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Lobby leans on Schumer to block Hagel– now that Ackerman, Berman, Frank, Weiner, Rothman and Lieberman are gone

On Meet the Press this morning, Andrea Mitchell said that Chuck Schumer is “ambivalent” about Chuck Hagel but the opposition is going to need some new information if it’s going to stop Hagel’s appointment as Defense Secretary. Neither Mitchell nor David Gregory could say what Politico says: that Schumer is “the most powerful Jewish Democrat in Congress”:

Schumer has told allies and power brokers in the Jewish community that he’s uneasy about Hagel’s nomination, a concern he reiterated at a private breakfast in Manhattan’s posh Park Avenue Winter restaurant on Wednesday.

Alana Goodman at Commentary picks up on the Jewish community theme and bewails its loss of power in Congress. Oh, and she calls the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs anti-Semitic– a baseless smear, surely having to do with the fact that it’s pro-Palestinian. Goodman:

It’s hard to overstate Schumer’s power in this debate. Pro-Israel Senate Democrats who aren’t getting much guidance on this issue from AIPAC (at least not officially) will look to Schumer for cues. This is particularly important in the case of his fellow New York Senator, Kirstin Gillibrand, whose vote on the Armed Services Committee could be the deciding factor in whether Hagel’s nomination is referred to the floor.

But If Schumer backs him, it would essentially give Hagel’s views the kosher seal of approval, letting the White House claim that any criticism of his Israel record is a faux controversy drummed up by the GOP….

Pro-Israel Democrats should ask themselves this. How did they get to a point where the leader of their party is nominating one of the most anti-Israel senators who ever walked the halls of the Capitol–a man who routinely made the anti-Semitic Washington Report of Middle East Affairs’ annual Congressional Hall of Fame list?

The party is shifting around them. The ranks of the pro-Israel Democrats in Congress are shrinking. Representatives Rothman, Frank, Berman, Ackerman, Weiner, and Senator Joe Lieberman are gone. The advocacy groups and think tanks incubating the next generation of Democratic leaders are increasingly moving against Israel.

Goodman says that young Jews ought to change their party affiliation, just like Irving Kristol sided with the Republicans over Israel back in the ’70s:

There is still a strong up-and-coming generation of pro-Israel Democrats. But they have fewer leaders to look to and fewer roles to fill in the party. If people like Schumer won’t stand up against Hagel, what message would this send to these young activists and operatives working in the trenches? That they should either change their opinions or their party affiliation?

That would clarify things. The Democratic Party will have to make room for critics of Israel.

Another good thing about the Hagel nod: all the talk of who is best for Israel is nauseating the folks on the sideline. Andrew Sullivan:

I’m struck by the following sentences in Politico today:

“Chuck Schumer is quietly letting out the word: He’s far from sold that Chuck Hagel will be a staunch advocate of Israel.”

Isn’t the job in question defense secretary of the United States? Why should an American defense secretary be required to “staunchly advocate” for the interests of another country that isn’t even in NATO? Or put it another way: can you imagine a leading Senator demanding that a defense secretary be a staunch defender of Canada?

Steve Walt said this last week:

neoconservatives and other extremists made it clear just… how much they believed that the commitment to Israel ought to trump other foreign policy priorities. And it wasn’t just the absurd claim that Hagel was anti-semitic; it was the bizarre suggestion that a key job requirement for the U.S. Secretary of Defense was a deep and passionate attachment to a foreign country.

But Jim Rutenberg in the Times says the neocons are still in the saddle, driving the debate on Hagel. He talks about the money:

In fact, the neoconservatives have done anything but disappear. In the years since the war’s messy end, the most hawkish promoters have maintained enormous sway within the Republican Party, holding leading advisory posts in both the McCain and Romney presidential campaigns as their counterparts in the “realist” wing of the party, epitomized by Mr. Powell, gravitated toward Barack Obama.

And while members of both parties think the chances are good that Mr. Hagel will win confirmation, the neoconservatives are behind some of the most aggressive efforts to derail it, through television advertisements, op-ed articles in prominent publications and pressure on Capitol Hill, where some Democrats, including Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York, have also indicated reservations.

Their prominence in the fight over Mr. Hagel’s nomination is testament to their continued outsize voice in the public debate, helped by outlets like The Weekly Standard, research groups like the American Enterprise Institute and wealthy Republican financiers like the casino magnate Sheldon Adelson, whose nearly $100 million in political donations last year were driven largely by his interest in Israel. The Republican Jewish Coalition, on whose board of directors Mr. Adelson sits, was among the first to criticize the Hagel nomination.

Of course it’s not as if the Democratic Party is anti-Zionist. It’s liberal Zionist, and there’s no criticism allowed of Israel. Not yet anyway. I keep waiting for an open conversation about the religious ideology at the heart of the mess: Zionism.

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This is the debate that should have happened around Chas Freeman…this is healthy sunshine is the great disinfectant of the germ that is this lobby. Its ironic that those who care about Israel and what is happening to it are called anti Semites and those who support its self destructive policies are considered pro Israel..

The problem for both Israel and the neocons is they can only win a pyrrhic victory against Hagel at the cost of Israel continuing on it’s suicidal spiral and further rapid loss for USA supporters of Israel.

It’s bizarre, insular thinking.

Her post basically confirms the reason why the realists got purged from the GOP.
The paleo/realists called the neocons out for what they were – RINOs(Republicans In Name Only). The reason for that was simple: Israel. The second reason was also simple: Israel. And so on.

This enraged the neocons – truth hit a bit too close to home for many of them, and so they attacked the paleos by claiming that they were anti-Semites who spread lies of dual loyalty. Notice the pattern with Hagel. It’s basically a re-run of the entire show.

This conflict was reiterated, ever so slightly, last year in the election campaign when Erick Ericksson of Red State basically stated that Jennifer Rubin at WaPo is a faux conservative who is only in the GOP because of Israel. A profile of her in Tablet basically confirmed his claim, she was a Hollywood liberal for her entire life, pro-life, anti-gun, pro-socialized healthcare and so on. Run the gamut. But she’s an Israel Firster and the GOP is simply blowing the Dems out of the water if you’re looking for unfailing support for an Apartheid state. So she switched, but on every other issue she is not a Republican. He called her out on it. Guess three times what she did. That’s right, anti-Se…

This is the underlying fear of Alana’s piece at Commentary. Not the Hagels, they’ve been purged effectively by the Kristol’s and co’s Stalinist campaigns.
No, the subtle back-up they used to get from liberals. Or, if we’re precise, the silence from Gentile liberals and the helpful smearing from Jewish liberals(both in politics but especially in the media). Well, the politics well is drying up. The media is far more fractured today.

True, the support for Israel among Jewish liberals is hardening among some, notably former IDF prison guard Jeff Goldberg. But the neocons can’t count on the subtle bigotry against ‘the WASPs’ that they used to count upon among liberals like Beinart or Remnick. Remember when Kristol sat and smiled with Ben-Ami of J Street last year when he bragged about ‘purging the WASP Arabists’? This is the common cultural reference, and the prejudices it birthed, that they neocons used to rely upon.

Well, no more. And this she knows, so the fear runs through her piece as a red thread.

“think tanks incubating the next generation of Democratic leaders [who] are increasingly moving against Israel”

or how classic “Frankenstein” was re-written as “Finkelstein” (or Weiss, but that does not rhyme).

Phil, Annie/all amazing discussion about John Brennan, torture program, drones etc on Up with Chris Hayes this morning. Quite a go around between Eli Lake and Amy Goodman. Amy bringing up innocents who have been killed and no one being put on trial. Eli coming back with “no they were not tried this is war” I asked over at Chris Hayes whether Eli would apply that same comment to those tried at Nuremberg for crimes against humanity.

When Amy and the ACLU attorney bring up that the Obama administration has been quite complicit in killing innocents that are not reported about Joy Reid who I think is absolutely amazing in her generally rational thinking and comments brings up that congress is also guilty. One of those false equivalency comments. Amy comes back with who is at the inner circle of these drone killings etc. John Brennan being the guy who picks the targets. Great conversation.

Saw Dark Night Thirty last night. Was absolutely disgusted. Promoted torture, made those who tortured out to be heroes. Marketed the false ‘they hate us for our lifestyle” instead of what former head of the CIA’s Bin Laden unit Micheal Scheuer as well as other experts say that there is hatred towards the US based on our foreign policy. The actress was pretty but terrible up there with Angelina terrible. The CIA folks who did this torturing should be tried at the Hague but instead in the US we havle movies coming out promoting torture and those who did it. The bad actress playing the special CIA agent says to the Seals going in for OBL “kill him for me” if that is what the CIA agent really said who allegedly followed the courier what a wicked arrogant individual “kill him for me” Actress “wanted to bomb the place” another one of those arrogant disregard for collateral damage killing kind of folks.

When the Seals go in and splatter those kids parents all over the wall and floor and tell them “its ok” and then one of the Seals hands a young girl a glo stick and the producer chooses to show the girl intrigued with the glo stick one of the most racist things I have seen in awhile. As if this little girl whose family members guts were just splattered all over the walls is going to be taken in and calmed down by a fucking glo stick was so disgusting I almost shouted out loud. Fucking racist. Then when the Seals return they talk about womens underwear as some of the stuff they confiscated from the third floor of OBL’s compound. So sexist so disrespectful. they just had massacred these folks. Disusted with this film. Horrible message to the public. Torture good, racism good.

The one thing that the film early on did focus on which seldom gets talked about with 9/11 is the Saudi connection. Former Bush Secretary of the Treasury Paul O’neil was dumped by Cheney when he started following the terrorist money to the Saudi government. That was shut down almost immediately.