My fantasy - a Biden/Cheney ticket. Policy differences, yes, all of which take a back seat to one and only one thing. I’m a Dem and would vote for this in a heartbeat.
Liz Cheney just got some karma payback. My Kevin has announced he's done at the end of this term.....oh, and Trump announced at Hannity's town hall, the he would only be America's dictator on his first day. Hannity was perplexed.
I went shopping with my wife yesterday for a Christmas ornament for each of the grandkids. There was a snow globe featuring Santa Claus looking down on, apparently, baby Jesus in a crib.
A second trump term would be one giant sharpie pen. No reality would be spared. Those with actual money one imagines would be ... concerned. Yet oddly not enough.
I Googled it because I wanted to find out why this issue is as common as it is in discussions of the Israel-Palestine problem.
I find that there are valid reasons for Israelis to take offense at the content of PA-approved textbooks, and that this has been going on for a long time. I also find that there are a (smaller) number of things in Israeli textbooks that may be problematic.
However, I am mindful of two things. When I’ve heard this issue raised, it’s always been as an argument for why Israel has nobody with whom they can make peace. I disagree with that. I think the disagreement about textbooks is more than anything a mirror of the larger issues of the Israel-Palestine conflict.
I continue to oppose its use as a reason why no peace can be contemplated.
I am also mindful of the fact that fights over textbooks currently embroil our own country. I think they are symptoms of larger divisions rather than causes of them.
Charlie asks why it took the UN 30+ days to acknowledge that Hamas raped Israelis.
First of all, 90% of news outlets and Western governments acknowledged that on day one. UN did acknowledge it but not with the moral emphasis you would have demanded Charlie, namely making it the sole and immediate focus of coverage in the region for some time.
Second, I'm still patiently waiting for anyone at the Bulwark, other that Will Saletan, to acknowledge just for a second that engaging in collective punishment is a war crime, and that the Israeli embargo on basic supplies since October 7 (which Israel has repeatedly proudly advertised) is a war crime.
The moral outrage from Charlie on this point as he just glosses over a war crime that is currently affecting 2.2 million Gaza civilians is astonishing.
The moral conviction with which Charlie distinguishes rape of Israeli women, from the actions of the Israeli government in say, knowingly killing Palestinian premie babies was a little bit rich.
I'm getting pretty fucking sick and tired of pointing out how NONE OF YOU Bulwark contributors with the exception of Will Saletan has said a single word about the Palestinian causalities. None. Not one. Charen goes even further by ridiculously stating that Israel has NEVER violated international law.
This example is the most glaring omission haven't heard ANYONE on the Bulwark mention this story even once. Not once:
What makes it even more disgusting is that on October 12 a former Israeli PM was asked about the risk to the lives of premature Palestinian babies that would come from cutting off supplies to 2.2 million residents of Gaza. His response? How dare you talk about Palestinian casualties, they're all Nazis.
Funny, I haven't heard or read about that lovely press conference from the likes of Charlie or JVL. Cause you know, Palestinians aren't real human beings.
And not once have ANY OF YOU except Saletan bothered to call out Israel for literally committing the war crime of collective punishments. Worse yet, JVL actually had a commentator on his show who called that war crime tactic "smart" with not a word said by JVL pointing out the criminal implications of that tactic (again, cause I guess brown babies aren't human to JVL).
This is getting incredibly annoying.
All I'm asking is for you and JVL to get your head out of your assesses and just ONCE acknowledge that collective punishments are a crime. And maybe treat your guests who praise said tactics as the war criminal advocates that they are.
You sure as hell play up every even horrendously vague comment that the ADL would interpret as anti-Semitic.
Can you please do your job and make a modicum of an effort to call out racism and enthusiastic praise for war crimes? Just a modicum of an effort is all I ask for.
It'd call it ironic that Bulwark contributors have such a chubby for Reagan, but this is actually a perfect example of Reaganite political policy. Reagan was all for promoting "democracy" in speeches, as long as people were voting white Christian neo-liberal capitalist. If they diverged from that, well they'd get gunned down in the streets by Reagan funded pro-dictator radicals for being commies.
As is the case here I guess. Any criticism of Israel is bad and super duper racist. Israelis literally murdering premie babies doesn't even register on your radar because said babies are brown and Muslim.
The basic distinction is that there are military and stragegic reasons for cutting off supplies (such as it's not so easy to guarantee that no military supplies would come in with the humanitarian ones). However the Hamas attacks were cruel and sadistic for the pleasure of it. Knowing that there will collateral civilian (even infant) deaths is not the same as having that as the actual purpose of the attack.
That's not how international law works. You don't get to cut off civilian supplies just-in-case, supplies could make it to the military.
Second, no one disputes the supposed intentions. But you have to acknowledge the STATED INTENTIONS of Israeli officials in cutting off the supply. They have explicitly acknowledged that they were cutting off supplies as a tactic to get Hamas to release hostages. Period. When Israelis aren't even saying they have any concern for these supplies making it to militants (quite the opposite, it's very clear that Hamas stockpiled supplies for over a year), you can't just fabricate that concern to defend their actions.
I never said bombing that kill civilians as a great wonderful thing, or that there is absolutely no better way (especially given that Netanyahu is a putz). The point is that without making distinctions, everything becomes equivalent. It's the root of why stuff with Biden's son is equated in j40% of the public's minds with Trump's absolutely criminal acts.
I do agree that the Israeli government has committed much violence against Palestinians who they treat as sub-human. That does not excuse Hamas for their violence, rape and murder.
It's odd, a lawyer friend of mine has publicly lambasted me for pointing out that cutting off water, food, medicine, and energy is a war crime. That statement apparently makes me a "Hamas supporter."
In this case the responsible approach to take was for the UN to wait until the evidence was clear, and then issue a statement, which they did.
Remember the oft repeated story about babies being beheaded? Turned out to be false.
Do we really want to criticize the UN for assessing facts before acting?
All that Americans need to do is to vote on Election Day, and better yet, also in the primaries, and to not vote for anyone who supports the Big Lie or who doesn't take January 6th to be an insurrection.
All Americans don't need to do this, just a small majority (just enough to take care of the peculiar American electoral map).
None of this as as onerous as going overseas to fight a war, to restrain consumption or to be rationed life's necessities, to be required to work a 6-day week, to pay more taxes, to reduce the enjoyment of life in the least. It is as close to a zero-sacrifice civic virtue that is possible, that is needed.
If the alarm bells are flashing red because Americans are no longer capable of this tiny bit of civic virtue, then I must question whether there is anything left to save. The flashing lights are not of those an emergency but of a funeral procession.
I just finished reading Will's column. I don't think Haley believes the right-wing conspiracy theory nonsense she is spouting about Covid vaccines. It's just that she is a shameless opportunist and will say anything to win votes including that she will support the Fascist Trump.
It's just as bad or worse. She gives a permission structure for even more people to believe the bs and the beast therefore gets bigger and bigger. It's exactly how Trump got to be such a threat: People who knew better enabled the mob by being afraid of it.
You are aware that the Netanyahu government is as hostile, if not more so to the Palestininan Authority as it is to Hamas? You are aware that Netanyahu PUBLICLY stated that by offering to support to Hamas, over the PA, this was the best way for Israel to prevent a Palestinian state from forming?
"Teaching their children to hate Jews"? Who does this? All Palestinians? What is your source for this?
President Biden has indicated his preference for a two-state solution with the PA as the most obvious interlocutor. Netanyahu opposes this. What do you say about this? What is YOUR preferred outcome?
I understand Liz Cheney is considering throwing her hat in the ring as a third-party candidate, however she qualified by saying it was something she would not do if she felt it would help trump get elected. I don't see how it wouldn't help get trump elected because Biden isn't winning over hearts and minds despite doing a heck of a lot better job than TFG. Still, I wish that if Liz would have considered this sooner as a Republican candidate. I just don't understand how running as a third-party candidate would not help trump, unless I'm missing something. What am I missing?
You’re basically suggesting that their only options are to risk their lives in a revolution against Hamas or risk their lives in a revolution against Israel.
I wonder if this collective - of I support the poor downtrodden masses called Hamas even though they are thugs, killers, rapists, and proud puppets of Iran - believes they are doing a service analogous to my generation's protests about 'Nam? Is this their, as in whatever gen X, Y, Z, or ZZ is now called, way of feeling relevant? It all seems rather obscene: they celebrating the depraved toxicant that is Hamas while we castigated the rather imperialistic machinations of a superpower. The world is not as it once was. Up is down. Fascism is democracy. Evil is heavenly.
I WELCOME a Republican attempt at impeachment. Newt Gingrich debased the concept 25 years ago, so impeachment is not what it used to be, and that is genuinely sad. On the Upside, it butchered his speakership and he was shafted out of the chair shortly thereafter. Furthermore, it shut up the people whining about Clinton triangulation and it showed the House GOP to be nothing more than vindictive imbeciles who were using impeachment as a weapon to gut Bill Clinton because he was just better at politics than they were. Was Bill slime? Oh ABSOLUTELY. Could he not keep his pants zipped? Uh....duh.
In attempting to impeach Joe Biden, the House GOP is showing itself to be pathetically desperate to show that he is as much of a massive crook as the *know* Donald Trump to be. It's like they are saying "See? Joe Biden is scum...we can prove it!!" The thing is, they can't. They have zero evidence that Joe Biden is a vile crook. They can show that his son is, but not Joe Biden. They are doing this to placate that early stage dementia addled jello mold in Palm Beach, and it is really stomach churning. The republican party used to be a place of ideas and backbones...those days are as long gone as summer re-run season.
Trump's potential trajectory is strikingly similar to that of Hugo Chavez, who staged an unsuccessful coup, was barely punished for it, remained vengeful and unrepentant, and came back to win an election and set up a dictatorship. The result has been destroyed institutions, a ruined country, and millions of Venezuelan refugees scattered across the prinicipal nations of the Hemisphere from the United States to Chile.
Do Americans really want to become a huge Venezuela? Where will they run to?
My fantasy - a Biden/Cheney ticket. Policy differences, yes, all of which take a back seat to one and only one thing. I’m a Dem and would vote for this in a heartbeat.
Liz Cheney just got some karma payback. My Kevin has announced he's done at the end of this term.....oh, and Trump announced at Hannity's town hall, the he would only be America's dictator on his first day. Hannity was perplexed.
I went shopping with my wife yesterday for a Christmas ornament for each of the grandkids. There was a snow globe featuring Santa Claus looking down on, apparently, baby Jesus in a crib.
'Tis the reason for the season, I suppose.
Not sure they had chimneys in Judea at the time.
If you insist. I suppose. Happy holidays.
Happy holidays?!! Oh no! <gasp> Another attack in the war on Christmas!
A second trump term would be one giant sharpie pen. No reality would be spared. Those with actual money one imagines would be ... concerned. Yet oddly not enough.
David - I did Google this. I read the Wikipedia article on the subject, https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Textbooks_in_the_Israeli%E2%80%93Palestinian_conflict. Thanks. It was a useful exercise.
I Googled it because I wanted to find out why this issue is as common as it is in discussions of the Israel-Palestine problem.
I find that there are valid reasons for Israelis to take offense at the content of PA-approved textbooks, and that this has been going on for a long time. I also find that there are a (smaller) number of things in Israeli textbooks that may be problematic.
However, I am mindful of two things. When I’ve heard this issue raised, it’s always been as an argument for why Israel has nobody with whom they can make peace. I disagree with that. I think the disagreement about textbooks is more than anything a mirror of the larger issues of the Israel-Palestine conflict.
I continue to oppose its use as a reason why no peace can be contemplated.
I am also mindful of the fact that fights over textbooks currently embroil our own country. I think they are symptoms of larger divisions rather than causes of them.
Steve,
I appreciate the fact that you took the time to do so. To me, it speaks volumes about the sincerity of your character.
Please don’t overload us with links to the Atlantic. Not all of us subscribe.
Charlie asks why it took the UN 30+ days to acknowledge that Hamas raped Israelis.
First of all, 90% of news outlets and Western governments acknowledged that on day one. UN did acknowledge it but not with the moral emphasis you would have demanded Charlie, namely making it the sole and immediate focus of coverage in the region for some time.
Second, I'm still patiently waiting for anyone at the Bulwark, other that Will Saletan, to acknowledge just for a second that engaging in collective punishment is a war crime, and that the Israeli embargo on basic supplies since October 7 (which Israel has repeatedly proudly advertised) is a war crime.
The moral outrage from Charlie on this point as he just glosses over a war crime that is currently affecting 2.2 million Gaza civilians is astonishing.
Just listening to Sykes podcast with Saletan.
The moral conviction with which Charlie distinguishes rape of Israeli women, from the actions of the Israeli government in say, knowingly killing Palestinian premie babies was a little bit rich.
I'm getting pretty fucking sick and tired of pointing out how NONE OF YOU Bulwark contributors with the exception of Will Saletan has said a single word about the Palestinian causalities. None. Not one. Charen goes even further by ridiculously stating that Israel has NEVER violated international law.
This example is the most glaring omission haven't heard ANYONE on the Bulwark mention this story even once. Not once:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/12/03/gaza-premature-babies-dead-nasr/
What makes it even more disgusting is that on October 12 a former Israeli PM was asked about the risk to the lives of premature Palestinian babies that would come from cutting off supplies to 2.2 million residents of Gaza. His response? How dare you talk about Palestinian casualties, they're all Nazis.
Funny, I haven't heard or read about that lovely press conference from the likes of Charlie or JVL. Cause you know, Palestinians aren't real human beings.
And not once have ANY OF YOU except Saletan bothered to call out Israel for literally committing the war crime of collective punishments. Worse yet, JVL actually had a commentator on his show who called that war crime tactic "smart" with not a word said by JVL pointing out the criminal implications of that tactic (again, cause I guess brown babies aren't human to JVL).
This is getting incredibly annoying.
All I'm asking is for you and JVL to get your head out of your assesses and just ONCE acknowledge that collective punishments are a crime. And maybe treat your guests who praise said tactics as the war criminal advocates that they are.
You sure as hell play up every even horrendously vague comment that the ADL would interpret as anti-Semitic.
Can you please do your job and make a modicum of an effort to call out racism and enthusiastic praise for war crimes? Just a modicum of an effort is all I ask for.
It'd call it ironic that Bulwark contributors have such a chubby for Reagan, but this is actually a perfect example of Reaganite political policy. Reagan was all for promoting "democracy" in speeches, as long as people were voting white Christian neo-liberal capitalist. If they diverged from that, well they'd get gunned down in the streets by Reagan funded pro-dictator radicals for being commies.
As is the case here I guess. Any criticism of Israel is bad and super duper racist. Israelis literally murdering premie babies doesn't even register on your radar because said babies are brown and Muslim.
The basic distinction is that there are military and stragegic reasons for cutting off supplies (such as it's not so easy to guarantee that no military supplies would come in with the humanitarian ones). However the Hamas attacks were cruel and sadistic for the pleasure of it. Knowing that there will collateral civilian (even infant) deaths is not the same as having that as the actual purpose of the attack.
That's not how international law works. You don't get to cut off civilian supplies just-in-case, supplies could make it to the military.
Second, no one disputes the supposed intentions. But you have to acknowledge the STATED INTENTIONS of Israeli officials in cutting off the supply. They have explicitly acknowledged that they were cutting off supplies as a tactic to get Hamas to release hostages. Period. When Israelis aren't even saying they have any concern for these supplies making it to militants (quite the opposite, it's very clear that Hamas stockpiled supplies for over a year), you can't just fabricate that concern to defend their actions.
There is absolutely a moral distinction imo. Sadism and disregard are very different from one another. Doesn't excuse either one.
I never said there wasn't.
It's really odd how many times I've made a similar reply to posts on this topic.
When the only "arguments" being responded to are red herrings, it says a lot about the factual & moral basis for these rhetorical complaints.
I never said bombing that kill civilians as a great wonderful thing, or that there is absolutely no better way (especially given that Netanyahu is a putz). The point is that without making distinctions, everything becomes equivalent. It's the root of why stuff with Biden's son is equated in j40% of the public's minds with Trump's absolutely criminal acts.
I do agree that the Israeli government has committed much violence against Palestinians who they treat as sub-human. That does not excuse Hamas for their violence, rape and murder.
Never said it did.
It's odd, a lawyer friend of mine has publicly lambasted me for pointing out that cutting off water, food, medicine, and energy is a war crime. That statement apparently makes me a "Hamas supporter."
In this case the responsible approach to take was for the UN to wait until the evidence was clear, and then issue a statement, which they did.
Remember the oft repeated story about babies being beheaded? Turned out to be false.
Do we really want to criticize the UN for assessing facts before acting?
> All the alarms are flashing red
All that Americans need to do is to vote on Election Day, and better yet, also in the primaries, and to not vote for anyone who supports the Big Lie or who doesn't take January 6th to be an insurrection.
All Americans don't need to do this, just a small majority (just enough to take care of the peculiar American electoral map).
None of this as as onerous as going overseas to fight a war, to restrain consumption or to be rationed life's necessities, to be required to work a 6-day week, to pay more taxes, to reduce the enjoyment of life in the least. It is as close to a zero-sacrifice civic virtue that is possible, that is needed.
If the alarm bells are flashing red because Americans are no longer capable of this tiny bit of civic virtue, then I must question whether there is anything left to save. The flashing lights are not of those an emergency but of a funeral procession.
I just finished reading Will's column. I don't think Haley believes the right-wing conspiracy theory nonsense she is spouting about Covid vaccines. It's just that she is a shameless opportunist and will say anything to win votes including that she will support the Fascist Trump.
It's just as bad or worse. She gives a permission structure for even more people to believe the bs and the beast therefore gets bigger and bigger. It's exactly how Trump got to be such a threat: People who knew better enabled the mob by being afraid of it.
You are aware that the Netanyahu government is as hostile, if not more so to the Palestininan Authority as it is to Hamas? You are aware that Netanyahu PUBLICLY stated that by offering to support to Hamas, over the PA, this was the best way for Israel to prevent a Palestinian state from forming?
"Teaching their children to hate Jews"? Who does this? All Palestinians? What is your source for this?
President Biden has indicated his preference for a two-state solution with the PA as the most obvious interlocutor. Netanyahu opposes this. What do you say about this? What is YOUR preferred outcome?
The sooner Netanyahu is gone from power the better.
"Who does this? All Palestinians? What is your source for this?"
Palestinian school textbooks are intensely antisemitic. Google it.
The EU condemned Palestinian textbooks and study cards back in May due to their hateful content and have done so for the last 4 years.
"Google it" is not a source.
Source: The European Parliament.
That's not a source either. For a source to be meaningful, you need to cite
(1) a specific document
(2) from a reputable source
(3) with enough information to enable readers to track it down and read it for themselves.
So far you are missing elements (1) and (3).
And yes, it is on the person making the claim (you, in this case) to provide that.
The only peson who can get away with saying "you'll have to Google that" is Robert Earl Keen.
I understand Liz Cheney is considering throwing her hat in the ring as a third-party candidate, however she qualified by saying it was something she would not do if she felt it would help trump get elected. I don't see how it wouldn't help get trump elected because Biden isn't winning over hearts and minds despite doing a heck of a lot better job than TFG. Still, I wish that if Liz would have considered this sooner as a Republican candidate. I just don't understand how running as a third-party candidate would not help trump, unless I'm missing something. What am I missing?
And how would you suggest they do this?
You’re basically suggesting that their only options are to risk their lives in a revolution against Hamas or risk their lives in a revolution against Israel.
"They could be protesting Hamas...."
I wonder if this collective - of I support the poor downtrodden masses called Hamas even though they are thugs, killers, rapists, and proud puppets of Iran - believes they are doing a service analogous to my generation's protests about 'Nam? Is this their, as in whatever gen X, Y, Z, or ZZ is now called, way of feeling relevant? It all seems rather obscene: they celebrating the depraved toxicant that is Hamas while we castigated the rather imperialistic machinations of a superpower. The world is not as it once was. Up is down. Fascism is democracy. Evil is heavenly.
Sigh.
I WELCOME a Republican attempt at impeachment. Newt Gingrich debased the concept 25 years ago, so impeachment is not what it used to be, and that is genuinely sad. On the Upside, it butchered his speakership and he was shafted out of the chair shortly thereafter. Furthermore, it shut up the people whining about Clinton triangulation and it showed the House GOP to be nothing more than vindictive imbeciles who were using impeachment as a weapon to gut Bill Clinton because he was just better at politics than they were. Was Bill slime? Oh ABSOLUTELY. Could he not keep his pants zipped? Uh....duh.
In attempting to impeach Joe Biden, the House GOP is showing itself to be pathetically desperate to show that he is as much of a massive crook as the *know* Donald Trump to be. It's like they are saying "See? Joe Biden is scum...we can prove it!!" The thing is, they can't. They have zero evidence that Joe Biden is a vile crook. They can show that his son is, but not Joe Biden. They are doing this to placate that early stage dementia addled jello mold in Palm Beach, and it is really stomach churning. The republican party used to be a place of ideas and backbones...those days are as long gone as summer re-run season.
Orange jello mold.
Trump's potential trajectory is strikingly similar to that of Hugo Chavez, who staged an unsuccessful coup, was barely punished for it, remained vengeful and unrepentant, and came back to win an election and set up a dictatorship. The result has been destroyed institutions, a ruined country, and millions of Venezuelan refugees scattered across the prinicipal nations of the Hemisphere from the United States to Chile.
Do Americans really want to become a huge Venezuela? Where will they run to?