More evidence that the only game in Washington is the Israel lobby. The Center for American Progress (CAP), a Democratic Party thinktank under steady attack from neoconservatives for being critical of Israel, has taken on a pr firm associated with Jewish organizations, including the neoconservative Jewish Council for Public Affairs, so as to maintain its street cred. Adam Kredo reports at the Free Beacon:
The Washington Free Beacon has learned that associates of the D.C.-based Rabinowitz/Dorf Communications firm, which has a reputation for managing crises inside the Jewish community, have reached out in recent days to reporters on behalf of CAP as the group struggles to respond to charges of anti-Israel bias.
Rabinowitz/Dorf has represented a plethora of prominent Jewish organizations, such as the … Jewish Federations of North America and the Jewish Council for Public Affairs. However, it also does work for… J Street and the New Israel Fund, both of which have had their pro-Israel bona fides questioned by critics.
The communications firm has been defending CAP after weeks of damaging reports, including a Washington Post exposé in which the Obama administration’s Jewish community liaison, Jarrod Bernstein, pointedly distanced the White House from the “troubling” situation at the organization. Their defense suggests that CAP is making a conscious effort, at least on the public relations front, to repair its reputation.
Earlier this week, Ilene Cohen made the pointed observation that in the eyes of many in the Jewish community, the New York Times is a Jewish house organ and not the paper of record. But this is the political reality of the Democratic establishment; the Israel lobby is in the saddle. Obama raised $1.2 million last June at a dinner at the home of David Cohen, the executive vice president of the company that owns NBC and MSNBC. You can be sure that many of the people who gave $10,000 came from Cohen’s network at the Jewish Federations, which he had headed– and an organization that CAP’s new p.r. firm also represented.
As for CAP’s new bedfellow, JCPA, here is the thinktank stirring up fears of Iran’s “existential” threat to Israel.
Just imagine the pressure on the journalists at CAP not to say that AIPAC is pushing war with Iran…
This is truly depressing. Everyone has to kiss the ring, every single day!
I am still waiting to hear from our media that the Ayatollah has rescinded his fatwa against Iranian nuclear weapons.
Won’t last.
Podesta is the former Clinton chief of staff. CAP is one of the largest democratic think tanks. These things aren’t forgotten by people. Sure, the lobby can hustle it’s enemies in the short term.
But the cat’s out of the bottle. I mean, even consider the cover ‘Israel vs Iran’ in the NY Mag.
It wasn’t the ‘West vs Iran’ or anything like that. Just ‘Israel vs Iran’.
Which is true of course.
I personally believe the lobby is trying to goad Iran into attacking first, thereby setting up a casus belli and then basically telling Obama “go for it or the lobby will nuke you on capitol hill”. Obama wants to get re-elected. The economy might be in the toilet after a conflict with Iran, but if the lobby wants him out he knows he has no chance. The funding’s going to dry up! He’ll face a massive media campaign as some sort of Islamic Radical/hater of the West. So he would do what he’s told.
But the thing is…people will ask questions. How did it come to these levels of tensions? Why did Congress pass these extreme bills forcing the President time and time again. Why didn’t the President really put up any serious fight, what’s he scared of? Why was Sen. Bob Menendez screaming at the administration on Iran, knowing he had the lobby’s back full-stop, in a way he would never have the guts on any other issue?
We know that the lobby and it’s media allies will go nuclear on all these questions. But these people don’t care about your pension fund. They don’t care about the economy, or how well your children are doing in school and their prospects to get a job. All they care about is Israel. All else be damned.
“Obama raised $1.2 million last June at a dinner at the home of David Cohen, the executive vice president of the company that owns NBC and MSNBC. You can be sure that many of the people who gave $10,000 came from Cohen’s network at the Jewish Federations, which he had headed– and an organization that CAP’s new p.r. firm also represented. ”
Comcast…is that right? No need to wonder why Bashir, Ratigan, Matthews, Al Sharpton, Ed, Rachel Maddow, Lawrence will not get anywhere near reporting about the Israeli Palestinian conflict or Iran fairly…if at all.
Now Ratigan did rip it up one time with Greenwald when they went up against Cliff May’s spin. And Rachel Maddow finally had former President Jimmy Carter on to say the things that not one of the MSNBC crowd (other than Ratigan) have the nerve or integrity to report. But the complicity goes even further than that. Chris Matthews, Rachel, Al etc do not even have the integrity or the interest to try to educate the public with facts about Iran or US history of negotiations or lack of negotiations. They do not even have the balls to say that IRAN HAS THE RIGHT TO ENRICH URANIUM UP TO 20% FOR PEACEFUL PURPOSES UNDER THE NPT THAT IRAN SIGNED AND ISRAEL CONTINUES TO REFUSE TO SIGN. Not one of the MSNBC host or producers have the integrity to have former Bush administration officials and Iranian experts Flynt and Hillary Mann Leverett on their programs to educate the public. We are not talking about having some lefties on. No the MSNBC host of news programs are yellow bellied cowards on these critical issues. The all mighty dollars wins out for them. And they will be blamed for being complicit if there is an attack on Iran. They have helped set the stage for an attack on Iran by allowing unsubstantiated claims about Iran to be repeated and not attempting to educate the public with facts
Neera Tanden on the Progressive Movement
Feb 19, 2012
C-SPAN | Washington Journal
Neera Tanden talked about progressives’ attitudes toward toward President Obama and his policies. She talked about views on job growth, debt reduction, and taxation policies, as well as the priorities of the progressive wing of