on point). It also gives one a deep clue about how it is that Bibi has a choke-hold on Capitol hill.
Bruce S
It is perfectly legitimate under the 1st Amendment for private citizens to believe in or advocate for the primacy of another nation’s interests over those of the US. Earl Browder, the head of the Communist Party in it’s heyday, had this perspective re: the Soviet Union. Protected by the Constitution, and all that. Perhaps such people even have a useful gadfly role to play occasionally in our public discourse, bringing a perspective that transcends rote nationalism. It is not, however, a good idea to put such folks – and like many hard-core neo-cons Dan Senor is one of them, with Israel clearly his primary allegience – in official government positions to help formulate or manage American foreign policy.
amk
@Amir Khalid: americans to the right ? what about the so called “left” ? Didn’t the entire congress critters give nut-n-yahoo a standing ovation when he gave a warmongering speech last year ?
redshirt
@Villago Delenda Est: True that. It really is pure 1984 stuff we’re dealing with in these twisted fucks. They’re terrifying in their devoted ignorance.
Speaking of Palin, better fire up the Old Facebook outrage machine: Darth Cheney said it was a mistake for McCain to pick her for VP. Wonder how she’ll respond? Normally it would be with some poorly worded personal insult. But this is the Dark Lord we’re talking about here!
beltane
@Matt: Because shut up, that’s why.
amk
The Newsweek
wrb
@redshirt:
Good point. I think both are true:
What was originally a position taking for pragmatic electoral reasons- “Being rabidly pro-Israel might win us Florida and it isn’t going to cost us Ohio because even if Ohioans disagree they don’t care enough about policy toward Israel for it to affect their vote”- once stated often enough becomes unquestioning tribal belief.
I fear it is happening with racism- the Republican’s and Hillary’s backers both have though they could turn a few votes by playing on racism so did so without necessarily being racist, but racism looks like it is becoming a tribal belief, held by people who previously didn’t give a crap about race.
Villago Delenda Est
@redshirt:
As President Obama once said, they take pride in it.
Roger Moore
@Amir Khalid:
Israel isn’t really the boss. They’re just a convenient excuse for what the right wing wants to do anyway: spend money on weapons and occasionally blow the crap out of some oil-rich Middle Eastern country.
Villago Delenda Est
@Matt:
Well, you know, the Israelis, unlike all those Muslim hordes, are adults, and can be trusted with nukes.
Davis X. Machina
@redshirt:
The mental construct “Israel” in the GOPverse bears no relation to facts on the ground, and I don’t think the politics of the Israeli government of the day matter that much to it.
The Cold War hangover (Israel is our client state, Syria, Egypt, etc, are their client states) is strong — and as Mitt keeps telling us, you can’t underestimate the Soviet threat.
And quite frankly, there’s a racial element, too. The Israelis, even when governed by stone collectivists like old Labour, are still white, and European (except when they’re Yemeni, or Iraqi, or from the Maghrb) and the Arabs aren’t. They’re surrounded by Them. (Because the GOP is above all trapped in 1850, and haunted by the ghosts of Nat Turner and Toussaint Louverture.)
Avigdor Lieberman and Yisrael Beteinu in particular are adept at pushing both buttons in the GOP psyche.
It’s tough sometimes to square all that with all that loverly oil, and oil money, that the neighbors have, and all those loverly, loverly kleoptocratic monarchies, which also speak so strongly to the GOP soul.
Roger Moore
@Valdivia:
Why would Israel need a safety net? Am I my brother’s keeper?
Linda Featheringill
@Roger Moore: #45
You’re right.
Unfortunately, there are people on the Religious Right who are fiercely anti-Islamic and would welcome a holy war. I must confess that I don’t really understand that.
Villago Delenda Est
@Roger Moore:
Next up: Bibi breaks up the commie Kibbutzes, Galtian Overlords in US cheer him on.
Valdivia
@Davis X. Machina:
One very interesting point here: how the sephardi vote is usually for religious parties, or for Likud, but since the arrival of the big waves of russian immigrants in the 1990s these immigrants have completely changed the tenor of the right wing to be even more xenophobic and racist, leaving the sephardi jews in a sort of evolving political stance. i would love to see how the racist views of the Russian immigrants have affected the sephardi vote.
Citizen_X
@redshirt:
When Dick Cheney shoots you in the face, you apologize.
amk
Despite the wet-dreams of the neocons, what exactly are the odds that nut-n-yahoo will launch an attack on iran ? Will the rest of the world, being in the shitter as they are now and the iraq fiasco by dubya & co staring at their faces, will just stand idly by ? Methinksnot.
Davis X. Machina
@Villago Delenda Est: The kibbutzim don’t need much breaking up, sadly. The movement hasn’t aged well.
Villago Delenda Est
@Valdivia:
They’ve brought with them ingrained centuries of Russian paranoia, the result of being invaded from the east (during the Winter!) by Mongols and turned into tributaries for centuries.
The Russians have had this inferiority complex for centuries (see Peter the Great and looking west) that they think that the people west of the Vistula look down on them as not really white, so by gum, we’re going to prove to them just how white we are!
Valdivia
@Roger Moore:
pretty much what @Villago Delenda Est: said.
I find it hilarious that the right wing rabid brigade who wants no daylight with Israel seems to have forgotten that Israel was founded by communists. The Kibbutz movement, the Rosetta stone of Zionism, and the hands that built the state, are probably the last bastions of communist living in the world (or they were in the 90s because I know by now a lot has changed with them, though a few remain that still operate like that).
My dream–that Obama wins reelection and Shimon Peres gives him a bust of Ben-Gurion to put in the oval office. A communist til his last breath. :)
aimai
100 meter dashback:
Judas Escargot, Acerbic Prophet of the Mighty Potato God
@Amir Khalid:
These are faith-based psychologies.
They don’t have to “know” anything. They just have to “believe”.
Patricia Kayden
So just like many of us on the left have surmised, if Romneybot 2.0 gets into the White House, America will definitely be going to war against Iran.
Couldn’t win in Iraq (or even Afghanistan) but planning already to waste money, resources and American lives/bodies in another Middle East fiasco. Good enough reason (among many) to vote for Obama, in my opinion.
Linda Featheringill
@amk: #53
I suspect that Obama would eventually come to Israel’s rescue. Eventually.
beltane
@Davis X. Machina:
The racial element has become prominent in recent years. My mother, who is Jewish, is constantly bombarded by disgustingly racist anti-Arab, anti-Muslim, Pam Geller style propaganda sent by “friends” from Israel. She used to forward some of these emails to me until I informed her that it would take me about 20 seconds to find similarly nasty antisemitic propaganda if she’d like to see it for comparison’s sake.
That got her thinking (she is, by nature, one of the most open-minded people I’ve ever known), and she is now involved with J-Street and very much opposed to Netanyahu, et al., but one wonders about all those other American Jews who do not have friends or family members restoring them to sanity.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@amk: any mention of the almost reflexive use of Mrs Mitt’s skirts as a bomb shelter?
I’d like to think this will at least cause some discomfort for Romney, but I was stunned to see during the recent Condi for Veep boomlet (AKA, don’t think of the Tax Returns) that She of the PDB and the Mushroomcloud has a 65% approval rating.
zzyzx
@Ben Franklin:
Exactly, and mid-east war brings us closer to the Rapture so peace is a bad thing.
As a Jew, I guess I prefer being a prop in their story instead of being a force to be wiped out but only a little.
NotMax
Mitt has a decades-long relationship with Netanyahu.
@Amir Khalid
Dominionist end-timers.
Gus
Making the mistake of watching Howard Kurtz. Apparently the UK adventures of Mitt aren’t a big deal, they’re being blown out of proportion by the British media. And it’s not fair that Mitt Romney’s unlikeabliity is being pointed out by the media.
beltane
@Patricia Kayden: If we couldn’t win in Iraq there is no way we can “win” in the much larger, much more socially cohesive Iran. Iraq was a clumsily put together afterthought of the British, Iran is the home of the Persian empire.
Canuckistani Tom
Does beg the question: If the Liberty incident happened today (Israelis attack USN ship), what would the response be from the Republicans?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Liberty_incident
Villago Delenda Est
@Gus:
“Mistah Kurtz, he fucktahd!”
SBJules
I would remind Israel that Mitt is a Mormon. They want to build a temple in Israel not to mention Baptize the dead.
Professor
Someone asked in the comments whether there are Jewish Nazi sympathizers in modern Israel. Please google search for ‘PATROL 35’.
PurpleGirl
@beltane: Not only do they not pay us, we give them money every year. I believe President Obama just signed another Israel aid bill and we’re giving them something like $70 million. A lot of their social safety net is possible because we give them so much money for their defense programs.
Villago Delenda Est
@beltane:
Also, the terrain is horrid for mechanized warfare.
None of this waltz across the desert, enveloping frightened units of the Republican Guard stuff.
amk
kevin drum weighs in on mr campbell fuck-up.
amk
@Villago Delenda Est: Didn’t hezbollah kick israel’s ass just a coupla years back during their misadventure into lebanon ?
Villago Delenda Est
@amk:
We don’t talk about that. Not good for our public image.
/IDF PR flack
Valdivia
@aimai:
I guess he just let his inner thoughts out and now he has to walk them back.
Amir Khalid
Meanwhile, NYT reports that Mitt has backed down from reneging on an arrangement with the media. Reporters can cover his Monday fundraiser in Jerusalem, featuring that generous Mr Adelson from Las Vegas, after all.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@NotMax: I thought Bibi disavowed that er, friendship?
In December GOP Debate regarding how America should handle Iran:
~Mitt Romney, April 2012 in the New York Times.
~Bibi Netanyahu, July 2012 in Vanity Fair Interview, (middle of Page 4)
I read that at the Great Orange Satan.
Villago Delenda Est
@amk:
Drum is making a seriously dumb assumption here:
They’re neocons. Ideologues first, policy analysts a distant and fading second.
beltane
@Villago Delenda Est: Plus, the Russians and/or Chinese will surely provide the Iranians with a great deal of covert support and assistance. Any American who loved his or her country has an obligation to speak out at the prospect of such a suicidal war which, even if we somehow “won”, would still destroy us as a nation. There are no positives to this, only negatives. Someone should strap Dan Senor to a missile and blast him out of orbit-his wife too while we’e at it.
Citizen_X
@aimai:
@amk: Oy. What a loose cannon Romney is. Can we revoke his passport or something? We’re gonna be lucky if he doesn’t start a war with South Ossetia or some damn thing by the time this trip is over.
amk
@beltane: Don’t the chinese get a big chunk of oil from iran ? Embargo or not ?
Villago Delenda Est
@Citizen_X:
I’m holding out for a war with the rest of NATO, myself.
I think Rmoney has it in him.
amk
@Villago Delenda Est: what he probably means is that there are better neocons who can spin their bs better than this mr campbell guy.
Amir Khalid
@amk:
It’s just the Mitt 2012: I’m So Not Ready For Prime Time World Tour, which has already played in Britain to rave reviews.
Roger Moore
@Canuckistani Tom:
They’d demand that Obama apologize for stationing a US ship where Israel might think it was a danger.
schrodinger's cat
@Valdivia: I knew a Russian Jewish woman. She was paranoid, believed all sorts of conspiracy theories, she wore her Jewish identity on her sleeve. I figured things must be really bad for Jewish people in Russia. Of course that’s no excuse to turn around and become an oppressor yourself.
NotMax
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
Even Netanyahu is not so far divorced from political gamesmanship (and knowing which side his bread is buttered on) as to officially and publicly insert himself as a foreign head of state into the presidential contest by making an endorsement, implied or direct.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Amir Khalid: Win. Sadly quite accurate. Sadly in that the GOP voters here are so fiercely tribal that they will (mostly) be bothered not one whit by any of these foreign fuck ups.
NotMax
@NotMax
FYWP. Edit:
insert himself as a foreign head of state into the presidential contest by appearing to make an endorsement, implied or direct.
lamh35
so bibi slaps Current CiC w/Romney next 2 him & no one bats eye. now what if candidateObama had done same??? int’l incident?
BiBi- – Obama Sanctions Haven’t Stopped Iran..
complete with pic of BiBi next to Romney
Valdivia
@schrodinger’s cat:
exactly. I was in Israel when the wave had just started and it was only in the last election that I realized that it was that precise immigration that tilted the country to the far right. There have always been crazy nationalists in Israel, mostly religious and american ex-pats. But this group brought an extra special something to the mix.
Amir Khalid
@NotMax:
A teeny quibble: as Prime Minister, Bibi’s actually head of government. Israel’s head of state is the President.
NotMax
@Amir Khalid
Quibble gratefully accepted. My bad for not proofreading more closely.
Valdivia
And now he has officially announced against US policy that he will move the Embassy to Jerusalem. oy.
lamh35
I’ve never been so happy with not having cable, don’t have to hear or read about R-money’s speech in Israel
Ben Franklin
Rmoney in Israel speaking in carefully measured pitch, halting pace…….
waiting for the off-message gaffe……
Focused like a laser on the teleprompter. Somehow he knows he can’t fuck up again
Iran, Iran, Iran……and more Iran.
Da Ayatollahs,,blah, blah blah….
“Nukes, nukes, nukes”….Senor whispers in the ear bud.
Villago Delenda Est
John, if I may, a slight quibble here:
While Senor is a hack, the fact is, the policy set from the getgo by the deserting coward brain trust on the post “major military operations” portion of our adventure in Iraq had FAIL stamped all over it. We knew this when GEN Shinseki had the audacity to point out that it was planned as fail because we didn’t have, in the active duty, reserve, and NG ranks, enough bodies for it to work.
von Rumsfailed essentially fired Shinseki for blurting out the truth in front of Congress. von Rumsfailed then threatened to fire anyone who dared to follow doctrinal military occupation planning guidelines in regards to Iraq.
wrb
@NotMax:
I think he’s already made a very strong implied endorsement.
He sees a Romney win as being in Israel’s interest. He’s made clear his dissatisfaction with Obama.
The only thing holding him back from being even more overt, imo, is the fear of a backlash, fear that there is some limit to how flamboyant and arrogant a display of their tool status Americans are willing to tolerate.
beltane
@Valdivia: Many, though by no means all, of these Russian immigrants have only one Jewish grandparent, if that, and are for all intents and purposes ethnic Russians, carrying along with them a lot of racist, xenophobic, and even anti-American baggage from their homeland.
Maude
@PurpleGirl:
You are so right.
I went to Beatles concert at Forest Hills in August of that year.
I read you comment late at night and the thread was dead.
Hope the vibrations gets solved. I think of that and how upset I would be about it.
The humidity is ick.
Valdivia
@Ben Franklin:
I would argue that starting the speech with saying jersualem the capital of Israel is pretty provocative but not to the wingnuts and people in that audience.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Valdivia: See I think that is a huge fuck up. How is that not criticizing US policy outside the US? Am I just dense?
I get that he is pandering to fundies both here and there, but can he really go there and announce that he will change US policy? Any assistance will be appreciated.
@NotMax: And it appears to me that he just did, by standing next to a candidate during those pronouncements.
Maude
@Valdivia:
Made me think of a series of crime novels set in Coney Island, NY that have Russian crime groups.
I’ll make some bathtub gin before the end of the day. Found some juniper berries on a shrub in someone’s yard. I’ll be very quiet and sneaky when I get them.
Ben Franklin
@Valdivia:
They couldn’t get Bush to say that.
Mitt for Chief Foreign Policy Enabler………..
Villago Delenda Est
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
IIRC, the Ronaldus Magnus assministration also made noises on the campaign trail about moving the US embassy to Jerusalem, but then cooler heads prevailed once they were in power and nothing was done about it.
There are a lot of very good reasons for not doing so, not the least of which is that it’s at odds with UN resolutions regarding the 1967 war’s outcome.
Valdivia
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
he made already two statements that totally contradict our policy (including Sainted Reagan and Bush II). And note that he always chastising Obama for telegraphing our plans to our enemies. And here he is undermining our standing in the region.
Also–if I were Iran and thought Romney could win, his statements would guarantee I would have the bomb ready by november, and announce it. Idiotic really what he is doing.
WaterGirl
@lamh35: Wow. Mitt looks scared to death in that photo.
Edit: MItt looks scared in a lot of his photos, but he looks frozen with fear in this one. I think MItt must know in his heart of hearts (not that I thought he had one) that he is in WAY over his head.
wrb
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
It is. However those members of the press who would be spraying spittle if a D did such a thing won’t make a peep. You watch.
The Other Chuck
@LosGatosCA:
I used to think that, but I really don’t think they have the depth or ability to plan like that. It’s just about “looking tough”. They have deep-seated insecurities, daddy issues, or are just plain sociopaths without empathy. And if they have to burn everything down to maintain their toughness, so be it. Every last one of them is simply a psychologically broken bully.
Heliopause
We all know that candidates think they can persuade Jews in Florida to vote for them by assuming a pro-Israel stance, but here is an interesting factoid: the Muslim population of Michigan is approximately twice that of the Jewish population. Electorally speaking, Obama doesn’t have to win Florida, but Romney has to pick off a decent sized blue state in order to have a chance, and his best opportunity at this stage would appear to be Michigan. Romney also has to win Virginia, which also has more Muslims than Jews. I just find all that interesting.
Roger Moore
@a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q):
IOKIYAR. It’s the answer to a whole slew of questions like that.
NotMax
@Valdivia
Campaign boilerplate/dog whistle (although saying it while in Israel is boneheaded indeed – that unsigned Adelson check must be humongous indeed).
‘W’ came closest to actually doing so rather than talking about it to appease the neocons and assorted others who need not be named, but in the end let it slide off the radar.
Todd
@Valdivia:
The boys at IDF have gotten pretty sloppy and soft in putting all their eggs in the “occupation/apartheid enforcement” basket in terms of training and planning. They’ve not really considered the potentially lethal combo of parity and asymmetry when defending a small, narrow area that backs up to an ocean.
When angry people eventually sweep that diseased political entity off the map, and will the Likudniks lash out with nuclear warheads in genocidal anguished disbelief? Or will they simply close up shop? And if they just close up shop, isn’t there a positive effect worldwide in terms of the global economy?
Valdivia
@Ben Franklin:
yep, they have him bought and controlled. Or better said: Adelson’s money speaks.
NotMax
@Valdivia
Campaign boilerplate/dog whistle (although saying it while in Israel is boneheaded indeed – that unsigned Adelson check must be humongous indeed).
‘W’ came closest to actually doing so rather than talking about it to appease the neocons and assorted others who need not be named, but in the end let it slide off the radar.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@WaterGirl: He does look totally terrified, almost as if it’s finally occurred to him that this is much more complicated than vulture capitalism. Such a thought isn’t possible of course, but that look is more telling than he’d like.
HRA
@Amir Khalid:
“I’ve never understood why, to Americans on the right, Israel is the boss of their country. Especially on this point, when everyone who knows anything is well aware that a military attack on Iran is just about the stupidest thing you could do.”
I have to answer this before I even go through the rest of the comments.
Israel as we know it today does know it, too. I do remember the Israel of years gone by. They did it alone and they did it superbly. Never would an empty suit (being nice) have been able to give the speech he gave moments ago.
wrb
Romney:
“The Ayatollahs are testing our moral defenses.”
Uh oh. I wonder how they infiltrated Mitt’s entourage.
They’ll do that though.
I read a book once called “The Persian Boy.”
The Thin Black Duke
O.K.
Romney fucked up in London.
Romney fucked up in Israel.
D’ya think he’ll go three for three?
beltane
@WaterGirl: I’m not sure if Mittbot is terrified or if it’s just that his screen froze. We may never know.
NotMax
@ a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
First time in his life he’s been surrounded on all sides by so many Jews.
Amir Khalid
On the original topic, this is by far not the first time a Romney campaign aide has said something dumb. It makes the campaign look out of control when aides’ anonymous statements need to be walked back. Where is their message discipline?
Valdivia
@NotMax:
I didn’t know Clinton had done it. Doing it while in Israel seems going the extra step.
Also note propagandist extraordinaire Eli Lake is out with a piece saying Ross abandoned Obama making it seem he did it out of ideological disagreement. Instead it was a long planned retirement.
scav
They’re so cute when the crawl ino the real Red Telephone and start playing with the wires for a campaign photo op.
And then make campaign speeches about thousand points of lights in tinderboxes and reach for their lighter for a quick cover photo.
(‘f course, Israelis and Jews everywhere have only to remember as far back as the GB and the Angle-Saxon Special Relationship to understand the game, but they know their role as props.)
How could I forget this until now? VOTE SAXON.
danielx
@Villago Delenda Est:
Nor any other neocon for that matter, but…you can’t get rid of them, they keep coming back like zombies. Agitating for more wars is their rice bowl; if we didn’t have a “muscular foreign policy” and the means to execute it* the entire Kagan clan (among others) would be searching for work. Kind of a nice thought, actually.
*Another reason why neocons generally go along with the idea of gutting the social safety net – the less we spend on poor people the more we have to spend on expensive and ever obsolescent toys.
Valdivia
Pretty good summary of Israeli coverage translated into English.
http://972mag.com/romney-uses-adelsons-free-newspaper-to-criticize-obama/52026/
Bruce S
So basically Romney’s big noise that he wouldn’t criticize a sitting President’s foreign policy while he, himself, is on foreign soil was essentially a signal that that’s exactly what he was planning to do. This is a not-so-slick but coordinated roll-out of a foreign policy fetish that has proven disastrous for our own country in the recent past but remains the centerpiece of neo-con cultists like Dan Senor and his fellow thinly-veiled Likudniks.
quannlace
So what is the big frigging deal with having the embassy in Jerusalem rather than Tel Aviv? A poke in the eye to the Palestinians?
***
And I love how Mitt kept saying that HE beleives Jerusalem is the real capital of Israel. I guess what the Israeley’s think doesn’t matter.
BBA
@Valdivia: Official US policy is that the embassy should be moved to Jerusalem within the next four years. This policy was adopted 17 years ago.
Bruce S
“Dan Senor, who is best known for bungling the Iraqi occupation…”
Actually Senor wasn’t senior enough to do the actual bungling. Senor was hired by Bungler-in-Chief Bremer to lie to the press about the bungling (“bungling” in the “worse than a crime,a blunder” sense of total disaster), which Senor actually admitted “off-the-record” that he was doing. Aside from his Likudnik credentials, he’s a skilled liar who manifests a certain boyish charm while he’s doing it (instead of sneering like Cheney and/or shooting you in the face) – which makes him the perfect surrogate for a less-than-charming candidate.
Ben Franklin
Rmoney’s historic foreign policy junket, illustrated.
http://www.emptywheel.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/6a00d8341bf82953ef017616c9f7aa970c-800wi.jpg
JPL
@The Thin Black Duke: Will he go to Poland and thank them for their help in WWII?
jp7505a
Let’s see in the course of 36 hours Mittens has dumped on the Arab spring, suggested that the freely elected leaders of several Arab counties do not pass muster with him, will green light a war on Iran and make the third holiest city in the Muslim world the – Jerusalem – the capital of Israel. Way to go on offending 1.4 billion Muslims.
On the other hand he will restart the Bush freedom agenda that succeeded so well the last time it was tried. Under the freedom agenda Mubarak was grooming his son as a success, we pissed off the Turks in the run up to the war in Iraq, Iraq went from the mortal enemy of Iran into a semi-ally and who can forget the wonderful exercise in freedom when the elections in GAZA were won by the terrorist group Hamas,
I’m not sure we can survive many more such victories
JPL
@jp7505a: and your point is?
VOTE OBAMA
jp7505a
@JPL: Actually there was a free Polish brigade that fought with the US and the UK in France and I think there was a squadron of Polish pilots attached to the RAF.
jp7505a
@JPL:what we really need is a sarcasm font. OF COURSE VOTE OBAMA. W was bad enough once.o not want to see the reruns
JPL
@jp7505a: Thanks for reminding me about that. I almost erased my comment because it was over the top.
um.. I think we were both being sarcastic.
Hypatia's Momma
@Amir Khalid:
It’s their wack “End Times” belief. Right-wingers are also huge financial backers of illegal settlements in Palestine. They really, really, want this war so that Jesus will come back because apparently he requires mass human sacrifice to manifest.
jp7505a
@JPL: np
jp7505a
@JPL: np
PurpleGirl
@Maude: Hi, thanks for the answer today. Yesterday I had the livingroom a/c on because of the humidity. The vibration thing still isn’t solved. Tomorrow I’m calling Legal Aid and the City’s Department of Housing for advice. My dentist is also an attorney and I may run a letter by him; although he doesn’t do tenant-landlord matters I’ll see what he thinks of what I write.
I’m going out shortly to see Brave.
Origuy
I’m wondering if Mitt has any connections to LDS Millennialism? According to the article, mainstream Mormonism pays lip service to millennialism, but only a few go to the point of storing a year’s supply of food. I suspect most of those are in the Utah outback.
Mnemosyne
@PurpleGirl:
I think you’ll like Brave. Quite a few reviewers seemed to miss the point. They were like, “Oh, geez, yet another princess movie about mother/daughter relationships.”
Um, hello — how many princess movies have mothers in them at all? Ninety-nine percent of the time, the mother is either dead or completely absent.
Davis X. Machina
@jp7505a: There was an entire Polish Army in the West — 115,000 of which settled in Britain after the war.
Roger Moore
@JPL:
Thanking them for their help in WWII would not be a mistake. People tend to forget it, but the Free Poles really were a big help. They fought in just about every campaign and were major contributors to the Battle of Britain (where the accounted for a disproportionate share of the kills), Italy (Monte Casіno), and Normandy (Falaise Gap). The Free Polish provided more troops for the Allies than Free France; in fact they provided more troops than any country but the USSR, USA, and UK. The Poles are justifiably proud of their role in the war, and praising them for it would be a good move.
kay
I truly loathe both Dan Senor and Campbell Brown, to the point where I can’t talk rationally about them, so I won’t. They sort of stand for everything I hate about our politics. The clubbiness, how there’s such a close and chummy relationship between media personalities and lobbyists and war propagandists, how they pretend to be “middle America” but are really wealthy and privileged people.
Anyway. End of rant:)
Great title, John. I think we should talk
about both Mr Campbell Brown and Mrs. Dan Senor at every opportunity.
JPL
@Roger Moore: thanks.. see my comment at 137… jp..reminded me and I was being facetious because of their treatment of the Jewish people among others. It was over the top on my part.
JWL
Israel: “Speak”!
Romney’s USA: “Arf Arf”!
Israel: “Good doggy”.
JWL
@Roger Moore: A question: How did those numbers of Poland’s armed forces escape to fight? They had no where to go in ’39 once the Soviet Union invaded their eastern border.
Nutella
I read the article in Tablet Mag that went on for three pages praising Senor. Well, it was faint praise like this about him being the spokesman for the Provisional Authority:
Give that man a promotion!
dead existentialist
@JWL: Now get up on the car roof.
Hypatia's Momma
@JWL:
“Escape”? Why would exiles, travellers of all types, and military personnel stationed abroad need to “escape”?
karen marie
@Valdivia: I read it and don’t see how it is in any way a walk-back. To my reading, it was a reiteration with explication.
WaterGirl
@beltane:
Late getting back to the thread, but that was just too funny not to say so, even if you may never see my comment.
Roger Moore
@JWL:
Some of them escaped across the borders in the interval while it was obvious the war was lost but before they were absolutely forced to surrender. Some of them weren’t part of the army in 1939, or put on civvies to escape capture, and sneaked out of the country after things cooled off. Others were Polish citizens who had been abroad at the start of hostilities and signed up with the hope of liberating their country. But most of them were Soviet prisoners of war who were either released to the West after 22 June 1941 or (eventually) incorporated into the army of the Soviet puppet government. I think the official number also includes the Polish Home Army, which was their rough equivalent of the French Resistance.
catclub
@Nutella: I read it too. When the people doing the praising include Bill Kristol and Elliot Abrams (felon!), it does not help.
And another thing. Not only is this a reprise of the Bush crew, it is a reprise of the Bush crew that George Fucking Bush had to tell: ‘We are NOT invading Iran, you assholes.’
Only thing that he got right, as far as I can tell.
JWL
@Roger Moore: Thank you very much for the history lesson.
Although aware of the Polish troops, I had no idea they outnumbered the Free French. I would have guessed otherwise. I am a WW2 buff (I hate that word, buff, but what else fits? Not “fan”, not “affectionado”), and had occasionally wondered how they escaped to fight, but never so curious as to track down the answer.
By chance, can you recommend a good book about the Polish Brigades in WW2? I doubt very many returned home afterwards, or lived very long if they did.
jp7505a
@Davis X. Machina: THANKS. JUST DID’NT KNOW THE NUMBERS
xian
@Roger Moore: Alan Furst’s Spies of Warsaw tells one version of the Polish resistance.
Rafer Janders
@Roger Moore:
Well, I’m afraid that’s not at all true. Overall, there were never more than about 250,000 Free Polish forces (on both the Western and Eastern fronts of the European theatre), while the Canadian armed forces numbered more than one million, and by war’s end Canada had the third largest navy and fourth largest air force in the entire world. So it’s Canada which had the fourth largest number of combatants, not the Free Polish.
And if we count the Asian theatre, obviously the number of Chinese on the Allied side dwarfed the Free Polish. While the size of the Chinese Nationalist Army and Communist armies is a bit hard to estimate, at war’s end there were handy about 6 million Nationalist soldiers and 1 million Red Army.
Rafer Janders
@Rafer Janders:
Just did some more resaarch on this, and indeed there were also far more Free French than Free Polish forces. To quote from Wikipedia:
“By mid-1944, the Free French numbered more than 400,000, and they participated in the Normandy landings and the invasion of Southern France, eventually leading the drive on Paris. Soon they were fighting in Alsace, the Alps and Brittany, and by the end of the war in Europe, they were 1,300,000 strong – the fourth-largest Allied army in Europe – and took part to the Allied invasion of Germany.”
So it appears the relative size of the European theatre Allied armed forces by war’s end was, in descending order of size, the (i) USSR, (ii) USA, (iii) UK, (iv) Free French, (v) Canada (including Newfoundland, which was not part of Canada at the time) and (vi) Free Polish.