Tonight on "Hardball," former Rhode Island Senator Lincoln Chafee, a Republican, said he was for Obama because he was concerned about our "foreign entanglements." And in this sense he was a true "conservative," he said. Chris Matthews said, Hear hear.
A year or so back the American Conservative had a great issue about What’s Right? What’s Left? predicting a realignment of our politics in the wake of Iraq. Its latest issue contains editor Scott McConnell’s analysis that Obama’s suggestions of evenhandedness in Middle East policy represent a historic challenge to the Israel lobby’s power.
[T]here are different ways for
Americans to be “pro-Israel” and push back against the view that being
pro-Israel means supporting the right of the Jewish state to lord it
over 5 million Palestinians in conditions increasingly seen as
resembling South African apartheid. The alternative view won’t sweep
the country, but it will migrate from its present home on university
campuses and liberal Protestant churches into the wider body politic. [Emphasis mine]Finally will come recognition that the Israel lobby’s power to dominate the American debate is beginning to weaken.
I share McConnell’s optimism. When Lincoln Chafee talks about "entanglements," he means the Israel lobby. In the Senate, he was a liberal Republican, now he’s a radical conservative. Well-bred Protestants like him have an aversion to being provocative. I know this
from my wife, who likes to say that her people are as sensitive as
mine, but they learn to bite their tongues. Please, senator, next time say it out loud!
