Have We Elected A Moral Coward Bereft of Knowing History

Is our dithering President a coward incapable of moral leadership? Is he is more oral than moral?

Have we elected a president who does not understand history and its linkage?

The collapse of the Middle East and the insurgency of radical leadership is probably where all of this is heading. That said, as the price of energy explodes the threat to Obama's re-election could also hang in the balance.

You decide. (See 1 and 1a below.)
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Obama seems to be following Carter's playbook on how to handle those who challenge us - act meekly? Lack of intelligence and confusion on the ground is also driving Obama's tepid response.

A bigger problem is the remaining Arab leadership no longer trusts Obama after seeing how he responded to Mubarak's plight. I expect the various protests will spread and probably Saudi Arabia could be the next regime to collapse.

The best thing Obama could do now is go shoot a few hoops! (See 2,2a and 2b below.)
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Palestinians play hard ball knowing Obama is in need of a victory and will continue to lean on Netanyahu. (See 3 below.)
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If matters continue to deteriorate Obama's prospects could sink and then the issue of who the Republicans choose could be less a factor. That could be good for wining but could be bad for the nation because the problems we face demand solid leadership and vision so winning would carry a price where we all lose. (See 4 below.)
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Dick
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1)Obama's Dithering
By Keith Riler

There "is a corollary to the conception of being too proud to fight. It is that the humble have to do most of the fighting.[1]" Another corollary is that those too proud to fight are often cowards.


The New Republic is surprised and bothered by the President's dithering over Iran, Egypt and Libya. That bastion of all things liberal observed that Barack Obama's


...diffidence about humanitarian emergencies is one of the most mystifying features of his presidency, and one of its salient characteristics....We disappointed Tehran. We disappointed Cairo. Now we are disappointing Tripoli. It is so foolish, and so sad, and so indecent.


It is also to be expected. TNR's surprise is suspect and probably disingenuous, given that in his book Terror and Liberalism, TNR's own Paul Berman traces liberal naiveté and cowardice through most atrocities of the last century:


In the 1930s, good-hearted liberals sneered at the ashen-faced witnesses who reported that Stalin was starving the Ukrainian farmers.[2] ...And, having analyzed the German scene in that manner, the anti-war Socialists concluded that Hitler and the Nazis...did make some legitimate arguments-even if Nazism came from the extreme right and was not at all to the Socialists' taste.[3]


At Auschwitz the SS said, 'Here there is no why.' The anti-war Socialists ... believed no such thing. In their eyes, there was always a why[4].


The truth is that "barbarism and civilization have always dwelt side by side in the world[5]." This is a fact with which liberalism unsuccessfully struggles, given its mania for evolution and linear progress, and its tendency for chronological snobbery. As a result, more often than not, liberalism's blind faith in rationality and its resulting denial preclude moral action, particularly in situations demanding courage.


During the years of Nazi triumph, Sweden and Switzerland played roles that were, all in all, contemptible....Entire Polish cities fought virtually to the last man so that Sweden and Switzerland could go on perfecting their social systems.[6]


Berman further bolsters his case with Europe's more recent response to Serb ethnic cleansing:


The Europeans who declined to lift a finger against the Serb nationalists in the 1990s naturally pictured themselves as something other than base, cowardly, greedy, and self-absorbed....who, in their worldliness, cannot be shocked, therefore cannot be motivated to do anything about being shocked. Those attitudes were, in fact, base, cowardly, greedy, and self-absorbed, apart from being antique.[7]


We, of course, know the end of the Serb story. The Europeans applied to the UN, stood around with their arm bands and permitted the Srebrenica massacre. Finally, like the humble Poles before, the American military stepped in with moral clarity and courage and solved the problem.


In his book, Berman highlights Noam Chomsky's reaction to the 9/11 attacks as liberalism's most recent moral failure. Of Chomsky, Berman says:


He was unfazed. The entire purpose of his political outlook was to be unfazed, even by the worst horrors. He knew exactly what to say. The notion that...a mass movement of radical Islamists had arisen, devoted to mad hatreds and conspiracy theories...was, from Chomsky's perspective, not even worth discussing. ...He knew the answer. The attacks on 9/11 represented the reply of oppressed people from the Third World to centuries of American depredations. The attacks represented...self defense.[8]


In the case of Libya, TNR accuses President Obama of behavior that happens to be identical to that of the cowardly, self-absorbed and arm-banded Europeans of the Serbian story:


But the president is not yet interested in action. His outrage seems to be satisfied by "consultations" with our "allies and partners," and with the Human Rights Council in Geneva next Monday. Yes, next Monday: what's the rush? The main point of Obama's statement on Libya was that "the nations and peoples of the world speak with one voice," and that "we join with the international community to speak with one voice." He is calling for words! He actually said that "the whole world is watching," that foul old slogan of the bystander.


There are also Chomsky-Obama parallels. TNR suggests that the President's imperialism concerns are irrational and misdirected:


They [Libya's opposition fighters] are fighting authoritarianism, but he [Obama] is fighting imperialism. Who in their right mind believes that this change [Libya's revolution] does represent the work of the United States or any foreign power?


In its stupidity, cowardice, self-loathing and lack of moral clarity, Obama's reflexive assumption of the guilt of imperialism is the same as Chomsky's blaming the attacks of 9/11 on America.


Peter Wehner explains in his recent article entitled Barack Obama's Moral Concession to Evil,


... the leaders of nations far less powerful than the United States, many with large expatriate populations in Libya, took much more forceful (and much earlier) stances against Qaddafi than did Obama. The president was the last major Western leader to speak up on Libya.... He showed weakness, irresolution, fear. I wonder if people have focused on just how troubling this action, and the mindset it manifests, really is.
"Receive those being led away to death; hold back those staggering toward slaughter." - Prov 24:11.


The Wall Street Journal has asked, "What is Mr. Obama waiting for?" It is a good question. As TNR points out, there are a number of straightforward courses of action the President might have already pursued, including a no fly zone to protect the innocent Libyan population or deployment of a humanitarian expeditionary force into Tripoli.


Unfortunately, the answer to the WSJ's question is nothing. The President is not waiting on a thing. He is a coward from the long line of cowards described by Berman. These cowards make things complex to hide from the demands of moral responsibility and believe "It depends" or "It's complicated" are acceptable answers. Doubt this? See the blatant shiftiness in the Administration's latest lame excuse for inaction -- that some websites might characterize any definitive action as a grab for Libyan oil.


Dithering and a lack of moral clarity are signatures of international liberalism, a philosophy trapped by an ever shifting moral relativism and hamstrung by the vanity of affected complexity. TNR's own Paul Berman hit the nail on the head years ago. There is no surprise here.


What may now bother The New Republic is that the United States, the moral trough from which parasitic international liberalism has fed for all these years, has apparently been commandeered by just such a liberal. Without the traditional moral clarity and courage of the US, international liberalism confronts a responsibility it is unequipped to handle. TNR is pining for a responsible man. Unfortunately, that's not who we elected. At least The New Republic noticed.


[1] G.K. Chesterton, The Everlasting Man, page 129.


[2] Terror and Liberalism, page 123.


[3] Terror and Liberalism, page 125.


[4] Terror and Liberalism, page 126.


[5] G.K. Chesterton, The Everlasting Man, page 63.


[6] Terror and Liberalism, page 167.


[7] Terror and Liberalism, page 167.


[8] Terror and Liberalism, page 151.

1a)History's Repetitions: "Never Forget"
By Lauri B. Regan

Earlier this week, the last surviving American World War I veteran died at the ripe old age of 110. Frank Woodruff Buckles enlisted in the Army at just 16 years old and was discharged in 1920. However, while working as a civilian for a shipping company in the Philippines, Buckles was captured by the Japanese the day after they attacked Pearl Harbor and spent three and a half years in a prison camp until rescued in 1945.
In a statement issued upon Buckles' death President Obama stated, "...our nation has a sacred obligation to always serve our veterans and their families as well as they've served us." But what exactly does it mean to say that we have an obligation to "serve our veterans?"

While I would venture a guess that Obama was referring to ensuring they have proper medical care, assistance in finding employment upon returning home, pensions, and other social benefits, it seems to me that one of the best ways to serve our veterans is to honor their memory by understanding what drove a patriot like Buckles to hide his birth certificate and lie his way into the Army at just 16 years old. For, in this regard, Buckles is no different than all American patriots from George Washington and the men who fought for the country's independence to every volunteer in the U.S. military serving across the globe today. Each and every one of these honorable and patriotic citizens recognized that freedom and democracy are worth their lives for the sake of humanity.

However, in serving our veterans, it is equally important to remember the atrocities committed in war, analyze how such violence occurred, and in doing so, prevent history from repeating itself. As a Jew, I was raised listening to the phrase, "Never Forget" and learning about the Holocaust. Yet, as Holocaust survivors become extinct and deniers' voices become louder, I fear that not only will the lessons of the Holocaust be lost on Jews across the globe, but the lessons and memories of World War II will become lost on future generations of Americans including the country's eventual leaders.

Even the lessons of 9/11 -- the worst terrorist attack on US soil that occurred just under ten years ago -- seem lost on many Americans more concerned with the politically correct way to search for, and deal with, terrorists than with the most effective way to fight a war begun by Islamic fundamentalists against Western civilization. And while it is a healthy attribute to be a resilient people and continue living life in the face of terrorist threats, the elected officials entrusted with the safety of American citizens cannot afford such willful blindness to reality.

And I fear that what we are witnessing in the Mideast and elsewhere in the world today is a repeat of history that is not only leading us into World War III, but that will entail a fight for survival for which the present U.S. leadership is not up to task. Our Commander-in-Chief has shown a complete lack of historical knowledge and insight, he has exhibited a complete lack of leadership and decision-making prowess, and he has shown he has neither the stomach for, nor ability to handle, the grave and immensely critical responsibilities handed to him when he entered the White House.

And one does not have to be a history buff to understand that it is time for this administration to rethink its policies to date, admit failure, and quickly develop Plan B, for not only are American lives at stake, but Western civilization and values are being threatened across the globe. World War I was supposed to be "the war to end all wars," however, the world was slow to learn its lessons. From World War II, the world should have learned from the failure of Neville Chamberlain's foreign policy that appeasement only emboldens one's enemy, not placates a foe intent on taking over the world a la Islamic fundamentalists in the 21st century.

Ahmed Chalabi, an Iraqi legislator, recently wrote an article in The Wall Street Journal comparing Qaddafi's murderous response to the Libyan uprising to the atrocities committed by Saddam Hussein in 1991 when George H.W. Bush abandoned the Iraqi people. Chalabi recognized that "[t]he international community owes it to the Libyans to help them remove the tyrant and prevent history from repeating itself."

So why is it that Obama and his advisors plug ahead with either inaction and indecision or failed policy in the face of history having proven that such decisions fly in the face of reason? Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that our President, a self-proclaimed student of history, thought that Austrian was a language, claimed that Emperor Hirohito signed the surrender of Japan to General MacArthur, asserted that Islam "has demonstrated through words and deeds the possibilities of religious tolerance and racial equality," or developed a Mideast policy based on the premise that if only Israel would cede Judea and Samaria to the peaceful Palestinians, the world would live in peace for eternity.

If our Ivy educated elitists in the White House cannot comprehend that their policies of appeasement and diplomacy are leading to disaster, how can we feel confident that later generations of Americans will understand the history of the world, grasp the necessity and desirability of strength rather than weakness, and acquire the means to lead the country and the Western world in the face of a determined and formidable foe?

My ninth grade son asked me recently why he had to learn history. He is studying "Cultures in Conflict" this year and is learning about the decline of Rome and rise of Christianity, the Islamic Empire and the Crusades, the Middle Ages through the Renaissance, the Spanish Conquest and Protestant Reformation, the rise of capitalism and private enterprise, and African cultures. I explained to him the importance of learning history in order to understand the world, create competent leaders and freedom fighters, and appreciate democracy and human rights.

But as I elucidated the importance of learning from prior mistakes in order to prevent them from reoccurring, it was difficult not to enter into a tirade explicating the ignorance of the Obama administration and complaining that if only Obama had studied world history from somewhere other than the knee of a devout socialist and institutions that indoctrinate rather than educate, the Mideast might not be in such disarray and the country in such decline.

It is certainly not too late to serve our country's veterans and ensure that not only do our future leaders respect the values on which this great country was founded, but that they appreciate just how great the United States is and ensure that no enemy is able to defeat our military or our resolve. We need to elect leaders who strive for greatness, not mediocrity, and who understand how to use our status as a superpower to defend human rights and protect freedom across the globe.


Will the next generation of leaders learn their history lessons through analyses of World War III or will they be spared future atrocities due to our present governors having acquired a working knowledge of world affairs to date? Will this administration continue to pursue a foreign policy based on ignorance, ideology, and obsessive fantasy rather than intelligence, reason, and realism? As events unfold at a rapid rate, I fear that we will know all too soon.
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2)Qaddafi troops regain Zawiyah, most oil towns. Obama names Libya intel panel


The big offensive pro-Qaddafi forces launched Friday night, March 4, to wrest from rebel hands control of Libya's most important towns and oil centers resulted Saturday in the recapture of the key town of Zawiya and most of the oil towns around the Gulf of Sirte. In Washington and London, talk of military intervention on the side of the Libyan opposition was muted by the realization that field intelligence on both sides of the Libyan conflict was too sketchy to serve as a basis for decision-making.

Their reports from their primary sources, American military advisers and intelligence officers attached to the Benghazi-based rebels in the east, are fragmentary and often contradictory. They too appear unclear about who is command the assorted militias in revolt against the Qaddafi regime and who gives those commanders their orders. Over the weekend, shapes began to emerge of informal armed civilian groups cohering occasionally into small militias who then decide independently whether to seize a certain piece of territory or town and hold it against military pressure. When there are no troops around, the rebels claim victory.
This is what happened Friday night when the opposition claimed to have finally captured Brega, the important oil terminal and refinery town south of Benghazi and, later, Libya's second oil terminal town of Ras Lanuf. However, according to debkafile's sources, while these opposition successes were widely reported, they were not confirmed. Opposition militias seized only parts of Brega – and not the most important ones, such as the oil exporting harbor which Qaddafi's forces control – and were still camped 15 kilometers outside Ras Lanuf when they claimed its capture.

Both towns are major prizes and have been tenaciously fought over. Their fall into rebel hands would cut Qaddafi off from fuel supplies and choke of Libyan exports of 500,000 barrels of oil a day. While only a third of Libya's regular export capacity, this amount it nonetheless nets him enough money to bankroll his war effort against the uprising against his rule.

Friday night, the rebel militias in the east suffered a major setback which halted their advance: Two ammunition dumps in Benghazi which they had seized from the Libyan army in the third week of February in were blown up, wiping out the anti-Qaddafi militias entire ammunition stocks. The cause of the explosions has not been established. Speculation ranges from a pro-Qaddafi suicide saboteur to aerial bombardment or the negligence of rebels inexperienced in ordnance maintenance.

Inside information about Qaddafi's forces is just as sparse. He is known to be supported by three elite brigades under the command of two of his sons, Khamis and Mutassim and the Defense Minister Maj. Gen. Abu Baker Younis Jaber, but intelligence about them is hard to come by, except that the most effective professional unit is the Khamis Brigade No. 32 of the Libyan army, which Saturday morning won the battle for Zawiyah 30 kilometers west of Tripoli, using tanks, Grad surface missiles and artillery to break down opposition defenses..

Washington sources report the shortage of the most basic information on the ground has seriously constrained deliberations between President Barack Obama, Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on the next steps in Libya. To correct this, Obama in the last 48 hours established a supreme intelligence commission on Libya made up of Pentagon, NSC and CIA experts to scrape together any data available as input for decisions.

By creating this panel, the president has also sidestepped the stiff opposition to his policies coming from Gates and Clinton, especially his inclination to explore limited military intervention to expedite Qaddafi's removal. They are also critical of Obama's policies in general with regard to other Middle East centers of unrest, especially Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

Following Hosni Mubarak's overthrow in Cairo, the Egyptian military junta in charge of the transition to democracy appears to be losing its grip on the situation events and letting the street protesters run out of control. Friday night, thousands stormed the national security services Alexandria headquarters and are still in there. The Muslim Brotherhood appears to be setting the tone in the Egyptian street amid reports of an internal coup by militant young leaders against the veterans.

The Obama administration has a better inside picture of the state of Egyptian opposition groups than it has about Libya, but it is still rated inadequate. US policy-makers are short of precise information about the real leaders of the opposition groups and to whom they are answerable.

In Saudi Arabia, the world's biggest oil exporter, unrest is spreading especially among the two million Shiites who live and work in the eastern oil regions. Demonstrations have become a daily event in with prominent anti-American slogans. Saturday, the Saudi government finally banned demonstrations and protests altogether.
The Wall Street Journal's reported Saturday, March 5, claiming that "The US is settling on a strategy in the Middle East aimed at keeping longtime allies who are willing to make democratic changes in power." Even if this is true, the change comes far too late to affect the tide of unrest surging through the region. After he summarily evicted Hosni Mubarak, America's staunchest Arab ally in the region in the second half of January, President Obama will be hard put to find any other ruler in the region willing to put his trust in Washington



2a)Saudi Arabia says protests won't be tolerated
By REUTERS

Following demonstrations by Shi'ite minority in oil-producing east, gov't warns that security forces will stop all attempts to disrupt public order.

Saudi Arabia warned potential protesters on Saturday that a ban on marches would be enforced, signaling the small protests by the Shi'ite minority in the oil-producing east would no longer be tolerated.

"The kingdom's regulations totally ban all sorts of demonstrations, marches, sit-ins," the interior ministry said in a statement, adding security forces would stop all attempts to disrupt public order.

Inspired by protests in other Arab countries there have been Shi'ite marches in the past few days in the east and unconfirmed activist reports of a small protest at a mosque in the Saudi capital Riyadh on Friday.

The US ally has not faced protests of the scale that hit Egypt and Tunisia that toppled veteran leaders, but dissent has built up as unrest has spread in Yemen, Bahrain, Jordan, Libya and Oman.


More than 17,000 have backed a call on Facebook to hold two demonstrations this month, the first one on Friday.

A loose alliance of liberals, moderate Islamists and Shi'ites have petitioned King Abdullah to allow elections in the kingdom which has no elected parliament, although even activists say they don't know how many of the almost 19 million Saudis back them.

Last month, Abdullah returned to Riyadh after a three-month medical absence and unveiled $37 billion in benefits for citizens in an apparent bid to curb dissent.

For about two weeks, Saudi Shi'ites have staged small protests in the kingdom's east, which holds much of the oil wealth of the world's top crude exporter and is near Bahrain, scene of protests by majority Shi'ites against their Sunni rulers.


Shi'ite protests in Saudi Arabia started in the area of the main city Qatif and its neighbour Awwamiya and spread to the town of Hofuf on Friday. The demands were mainly for the release of prisoners they say are held without trial.

Saudi Shi'ites often complain they struggle to get senior government jobs and other benefits like other citizens.

The government of Saudi Arabia, an absolute monarchy without an elected parliament that usually does not tolerate public dissent, denies these charges.

The interior ministry said demonstrations violated Islamic law and the kingdom's traditions, according to a statement carried by state news agency SPA.


2b) Has Anybody Seen Jimmy Carter Lately?
At this point, would America settle for a new 1980s?
By Tim Cavanaugh

Veiled within the news that Ronald Reagan handily topped a recent Gallop poll of Americans’ favorite presidents is a pretty clear mandate: We want somebody to make the 1970s end.

This is not the swinging '70s of fond memory (a period during which the nation actually experienced a surge in nostalgia for the 1950s) but the brutalizing fiscal '70s of stagflation, soaring gas prices, President Jimmy Carter’s national “malaise,” and then-California Gov. Jerry Brown’s “era of limits.”

With a Carteresque president, a scolding yet permissive Federal Reserve chairman who inspires even less confidence than Nixon-appointed Fed chief Arthur Burns, and Jerry Brown himself back in charge of the Golden State, the United States is experiencing a grim and pleasureless sensation of '70s nostalgia.

This retro-shock is showing up in political and media rhetoric. President Obama got the ball rolling in May 2009 by announcing “We’re out of money now.” Jerry Brown’s most memorable quote since returning to the office of governor has been a shocker about the state budget: “It is much worse than I thought. I’m shocked.” Succumbing to the spreading panic, Washington Post columnist Steven Pearlstein recently let loose a closing-all-the-exits lamentation:

Now, even three years after reality came crashing down, we have only just begun to figure out how to bring about the reduction in living standards that will be necessary to create a sustainable balance. Will the pain come in the form of prolonged high unemployment? Or wage and salary cuts? Or reduction in the value of homes and financial assets? Or loss of ownership of American companies? Or price inflation? Or higher taxes? Or reductions in government services and benefits?

In practical terms, there is no case to be made against hairshirt drones like these. (Nor is 2011 the first year the United States has been possessed by demons of the 1970s.) Governments in most of the 50 states are facing severe budget deficits. Obama proposes [pdf] adding $1.645 trillion this year, $1.102 trillion next year, and $768 billion in 2013 to a national debt that is already more than $14 trillion, and the full cost-cutting power of a Republican majority in the House of Representatives succeeded in knocking only $61 billion out of that spending.

Commodity inflation is soaring while the value of most Americans’ primary asset—real estate—continues to plummet. When Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) asked yesterday about the spike in prices for gold, oil, wheat, and other commodities , Fed chief Ben Bernanke—whose expansion of the money supply over the past three years amounts to a highly confident gamble on the Fed’s ability to control the devaluation of the dollar—dismissed the idea that this inflation was related to Fed policy, noting that “commodity prices have risen just about as much in other currencies as they have in terms of the dollars. So while I take those commodity price increases very seriously I don't think they're primarily a dollar phenomenon.” While accurate within a narrow scope, this reply doesn’t provide much comfort to Americans who are subject to the dollar economy. When the central bank is rapidly creating more dollars and the cost of your daily existence is rapidly increasing, do you feel better knowing that other Bernankes in other countries are doing the same thing?

The Congressional Budget Office’s (CBO) most recent Budget and Economic Outlook [pdf] contained more news suited to the Crash of ’79 era. The trust funds for Social Security’s disability insurance (DI) and Medicare’s hospitalization insurance (HI) ran 2010 negative cash flows of $21 billion and $30 billion, respectively, and neither have any prospects of returning to balance. Says the report: “In CBO’s projection, the negative cash flows for the two funds continue throughout the baseline period; their balances are exhausted in 2017 (DI) and 2021 (HI).”

Meanwhile, unemployment remains in the high single digits, economic activity is increasing at too slow a rate to replace the dollar values lost since the start of the 2007 recession, and the real estate market remains stuck in the lieux d'aisance (actually, the real estate market has cleared the loo and is now passing through lengths of cheap PVC pipe toward the municipal sewers).

The fad for calling the great credit unwind the "Worst Since the Great Depression" seems to have run its course by 2009. (And what is the point of ranging recessions on a “good-bad-worst” continuum, given how radically your definition of good may differ from mine when our financial interests are concerned?) But there’s a strong case for calling the Bernanke economy the most stagflationary malaise since the ’70s.

So why shouldn’t people talking to pollsters fondly recall the president they perceive as having ended stagflation the first time around? History has not yet settled on how much credit Reagan deserves for restoring the U.S. economy to vigor. There is a decent presidential-continuity case to be made from the evidence that Jimmy Carter (currently holding twelfth place in the hearts of his countrymen, according to Gallup) began the deregulatory and anti-monopolist processes for which the Gipper gets most of the thanks. But belated interest in the 1980s at least suggests Americans are interested in innovation rather than repetition as a way out of the current jam. The first time around, stagflation was defeated by a combination of tight monetary policy, deregulation, market competition, and supply-side tax policy. What will it take to get America moving this time
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3)Abu Rudeineh: State with Provisional Boarders Unacceptable - no compromise on Jerusalem

Presidential spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeineh stressed Thursday that President Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian leadership have rejected the idea of state with provisional borders.

He said in statements to the press that this matter is not open for
discussion.

The proposal by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of a state with
provisional borders before the end of this year is completely unacceptable
and not open for discussion,” he said.

What is acceptable, he added, “is only a fully sovereign state on land
occupied in 1967 as per the national consensus, and in accordance with Arab
summit and international resolutions.”

Netanyahu’s idea, he said, “means relinquishing Jerusalem, which is
something the Palestinian people will not accept nor would President Mahmoud
Abbas and the leadership, even though some Palestinian parties have
unfortunately accepted it.” He was referring to Hamas.

Abu Rudeineh condemned recent Israeli settlers’ attacks and escalation of
aggression in the West Bank.

He said “this is part of the Israeli policy of terrorizing the Palestinian
people to force it to surrender. We condemn this policy and reject it, and
the international community had already condemned it by a vote of 14 states
against settlements in the last meeting of the Security Council.”

He said, “We warn the Israeli government from the repercussions of these
daily crimes and call upon the international community, namely the United
Nations and the Security Council, to take the necessary steps to stop these
settlement crimes protected by the Israeli government. We warn the Israeli
government of the gravity of these actions which will lead to serious
consequences, which constitute an assault on international law and the
rights of the Palestinian people.”

Regarding the decision to expand Jewish settlements, especially in Ras
al-Amoud in Jerusalem, Abu Rudeineh warned of the Israeli government’s
settlement policy, saying: “This is part of Israel's policy of judaizing
Jerusalem. We have condemned this policy and asked the international
community to stop it.”

He said Abbas had presented the recent Arab Summit a program to protect
Jerusalem.

“We demand from all Arab states to fulfill their obligations, particularly
since Jerusalem is now under siege as Israel attempts to force the
Palestinians to leave it and Judaize it.”

He said the Palestinian people will not give up Jerusalem and its Islamic
and Christian holy places and that there will not be a solution without
Jerusalem and the territories occupied since 1967.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------4) Who will be the Republican presidential nominee? Even political professionals don’t have a clue
By Charlie Cook

Consider yourself clairvoyant if you can correctly predict who is going to win the 2012 Republican presidential nomination. The race is that wide open.

In most years, Republicans tap the person whose “turn” it is to be the party’s standard-bearer, and that individual’s identity is often known long before the start of the primary and caucus season. This time, the race looks different. One could argue that it is former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin’s turn because she was the party’s vice presidential nominee in 2008. Or former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee’s turn because he won the Iowa caucus last time around. Or former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney’s turn because he was eventual nominee John McCain’s toughest rival in 2008. But none of those arguments is particularly convincing.

In most years, current and former U.S. senators are grossly overrepresented in presidential fields. But with the announcement by Sen. John Thune of South Dakota that he isn’t going to run, it appears no sitting GOP senator will enter the race. Pennsylvania’s Rick Santorum may be the only former member of the chamber to make a bid. Current and former House members have a dismal record in winning nominations, but that hasn’t stopped them before. This time, Rep. Ron Paul of Texas looks to be the only House member running, and former Speaker Newt Gingrich may be the only former member in the contest.

With Washington so out of favor, this could be a campaign that features lots of current and former governors. Three sitting governors are possible candidates—Haley Barbour of Mississippi, Mitch Daniels of Indiana, and Rick Perry of Texas—along with five former governors: Jon Huntsman of Utah, Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota, Huckabee, Palin, and Romney.

Each of the possible contenders has strengths and weaknesses; how voters will ultimately weigh these pluses and minuses is unknowable today. Gingrich and Palin have near-total name recognition, certainly an asset, but also unusually high negatives and big questions about electability. Can Huckabee raise money? Do Barbour’s former job as a K Street lobbyist and his Deep South roots offset his prodigious fundraising potential and unmatched Republican Rolodex? Will Romney’s experience in running for president and his personal fortune and fundraising potential outweigh charges that he is an ideological chameleon and the suggestion that his Massachusetts health plan makes him the “father of ‘Obamacare’ ”? Can Pawlenty become exciting? All these questions have yet to be answered.


It appears no sitting U.S. senator will enter the race. Many people seem unable to look at politicians on any axis other than left-center-right. But in terms of presidential nominations, there often don’t seem to be many huge ideological differences. Among the potential Republican contenders, all oppose abortion and gun control, are skeptical of Big Government, and favor cutting taxes and spending.

The real differences will turn out to be in style, tone, temperament, and, most important, emphasis. Emphasis is key because it defines candidates to a certain degree and what pockets of voters they plan to target. All of the potential candidates are pretty conservative on social and cultural issues. But an aspirant who talks about social issues a lot is looked at differently than one who emphasizes fiscal and economic issues. And a candidate who emphasizes economic issues is look at differently than one who focuses on foreign-policy and national-security concerns (really none in this field, though). The term “moderate” often is less a reference to ideology (no Ripon Society members in this group) than to style and the temperature of rhetoric. Some candidates run hot and others at room temperature, even if their fundamental positions aren’t much different.

Republican pollster Bill McInturff once articulated a construct for looking at presidential nominations that I have often found useful. Compare the field to a set of NCAA basketball brackets, starting at the quarterfinals. The theory goes that each bracket features candidates with similar appeal. This approach, when applied to the 2012 campaign, might yield a tea party bracket, sporting competitors who are first and foremost antigovernment and in favor of slashing both taxes and spending.

A second bracket might contain candidates whose appeal very much centers on social and cultural issues. They’re targeting voters who are religious, most of them evangelical, although some are Catholic, with abortion a dominant issue. This year, the other two brackets might actually be one very large group with a straight shot to the finals: secular, establishment, business-oriented Republicans.

Thinking back to 2008, Huckabee was going after one group of GOP voters, Romney another faction, and McCain yet a third. Each was drawing his support from different pools, at least initially. Eventually, the top two this time around will face off in the finals for the nomination. At this point, though, who the nominee will be is anybody’s guess.
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