Politicians aren't the only ones who vomit up mistakes!

Bruce Bartlett had a recent article the thrust of which was to try and make the bitter pill of a prospective election of Hillary acceptable to conservatives. He did so by explaining Hillary was the most conservative of the liberal candidates. With rationalization like that it would appear the conservatives have decided to cave and concede.

Meanwhile, it would appear the Administration has decided to make billions of dollar arm deals with everyone in the Middle East on the flawed assumption it will bring peace or an ability to stare down Iran. From my vantage point it is simply the consequence of a failed policy being held together by military tape.

War talk continues to spread its wings. Is Assad planning an attack to pacify Iran? (See 1 below.)

Israeli can choose among flawed candidates of the past - Barak, Olmert and Netanyahu.
Not an exciting position to be in considering the problems the nation faces. (See 2 below.)

Netanyahu continues to position himself to return as PM. (See 3 below.)

It never hurts to read what foreigners are saying about us and "4 below" is from a Saudi newspaper . They apparently do not like Karl Rove either.

On another note, I suspect Rove resigned for a variety of reasons but two seem to stick out:
a) eliminate himself as a lightening rod as Rumsfeld did but do so earlier and b) get ahead of the historians and publish an "authoritative" book regarding the Bush Presidency and "set the record straight."

Apparently, Israel's government has decided to lower morale among those in the IDF who have served. (See 5 below.)

Off to play in state mixed doubles tennis tournament and back Sunday.



Dick

1)War tensions rise between Syria and Israel amid soothing words on both sides. Gen. Kaplinksy’s departure delayed


Sources report that the delay in Maj. Gen. Moshe Kaplinsky’s scheduled departure as Deputy Chief of Staff, announced by the IDF spokesman Wednesday night, Aug 15, is connected with the war tensions on Israel’s northern and Gaza borders and renewed threats from Iran. Defense minister Ehud Barak and chief of staff Lt. Gen. Gabby Ashkenazi prefer to keep in harness at this time a general with experience in managing warfronts.

Barak inspected the IDF preparations on the northern front Wednesday the day after he escorted prime minister Ehud Olmert on a visit to the northern command. Both stressed that Israel does not seek war, echoed by Syria’s vice president Farouk a- Shara.

Intelligence data and ground activity add up to the presumption that Syria is planning a campaign of hit-and-run cross-border attacks against Israeli border patrols and positions in Golan and attempts to take hostages. OC Northern Command Maj. Gen. Gad Eisenkott and senior officers briefed the prime minister on their preparations in anticipation of such attacks.

They discussed ways of taking Syrian forces by surprise without provoking a full-scale conflict. In particular, Israeli decision-makers want to avoid exposing the populations of northern and central regions to Syrian missiles. They are also intent on limiting any flare-up to the Golan front and leaving out of the action the Lebanese Hizballah and Hamas and allied Palestinian terrorist groups of the Gaza Strip.

Military sources report, Washington updates point to the rising influence of the pro-war faction in Bashar Assad’s government. As we reported last week, this faction is led by the Syrian president’s brother-in-law commander of military intelligence, Gen. Assaf Shawqat. Since then, Syrian troop reinforcements have been moved forward to the front line, mostly by night. They include artillery contingents which have been kept well behind hitherto.

US and Israeli intelligence watchers believe Syrian leaders’ calculations are based on their expectation of a low-intensity Israel response, such as artillery crossfire, to their attacks. They are sure that both Israel and the US are determined to avoid a major conflagration. They expect the Israeli air force to be activated against strategic targets deep inside Syria only if their own persist.

Whether Israeli bombers go after civilian infrastructure, like bridges, highways and power stations, or stick to military targets, such radar stations, bases and military command posts, will depend on the duration of the Syrian offensive, its violence and how much pain is inflicted on Israeli lives and property. The Israel reprisal spiral is likely to match the intensity of Syrian attacks.

The scenarios examined by Israeli policy-makers during the prime minister’s visit therefore postulated a war of attrition starting later this year and going on for months. Charting how this war will unfold is chancy because some unforeseen circumstance could potentially blow it up suddenly into a full-scale war.

Some officers in the northern command therefore advocate a short and sharp Israeli response to nip any Syrian action in the bud before it develops, instead of a temperate reaction that would leave the tactical initiative with Damascus. Furthermore, if a war of attrition is allowed to drag on into the winter months, weather conditions would seriously hamper Israeli air force operations. Having heard these arguments, the prime minister, defense minister and the chief of staff must decide in the next few days how to proceed.

2)Poll: Netanyahu preferred as PM in four alternative candidate groupings
By Dr. Aaron Lerner

Telephone poll of a representative sample of 518 adult Israelis (including
Arab Israelis) carried out by Maagar Mohot Survey Institute (headed by
Professor Yitzchak Katz for Israel Radio's "Its all Talk" on 17 August 2007.
Statistical error +/- 4.5 percentage points.

Of the following candidates, who would you prefer to be prime minister? [AL:
Israel does not have direct elections]

Scenario #1
Total: Olmert 5% Barak 30% Netanyahu 32% Other replies 33%
Kadima voters: Olmert 14% Barak 33% Netanyahu 22% Other 31%
Likud voters: Olmert 0% Barak 4% Netanyahu 87% Other 9%
Labor voters: Olmert 3% Barak 74% Netanyahu 7% Other 16%
New immigrants: Olmert 3% Barak 6% Netanyahu 47% Other 44%
Religious: Olmert 0% Barak 4% Netanyahu 52% Other 444%

Scenario #2
Total: Livni 24% Barak 24% Netanyahu 29% Other 23%
Kadima voters: Livni 32% Barak 31% Netanyahu 23% Other 14%
Likud voters: Livni 6% Barak 4% Netanyahu 80% Other 10%
Labor voters: Livni 36% Barak 52% Netanyahu 7% Other 5%
New immigrants; Livni 14% Barak 10% Netanyahu 42% Other 34%
Religious: Livni 0% Barak 4% Netanyahu 52% Other 44%

Scenario #3
Total: Mofax 10% Barak 29% Netanyahu 32% Other 29%
Kadima voters: Mofaz 5% Barak 39% Netanyahu 30% Other 26%
Likud voters: Mofaz 11% Barak 4% Netanyahu 80% Other 5%
Labor voters: Mofaz 9% Barak 63% Netanyahu 13% Other 15%
New immigrants: Mofaz 6% Barak 7% Netanyahu 46% Other 41%
Religious: Mofaz 11% Barak 0% Netanyahu 52% Other 37%

Scenario #4
Total: Sheetrit 10% Barak 31% Netanyahu 32% Other 27%
Kadima voters: Sheetrit 10% Barak 39% Netanyahu 28% Other 23%
Likud voters: Sheetrit 11% Barak 0% Netanyahu 84% Other 5%
Labor voters: Sheetrit 21% Barak 70% Netanyahu 2% Other 7%
New immigrants: Sheetrit 2% Barak 13% Netanyahu 53% Other 32%
Religious: Sheetrit 6% Barak 4% Netanyahu 46% Other 44%

3) Netanyahu dares Barak to force election
By Gil Hoffman

Likud Party leader Binyamin Netanyahu attempted to build on momentum from
his victory in Tuesday's Likud primary by daring Labor chairman Ehud Barak
on Wednesday to force a general election.

Netanyahu did not take time to savor his victory in the Likud race. He
immediately began working on his next election campaign, this time for prime
minister.
"I call upon Ehud Barak to keep his promise and advance the election now,"
Netanyahu said. "I invite him to coordinate with me a date for the general
election. The public wants it and the time has come."

Netanyahu's associates went further, saying Barak, as the head of Prime
Minister Ehud Olmert's largest coalition partner, could force an election at
any
moment and therefore he should "bring it on."

Barak declined to respond to Netanyahu's challenge. Labor MKs who support
quitting the coalition said Barak would not take steps to advance the
election until the Winograd Report comes out, which could happen anytime
from October to March.

Olmert responded to Netanyahu's call for advancing the election by saying,
in a meeting with Kadima council members in his Jerusalem residence: "I hear
the voices of those who want to replace me from the other parties. I want to
say to them, 'We have already seen what you are capable of.'"

According to final results, Netanyahu won the primary with 72.8 percent of
the vote, compared to 23.4% for Moshe Feiglin and 3.77% for Danny Danon.

The voter turnout was 40.2%.

[IMRA: The figures for Jerusalem are meaningless because many Feiglin
supporters took advantage of the option voters had to to vote at any polling
station in the country and drove to Jerusalem to cast their votes.]

Netanyahu beat Feiglin in Jerusalem 58% to 39%. Feiglin beat Netanyahu in
settlements like Efrat, Hashmonaim and Kiryat Arba.

Netanyahu said he would continue fighting Feiglin. He said he would try to
expel him through internal Likud courts and the High Court of Justice, and
would initiate a Likud membership drive ahead of the election for the
party's Knesset list to "drown out" Feiglin's support.

"Feiglin is an intruder into the party and the fate of his membership is in
the hands of the courts," Netanyahu said. "His group won't have any impact
on me, on the Likud list or on anything. Their number is not growing. When
more people vote, which will happen with the Knesset list, their support
will be more watered down."

Sources close to Feiglin said they would defend themselves by trying to
expel Likud MKs, such as their nemesis Limor Livnat, who violated the
Likud's platform by voting for disengagement from the Gaza Strip. They said
Feiglin's support would continue to grow, as it has since the 2003 Likud
race, when he won 3% of the vote, and the 2005 primary, when he won 13%.

"Likud members said with their votes that they want leaders with faith who
give hope that the country will survive and blossom," Feiglin said. "I am
not taking over the Likud. I am simply persuading people."

Labor and Kadima MKs said Feiglin's strong finish should convince Likud
voters to switch their allegiance to a more moderate party.

Sources in Kadima close to Olmert said the Likud had been tainted by
Feiglin's extremism and that Likud members with a conscience should move to
Kadima.
"The people are looking for responsible and moderate leadership," Labor
secretary-general Eitan Cabel said. "The Likud holds contests to determine
who could be a more right-wing extremist. The Likud under Bibi [Netanyahu]
and Feiglin gave a divorce document to centrist voters and proved that
everything must be done to prevent them from leading the country. Bibi
remains the same Bibi who is unable to make decisions under pressure or lead
the country."

4) Editorial: Master of Dirty Tricks


SO White House aide Karl Rove — the man they called “the president’s brain” — has quit. It is a significant departure which probably represents the beginning of the political end of this flawed and failed administration. Rove ran both George Bush’s successful election campaigns and also fulfilled a role as fixer and eminence grise at the White House. As deputy chief of staff, he played a major role in many decisions, including the one to invade Iraq. But last November he failed in the probably impossible task of saving the Republican hold on both houses of Congress. Bush, who has been consistently loyal to his staff, would probably have been happy for Rove to stay through the last 15 months of his presidency. But Rove decided that a decision that White House staff in post after this month should see out the presidential term was unacceptable.

He was probably glad of the chance to quit. This master of dirty tricks who is roundly disliked by Democrats — he once sent a crowd of Chicago down-and-outs to a swish Democrat reception, falsely promising they would be given free alcohol — was widely suspected of “outing” Valerie Plame, the CIA secret agent, in revenge for her ambassador husband Joe Wilson’s accurate debunking of administration claims that Saddam Hussein had been buying uranium yellow cake from Niger. Rove was called before a grand jury investigating the leak — which is an extremely serious federal offense — no fewer than four times.

In the end, Rove escaped prosecution as indeed did everyone else in the White House for this specific crime, despite evidence from journalists that the information came from there. In the end, the can, such as it was, was carried by another official, Lewis “Scooter” Libby who was found guilty of the lesser but no less reprehensible charges of perjury and obstructing the course of justice. There are many observers who believe that Rove should have been the man in the dock.

Rove’s key presence in the administration demonstrates the second fault line in this presidency. The bloody ruins and chaos of Iraq are testimony to the first — Bush’s ignorance and inability to take good advice from friends and allies, preferring the simplistic and bullheaded avenue of main force which in the end created more problems than it solved. It has, however, been little focused on the extent to which this presidential team has been prepared to resort to skullduggery and falsehood in order to achieve its ends.

Democrats, almost all of whom were complicit in the triumphalist crowing at the Iraq invasion and ouster of Saddam, seem unprepared to dwell on the lies and subterfuge that preceded it. They have not loudly claimed that they were misled. Why? Does the US political establishment accept that dishonesty is part of the political process? The electorate, it seem, does not. Only a quarter of Americans believe the Bush presidency will be considered a success. That number will be even smaller by Jan. 1, 2009.

5) Turning our backs on the soldiers
By David Regev

Nowadays as the draft dodging phenomenon is breaking records, the state is deserting those who served their country by withholding a significant benefit

According to a new regulation of the Finance Ministry, soldiers who completed their IDF service will no longer be eligible for unemployment allowance following discharge. Thousands of soldiers who use the funds in the intermediate period following the completion of their
duty and the time they find a job will have to find other means for sustaining themselves.


Of the 70,000 soldiers who are released from the army every year, 24,000 – primarily from lower socio-economic backgrounds – apply for unemployment allowance. Avi Tzarfati, an activist that aids the soldiers on issues relating to Social Security, explained that the newly-released soldiers would be eligible for the allowance only after if the employment bureau could not place them in a job.


The monthly allowance in the sum of NIS 2,100 ($500) was given to about 6,600 former soldiers with the goal of assisting them in integrating into the workforce. Initially the young men and women were eligible for allowance for a period of six months, which was later shortened to three months.


Yet, a year ago, the Finance Ministry decided to cut back on this expense and cancel it. The rational was the saving of over NIS 100 million (about $24 million) a year, and the desire to "educate" the former soldiers to become self-sustaining, productive citizens.


Nitzan Harel, who was released last week from three-year active duty in the artillery corps, said: "I applied for several positions but was rejected because I didn't have any experience since I enlisted immediately after I graduated high-school. I finally found an employer who was willing to give me a chance, but many of my fiends are still looking. I don't understand this decision. After risking my life for this country for a few hundred shekels a month, I deserve this allowance."