Obama The Juvenile! Podhoretz' Comments at PDD!

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John Podhoretz gave an interesting summation of how the 2016 election might shake down at the PDD , this past Monday evening.

John believes Hillary will run but is yesterday and the campaign will be about the future.  Hillary has had the domestic ground cut out from under her by Obama and has very little that qualifies her for a foreign policy campaign worthy of winning her much by way of attention.  Furthermore, will difficult for her to be hawkish without alienating Democrats which she needs.

The Republicans have a significant number of interesting and young candidates who will focus on the future yet John is unwilling, at this point, to predict who will capture the nomination. He finds Walker, Rubio, very interesting and does not rule out Christie and the other noted candidates.  The one John feels would drive him out the country would be a Trump candidacy.

Jeb, John believes, has the problem of having a name that implies too much family succession.

In terms of Obama he mocked his accomplishments and with good and justifiable reasons.

In answer to questions he agreed the Netanyahu's invitation was botched but Obama's handling of it and response to it was disgraceful.

As for the press being able to win for the Democrats, he pointed out the press truly were turned off by Hillary and agreed though  they would attempt every way possible to embarrass Republicans  the press and media had to compete against other news  and media delivery methods and this weakens their impact and effectiveness.

In summation it is the Republican's to win or lose.

Mencken wrote the editorial below while working for the Baltimore Evening Sun, which appeared in the July 26,1920 edition.

"As democracy is perfected, the office of the President represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people.  On some great and glorious day, the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last and the White House will be occupied by a downright fool and complete narcissistic moron."

- H.L.  Mencken, July 26, 1920

So it was written, and so it has come to pass...

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Obama and  Warren Beatty.

Obama maye have a grievance regarding Netanyahu's address to Congress but his behaviour is juvenile. Talk about acting like the JV. (See 1 and 1a  below.)
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Israel's new Chief of Staff!  (See 2 below.)
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Sonof a gun! Watch this: http://www.youtube.com/embed/_T-F_zfoDqI?rel=0
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Just back from Athens committee meeting of GMOA. Have much I want to write about but no time.

More later in another memo.

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Dick
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1)

Barack, Bulworth & Bibi

By William Kristol

David Axelrod is the man who, more than any other, could be called Barack Obama’s brain (though Axelrod would be publicly horrified by the honorific, and would hasten to assure Valerie Jarrett that he has never been in communication with the editors of this magazine). In his new book, Axelrod describes a moment late in Obama’s first term where Obama acknowledges having a “Bulworth” list of “issues on which he felt he had been insufficiently forthright,” but about which he would be more candid in his second term. (The reference is to the Warren Beatty movie in which a candidate finally decides to tell the truth.) About what issues was Obama now going to be honest? One of them was Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, with regard to whom Obama “felt he had pulled his punches .  .  . to avoid antagonizing elements of the American Jewish community.”

One’s first reaction is that Obama needn’t have worried, since major elements of the American Jewish community seem more committed to staying on good terms with Obama than to forthrightly defending Israel. But Obama perhaps mistakenly assumed that behind much of the Jewish community’s bark there was some bite, and kept his true views under wraps until reelected.

No longer. The Obama White House’s amazing assault on Netanyahu in recent months has culminated in the attempt to make sure, as one Obama aide put it, that “there will be a price” for the prime minister’s accepting the invitation of the speaker of the House to address Congress. That price will not be limited to Netanyahu personally, though there has been no shortage of personal attacks on him. That price will also be exacted on the state of Israel. Why? Well .  .  . why not? The Israelis elected Netanyahu. Even the Israeli opposition parties say they won’t give back all the “territories”—which includes the Old City of Jerusalem—to allow for the establishment of a terrorist-friendly or terrorist-dominated Palestinian state. Even the opposition parties seem to take seriously what Obama has said but doesn’t himself mean, that an Islamic Republic of Iran with nuclear weapons is unacceptable.

Obama wants to claim that his problem is with Netanyahu. Obama’s political allies on the left and his credulous well-wishers in the nominally pro-Israel parts of the Jewish community want to believe his problem is with Netanyahu. But his problem is with Israel, a state founded by a bunch of folks who Obama believes were unjust to the Palestinian Arabs living there and that is now inhabited by a bunch of folks who keep getting in Obama’s way. Obama doesn’t have a Netanyahu problem. He has an Israel problem.

This is nothing new and nothing to panic about. The Jewish state and the Jewish people have survived far more formidable threats than Barack Obama. Still, dealing with a hostile American president isn’t easy for the prime minister of Israel. But surely the worst way for Netanyahu to deal with Obama’s hostility would be to succumb to bullying and cancel the speech he’s been invited to deliver. Which means that friends of Israel, of whatever political party and whatever degree of hawkishness or dovishness on Iran, the Palestinian question, or a host of other issues, need to stand with Netanyahu. In doing so, they stand with Israel.

As a joint statement by Christians United for Israel and the Emergency Committee for Israel (which I happen to chair) put it,

Some Senators and Congressmen are now threatening to boycott the speech. Whatever their intentions and reasons, their action will be construed, at home and abroad, as a victory for the enemies of Israel and the enemies of a strong U.S.-Israel relationship. .  .  . Welcoming Israel’s Prime Minister to the halls of Congress is the least that those who claim to be friends of the Jewish state should do.

Welcoming the prime minster with courtesy and respect as the leader of a democratic ally is the least we should do, but it’s not all we can do. We can also learn from him. Netanyahu has spent many years on the front lines of the war on terror. As a young man, he was fighting terror while Barack Obama was fighting boredom. As an adult, while Obama was community-organizing his way to the presidency, Netanyahu was a participant in the civilizational struggle in which both Israel and the United States, as leaders of the West, are engaged.

While he may be less familiar than Obama with fictional movies like Bulworth, Netanyahu is undoubtedly familiar with the following historical moment: Just over 75 years ago, on September 2, 1939, Arthur Greenwood, deputy leader of the Labour party, rose in the House of Commons in response to remarks by Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain to speak for Labour. Greenwood was famously interrupted by the Conservative backbencher and fierce critic of appeasement Leo Amery, who startled the House by shouting across the aisle, “Speak for England!”

In that spirit, and in sad recognition that we can expect no such thing from our own president, we say to the prime minister of Israel: When you speak to Congress, speak for the West.

1a) Obama's Iran Policy and Israel's Elections

by Efraim Inbar
BESA Center Perspectives

Unfortunately, there are many sources of tension between the Obama administration and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government. The main issue of discord is, of course Iran. Obama seeks an agreement with the Islamic Republic of Iran over its nuclear program that will allow President Obama to claim that he prevented Tehran from building the bomb. The fact that Iran will maintain the capability to enrich uranium, and will not dismantle any of its nuclear installations, is simply swept under the rug as insignificant. Strange as it sounds, it seems that Obama is prepared to brand Iran as a US strategic partner in the attempt to bring stability to a region beleaguered by chaos.

Part of this realignment involves American capitulation on the nuclear issue, and an apparent carte blanche for stepped up Iranian activity and influence in the region. Iran is taking over Yemen (and throwing American diplomats out of the country); carving a sphere of influence in Iraq; continuing to support the brutal Assad regime in Damascus; strengthening Hizballah's grip over Lebanon; engaging in subversion in Central Asia; and developing its terrorist apparatus. In the context of Obama's "Grand Bargain" with Iran, all this seems to be okay. Tehran gets all it wants, while Washington gets an Iranian promise not to go nuclear as long as Obama is in the White House. Having made no foreign policy achievements throughout his presidency, Obama, perhaps obsessively, now wants the relationship with Iran to serve as his foreign policy legacy.

This foolish behavior negatively affects America's own position in the Middle East, as well as the national interests of its closest ally, Israel. Obama does not care about American international stature. He has advocated a retrenched position in world affairs. Israel, as well, has never been close to his heart, but Obama understands that Israeli concerns strike a sensitive chord with the American public.

As long as there is a chance that an address to Congress will obstruct Obama's attempt to sign a bad deal, Netanyahu feels compelled to make a stand.

This is precisely why he does not want Netanyahu to speak in the US Congress. Obama fears that Netanyahu's planned March 3 speech could become a catalyst for a public debate about his own dangerous policy toward Iran. He does not want undue publicity for his dangerous foreign policy gambit. The last thing he needs is a gifted orator such as Netanyahu pointing out the glaring deficiencies in the American approach toward Iran.

And this is precisely why Netanyahu is determined to defy Obama's wishes. The gravity of the Iranian threat is understood by Israelis of all political hues. As long as there is a chance, however slight, that an address to Congress will reinvigorate the public debate in the US on Iran, and obstruct the administration's attempt to sign a deal, Netanyahu feels compelled to make a stand against all odds to halt a bad deal with Iran. Paradoxically, Obama's efforts to prevent Netanyahu from visiting Washington, and to convince Congress members to boycott the session, only increase the interest in what Israel's prime minister has to say.

Among the candidates for prime minister, only Netanyahu would consider attacking Iranian nuclear installations in defiance of the US.

Beyond the personal animosity and the vast difference in worldviews, Obama does not want Netanyahu around because he considers Israel's prime minister a serious spoiler of his most important foreign policy initiative. But it is not only in Washington that Obama considers Netanyahu to be unwelcome. Obama wishes to be rid of Netanyahu in Jerusalem as well. This is not the first time we have been witness to American intervention in Israeli elections; with the White House showing displeasure with Likud candidates, and enlisting Jewish activists and donors for the anti-Netanyahu campaign.

Obama does not want Netanyahu as prime minister of Israel even after a deal is signed with Iran. He has no desire to be exposed to Netanyahu's continued criticism, based on the realization that the proposed deal has many loopholes, or based upon probable Iranian violations of the agreement. He also takes seriously Netanyahu's statement that Israel is not bound by America's unilateral agreements. In Obama's view, a paranoid Netanyahu may still revert to the military option, and thereby destroy his only foreign policy "success."

Obama is probably right on this point. Among the candidates for prime minister in the Israeli elections, only Netanyahu is passionate about Iran, and only Netanyahu would consider ordering the IDF to attack Iranian nuclear installations in defiance of the United States. While the campaign in Israel is focused more on personalities than on issues, the underlying theme of the elections is the Iranian threat and who is best placed and most experienced to tackle this challenge.

Efraim Inbar is director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, a professor of political studies at Bar-Ilan University, and a Shillman-Ginsburg fellow at the Middle East Forum.

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2) Eisenkot's Herculean task 

Analysis: The likelihood of a war breaking out on more than one front during the 21st IDF chief of staff's term is much higher than during his predecessors' time in office.
By Yossi Yehoshua

In the Bahad 1 school for officers, from which Gadi Eisenkot graduated more than 30 years ago, cadets are repeatedly told that "the battlefield is the kingdom of uncertainty."

 

The term of the 21st IDF chief of staff, who steps Monday into Lieutenant-General Benny Gantz's boots, will be marked by uncertainty on both the external front and the domestic one.

 

There are only two things about which we can be almost completely certain: The likelihood of a war breaking out on more than one front during Eisenkot's term is much higher than during his predecessors' terms, and the window of opportunities for a peace agreement has been almost completely shut

It's been many years since so many weights were placed on the risk side of the Middle Eastern scales and so little on the opportunity side. Hezbollah in Lebanon and in the Golan, global jihad sitting on the same fence, Hamas in Gaza and the Islamic State in Sinai.

 

The Military Intelligence Directorate believes that this will be an explosive year in the Palestinian arena as well, and we have yet to mention Iran, which is still pursuing a nuclear bomb while encouraging and funding the terror on the fences.

 

The new chief of staff will have to deal with this imbalance from his very first day in office. One of his most urgent missions will be to prepare a better army for war – and to do it with less manpower and less resources.

 

In the coming years, the IDF is expected to shrink considerably: The number of recruits has been reduced, the number of draft dodgers and exemptions has increased, the fighters' compulsory service will be cut short, the standing army has cut 4,500 positions, and the reserve system has cut thousands more.

 

One of Eisenkot's most urgent missions will be to prepare a better army for war with less manpower and less resources (Photo: IDF Spokesperson's Office)

 

While facing demands for a defense budget cut, which will grow upon the new government's establishment, Eisenkot will have to create a perennial work plan for the IDF, which will prepare the forces for the changing threats in the different districts. The IDF hasn't had such a plan for four years now.

 

The new chief of staff is receiving a strong air force and advanced intelligence, but weak ground forces which have not been sufficiently trained and, most importantly, are insufficiently adjusted to the fighting arenas in the north and south. Hezbollah and Hamas have taken a significant leap forward, which is not really reflected in the training facilities in Tze'elim and Elyakim.

 

In the recent rounds of fighting the Israeli home front got used to paying a price, mainly in anxiety and a disrupted routine, but the northern threats could bring a new variable into the equation: Many casualties in the home front, including in central Israel. This will have a decisive impact on the way the next round is conducted – not only on the army and its leadership, but also on the interfaces between the IDF and the political echelon. One of Eisenkot's first missions, therefore, will be to restore the political echelon's confidence in the IDF and its abilities.

 

Most of the major decisions made in the past decade were forced on the IDF by the political echelon: From new submarines to the Iron Dome system, from the separation fence in Judea and Samaria to a fence in Sinai, not to mention Operation Protective Edge and the strike in Syria, which one can assume that not all of the IDF echelon approved of – if it was indeed carried out by Israel, as foreign sources claim.

 

Eisenkot will have to prove that he is serious about building the army while adjusting it to the threats on all the fronts. He will have to end the approach of the waiter who only serves the political echelon with the options, express stronger and clearer opinions and insist on them in the most professional way possible.

 

In the round which is still to come, the public will rightfully want to see better results, which will keep the next war as far away as possible.

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