Oh my: British PM Theresa May in 'unprecedented' attack on US over Kerry speech
In what's being called an 'unprecedented' attack, British Prime Minister Theresa May on Thursday issued a blistering rebuke of US Secretary of State John Kerry's ranting attack on Israel on Wednesday.
A spokesman for Prime Minister Theresa May said it was inappropriate of Mr Kerry, America's top diplomat, to attack the make-up of the democratically-elected Israeli government – a key ally of both the US and Britain.
Downing Street also rebuked Mr Kerry for focusing on the single issue of Israeli settlements and not the whole conflict.
Intervening in the increasingly hostile international dispute today, a spokesman for the British Prime Minister said: 'We do not... believe that the way to negotiate peace is by focusing on only one issue, in this case the construction of settlements, when clearly the conflict between the Israelis and Palestinians is so deeply complex.
'And we do not believe that it is appropriate to attack the composition of the democratically-elected government of an ally.'
'The Government believes that negotiations will only succeed when they are conducted between the two parties, supported by the international community.'
It echoes Mr Netanyahu's riposte yesterday when he accused the US Secretary of State of being skewed against Israel' and talking 'obsessively' about settlements.
Mind you, Britain was one of the 14 countries that voted in favor of UN Security Council Resolution 2334 last Friday, so why are they now attacking Kerry?
Apparently because they think he went too far.
And Britain is not the only country who went after Kerry today. So did Australia's Julie Bishop.
In a statement released on Thursday, Foreign Minister Julie Bishop
said Australia was not currently a member of the Security Council and
was not eligible to vote on the resolution.
However, she said, "in voting at the UN, the Coalition government has
consistently not supported one-sided resolutions targeting Israel".
She
urged both sides to refrain from steps that damage the prospect for
peace and to "resume direct negotiations for a two-state solution as
soon as possible".
Meanwhile, in the US, it's not just President Elect Donald Trump who has been tweeting up a storm in support of Israel. So have many Representatives and Senators from Kerry's own party (and of course from the Republican party).
“While he may not have intended it, I fear Secretary Kerry, in his speech and action at the U.N., has emboldened extremists on both sides,” said Senator Chuck Schumer, the incoming Senate Democratic leader.
A
bipartisan chorus of lawmakers, upset with President Obama’s decision
last week to allow the passage of a United Nations resolution condemning Israel’s construction of settlements in disputed territory, made clear that they were looking past the departing administration.
Senator
Benjamin L. Cardin of Maryland, the top Democrat on the Foreign
Relations Committee, said he shared Mr. Kerry’s concerns “with the lack
of forward progress on a two-state solution.” But Mr. Cardin also said
he was unhappy that Mr. Obama had not vetoed the United Nations
resolution, instead abstaining from the vote. He pledged to “explore
congressional action that can mitigate the negative implications” of it.
The most ardent supporters of Israel in Congress seemed just as liberated as Mr. Kerry was to let loose.
“Secretary
Kerry’s speech today was at best a pointless tirade in the waning days
of an outgoing administration,” said Senator John McCain, Republican of
Arizona. “At worst, it was another dangerous outburst that will further
Israel’s diplomatic isolation and embolden its enemies.”
Representative
Eliot L. Engel of New York, the top Democrat on the House Foreign
Affairs Committee, called Mr. Kerry’s speech “gratuitous” and “wrong.”
“There doesn’t seem any purpose to this other than to embarrass Israel,”
Mr. Engel said. “It just pained me to watch it.”
Democratic
members of Congress who are closer to Mr. Kerry, a former senator, and
the Obama administration were more measured. Many had been angered by
Mr. Netanyahu’s decision last year to accept an invitation from the
Republican-led House to deliver a speech in the Capitol, where he
confronted the president over the Iran nuclear accord.
Yet
even these Democrats — eyeing the arrival of a Republican
administration-in-waiting that has vowed strong support for Israel —
left little doubt that they were parting ways with Mr. Obama on the
substance of the United Nations resolution.
Senator
Bill Nelson of Florida, who is facing re-election in 2018, said he knew
why Mr. Kerry was frustrated over the settlements, which he called an
“impediment toward a negotiated two-state solution.” But he was quick to
note that he was among the 88 senators who signed a letter months ago
opposing the sort of United Nations resolution on Israel that the
Security Council approved last week.
Hopefully the reactions in Congress will keep the Obama administration from saddling Israel with their 'peace plan.' Perhaps this picture says it best.
And then there were three: McCain tells Obama 'get over your temper tantrum' over Netanyahu
For the third time since Thursday, a United States Senator has blasted President Hussein Obama for his treatment of Prime Minister Netanyahu. This time, it's John McCain (R-Az) on CNN's State of the Union.
Notice what he said at the end about re-examining United Nations funding. That's long overdue anyway.
Still waiting for the first Democratic Senator to publicly attack Obama over his tantrum. Anyone want to take bets on who will go first? I'm betting on Robert Menendez (NJ). He has nothing to lose anyway.
But
in a letter
Tuesday to members of the CNAS board of directors, Flournoy said she
would
remain in her post at the think tank and asked Obama to take her out of
consideration to be the next secretary of defense. Flournoy told the
board
members that family health considerations helped drive her decision and
the fact that two of her children are leaving for college in the next
two years.
"Last night I spoke with President Obama and removed myself from
consideration due to family concerns," reads the letter. "After much
agonizing, we decided that now was not the right time for me to reenter
government. The good news is that you all are stuck with me for the
indefinite future!"
The move means that only
one of the three names rumored for the post remains under consideration: Ashton
Carter, the former deputy secretary of defense. When Hagel was ousted Monday,
speculation had immediately turned to Flournoy, Carter, and Democratic
Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island, a former Army Ranger. But Reed took himself out
of the running almost immediately after Hagel announced his resignation.
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) on Monday suggested Hagel had vented “frustration” to him over his treatment by the White House.
The
steady stream of stories in recent weeks that suggested Hagel was
having a difficult time penetrating the president’s inner circle carried
echoes of Robert Gates and Leon Panetta, two past Defense secretaries
who went on to write tell-all books critical of the president’s handling
of defense policy.
Former Democratic aide Brent Budowsky said
Democrats across the Capitol saw Hagel’s ouster as the latest example of
“unprecedented” drama created by “too tight and too controlling of an
inner circle.”
He noted that not only had each of the president’s
previous Defense secretaries voiced concern over his Syria policy, so
had former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
“This is going to
precipitate a very visible battle beginning today and going through the
confirmation of his successor about what the policy should be, and
highlight the long-term and chronic internal disagreement,” said
Budowsky, who is a columnist for The Hill.
Other defense experts say Hagel was not particularly close with the president or members of his national security team.
"He
had no relationships that were already established within this
administration," said a retired military officer with current policy
experience in Washington, who wanted to speak on background.
The
retired officer noted that Hagel is also older than the president's
closest advisers, such as Rice and chief of staff Denis McDonough.
"The generational difference was a really difficult thing," he said.
[Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Robert] Menendez [D-NJ] also panned a recent Wall Street Journal headline: “Obama Administration Shows Optimism on Iran Nuclear Talks.”
“I’m trying to glean where that’s from,” he said. “…With no sanctions
regime in place, and understanding that every sanctions that we have
pursued have needed at least a six-month lead time to become
enforceable, and then a greater amount of time to actually enforce, that
the only option left to the United States to this or any other
president, and to the West, would be either to accept a nuclear-armed
Iran or to have a military option.”
Kerry dismissed breakout as “just having one bomb’s worth,
conceivably, of material, but without any necessary capacity to put it
in anything, to deliver it, to have any mechanism to do so, and
otherwise.”
He then admitted that “our goal” is not eliminating nuclear capability as much as “proving that this is a peaceful program.”
Senator John McCain (R-Az), who could have done something about this in '08, but didn't, came up with a classic line.
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) told Kerry he was “about to hit the trifecta.”
“Geneva II was a total collapse as I predicted to you that it would
be. The only tangible result is that people who went to Geneva for the
Free Syrian National Council, their relatives were kidnapped,” he said
of the administration’s attempts to hold talks between Bashar Assad’s
regime and the opposition. “The Israeli-Palestinian talks, even though
you may drag them out for a while, are finished. And I predict to you,
even though we gave the Iranians the right to enrich, which is
unbelievable, that those talks will collapse too.”
“…On the issue of Ukraine, my hero, Teddy Roosevelt, used to say talk
softly, but carry a big stick. What you’re doing is talking strongly
and carrying a very small stick — in fact, a twig.”
'I was against Pollard's release before I was for it'
In 1999, 60 US Senators sent a letter to then-President Bill Clinton urging him not to free hostage Jonathan Pollard. One of those Senators was the current Secretary of State, John FN Kerry.
In January 1999, a bipartisan group of senators sent a strongly worded
letter to President Bill Clinton urging him not to commute the prison
sentence of Jonathan Pollard, who was then in the 12th year of a life
sentence for spying for Israel. Freeing Pollard, the lawmakers said,
would "imply a condonation of spying against the United States by an
ally," would overlook the "enormity" of Pollard's offenses and the
damage he had caused to national security, and would undermine the
United States' ability to share secrets with foreign governments. Among
the 60 signatories of the letter was John Kerry, then a senator from
Massachusetts. Fifteen years later, Kerry is singing a very different
tune.
...
Kerry wasn't alone in opposing Pollard's release in 1999, when the issue
was similarly under consideration as a possible sweetener for Israel
during its on-again, off-again talks with the Palestinians. Kerry's
allies at the time included then-Sen. Chuck Hagel, now the secretary of
defense, as well as Dianne Feinstein, the current chair of the Senate
Intelligence Committee; Mitch McConnell, the current Senate minority
leader; John McCain, a former Republican nominee for president; and
Patrick Leahy, now the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Kerry and Hagel in particular now find themselves in the awkward
position of serving in an administration that is considering letting
Pollard go, exactly the outcome they once railed against. A spokesperson
for Hagel said, "The secretary will keep private his counsel for the
president." A spokesperson for Kerry wouldn't discuss details of any
negotiations. Neither Hagel's nor Kerry's spokesperson addressed the
positions they'd taken in 1999. White House spokesperson Jay Carney said
Tuesday that Obama, who has the sole authority to commute Pollard's
sentence or grant him a pardon, "has not made a decision" on the
question.
The signatories largely had strong pro-Israel voting records, but their
contempt for Pollard crossed party lines and was striking in its
ferocity. "Any grant of clemency would now be viewed as an acquiescence
to external political pressures and a vindication of Pollard's specious
claims of unfairness and victimization.... This would send the wrong
signal to employees within the Intelligence Community. It is an
inviolable principle that those entrusted with America's secrets must
protect them, without exception, irrespective of their own personal
views or sympathies."
Report: Pollard willing to be released but Congress opposed
Contrary to a report I cited on Tuesday, the head of a campaign to free Jonathan Pollard says that Pollard would be willing to go free in exchange for 'Palestinian' terrorists.
Aaron Troodler, a spokesman for the campaign to free Pollard, told
The Daily Beast Tuesday, "Jonathan Pollard would not reject the
commutation of his sentence. The deal that is currently being discussed
is by no means a quid pro quo, rather it’s a gesture being made by the
United States to Israel. The fact is this is not a tit for tat. It’s
part of a larger agreement."
But that is not how other prominent Jewish groups that have supported
freeing Pollard, a former civilian intelligence analyst who was
sentenced to life in prison for spying on the United States on behalf of
Israel, see it.
But some members of Congress are opposed to giving up American's hostage.
Pollard’s potential release faces stiff opposition on Capitol Hill, where both Senate Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein
and ranking Republican Saxby Chambliss told The Daily Beast Tuesday
that releasing Pollard at this stage was a bad idea and they would
oppose it.
Feinstein said releasing Pollard simply in exchange for a
continuation of negotiations was not appropriate, given his crimes and
the lack of a real deal between the two parties.
“This was a major betrayal and I’ve followed it over the years. It’s
one thing if there’s an agreement. It’s another thing totally if there
isn’t,” she said.
In other words, Feinstein admits that Pollard is being held hostage, but the price being offered for him isn't high enough.
And Chambliss?
Chambliss is opposed to releasing Pollard altogether. “I think he’s done
a lot of harm to America and I just don’t think he should be released,”
the two-term Georgia Republican told The Daily Beast.
At least he's consistent.... Apparently someone forgot to tell Chambliss that Pollard is now a hostage.
At the end of the day, it doesn't matter what the Senate or the House think of releasing Pollard - now or ever. The President has the exclusive power to pardon anyone - including Pollard. And Pollard's sentence is scheduled to end late in 2015 either way.
Two other Senators came out in favor of releasing Pollard on the merits of the case: Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and John McCain (R-Az). Note especially what McCain says.
Sen. Chuck Schumer told The Daily Beast Tuesday that he supported Pollard's release, based simply on the merits of the case.
“I think he did a very bad thing. He deserved to serve some time in
jail. The amount of time he served in jail is disproportionate,” the New
York Democrat said.
As for whether Pollard’s release should be linked to the peace
process or Israel’s release of Palestinian prisoners, Schumer said,
“That I’m not going to get into.”
Sen. John McCain said Tuesday that he supports releaing Pollard on
the merits of the case but the administration must not link the release
to the ongoing peace process.
"It's disgusting," he said. "I favor his release, I think he's served
long enough, but to be used in this fashion, it's disgraceful."
More than five years after he all but conceded the Presidency by not going for Barack Hussein Obama's jugular, John Sidney McCain is calling Obama the most naive President evah.
It happened Sunday on CBS's Face the Nation.
Let's go to the videotape. The interview starts at the 3:37 mark, and the question and answer you're looking for is at the 7:54 mark. The interview runs until 9:40.
McCain had his chance to show up the most naive President evah and he didn't take it. He didn't hit Obama for listening to weekly sermons from an anti-Semite for 20 years. He didn't hit Obama for hiding a video in which Obama is alleged to have made anti-Semitic comments. He didn't hit Obama for his associations with the likes of Jeremiah Wright, Rashi Khalidi, Billy Ayers, Bernadine Dohrn, Louis Farrakhan and the most corrupt politicians Chicago has ever seen. He didn't hit Obama for his inexperience in 2008. He didn't hit Obama for his disappearing birth certificate and academic records. He didn't hit Obama for anything, and he tried to prevent Sarah Palin from doing the job for him.
And now, in 2014, McCain calls Obama naive? He still doesn't get it. Obama is anything but naive. He is undermining America from within. That's not naive. It's conniving. It may be years before the Republicans are able to cleanly win a Presidential election because of all the cheating that Obama has built into the system. And John McCain is the one who let that happen. Obama was a Manchurian candidate and McCain let him win.
Palin: 'Elitists running McCain campaign kept me silent on Obama'
I don't think RINO McCain is going to care about this anymore, but Sarah Palin Destroys Obama and his "Phony Scandals" on Fox New -
7/26/2013 - Tonight Greta Van Susteren explores why the president is
calling the D.C. scandals "phony." In this sneak peek clip of the
special, Greta talks to Sarah Palin who exposes that in her 2008 vice
presidential run, she was forbidden from talking about Obama's
relationships with both Jeremiah Wright and Bill Ayers, as well as his
job experience.
Arizona Senator John McCain (R) stole into Syria from southern Turkey on Monday to meet with Gen. Salem Idris, the leader of the Supreme Military Council of the Free Syrian Army.
McCain, one of the fiercest critics of the Obama administration’s Syria policy made the unannounced visit across the Turkey-Syria border with Gen. Salem Idris, the leader of the Supreme Military Council of the Free Syrian Army. He stayed in the country for several hours before returning to Turkey. Both in Syria and Turkey, McCain and Idris met with assembled leaders of Free Syrian Army units that traveled from around the country to see the U.S. senator. Inside those meetings, rebel leaders called on the United States to step up its support to the Syrian armed opposition and provide them with heavy weapons, a no-fly zone, and airstrikes on the Syrian regime and the forces of Hezbollah, which is increasing active in Syria.
Idris praised the McCain visit and criticized the Obama administration’s Syria policy in an exclusive interview Monday with The Daily Beast.
“The visit of Senator McCain to Syria is very important and very useful especially at this time,” he said. “We need American help to have change on the ground; we are now in a very critical situation.”
There is no sugar-coating the point. The Senate
has just confirmed the most truculent cabinet officer in respect of
Israel in more than a generation because important institutions and
leaders shrank from making an issue of it.
This is a story that is painful for many people to talk about. It
would be inaccurate to suggest that the only objection to putting Mr.
Hagel in at the war department had to do with Israel. He would be
inadequate, even were Israel not an issue. There is a broad sense within
the Jewish community — as there is among a number of non-Jewish
senators who permitted his nomination to go to the floor — that Mr.
Hagel has proven himself incompetent and disingenuous.
Yet there’s no gainsaying the special concern that his hostility to
Israel has raised among the Jewish leadership. And one of the stories
that is being spoken of in private is how humiliated the leaders of the
Jewish community feel. Nearly all of them — not all, but nearly all —
were opposed to the elevation of Mr. Hagel to the Pentagon. But only one
of the Jewish defense agencies spoke out forcefully against him.
That was the Zionist Organization of America, which is the oldest
pro-Israel organization in America, having been founded in 1897, the
same year in which Theodor Herzl convened at Basel, Switzerland, the
First Zionist Congress. It opposed the Hagel nomination early,
forthrightly, and unapologetically. The result, according to the ZOA’s
president, Morton Klein, is that it received objections from several
leaders worried about the consequences for the Jewish community of such a
public position.
Mr. Klein believes the Hagel nomination would not have been confirmed
had the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the Anti-Defamation
League, and the American Jewish Committee taken a formal public position
against Mr. Hagel. All three agencies have had many heroic moments. But
they stood down on Mr. Hagel. Said Mr. Klein: “Several senators — and
important ones — said to me: ‘If Aipac, ADL and AJCommittee — especially
Aipac — had come out and lobbied against Hagel, he would have been
stopped.”
Speaking on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Senator John McCain signaled
that he would no longer hold up his former colleague Chuck Hagel’s
nomination after Congress returns. “I don’t believe he is qualified,”
Mr. McCain said. “But I don’t believe that we should hold up his
nomination any further because I think it’s a reasonable amount of time
to have questions answered.”
McCain’s answer does more to sum up what’s wrong with partisanship,
comity, and how senators treat national security than any other recent
comment. When a cabinet nominee comes before the Senate, senators should
consider any number of factors. Before deference to the president’s
choice, friendship, or consideration of that nominee’s past or present
statements, one question should be considered disqualifying, and that is
the question of competence.
There is no graceful exit from the White House because President
Obama doesn’t give a darn whether Hagel is an incompetent fool. He’s not
backing down. He’s going to stick it to the pro-Israel community and to
Israel. He’s going to stick it to the Republicans. There is no other
way to read his determination to go forward with such a flawed nominee.
And Democrats, unlike their Republican counterparts in the Miers
nomination, don’t have the nerve or the concern for the institution in
which the nominee would serve to force the president’s hand.
Let’s recap. The president doesn’t care about an inept nominee. The
Democrats don’t care about an inept nominee. But Republicans are
supposed to defer to the White House’s judgment? This is, frankly, nuts.
All of this is doubly concerning since the report from Rutgers.
Contemporaneous notes recorded his words, and now Hagel can’t say
definitively that he didn’t say them. Meanwhile, after a slumber, two
major liberal Jewish organizations, the Anti-Discrimination League and
the American Jewish Committee, have perked up. Gosh, if true, this is
really bad stuff, they say. In fact it’s about the worst they’ve heard
from a nominee, who’s already declared himself not to be the senator
from Israel. They’ve woken up, so why won’t the GOP senators following
the Rutgers potential straw that breaks the nomination’s back?
And that’s not all there is. After discovery of even more speeches in
which Hagel was heard cozying up to Iran and embracing the
false-linkage theory, Hagel still will not say who paid for all his
speeches in the past five years. He has the information at his
fingertips, because presumably he reported his speaking fees as income
on his tax return. However, he won’t make a copy of that and send it to
the Senate for inspection. Is that because the payers are dubious
characters? Because of the amounts involved? Given everything else wrong
with this nominee, it is inconceivable that he would not be asked under
oath if he made the purported remark at Rutgers or elsewhere and who
paid for his speeches.
In any event, McCain and Graham shouldn’t fold when the going gets
tough. If this nominee is as bad as they say, they should, and indeed must,
filibuster him if the White House (unlike the Bush White House) and the
Democrats (unlike the GOP senators of yesteryear) won’t do the right
thing.
But Jonathan Tobin reports that the report on Friday that Hagel had told an audience at Rutgers University in 2007 that Israel controls the State Department has galvanized the American Jewish organizations whose silence has acted as cover for pro-Israel Democratsto support Hagel. Two of them, the Anti-Defamation League and the American Jewish Committee have now issued statements strongly questioning Hagel's fitness to be Secretary of Defense, and the result may be a whole new ballgame - including the withdrawal of Hagel's nomination - by the time the Senate returns to session next Monday.
On Thursday, Contentions called
on some of the major Jewish organizations that have been conspicuous by
their absence from the debate about Hagel to finally break their
silence on the issue and to demand an explanation about the 2007 speech
given at Rutgers University during which Hagel is alleged to have made
the crack about the Israelis and the State Department. Last night, the
Jewish Telegraphic Agency reported that both the Anti-Defamation League
and the American Jewish Committee have made such statements. The ADL told JTA Hagel needed to explain the remark but the American Jewish Committee went farther in saying that “further Senate deliberation is called for before any final vote is taken.”
These comments are part of the growing furor over Hagel that is not
going to be defused by the nominee’s assurance to Senator Lindsay Graham
that he “doesn’t recall” making the controversial statements about
Israel and the State Department. The allegations about the Rutgers
speech are credible not just because of the contemporaneous account of
the event but also because of Hagel’s history of saying similar things
about the “Jewish lobby” and disavowals of past stands favoring outreach
to Iran, Hamas and Hezbollah. As Hagel “twists in the wind” — a
Watergate allusion made today by Woodward —pressure is growing on
pro-Israel Democrats to abandon him.
With each passing day during the Congressional recess over the next
week, the Hagel deathwatch will become a bigger and bigger story. Though
Democrats closed ranks behind the president’s choice in a partisan
votes on Hagel last week the failure to block a delay of the decision on
him via a filibuster on Thursday will give some of them the time to
change their minds. Some of the pro-Israel senators like Chuck Schumer
who have been using the silence of mainstream Jewish groups about his
nomination as cover for their decision to go along with what they knew
was a questionable choice are now on the spot. As John wrote in the New York Post on Friday,
it’s time for Schumer to live up to his boast that he was the
“guardian” of Israel in the Senate. In light of the latest revelations
about the nominee’s record, that pose is meaningless if he doesn’t jump
off the Hagel bandwagon.
It is true that many of the Republicans who voted to oppose cloture
of Hagel on Thursday were doing so in order to try to force the White
House to give up more information about what the president knew about
the Benghazi terror attack. But the extra time gives members on both
sides of the aisle to reconsider the Hagel fiasco.
If this nomination is defeated, the Jewish community owes the Washington Free Beacon a debt of gratitude. WFB has gone out and fought this nomination when everyone else gave up hope.
Senate Armed Services Committee approves Hagel 14-11, but will need 60 votes for confirmation
Chuck Hagel's nomination cleared the Senate Armed Services Committee in a rare 14-11 party line vote on Tuesday night just before the President's State of the Union address. But Republicans are insisting that Hagel will need 60 votes to be confirmed by the full Senate (Hat Tip: Memeorandum)..
Several GOP senators told The
Cable Tuesday that they will not agree to a simple up or down vote on the Senate
floor this week, including Senate Armed Services Committee ranking Republican James Inhofe (R-OK), Senate Minority
Whip John Cornyn (R-TX), John McCain (R-AZ), and Lindsey Graham (R-SC).
Inhofe's demand for 60 votes is related to his overall
objection to Hagel becoming defense secretary, which is based on Hagel's past
record on issues ranging from Iran, Israel, Hamas, and cuts to the defense
budget. Inhofe also wants Hagel to further disclose financial records related
to his past speeches.
"We're going to require a 60-vote threshold," Inhofe told The Cable.
Cornyn told The Cable,
"There is a 60-vote threshold for every nomination."
Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin (D-MI) told The
Cable that he is confident Hagel can avoid a filibuster.
"If there's a filibuster, I think there will be more than 60
votes to stop a filibuster," Levin said.
Levin is adding up the 55 Democrats in the Senate, all of
whom are expected to support Hagel, with the two Republicans who support Hagel, Thad Cochran (R-MS) and Mike Johanns (R-NE), and the senators
who have pledged not to filibuster Hagel, such as McCain.
I don't understand McCain's objection to a filibuster, but Inhofe seems to have found a way to work around it.
Inhofe insisted that his demand for a 60-vote threshold is
not a "filibuster." Inhofe said he will object to unanimous consent for a
simple majority vote, which will prevent Reid from bringing the Hagel
nomination to the floor without first filing for cloture, which requires 60
votes to proceed to a final vote.
"It's not a filibuster. I don't want to use that word,"
Inhofe said.
It may be a distinction without a difference, but it's a
distinction that GOP senators like McCain are prepared to embrace. McCain has
repeatedly said he is opposed to filibustering Hagel but told The Cable Tuesday that he would vote
against a cloture vote this week if the White House doesn't provide the
information he has requested on the president's actions the night of the
Benghazi attack.
"We need to know what the president's conversations were,"
McCain said. "I would vote no [on cloture] on Thursday [unless the information
is provided]."
Graham is also opposed to a "filibuster" of Hagel, but told The Cable today he would place a "hold"
on the Hagel nomination after the committee vote.
"I think the president has stonewalled the Congress on
Benghazi. I think a lot of people are worried that we don't have all the
information on Chuck Hagel," said Graham. "I'm not inclined to filibuster. I'm
going to hold him and Reid is not going to not honor my hold and try to hold
the vote on Thursday."
Senate aides told The
Cable that the earliest Reid could call for a cloture vote would be
Wednesday, according to Senate rules. That would set up a final vote for
Friday, unless there were unanimous consent to move the vote up to Thursday. If
the vote doesn't happen by Friday, it would be delayed until after the
President's Day recess.
The Democrats' behavior is beneath contemptible. The Republican objections to Hagel are legitimate and deserve at least a fair hearing before the vote. Everyone should be tired of being railroaded by Obama.
Levin wants to vote on Hagel on Tuesday, Republicans may walk out
The Obama administration is determined to push ahead with Chuck Hagel's nomination to be Secretary of Defense, and Senator Carl Levin (D-Mi) is planning to dutifully bring the nomination to a vote on Tuesday. But Republicans may walk out(Hat Tip: Memeorandum).
Meanwhile, two Senate Republican aides said that some GOP senators
were considering the possibility of walking out during such a vote.
Levin faces a conundrum: He has the ability to force a Hagel vote
through the committee on a party-line vote, since Democrats outnumber
Republicans. But doing so could damage the committee’s longtime
bipartisan spirit.
Last Thursday’s hearing with Panetta alarmed Levin, Democrats said.
Levin worries the aggressive, pointed questioning that Republicans
directed at Panetta over the Sept. 11 attacks in Benghazi, Libya, could
signal some Republicans simply will not compromise on the issue of
Hagel’s nomination.
“Fed up is the right term for [Levin’s mood],” said a Democratic
source. “After the Benghazi hearing, it showed what we are dealing with
on the Republican side.”
...
Democratic aides were unhappy with the week’s turn of events. The
Senate Armed Services Committee has traditionally been collegial; it has
passed a defense authorization bill for over 50 consecutive years, as
defense advocates like to point out. But Republicans’ grilling of
Panetta on Thursday seemed to indicate that the bipartisan feeling has
diminished, and Republicans signaled again Sunday they were playing for
keeps.
"There are two options: If Hagel doesn't fully disclose all the
things in the letter [in which Republicans made requests for more
disclosure] ... either you will see a party line vote or Republicans
will stand up and leave the room in protest,” said a senior Republican
Senate aide. “Does Levin really want that to happen on his watch as
chairman? … It would really debilitate the committee.”
Why should the Senate Armed Services Committee be any different than anyplace else under the 'post-partisan' Obama administration? Here's betting that Levin calls the vote and all the Republicans except McCain walk out.
Is Chuck roast? Hagel refuses to disclose foreign funding sources
Will this finally be enough to break the Obama administration's hold over Senate Democrats when it comes to the Hagel nomination? Chuck Hagel has refused to disclose to the Senate Armed Services Committee the sources of his foreign funding over the last five years. Is Chuck roast? (Hat Tip: Noah P).
Republican members of the committee asked Hagel last week for
information on whether any of the organizations received funding from
any foreign government, individual, or corporation — a request he
declined late Tuesday in a letter citing confidentiality agreements.
"[T]he
information you seek is legally controlled by the individual entities
and not mine to disclose," he said, adding that he was not involved in
the day-to-day operation of the organizations. "As a board-member, I
have a fiduciary duty that includes the obligation to maintain the
confidentiality of non-public corporate information. The information may
also be subject to various other legal requirements or contractual
arrangements that prohibit its disclosure."
According to a senior GOP aide close to the confirmation process, "Senators are not reacting well to this response."
"Hagel
is refusing to answer any of the questions or make any effort to get
them the answers," the aide said. "He is basically telling Senators they
have no right to know if he has been unduly influenced by foreign
governments or foreign agents over the last five years. What is he
hiding? I'm told several Senators, including McCain, who have previously
expressed opposition to a filibuster said privately yesterday that
failure to disclose foreign funding information would change their
thinking."
"Committee members have specific concerns with regard
to foreign contributions to the Atlantic Council by Saad Hariri (or the
Hariri family), Dinu Patriciu, Kazakhstan, Bidzina Ivanishvili (his
supporters/network) – and the nexus between Chevron's investments in
Kazakhstan and their involvement with Hagel at the Atlantic Council,"
the aide added. All of those groups have paid chairs or programs at the
foundation.
The committee also requested the transcripts or
recordings of any paid speeches delivered by Hagel since he left the
Senate — a request Hagel also said he could not accomodate. In his
letter to lawmakers, Hagel said his contracts stipulated the speeches
were off the record and not to be recorded. He added that he never
prepared written remarks before his speeches.
Here's hoping for the filibuster - it's a much better hope than hoping that any Democrats will put country ahead of party and break ranks.
You would think that a Republican Senator who was present at Chuck Hagel's shameful performance last Thursday would be willing to do just about anything to defeat Hagel's nomination. But not John McCain. Not only has McCain apparently not decided how to vote on Hagel's nomination, he's not even willing to support a filibuster to prevent the incompetent, somnolent Hagel's nomination from coming to a vote.
"I do not support a
filibuster," the Arizona Republican told reporters at the Capitol. "I
don't think it's appropriate and I would oppose such a move."
McCain, the Republican presidential nominee in 2008, did not say whether he would vote to confirm Hagel.
...
But even before
McCain spoke, a source close to the administration of President Barack
Obama said the White House believed it would have the votes to get Hagel
confirmed.
Administration insiders say their "head count" shows
that all 53 Democrats in the Senate, as well as two independents and a
handful of moderate Republicans, are likely to vote to confirm Hagel.
The Democrats at least have the excuse that they are putting party (and political future) ahead of country. But what's McCain's excuse? More here (Hat Tip: Memeorandum).
Video: Hagel refuses to answer McCain's surge question
Keep the popcorn out. If only Senator John McCain (R-Az) had been this effective in the 2008 Presidential campaign, we might not have Chuck Hagel on the verge of becoming Secretary of Defense.
I am an Orthodox Jew - some would even call me 'ultra-Orthodox.' Born in Boston, I was a corporate and securities attorney in New York City for seven years before making aliya to Israel in 1991 (I don't look it but I really am that old :-). I have been happily married to the same woman for thirty-five years, and we have eight children (bli ayin hara) ranging in age from 13 to 33 years and nine grandchildren. Four of our children are married! Before I started blogging I was a heavy contributor on a number of email lists and ran an email list called the Matzav from 2000-2004. You can contact me at: IsraelMatzav at gmail dot com
