Republicans smell blood
For the first time since 1980, Republicans are smelling that the Jewish vote is within reach. Former speaker-of-the-house Newt Gingrich promised that upon election, he would immediately shake up the State Department and demand that the US embassy in Israel be moved from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, garnering loud applause from his audience. He also promised to offer the reins of the State Department to ambassadorial maverick John Bolton, an announcement that was also greeted with ringing enthusiasm from his audience.YNet adds:
Gingrich said that he would try to restore America's ability to carry out covert operations, particularly in Iran and promised that, if elected, he would work to destabilize Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's regime by sabotaging the state's fuel supply and supporting anti-regime movements.
The former speaker, who has re-emerged as a right-wing favorite after the suspension of restaurant executive Herman Cain, roused the crowd early on by slamming recent Obama administration remarks seen as anti-Israel. He blasted last week's comments by the US ambassador to Belguim, as well as comments made by Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and a planned meeting at the State Department with “those who would censor the world on behalf of Islam.”
Criticizing what he described as a “one-sided disarmament of the Judeo-Christian civilization”, Gingrich also devoted part of his talk to domestic issues, promising to abolish the capital gains tax, repeal Obama's health care program and re-scale the federal government.
Less than a month before the primary season kicked off, Gingrich was far from the only candidate to propose a tougher stance on Tehran. Front-runner Mitt Romney said that he supported both covert and overt activities to push Tehran to abandon its weapons program.
"Ultimately, regime change is what's going to be necessary," said Romney, also garnering a standing ovation from the audience. "I will travel to Israel on my first foreign trip. I will reaffirm as a vital national interest Israel's existence as a Jewish state. I want the world to know that the bonds between Israel and the United States are unshakable," he added.
Gingrich slammed US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta for "ordering" Israel to resume its negotiations with the Palestinians: "Can you imagine if our next-door neighbor were firing missiles at us and we said 'Oh, can we come to the table?' How about saying to Hamas: 'Give up violence and come to the table?'" Gingrich said.You get a very different perspective on the Presidential race from the US (where I am now) than you do in Israel.
"It's always Israel's fault no matter how bad the other side is, and it's got to stop," he stated.
Romney, yet again, said that Obama's actions have "emboldened Palestinian hard-liners who now are poised to form a unity government with terrorist Hamas and feel they can bypass Israel at the bargaining table.
"President Obama has immeasurably set back the prospect of peace in the Middle East," he said.
GOP hopeful Michele Bachmann said that she too will relocate the US Embassy to Jerusalem should she be elected, adding that "A Bachmann administration will recognize that Israel is the historic homeland of the Jewish people.
"My administration will fully recognize Jerusalem as Israel's undivided capital, and… will also recognize Israel's 1980 annexation of the Golan Heights and any settlements, which Israel, as a sovereign state, chooses to annex. Simply put, my administration will accord Israel the respect to which sovereign, democratic nations are entitled."
The car I am using has only one station that works - WRKO talk radio. In the last two days, I've listened to Laura Ingraham, Michael Savage and Howie Carr, and the amount of bickering you hear among both the hosts and the callers over whether this candidate or that candidate is conservative enough is something we hear little about in Israel. My two biggest fears are that Romney gets the nomination and the conservatives stay home, giving the election to Obama, or that Gingrich or Bachmann (or Santorum - who is not a frontrunner right now) gets the nomination and many Republicans cross over to vote for Obama because they're 'too conservative.' As far as I am concerned, the most important outcome of the election is, "Obama must go."
Labels: Conservatives, pro-Israel, Republican Jewish Coalition
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 5:46 AM
4 Comments:
"Vote them out" is the slogan for the year. Unfortunately, no perfect candidates, but all better than Obama. That's why I started working at the GOP office... they figured out that if the "conservatives" who sat out last time because McCain wasn't sufficiently conservative had voted, Obama would have lost. So they can't sit out if they want to have a recognizable America by 2016. It will take multiple elections to get to some reasonable place; JFK's old speeches sound farther to the right than the current Republicans. And the "secret" ballot will be vital for people to be able to vote out the Dems and have America as America, not an Soviet Union.
BTW, it isn't just the national offices. Where I live, the Dems have had a majority in both houses of the legislature since the 1930s. OMG. It has always been a patronage system, but has progressed into a train robbery with protection provided by departments in D.C. The main way we found out about one part of the train robbery was that it spilled out as miscellaneous trivia in criminal investigations in New York by Cuomo. Ugh. Vote them out. Top to bottom.
It will be the Obama supporters sitting out this election, and conservatives will vote en masse against him (and for the Republican as long as it's not Mitt).
Brett_McS, if it is Mitt, they better vote anyway, until they find and field candidates that they like. Start local and go up. It will take some elections to accomplish. Even the (R)s are way left. Get on the school boards and volunteer in the schools to read to kids so they'll want to read themselves. Get them to love the story, not a particular religion's story, but all stories. It makes people smart to read everything they can get their hands on, with lots of old books and stories, not limited by anybody. But in the meantime, even if it is Mitt, VOTE OUT OBAMA and any Dems you have on your ballot. Don't sit it out like '08 or you are handing the U.S. to the marxists. Vote them out!
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