The Democrat's Peace Candidate...Lol.

I don't know, Felix. It's tough to tell whether this is a brand new tune or the same tune in a different key for political reasons. Certainly, Obama wants Florida and his prior stand didn't cut the deli mustard in Miami.

Of course, there have been some newer developments, not really new, but some declared threats. Mickey had an article up yesterday where he quoted Mahmoud Ahmadinejad from a speech he gave the day before yesterday. According to Mickey's post he said, "Israel is about to die and will soon be erased from the geographical scene." Then he added that "The time for the fall of the satanic power of the United States has come and the count down to the annihilation of the emperor of power and wealth has started."

If he is going to get the AIPAC vote - he had better say that, Felix.

And, Sue, your quotes are not accurate. Obama has always been on the side of Israel.

Those aren't Obama's quotes, Joe! Are you on something?

interesting

A bit unfair, Felix, but you are entitled to your opinion!

What's unfair about it the Likudniks want the U.S. troops to attack Iran. Obama is suppose to be the peace candidate and as such should not sacrifice anymore young American lives to the Olmert Regime.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said on Tuesday Iran's nuclear program must be stopped by "all possible means" and Tehran must be made to see it would suffer devastating repercussions if it pursued atomic weapons.

more stories like this"The Iranian threat must be stopped by all possible means," Olmert said in a speech during a visit to Washington. "The international community has a duty and responsibility to clarify to Iran, through drastic measures, that the repercussions of their continued pursuit of nuclear weapons will be devastating."

http://www.boston.com/news/world/middleeast/articles/2008/06/04/stop
_iranian_bomb_by_all_possible_means_olmert/

Where did you get this speech, Sue?

Iran is not threatening to nuke us, but, we are threatening Iran with nuclear bunker busters. Iran is developing nuclear capabilities, as is their' right to do...but, Israel wants to be the only kid on the block with nuclear weapons.

We have 3,000 nukes...more than all the countries in the world combined and we feel that we have the moral authority to be dictating to other nations what they can or cannot have. We who have been the only country on the planet irresponsible and demented enough to have actually employed nuclear boms to incinerate civilian populations in Hiroshima and Nagasaki? Let's get serious...this is insanity. How many more young American lives is enough for you in the defense of a problematic, belligerent foreign country who should take care of it's own problems and not be using our' men and women as cannon fodder in it's mad quest to subjugate and dominate the Middle East?

Do you want to go to war with Iran...and it's allies...Russia and China? And no Iran is not going to stop it's development of nuclear capabilities it's national security demands it under the constant threst from Israel. These people have a right to protect their' people and nation from the imminent threat that Israel has been to all Muslim nations.

Iran has offered, on numerous occasions to stop it's nuclear development...if and only if...Israel dismantles it's nuclear armaments. That's fair enough, I think...but, it'll snow in hell before Israel agrees.

I know, Joe, political expedience...but, this is a dangerous time to be getting on board the 'Iran is a serious threat' train. Bush/Cheney are intent on attacking Iran before he leaves office. I posted an article on this previously on this issue...if you'd like to see it:

http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.jsp?articleId=281474977355316&nav=MyGather

Listen to what Bill Kristol, of all people, had to say:

There are actually no disputes of that nature...with the exception of Iraq this time. Obama's not for cutting the defense budget; Obama's not for pulling troops back from our forward positions around the world, with the exception of Iraq. Obama and McCain don't actually differ, at least on paper, even on Iran, where they're arguing about whether they would talk to [Iranian President Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad or not -- and I think that's an important dispute. Still, at the end of the day, Obama doesn't say he would rule out the use of force. McCain certainly is committed as he said this morning to trying to increase economic pressure on Iran, which Obama has also talked about."

Of course there have been differences between the two candidates. Kristol brushed aside perhaps the greatest one: whether or not lowering the bar for diplomatic engagement might prove a tactical benefit for U.S. foreign policy. But beyond that, Obama opposed the recent Kyl-Lieberman amendment, which would have designated the Iranian Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization. While Obama says he shares that opinion of the group with McCain and others, he instead prefers a less deliberately bellicose approach to international relations.

But given the fact that some Obama opponents seem to believe his views are frighteningly distant from the mainstream, it was interesting to hear someone of Kristol's stature on the right make the case that the Illinois Democrat's differences from McCain are ones of degree and not kind.

Which is why Obama probably won't need to respond in explicit fashion to McCain's speech when he takes to AIPAC's stage on Wednesday. The group's campus delegates who spoke to The Huffington Post all agreed that the worst thing Obama could do would be to pander. "The fact of the matter is he's said everything right," one delegate admitted, suggesting all that remains is for the audience to believe what they hear."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/06/02/bill-kristol-at-aipac-oba_n_104799.html

Well, pander he did...and in the worst way:

"I will do everything in my power to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, everything in my power to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon - everything," he said to a standing ovation.

I think that Iran is due for another coup. The CIA did it once before (1950s - Mossadegh), they can do it again.

The time for the fall of the satanic power of the United States has come and the count down to the annihilation of the emperor of power and wealth has started

Here's another post with both quotes, both the US threat and the Israeli threat.

Google is a great tool.


"I must announce that the Zionist regime (Israel), with a 60-year record of genocide, plunder, invasion and betrayal is about to die and will soon be erased from the geographical scene,"

Thanks for the links, Sue.

I'll have to wait and see on this to see if he really said this or if words are being put in his' mouth as they were back in 2006 (http://www.counterpunch.org/tilley08282006.html).

Iran knows that the Olmert/Bush plan is to attack Iran as soon as possible so I'm taking these alleged statements with a grain of salt. Olmert wants to attack Iran now so it doesn't surprise me that they would want to make it look like it's Iran fault.

"Tel Aviv /Washington - Israeli Premier Ehud Olmert will ask President George W Bush Wednesday to step up US and international action against Iran and prepare for a possible military strike against its nuclear facilities, the Yediot Ahronot daily reported.

Citing 'officials close to Olmert,' the daily said Wednesday the Israeli leader would tell the president that the measures taken so far to stop Iran's nuclear programme had run their course and had not yielded results.

Israel views Iran as its main existential threat, given Tehran's nuclear drive and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejd's often-repeated statements that the Jewish state needs to be erased from the map.

Olmert, speaking Tuesday night to the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), called Iran 'the most serious and imminent threat to global security and stability' and said that 'the Iranian threat must be stopped by all possible means."

http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/middleeast/news/article
_1409183.php/Olmert_to_ask_Bush_to_step_up_action_against_Iran

Yesterday, over at AIPAC they got the Democrats on board and it now looks like we will be expanding the war into Iran. This is what the people want this is what the people will get. Question now is...what will Russia and China do?

Hey, Joe, here comes your' coup.

Felix, I read the article corresponding to the URL you supplied that you referred to as the words put in his mouth in 2006. the article does say that speech was in 2005, nonetheless, the following point remains.

Although a translation from a language like Farsi to English may not always be as literally exact, the essence of its meaning remains. I certainly do not see this author's point that words were put into his mouth. She says that the translation, " Israel must be wiped off the map, is the most glaringly wrong."

She says that "what he actually said was this regime that is occupying Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time."

The essence of meaning remains the same in either quote, in fact, I find her translation somewhat more foreboding.

To vanish from the face of time is even more sweeping and annihilative than merely saying that Israel must be wiped from the map. Do you understand this?

I think the woman who wrote that article should be a Gather member.

There is an enormous difference between ending the Bush Regime, for instance, and wanting to eliminate the United States. Many Americans are looking forward to the end of the Bush Regime, but, that doesn't mean a desire to end the United States.

How come you don't have a problem with what Hillary said...she wants to obliterate Iran totally...and we have the means to do it. Iran wants to see the passing of this belligerent Likudnik Regime in Israel...not the State of Israel.

What everyone seems to be oblivious to is the fact that an attack on Iran is imminent and our' troops will be fighting a war for Israel, because, Iran is absolutely no threat to us whatsoever. Whichever animosity Iran and Israel have with each other is of no concern to me...if Israel feels threatened by Iran than let Israel deal with it, but, not with our' troops.

NOTE:

"...the most important evidence of the split within the powerful elites came with the release of a new National Intelligence Estimate on Iran (NIE) on December 3, 2007.3 The NIE, reflecting the consensus view of all 16 U.S. intelligence agencies, made clear that Iran did not have a nuclear weapon, did not have a program to build a nuclear weapon, and was less determined to develop nuclear weapons than U.S. intelligence agencies had earlier claimed.

How could anyone now claim there was any legal or moral pretext for threatening Iran? But somehow the release of the NIE did not stop Washington's talk of war. The day after the NIE was released the Washington Post headline read, "U.S. Renews Efforts to Keep Coalition Against Tehran." The White House, the President, and especially the Vice-President, all continued ratcheting up the rhetoric. In fact, the president had been told of the NIE's overall conclusions months earlier, back in the summer of 2007.

When Bush arrived in the Middle East in January 2008 for his first trip to the region as president, Iran remained top of the agenda. One of his primary goals was to reassure Israel that the NIE had changed nothing in U.S. policy trajectories towards Iran and that despite the intelligence agencies' consensus that Iran was not building a nuclear weapon, "all options" remained on the table. According to Newsweek, "in private conversations with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, the President all but disowned the document, said a senior administration official who accompanied Bush on his six-nation trip to the Mideast. 'He told the Israelis that he can't control what the intelligence community says, but that [the NIE's] conclusions don't reflect his own views.'"

Newsweek went on to recognize that:

"Bush's behind-the-scenes assurances may help to quiet a rising chorus of voices inside Israel's defense community that are calling for unilateral military action against Iran. Olmert, asked by Newsweek after Bush's departure whether he felt reassured, replied: 'I am very happy.' … Bush told Olmert he was uncomfortable with the findings and seemed almost apologetic …. But the president may be trying to tell his allies something more: that he thinks the document [the NIE] is a dead letter."

Just a couple of days before Bush's January 2008 trip to Israel, the Pentagon reported an "incident" in the Strait of Hormuz. Iranian speed boats had allegedly swarmed between and among three large U.S. warships heading into the Persian Gulf, broadcasting threatening messages that the U.S. ships were about to explode and dropping small box-like objects onto the seas. Just as the sailors were aiming their guns at the provocateurs, the Iranian boats reversed course and sped away.

Reuters described how the boats "aggressively approached" the U.S. ships. The Pentagon called it "careless, reckless and potentially hostile," the White House "reckless and provocative." Numerous Persian speakers pointed out that the voice making the threats did not sound like a Persian accent. The U.S. Navy itself acknowledged that they had no idea where the voice making the threats had actually come from. Quickly the words "Tonkin Gulf incident" were on many lips. Many remembered August 4, 1964, the "attack on a U.S. Naval ship" off the coast of Vietnam Lyndon Johnson used as a pretext for sending troops to Vietnam. Years later the world learned that the alleged attack had never occurred at all; it was cooked up. Would the "swarming boat incident" in the Strait of Hormuz serve as George Bush's Tonkin Gulf?

Despite the NIE, the possibility of a U.S. military strike on Iran remains a very real threat. Neither operative intelligence estimates nor actual facts on the ground would have much sway over the ideologues in the Bush White House."

http://www.fpif.org/fpiftxt/5025

Felix, I guess you don't get it. I'm sorry. I thought you might.

Don't get what? Please enlighten me.

what I said in the last comment

Vanish from time? As though it never was? That is scary, Sue.

UPDATE:

The Unpromised Land

Obama's eagerness to placate America's Israel lobby shows the Democratic party's presidential nominee in a poor light

Ian Williams guardian.co.uk,
Thursday June 5 2008

Imagine the shock-horror: Barack Obama attends the conference of an organisation whose former officials face trial for spying on the United States!

It would be all over the blogs, except that John McCain and Hillary Clinton were attending the AIPAC conference this week in Washington DC as well, pandering to the lobby that will get you accused of anti-Semitism if you quote its own website about its power.

This non-lobby has always harassed politicians into compliance – who now remembers the way they hounded Hillary Clinton for years as a crypto-Palestinian supporter? It works. Whatever the lobby asks for, she now gives them 50% cent more. And Obama gave them 100% extra.

So there we were, thinking that the country had come of age at last, finally putting truth in the rumours about liberty and equality first spread by a group of slave-owners some ten-score and thirty years ago. Obama's securing of the nomination alone underscores how much the country has changed in the 20 years I have been here.

However, I am glad that I kept some reservations about the idea of Obama taking us to the New Jerusalem. Not least since he was busy giving away the old one to those who stole it.

After viral emails and vicious attacks against him as an anti-Israeli or even Islamic sleeper, the worm turned – in the direction they pointed. Obama promised to support an "undivided Jerusalem," as Israel's capital in his speech to the lobby.

Not a single country recognises the Israeli annexation of East Jerusalem. Indeed, the last few banana-ish republics that maintained embassies in West Jerusalem have removed them, since no country, including the US, is prepared to over-ride the UN partition resolution which designated the city as international territory.

There are proposals that would have the city as the joint capital of both Palestine and Israel, and it is possible that Obama was thinking of those. However that possibility was somewhat diminished by the complete absence of any mention of Israeli settlement building, the road blocks, the separation wall, all in defiance of international law, and indeed of Israel's own commitments to the Quartet and the peace roadmap. Indeed, far from pressuring Israel to live up to its obligations, he promised yet another $30bn in stringless aid!

Those of us who were, on Tuesday night, cheering the seeming end of the long years of neocon domination of foreign policy should pause and recall that Paul Wolfowitz addressed an AIPAC crowd and reminded them: "Israelis are not the only victims of the violence in the Middle East. Innocent Palestinians are suffering and dying in great numbers as well. It is critical that we recognize and acknowledge that fact." The crowd booed. However, he knew they would and was prepared to take the risk.

At any AIPAC rally since the defeat of Saddam, it is always good for a quick buzz to attack Iran, and of course, all the candidates obliged. So, the choice we are left with is choice between Obama, who is prepared to talk to the Iranians, but still waving a big stick, ("I will do everything in my power to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. Everything in my power. Everything.") and McCain, who wants to dispense with the talking.

Of course, some AIPACniks mightn't like talking to the Iranians, but Obama could always send Ollie North, who has considerable experience bridgebuilding between Israel and Iran and seems to be still beloved of the lobby and its friends.

But he would be better of building up ties to J-street, the new Peace-Nowish lobby whose views seem to represent far more American Jews than AIPAC, which more and more looks like a Likudnik-Neocon lobby, prepared to fight to the last Israeli – and indeed the last GI - for their eschatological visions.

Let us hop Obama's speech was just a passing pander and that the peace drive he promised takes international law on occupied territories into account."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/jun/05/
barackobama.israelandthepalestinians

UPDATE:

Arabs Shocked By Obama Speech

Arab leaders have reacted with anger and disbelief to an intensely pro-Israeli speech delivered by Barack Obama, the US Democratic presumptive presidential nominee.

Obama told the influential annual policy conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Council (Aipac): "Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel and it must remain undivided."

His comments appalled Palestinians who see occupied East Jerusalem as part of a future Palestinian state.

Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, told Al Jazeera on Thursday: "This is the worst thing to happen to us since 1967 ... he has given ammunition to extremists across the region".

"What really disppoints me is that someone like Barack Obama, who runs a campaign on the theme of change - when it comes to Aipac and what's needed to be said differently about the Palestinian state, he fails."

"I say to Obama ... please stop being more Israeli than the Israelis themselves, leave the Israelis and Palestinians alone to make decisions required for peace."

Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, rejected the statement, saying: "We will not accept an independent Palestinian state without having Jerusalem as the capital.

"I believe that case is clear."

He said: "Jerusalem is part of the six points that are subjects on the negotiations' agenda.

"And the whole world knows that East Jerusalem, Arab Jerusalem and Holy Jerusalem were occupied in 1967."

More: http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/93FE247B-452D-4022-8374-088D8704C1DE.htm

UPDATE:

OYBAMA! 'PIN'UP DEM WOOS JEWS
ISRAEL FLAG ON LAPEL, HE HAILS JERUSALEM

By ANDY SOLTIS,
Post Wire Services

June 5, 2008 --

Barack Obama, wearing a pin bearing the Israeli and American flags, kicked off his general election campaign yesterday with an impassioned appeal for Jewish votes that promised Jerusalem must remain the undivided capital of Israel.

His declaration - which immediately outraged the Palestinians - goes beyond longstanding neutral American policy, which holds that the future of Jerusalem must be agreed upon in negotiations.

Obama, in a major address the day after he clinched the Democratic nomination, told the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, "The Palestinians need a state that is contiguous and cohesive, and that allows them to prosper.

"But any agreement with the Palestinian people must preserve Israel's identity as a Jewish state, with secure, recognized and defensible borders," he added.

"Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel, and it must remain undivided."

Mahmoud Abbas, the US-backed Palestinian president who is currently trying to negotiate the future of Jerusalem, expressed outrage at Obama's stance.

"This statement is totally rejected," he said.

Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat told al-Jazeera that Obama "was giving ammunition to extremists across the region."

The United States has long called for the creation of a Palestinian state, whose capital would be determined in negotiations with Israel.

The Palestinian Authority has claimed all of Jerusalem. But in negotiations it demanded instead that east Jerusalem, captured by Israel in the 1967 Six-Day War, be returned to them so it can be their capital.

The Israelis tentatively accepted that divided capitals idea as far back as the Camp David negotiations led by President Bill Clinton in 2000, and repeated their willingness when peace talks revived last year, according to diplomatic reports.

Obama took pains yesterday to reassure his audience, a powerful lobbying group known as AIPAC, that he wouldn't pressure Israel into dangerous concessions.

"Let me be clear. Israel's security is sacrosanct. It is nonnegotiable," the Illinois senator said.

Obama, who has been criticized for sometimes not wearing an American-flag pin, wore a pin of both Old Glory and the Star of David on his lapel. Hillary Rodham Clinton, who also addressed the Washington convention, did not.

http://www.nypost.com/seven/06052008/news/nationalnews/
oybama__pinup_dem_woos_jews_114050.htm

Yes, Marilyn. It certainly is. Thanks for the comment. I think I'm talking to the wall sometimes.

Thanks, Felix. I thought that Obama was superb in his address at the AIPAC meeting.

I'm sure you did, Joe, I'm sure you did.

UPDATE: (From an Obama supporter...well, ex-supporter)

Obama Capitulates
– To The Israel Lobby

by Justin Raimondo

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's visit to the U.S. is part of a concerted effort, by the Israeli government and its American lobbyists, to convince U.S. lawmakers – and, most of all, President George W. Bush – that the time to attack Iran is now. The Israeli newspaper Yediot Achronot reports that Olmert will tell Bush "time is running out" on diplomacy and that he'd better launch an attack.

In his speech to the AIPAC conference, Olmert's message was harsh and unrelenting: Iran, he said, "must be stopped by all possible means" from acquiring a nuclear capability. Yes, sanctions must be tightened, but these are only "initial steps": what's needed, he averred, are "more drastic and robust measures" – and that can only mean one thing.

Israel would rather not act alone, but Olmert signaled that he was willing to do so if pushed: ""Israel will not tolerate the possibility of a nuclear Iran, and neither should any other country in the free world," he declared, in what was clearly a threat of unilateral action. Citing Israel's record in regard to Iraq in the eighties and Syria last year, Tim Butcher warned in the Telegraph: "The speech shortens the odds significantly on military action against Iran's nuclear program."

The U.S. would almost certainly be drawn into the conflict if Israel carried out its threat, and Olmert knows that. So does Bush, who, in any case, may not need much persuading. After all, in his speech to the Israeli parliament last month, the President declared:

"Permitting the world's leading sponsor of terror to possess the world's deadliest weapons would be an unforgivable betrayal for future generations. For the sake of peace, the world must not allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon."

For the sake of peace, we must make war: a familiar refrain that echoes down through the years, mocking the living and the dead.

The clock is ticking, and time is running out for the War Party: they must get in their licks before the most pro-Israel president, ever, leaves office. As Butcher writes: "Among Israeli supporters of military action against Iran there is concern something must be done before Mr. Bush's end of office next January as Mr. Bush is perceived as closer to Israel than any potential successor."

Don't look to Barack Obama for deliverance from this looming conflict. In his speech to AIPAC, he clearly signed on to the Lobby's latest project, departing from his prepared text to declare:

"I will do everything in my power to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. Everything in my power. Everything."

"Everything" includes murdering tens of thousands of Iranians, mostly civilians – driving the price of oil up above $300 a barrel and destroying the US economy – and involving us in a war that will make the Iraq conflict look like a Sunday school picnic. And for what?

The irony, of course, is that Iran is nowhere near obtaining nuclear weapons, as the President's own intelligence agencies recently informed him: but no matter. That's a small obstacle to those who disdain "the reality-based community," and see themselves as Making History while the rest of us watch, helpless and aghast. As Ha'aretz recently reported

"Olmert will try to convince Bush to set aside the National Intelligence Estimate on Iran's nuclear program in favor of data presented by Israel, and determine the administration's policy on Iran accordingly."

The coming war with Iran has nothing to do with "weapons of mass destruction" – no more than the invasion of Iraq ever did. It's all about preserving Israeli hegemony in the Middle East by wiping any and all recalcitrant Arab-Muslim states off the map. First Iraq, then Iran – and Syria will have its turn soon enough, along with poor prostrate Lebanon, once the jewel of the eastern Mediterranean and now an economic and political basket case.

It is almost certain we will be at war with Iran before a new President is inaugurated: now that Obama has capitulated to the Lobby, nothing but Divine Providence can stop it.

God help us all.

I have to say I was wrong – dead wrong – about Obama. In my eagerness to find a bright spot in a rapidly darkening world, I grasped on to his alluring rhetoric and his at-times trenchant critique of the Bush foreign policy, like a sinking man holding on to a life-jacket. But looking for hope in all the wrong places doesn't create opportunities for peace – it only prolongs our illusions. We must face the prospect of a much more terrible conflict than we have ever known, and look it squarely in the face, without flinching or looking for false messiahs. I know many of you are disappointed, and some of you are now exclaiming "I told you so!" All that we can do now is hope, and pray, that our country – and the Iranian people – will somehow survive the coming catastrophe.

http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=12944

Attacking Iran would be a big mistake - that's the obvious. Not standing up for Israel is a bigger mistake - that's not so obvious.

Exactly, this is my concern with another criminal attack on another country and what it's effect will have on our' country.

Israel, is not my concern...all it does is saber-rattle and threaten. I have no issue with Israel attacking anyone...it's not my country, but, I don't want our' military dragged into it's hegemonic ambitions.

This carte blanche to a foreign government is exactly what our forefathers warned against. No foreign entanglements. One thing is come to an allies aid if it is attacked, but, if it attacks another country...they're on their' own. Israel should be told by our' leaders...stop your' belligerence and don't start no war. We're not going to go to war for you.

Felix,

Don't budge an inch. Murder is murder. Calling someone an enemy, or evil, first, is thoroughly covered, and thoroughly rejected.

But love ye your enemies, and do good, and lend, hoping nothing again; and your reward shall be great, and ye shall be the children of the Highest: for He is kind unto the unthankful and to the evil.

That's the Boss. That's the end of the discussion phase.