Trust: 71% believe Obama's IRS destroyed emails to hide guilt
What do you call a country where the public believes the taxman plays politics? The United States of America. A Rasmussen poll finds that 71% of the American public believes that the IRS destroyed its emails to hide its guilt in targeting pro-Israel and tea party groups (Hat Tip: Memeorandum).
Most voters think it’s likely the IRS deliberately destroyed e-mails
about its investigations of Tea Party and other conservative groups to
hide its criminal behavior. Two-out-of-three now believe IRS employees
involved in these investigations should be jailed or fired, and most
suspect the agency of targeting other political opponents of the Obama
administration.
A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 53% of
Likely U.S. Voters believe that the Internal Revenue Service broke the
law when it targeted Tea Party and other conservative groups. That’s up
from 49% earlier this year
and back to the level seen last September.
Little changed from the early surveys are the 22% who think the IRS did
not break the law. Slightly more (25%) are not sure. (To see survey
question wording, click here.)
When citizens cannot trust independent agencies to be independent, they are more likely to try to defy the laws that those agencies are meant to enforce. I don't know of anyone famous who said that, but intuitively, it's correct.
Z Street is a pro-Israel organization whose application for a tax exemption was denied in 2009 after it was asked whether it supports the 'occupation.' Z Street sued the IRS (never cross a couple where both spouses are lawyers :-), and now finds itself at the center of a major scandal in the US involving 'lost' IRS emails.
In 2009 a pro-Israel group called Z Street applied to the IRS for
tax-exempt status. When the process was delayed, an IRS agent told the
group that its application was undergoing special review because "these
cases are being sent to a special unit in the D.C. office to determine
whether the organization's activities contradict the Administration's
public policies." In August 2010 Z Street sued the IRS on grounds that
this selective processing of its application amounted to viewpoint
discrimination.
Under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure
and legal precedent, once the suit was filed the IRS was required to
preserve all evidence relevant to the viewpoint-discrimination charge.
That means that no matter what dog ate Lois Lerner's hard drive or what
the IRS habit was of recycling the tapes used to back up its email
records of taxpayer information, it had a legal duty not to destroy the
evidence in ongoing litigation.
In
private white-collar cases, companies facing a lawsuit routinely operate
under what is known as a "litigation hold," instructing employees to
affirmatively retain all documents related to the potential litigation. A
failure to do that and any resulting document loss amounts to what is
called "willful spoliation," or deliberate destruction of evidence if
any of the destroyed documents were potentially relevant to the
litigation.
At the IRS, that requirement
applied to all correspondence regarding Z Street, as well as to
information related to the vetting of conservative groups whose
applications for tax-exempt status were delayed during an election
season. Instead, and incredibly, the IRS cancelled its contract with
email-archiving firm Sonasoft shortly after Ms. Lerner's computer
"crash" in June 2011.
In the federal
District of Columbia circuit where Z Street's case is now pending, the
operating legal obligation is that "negligent or reckless spoliation of
evidence is an independent and actionable tort." In a 2011 case a D.C.
district court also noted that "Once a party reasonably anticipates
litigation, it must suspend its routine document retention/destruction
policy and put in place a 'litigation hold' to ensure the preservation
of relevant documents."
The
government's duty is equally pressing. "When the United States comes
into court as a party in a civil suit, it is subject to the Federal
Rules of Civil Procedure as any other litigant," the Court of Federal
Claims ruled in 2007. The responsibility to preserve evidence should
have been a topic of conversation between the IRS chief counsel's office
and the Justice Department lawyers assigned to handle the Z Street
case.
As it happens, the IRS also had a
duty to notify Congress if it learned that discoverable evidence had
been lost or destroyed. We now know that the IRS has been aware of Lois
Lerner's lost emails since at least February, but IRS Commissioner
John Koskinen
failed to mention this in his congressional testimony on March
26, saying instead that the IRS was fully cooperating with congressional
requests.
...
Attorney General
Eric Holder
won't name a special prosecutor, but there's still plenty of room
for the judge in the Z Street case to force the IRS to explain and
answer for its "willful spoliation" of email evidence.
Oh my.... Here's betting that if they're prosecuted and convicted before January 2017, Obama will pardon them.
From time to time over the past four years, I have covered the IRS's refusal to grant tax-exempt status to Z Street, a pro-Israel organization. This week there was a breakthrough and the IRS will be forced to answer the charges against it.
On Tuesday, Federal Judge Ketanje Brown Jackson issued the first
substantive ruling in any suit that challenged the IRS’s pose of
political neutrality under the Obama administration. The case concerns Z
Street, a Philadelphia area-based pro-Israel organization that filed
for tax-exempt status in December 2009 because of its role in educating
the public about Israel and the Middle East conflict. The group’s
founder Lori Lowenthal Marcus wrote in the Jewish Press this week about what followed:
On July 19, 2010, when counsel for Z STREET spoke with the IRS agent
to whom the organization’s application had been assigned, that agent
said that a determination on Z STREET’s application may be further
delayed because the IRS gave “special scrutiny” to organizations
connected to Israel and especially to those whose views “contradict
those of the administration’s.”
Z Street subsequently sued the government and rightly argued that its
constitutional rights had been violated because of the “viewpoint
discrimination” that the IRS agent had openly displayed. Now after years
of delays, Judge Jackson has ruled that by asserting that Z Street had
no right to sue, the government had tried to “transform a lawsuit that
clearly challenges the constitutionality of the process … into a dispute
over tax liability.” She similarly dismissed the government’s claims of
sovereign immunity.
What has this got to do with the Tea Party and its complaints? Plenty.
This ruling will force the IRS to open its books on the procedures it
used and decisions it made reviewing Z Street’s tax-exempt application,
procedures it has tried to keep shrouded. As the case proceeds, Z
Street’s attorneys can seek depositions from many who have been part of
the larger attempt to sit on similar applications by other conservative
groups.
In other words, this case may be the straw that breaks the camel’s
back of the IRS’s politically prejudicial policies. If an IRS agent can
reject or stall a pro-Israel group’s application on the grounds that
“these cases are being sent to a special unit in the D.C. office to
determine whether the organization’s activities contradict the
Administration’s public policies,” then no group, no matter what its
political orientation or cause is safe from being subjected to a
political litmus test designed by any administration of either political
party.
Bring it on. Too bad it's taken so long to reach trial that Obama's term will likely be over before we know what happened.
Lois Lerner takes the 5th and what it has to do with Israel
For those of you who think that this story has nothing to do with Israel, please keep in mind that we know of at least one pro-Israel organization that was denied tax-exempt status because it opposed the 'two-state solution.' And the IRS admitted it.
The second revelation was one made by Bloomberg News.
That media agency obtained IRS documents revealing that, in addition to
the terms Tea Party and 9/12, other terms were used in flagging
organizations seeking tax exempt status for additional scrutiny. While
the headline of the article, and what was the object of most media
attention, was that terms that suggested not just conservative groups,
but also liberal or progressive groups were given the IRS evil eye –
words such as “occupy” and “progressive” were allegedly triggers, as was
the word “Israel.”
But far down in a long article the Bloomberg reporter explains that, “Disputed Territories” was considered problematic. To wit:
‘Disputed Territories”
The November, 2010 [BOLO - Be On the Look Out] list also has terms
that could be related to Israel, looking for applications that ‘deal
with disputed territories in the Middle East’ and ‘may be inflammatory.’
Well, golly! What kind of a group calls a particular area of land
“disputed territories,” which the vast majority of people, either for
ideological or simply conformity refer to as the “West Bank?” Yes, that
would be strong Zionist groups such as Z STREET.
Half of all voters consider radical Muslims the bigger terrorist threat
facing the nation, but supporters of President Obama consider the Tea
Party to be as big a danger.
A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 51% of
Likely U.S. Voters consider radical Muslims to be the bigger threat to
the United States today. Thirteen percent (13%) view the Tea Party that
way, and another 13% consider other political and religious extremists
to be the larger danger. Six percent (6%) point to local militia groups.
Two percent (2%) see the Occupy Wall Street movement as the bigger
terrorist threat. (To see survey question wording, click here.)
However, among those who approve of the president’s job performance,
just 29% see radical Muslims as the bigger threat. Twenty-six percent
(26%) say it’s the Tea Party that concerns them most. Among those who
Strongly Approve of the president, more fear the Tea Party than radical
Muslims.
IRS First Post-Scandal Appearance in Court Reveals Effort to Run From Justice
The IRS has learned nothing from all its travails in Congress. It continues to behave as Obama's Gestapo.
As you might recall, Z Street is a Jewish organization that was set up in part to counter the pro-'Palestinian' J Street. Z Street sought exempt organization status as a 501(c)(3) corporation, but has not yet been able to get it because it is pro-Israel (or possibly because it disagrees with the Obama administration's position on Judea and Samaria). In other words, Z Street is the foreign policy alter-ego of the Tea Party organizations that have grabbed most of the headlines in the IRS scandal.
In 2010, Z Street sued the IRS. On Tuesday, the IRS sought (again) to dismiss that lawsuit. This press release was put out by Lori Lowenthal Marcus, the President of Z Street, in response.
IRS First Post-Scandal Appearance in Court Reveals Effort to Run From Justice
Yesterday
marked a new entry in an ongoing pattern of changing stories and
defenses to prevent the light of day from exposing egregiously
unconstitutional behavior by one of the most dreaded limbs of
government: the Internal Revenue Service.
“It is no surprise
that the IRS is desperately fighting to prevent anyone from learning
exactly how the IRS decided to categorize organizations on the basis of
their political, religious or other viewpoints, an issue from which the
government entity has been reeling for weeks, and with good reason,”
said Lori Lowenthal Marcus, president of Z STREET.
Represented by
the Justice Department, the IRS filed a brief seeking to dismiss the
lawsuit against it brought by Z STREET, a staunchly pro-Israel
organization, which was filed in August, 2010.
That lawsuit was
the first public utterance that the IRS was discriminating against
certain organizations because of their viewpoints, rather than because
of a failure to follow the required guidelines of eligibility.
In
May, the admission - after years of denials - by the IRS itself that it
had engaged in categorizing politically conservative groups for
differing treatment touched off a flurry of congressional and media
attention. Most of the attention was focused on the treatment of “Tea
Party” and other politically or socially conservative groups.
Z
STREET brought its lawsuit nearly three years ago, after being told by
the IRS agent to whom its file had been assigned that the IRS had to
“give special scrutiny to organizations connected to Israel,” and that
the files of some of those “organizations were sent to a special unit in
Washington, D.C. to determine whether the activities of the
organization contradicted the public policies of the administration.”
Such treatment by the IRS constitutes bald-faced viewpoint
discrimination and is a violation of the U.S. Constitution.
The
IRS has defended itself in the lawsuit on several different grounds,
including the absurd notion that the government is immune from such a
lawsuit. (In fact, of course the Bill of Rights -- which begins with the
First Amendment, securing the right to free speech -- was created
specifically to protect citizens from unconstitutional behavior by the
government).
In particular, the government has repeatedly
denounced Z STREET for failing to wait the requisite number of days
before complaining and going to court for not receiving tax exempt
status. And as Z STREET explained in every single one of its own court
filings, the lawsuit was not brought because it had not been given (or
denied) tax exempt status within a particular time frame. The lawsuit
was brought because Z STREET believes, based upon what the IRS agent
herself said, that the IRS engaged in unconstitutional viewpoint
behavior. There is no requirement to wait a set period of time before
making such a claim.
However, in yesterday’s filing, the IRS
claimed - for the first time, not surprisingly, as it completely
contradicts every other court filing by the IRS in this case - that Z
STREET’s lawsuit should be dismissed because it failed to make out the
very claim the IRS had repeatedly insisted Z STREET was making - that it
qualifies for, and should have already been given, tax exempt status.
It bears noting that yesterday another set of significant documents was released by the IRS, via
the House Ways and Means Committee. These, in an apparent attempt to
prove that the IRS was not just engaging in viewpoint discrimination
against politically conservative groups, showed that the IRS had created
a category for review it labeled “progressive,” as if that made
everything kosher. But also included in the documents released was a
category labeled “occupied territory advocacy.” In other words, the IRS
was indeed singling out applications for tax exempt status on the basis
of a particular political viewpoint which is inconsistent with this
administration’s. And that is bald-faced viewpoint discrimination and
is the basis for Z STREET’s lawsuit against the IRS.
The first
hearing in Z STREET’s lawsuit against the IRS will be held on July 19 at
10:00 in Courtroom 17 before Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, in the
Federal District Court of the District of Columbia.
And you thought the IRS acted unfairly to the Tea Party....
Krauthammer: Obama Has Been Parsing Words That Makes Clinton Look Unsophisticated
Charles Krauthammer destroys President Hussein Obama on his response to the IRS scandal. "He says I didn't know about
the IG report. Well if he didn't know about any of this, never heard
any complaints, then he would have said I don't know anything about this
at all. The IG is a peculiar answer by a guy who I have now seen for
weeks now, he and his spokesman have been parsing words that make
Clinton look unsophisticated."
The "IG" (Inspector General) is the same person who claimed on Thursday that there was 'no evidence' that the IRS discriminated against pro-Israel groups.
Let's go to the videotape.
To see why Obama is Clintonian rather than Nixonian go here.
I had seen something about Pam Geller not being invited to CPAC this year. Being in Israel, I may not follow everything in the US as closely as I should. But this story might be connected to that one.
I was surprised and honored that Jihad Watch was among the nominees for the People's Choice Blog Award, sponsored by Right Wing News and TheTeaParty.net, to be awarded at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) 2013.
As you can see from the vote above, Jihad Watch won decisively,
getting over 50% of the vote in a field of fifteen. And I received
confirmation of the victory from one of the organizers of the CPAC blog
awards when I asked him when voting officially ended:
From: XXXXXXXXX Subject: Re: You've Been Nominated For A People's Choice Award At the CPAC Blogger Awards Date: March 2, 2013 2:58:26 AM EST To: Robert Spencer
Robert
It officially ended at midnight. You won!
But as time went by and no announcement was made of this victory, and
the voting continued despite my having been told that it officially
ended last Friday night and that I had won, and the promised
links and other placement promised to the winning blog didn't
materialize, I started to wonder. So I contacted the organizer who had
written me telling me I won and asked him what was going on.
He told me that there was a slight problem: the Tea Party group,
which co-sponsored this People's Choice Blog Award, didn't want to allow
me to receive it at CPAC next week unless I promised not to criticize
Grover Norquist and Suhail Khan as I accepted the award.
I told the organizer that I couldn't agree to that. He asked me if I
had planned to talk about Grover and Suhail. I said no, I hadn't, but I
had to now.
So that's that. The People's Choice Blog Award is now the Grover's
Choice Blog Award. I will not be going to CPAC and will not be receiving
this award.
And since I will not be allowed to receive this award at CPAC, I will talk about Norquist and Khan here.
There was a President named George W. Bush who had a very simple test for Islamic terrorism: Are you with us or with the terrorists? I don't care how anti-tax Norquist and Khan are if they're pro-Hamas. And Robert Spencer (of whom I already had a high opinion) has just gone up some more in my book.
Boston Bruins goalie Tim Thomas, the second American-born player ever to win the Conn Smythe trophy as the most valuable player in the Stanley Cup finals, has caused a bit of a scandal by skipping the team's White House visit with President Obama on Monday. The Bruins are in Washington to play the Capitals on Tuesday evening.
Tim Thomas, one of two American players on last year’s roster, chose not to attend the ceremony. During his six-minute speech in the East Room, Obama mentioned Thomas for his performance in the Stanley Cup Final and how he was only the second American to win the Conn Smythe Trophy as postseason MVP.
“I believe the federal government has grown out of control, threatening the rights, liberties, and property of the people,’’ Thomas said in a statement on his Facebook page. “This is being done at the executive, legislative, and judicial level. This is in direct opposite to the Constitution and the Founding Fathers’ vision for the federal government. Because I believe this, today I exercised my right as a free citizen and did not visit the White House. This was not about politics or party, as in my opinion, both parties are responsible for the situation we are in as a country. This was about a choice I had to make as an individual.’’
Bruins president Cam Neely released a statement on the Bruins’ website.
“As an organization we were honored by President Obama’s invitation to the White House. It was a great day and a perfect way to cap our team’s achievement from last season. It was a day that none of us will soon forget. We are disappointed that Tim chose not to join us, and his views certainly do not reflect those of the Jacobs family or the Bruins organization. This will be the last public comment from the Bruins organization on this subject.’’
General manager Peter Chiarelli spoke with Thomas several times about attending the ceremony over the last few months.
We must all celebrate that Thomas, born in Flint, Mich., nearly 38 years ago, has the right to say all of that and more, and we’ve grown accustomed to hearing near-identical dogma from the right wing/conservative/Tea Party end of our political spectrum for the last 2-3 years. He is a free man, living in a free country, and he can sing that blatherall from his hotel room, his crease, and the corner of Causeway and Staniford if he so chooses.
As a country, we’re not yet so deep in the handbasket that any of us has been denied that right. Thankfully.
But yesterday was not about politics and government until Thomas made it about politics and government. The day, long set on the calendar, was a day when the Boston Bruins were asked to visit Pennsylvania Avenue to celebrate what they did as a team last season. It was their day in the national spotlight, until Thomas didn’t show, and then the focal point became, much the way it would be in a hockey game, on the guy who was no longer standing in goal.
Shabby. Immature. Unprofessional. Self-centered. Bush league. Need I go on? All that and more applies to what Thomas did, on a day when Cup teammates Mark Recchi (now retired), Shane Hnidy (a radio guy these days in Winnipeg), and Tomas Kaberle (a member of some Original Six team in Canada), all gladly joined the red-white-blue-black-and-gold hugfest at the White House.
Thomas needed to be there in solidarity, and celebration, with his team. It was the same government yesterday, and will be today, that protected his country, his security, his family, and his right to make $5 million a year, all last season. In his absence, he stole his teammates’ spotlight. Win as a team. Lose as a team. And when asked to stand up and take a bow, then stand up there and suffer if need be, even if you don’t like the setting, the host, or any of the political trappings and tenets that come with it.
Team guys don’t opt out of team meetings or celebrations.
I wonder what DuPont would have said had one of the Red Sox or Patriots or Celtics opted out of meeting George W. Bush when he was in the White House (yeah, it's been a heck of a decade for Boston sports).
At Commentary, Jonathan Tobin defended Thomas (didn't know you followed Boston sports Jonathan):
But the Globe and other liberal outlets that claim Thomas politicized something that had nothing to do with partisan strife are wrong. The business of schlepping team members and officials and their trophy for photos with the president months after their triumph may be a harmless tradition, but as much as the president serves as head of state as well as head of our government, no one should feel obligated to play along with the charade. Thomas was fully within his rights and is no more at fault than any left-wing actors who denied themselves the pleasure of a visit with George W. Bush.
Thomas, the winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy as the most valuable player in the 2011 playoffs, was one of only three American citizens on the Bruins and is also an active member of the Republican Party. And because he sports the image of the Gasden flag (“Don’t Tread On Me”), the symbol of the Tea Party, on his goalie mask, it isn’t too hard to figure out where his political sympathies lie. But unlike some Tea Partiers who got in the face of politicians who voted for the bank bailouts, the stimulus or Obamacare, Thomas kept a respectful distance from the event.
Oddly enough, the Globe’s Dupont criticized Thomas as lacking the guts to criticize Obama to his face. Of course, creating an incident at the White House would have been in bad taste, embarrassed his teammates and spoiled their fun. Nor should, as Dupont claimed, his beliefs have obligated him to not represent his country at the Olympics, as Thomas has done. Reading this attack, one can’t help wondering whether he would not be praised in the Globe and elsewhere had his protest been against a Republican president.
Indeed.
Let's go to the videotape. More after the video.
I don't think I'd want to meet Obama either. Of course, like Binyamin Netanyahu, I'd probably have to enter and leave the White House through the service entrance and leave the photographers at home.
The Globe has a poll on Thomas' actions, and frankly he's getting slammed. If you're so inclined, please go here and agree with Tim Thomas.
Allen West: 'Ron Paul is not the kind of guy to be sitting at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Representative Allen West (R-Fla) tells a tea party gathering that isolationist Ron Paul (R-Tx) is not the man we want sitting at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
Sammy Levine writes about a session at the recent AIPAC convention which attempted to prove that the Tea Party is pro-Israel.
The three discussed the fear of some, including a UCLA professor present at another session, that the tea party movement’s focus on dramatically reducing the federal budget might threaten the three billion dollars per year America gives to Israel. This is a legitimate concern to anyone who is not familiar with the tea party movement. Though the tea party movement is determined to reduce the budget, it is conservative enough in political ideology to believe in a robust national defense. According to [Gary] Bauer, Ron and Rand Paul are outliers who do not represent the mainstream of the tea party movement on foreign affairs. As it happens, when Rand Paul made public his wish to cut off all of American foreign aid, including to Israel, Bauer mobilized twenty thousand emails asking for reconsideration. And Bauer declared that in addition to current levels of aid, “we should take money we’re giving to the Palestinians, and give it to Israel” too, in response to the new unity agreement between Hamas and Fatah.
Dick Armey told the audience he believes America’s investment in Israel is in our vital national security interest because both countries are on the front lines in the war against radical Islam. The tea party movement supports Israel, he said, because it is an “island of freedom” in a sea of despotism. Plus, Americans and Israelis share the same fundamental values: liberty, democracy, and justice.
There is, Armey continued, an even more fundamental reason as to why the tea party — like conservatives in general — is so forthright in its support of Israel: the overwhelming majority of new tea party members in Congress are evangelical Christians. And, as anyone who is familiar with the Old Testament knows, God instructs the Israelites that “I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curses thee.” Christians support Israel, said Armey, because “God gave this land [of Israel] to Abraham and the Jews.” For Armey, it doesn’t go too far to say that the tea party movement believes supporting Israel is a moral imperative, a command from God.
65 of 87 Republican freshmen sign letter calling to continue aid to Israel
So much for those of you who thought that the Tea Party representatives would vote to cut off aid to Israel. 65 of the 87 freshmen Republicans in Congress have signed onto a letter to the party leadership calling for it to continue the current levels of aid to Israel.
Among the 87 freshmen, 65 have signed the letter initiated by Reps. Robert Dold (R-Ill.) and Austin Scott (R-Ga.) to the party's House leadership.
"As Israel faces threats from escalating instability in Egypt, Hezbollah rockets in Lebanon, Hamas terrorists in Gaza and the existential danger posed by Iran's nuclear program, full US security assistance to Israel, including supporting Israel's acquisition of the Iron Dome defense system, has never been more important for our own national security interests," said the letter asking fellow freshmen to sign, which was still accruing signatures as of Tuesday.
The appeal -- and the support it garnered -- is significant because it answers questions pro-Israel groups had about the 2011 class of GOP freshmen, many of them spurred to office by the Tea Party movement, which has cost cutting as its central focus.
The letter is a sign that US President Barack Obama's proposal this week to maintain levels of funding for Israel, currently at about $3 billion annually, will be untouched.
Dold joined Rep. Gary Peters (D-Mich.), who is not a freshman lawmaker, in sending a similar letter last week to House appropriators.
The Tea Party is great for the US - Israel relationship
You will recall a post I did two weeks ago, in which I attacked a New York Times piece that set Rand Paul up as a boogeyman for an argument that the Tea Party was going to turn the Republican party into a bunch of anti-Israel isolationists. That article is one of several of the same genre, coming mostly from the Leftists in the media, in which they argue that the Tea Party is bad for the US - Israel relationship. Jennifer Rubin takes on the latest one.
In conversations with multiple Republican leaders and their advisors, I've detected not a whiff of neo-isolationism, nor, frankly, anything but robust support for Israel (coupled with criticism of the Obama administration's sometimes harsh public rhetoric about the Jewish state). A senior Senate aide tells me: "This is a freshmen class of Republicans whose pro-Israel credentials are beyond dispute by anyone except fierce partisan Democrats and liberal journalists with anti-GOP blinders. In fact, these new Republicans would make the Maccabees proud."
But that hasn't stopped some reporters and some left-leaning columnists from spinning the notion that the election of Republicans is a mixed blessing, or even a bad omen, for Israel. The New York Times tried it, with little evidence.
The latest is a shoddy piece of propaganda in The New Republic by Barry Gewen. In a piece headlined, "How the Tea Party is wrecking Republican foreign policy," Gewen accuses the Tea Party of championing neo-isolationism and anti-Israel views, setting up a clash within the GOP.
...
If you look at some of the Tea Party favorites, you'll find stirring defenses of Israel. Marco Rubio (whose speech on Israelwas one of the strongest by an candidate in recent memory) and Scott Brownboth distinguished themselves on this front. This was also true in the 2010 primaries. In California, Carly Fiorina gained the support of Tea Partyers in a race against Tom Campbell in which Campbell's shaky record on Israel and association with CAIR became an issue. Likewise, in Indiana, Dan Coats, who voiced his strong support for Israel and criticism of Obama's response to the threat posed by Iran, crushed conservative John Hostettler, whose anti-Israel rhetoric has been roundly criticized. Noah Pollak, executive director of the Emergency Committee for Israel, tells me, "As the polling shows, Tea Partyers are among the most pro-Israel voters in America, and the Tea Party vote helped ensure that the incoming Congress will be even more pro-Israel than the previous one. As for Ron Paul -- on foreign policy, he is to the Tea Party what J Street is to the pro-Israel community: a pretender who speaks for a few disaffected cranks. The Tea Party is great for the U.S.-Israel relationship."
Sounds to me like the American Left and its media fan club are doing some wishful thinking in the hope of preventing a hemorrhage of Jewish votes to the Republicans in 2012. But their effort is an exercise in futility. Pro-Israel Jews recognize that there's only one thing on the American political scene that's hurting the US - Israel relationship: Barack Obama's presence in the White House.
Here are some very interesting remarks by Joel Pollak about his recent election battle with J Street Jan Schakowsky.
Let's go to the videotape.
Joel has also written an article about his campaign. There's one small line about Israel.
We also sent a powerful message to the Obama administration about the need for stronger U.S. support for Israel. While Israel was never the focus of the campaign, it was an important priority. We led a nationwide push-back against the far-left J Street organization, which supported Schakowsky lavishly. In so doing, we helped Republicans defeat J Street Democrats in races across the country, further marginalizing the group.
The issue is not solely the billions of dollars Washington pours annually into the UN — providing roughly one-quarter of a system-wide UN budget that now comes to well over $20 billion. The problem is also that along with the usual waste and fraud, the UN spends some of those American billions on activities hostile to U.S. values and interests.
Just this past week, as I noted in a post last weekend on the UN’s Tiananmen Travesty, the Chinese head of the UN’s Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Sha Zukang, presented an award to a Chinese former defense minister, Chi Haotian, who was operational commander of the troops who crushed the 1989 Tiananmen democratic uprising. Sha — UN credentials and all — delivered this award on behalf of the World Harmony Foundation, an outfit intriguingly listed by the UN itself in its accredited NGO database as having no available address or home country. Presumably that’s just UN sloppiness, given that the World Harmony Foundation on its own web site lists addresses in both Manhattan and Zhejiang, China.
Now comes word that the UN is now planning a Durban III conference for next September in New York City. Anne Bayefsky has the details at the Weekly Standard. This Durban III would follow the UN’s Durban Review Conference held in 2009 in Geneva (with Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as one of the main speakers), which followed the UN’s anti-Semitic Durban Conference of 2001 (which got so bad that then-Secretary of State Colin Powell ordered the U.S. delegation to walk out).
Those are just two of the latest items in a list that includes: Iran on a slew of UN agency governing bodies, including UNICEF and the UN’s flagship development agency, the UNDP; Libya, China and Russia on the UN Human Rights Council; Iran among the countries overseeing the rights of women; UN efforts to gag free speech in the name of “anti-blasphemy”; sexual exploitation by UN peacekeepers of populations they are supposed to protect; brazen violation of UN sanctions by members of the UN’s own Security Council; and the apparently endless list of UN proposals to impose its management style on the entire economy of the world, in the name of controlling the climate, commanding the seas, rolling out central plans for the planet, or whatever.
Basically, there is no incentive for the UN to put a brake on such stuff — barring threats that without better behavior, the funding will dry up. The main gusher of funding for the UN is the U.S. fisc. Don’t count on any serious oversight of the UN from the U.S. executive branch, which — with the State Department in the lead — usually prefers to treat the UN as a handy (though sometimes inconveniently toxic) slush fund. Note that almost two years into his administration, President Barack Obama has yet to get around to filling the slot at the U.S. Mission to the UN for an envoy for UN Management and Reform (since 2008, there has been only an acting ambassador in the post).
Repeatedly, it has fallen to Congress, whence the appropriations originate, to ask what U.S. tax dollars are really paying for at Turtle Bay — and try to do something when it turns out that American money is underwriting the activities of America’s enemies. The current Congress hasn’t really bothered with any of that. The UN is ripe right now for a good old American tea party at Turtle Bay.
At least some people in the Tea Party movement would like to get out of the United Nations altogether, at least in part because of the UN's opposition to the Arizona immigration law. I wonder how many of them realize that the US spends some $5 billion annually financing the UN. Oh well, a billion here and a billion there and eventually it adds up to real money.
I agree that it's time for the US (and Israel and every other democracy) to get out of the United Nations. That's more for the reasons that Rosett cites, as well as because of the organization's miserable treatment of Israel at every level. Unfortunately, with this President still in power, it's unlikely that the US would withdraw from the UN. But at least Congress could cut off its funding.
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
