Today, the right-wing Heritage Foundation announced that it would be hosting a special screening of Clarion’s latest film, “Iranium,” on February 1. The event will include an appearance and comments by none other than arch-neoconservative Richard Perle. Perle, whose nickname is “The Prince of Darkness,” is widely seen as playing an important role in shaping post-9/11 Bush administration foreign policy from his perch at the Defense Policy Board.

Perle’s institutional affiliations are a useful guide for anyone seeking to understand the intellectual underpinnings of the Bush administration’s (first term) foreign policy or diagram the web of neoconservative institutions in Washington, D.C. Perle is currently a fellow at the neoconservative American Enterprise Institute; a letter signatory for the Project for the New American Century; a member of the National Security Advisory Council at Frank Gaffney’s Center for Security Policy; a member of the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq and Committee on the Present Danger; and a board member of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs, and the Hudson Institute.

Perle’s role in the Clarion Fund’s film screening would indicate that the organization is deeply embedded in the neoconservative movement. Given Perle’s track record for pushing the U.S. into aggressive wars of choice, this affiliation should be looked at closely as the Fund rolls out its latest documentary, which claims to document the “threat to international stability” presented by Iran’s nuclear program.

When not teaming up with one of the chief boosters of the Iraq war, Clarion has been adding Center for Security Policy founder Frank Gaffney to its board. Gaffney was recently deemed too hot to touch by the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC). Sarah Posner spoke with Suhail Khan, a Muslim member of the American Conservative Union Board, the group which sponsors CPAC. Khan told Posner:

“Frank has been frozen out of CPAC by his own hand, because of his antics. We need people who are credible on national security . . . but because of Frank’s just completely irresponsible assertions over the years, the organizers have decided to keep him out.” That, Khan added, is similar reaction to current and former members of Congress, including Bobby Jindal, Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ), and the late Henry Hyde, who distanced themselves from Gaffney.

The conservative shunning of Gaffney, said Khan, is not “because of any pressure from Muslim activists but because they didn’t want to be associated with a crazy bigot.”

CPAC is a major event for Republicans—a veritable Woodstock, of sorts, for conservatives, and, as I wrote last year, an event with no shortage of Islamophobic rhetoric. Gaffney being “frozen out” is a major blow for his credentials within the conservative movement.

But for Clarion, linking up with the arch-neoconservative Richard Perle, and a counter-Jihadi so extreme that his Islamophobia was too much for CPAC, shows that the organization and its films are well outside of the mainstream. In the past, Clarion has succeeded in getting its projects promoted in mainstream media venues such as CNN and Fox News. It will interesting to watch and see if an organization that has now publicly acknowledged its extreme neoconservative and Islamophobic leanings can get the same type of traction with “Iranium.”

While Clarion remains a fairly small organization (despite its $18 million distribution of “Obsession” DVDs before the 2008 presidential election), the links between ultra-orthodox Aish HaTorah, neoconservative extraordinaire Richard Perle and Islamophobe Frank Gaffney should raise questions. Perhaps most importantly, are these new connections for neoconservatives like Richard Perle? Or is this simply a rare public acknowledgment of the relationship between ultra-orthodox Israelis, Islamophobes, and neoconservatives?

A new poll commissioned by J Street—an organization which identifies as “for pro-Israel, pro peace Americans”—showed that Jews continued to vote overwhelmingly for Democratic candidates by a 66 to 31 percent margin. In a list of issues, Iran ranked as least important. Israel was identified as the most important issue by only seven-percent of respondents. Issues such as the economy, health care and government spending polled as the most important issues for Jewish voters. Thus Israel related issues remained a relatively low priority for Jewish Americans who, as illustrated in the poll, decided whom to vote for based on issues that closely mirror the entire electorate.

The poll (PDF) reads (my emphasis):

Below is a list of issues facing our country today. Please mark which TWO of these issues are the most important for you in deciding your vote for Congress in November.

Total
The economy ……………………………………………………………………… 62
Health care…………………………………………………………………………. 31
The deficit and government spending ……………………………………. 18
Social Security and Medicare ……………………………………………….. 16
Taxes…………………………………………………………………………………. 14
Terrorism and national security…………………………………………….. 13
Education…………………………………………………………………………… 12
Israel ………………………………………………………………………………….. 7
The environment………………………………………………………………….. 7
The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan…………………………………………… 6
Illegal immigration ………………………………………………………………. 6
Energy………………………………………………………………………………… 4
Iran…………………………………………………………………………………….. 0
Separation between religion and state ………………………………………-
(Other) ……………………………………………………………………………….. 2
(None of these) ……………………………………………………………………. 1
(Don’t know/refused) ……………………………………………………………. 0

In the hotly contested Pennsylvania Congressional race which pitted J Street backed Democratic candidate Joe Sestak against the ECI backed Republican candidate Pat Toomey, the results closely mirrored the national poll.

The Pennsylvania poll (PDF) asked a similar question (my emphasis again).

Now, I am going to read you a list of issues facing our country today. Please tell me which TWO of these issues were the most important for you in deciding your vote in the Senate race between Joe Sestak and Pat Toomey.

Total
The economy ……………………………………………………………………… 53
Health care…………………………………………………………………………. 35
Education…………………………………………………………………………… 15
Social Security and Medicare ……………………………………………….. 15
The deficit and government spending ……………………………………. 14
The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan………………………………………….. 11
Taxes………………………………………………………………………………….. 9
Israel ………………………………………………………………………………….. 8
The environment………………………………………………………………….. 7
Terrorism and national security……………………………………………… 7
Illegal immigration ………………………………………………………………. 2
Iran…………………………………………………………………………………….. 1
(Other) ……………………………………………………………………………….. 5
(None of these) ……………………………………………………………………. 2
(Don’t know/refused) ……………………………………………………………. 4

If the ECI’s attack ads against Sestak had any impact, it’s very difficult to tell from the polling data.  Instead, it looks like Jews, both nationally and in Pennsylvania, voted on the same issues that face all Americans. These were the issues that dominated the midterm elections last night. Despite the best efforts of the ECI to make the unconditional support of Israel and confronting Iran’s nuclear program an issue for Jewish voters, their efforts have met with remarkably little success.

While Lieberman’s speech hit on many neoconservative talking points — for example, the argument that Israel will act unilaterally against Iran if the U.S. fails to act first– several of the arguments presented at CFR were eerily reminiscent of his rhetoric in the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq.

In his speech Wednesday, Lieberman warned of the dangers of nuclear proliferation in the Middle East and the possibility of such weapons falling into the hands of terrorists.

He said:

It goes without saying that Iran’s illicit nuclear activities implicate broader global interests of the United States as well — foremost the international nuclear nonproliferation regime. As President Obama has repeatedly warned, a nuclear Iran could drive other states in the region to seek to acquire their own atomic arsenals. And, have no doubt: the more nuclear-proliferated the Middle East becomes, the greater the odds that nuclear weapons will fall into the hands of terrorists who will try to use them against the U.S.

On March 20, 2003, Lieberman issued similar warnings about Saddam Hussein passing his weapons of mass destruction — which turned out to be nonexistent — to terrorists.

At that time, he said:

What we are doing here is not only in the interest of the safety of the American people. Believe me, Saddam Hussein would have used these weapons against us eventually or given them to terrorists who would have. But what we are doing here, in overthrowing Saddam and removing those weapons of mass destruction and taking them into our control, is good for the security of people all over the world, including the Iraqi people themselves.

Warning that Iran’s motivation for acquiring nuclear weapons is to “remake” the Middle East, Lieberman told the CFR audience that:

The Iranian regime’s pursuit of a nuclear weapons capability cannot be separated from its long-term campaign of unconventional warfare, stretching back decades, to destabilize the region and remake it in its own Islamist extremist image.

The same warning of a revolutionary power in the Middle East which threatens both the U.S. and its Arab and Israeli allies was voiced by Lieberman in a September 13, 2002 floor statement in which he said:

Every day Saddam remains in power is a day of danger for the Iraqi people, for Iraq’s neighbors, for the American people, and for the world. As long as Saddam remains in power, there will be no genuine security, and no lasting peace in the Middle East among the Arab nations, or between the Arabs, Israelis, and Christians who live there.

On Wednesday, Lieberman also said that the U.S. is at risk of losing credibility with its regional allies if it fails to use its overwhelming military force again Iran.

Some have suggested that we should simply learn to live with a nuclear Iran and pledge to contain it. In my judgment, that would be a grave mistake. As one Arab leader I recently spoke with pointed out, how could anyone count on the United States to go to war to defend them against a nuclear-armed Iran, if we were unwilling to go to war to prevent a nuclear-armed Iran? Having tried and failed to stop Iran’s nuclear breakout, our country would be a poor position to contain its consequences.

I also believe it would be a failure of U.S. leadership if this situation reaches the point where the Israelis decide to attempt a unilateral strike on Iran. If military action must come, the United States is in the strongest position to confront Iran and manage the regional consequences. This is not a responsibility we should outsource. We can and should coordinate with our many allies who share our interest in stopping a nuclear Iran, but we cannot delegate our global responsibilities to them.

Similar warnings were issued by Lieberman in an October 29, 2001 op-ed in The Wall Street Journal, in which he wrote:

Throughout this war, we should remember three things: America is very strong; more than 3,000 Americans have been killed by terrorists; and, in the end, we — not our coalition partners — have the moral obligation to determine our response to terrorism.

That is why it is imperative that we hold firm to the Bush Doctrine: to be unshakable in our support for allies who are steadfast, and unyielding in our challenges to those who are not; to be uncompromising in our demands that countries like Syria and Iran end their support of terrorism before we open our diplomatic and economic doors to them; and to be unflinching in our determination to remove a uniquely implacable enemy and terrorist, Saddam Hussein, from power before he strikes at us with weapons of mass destruction.

And he concluded his CFR speech by hearkening back to Woodrow Wilson’s attempts to frame American interests in the context of a broader international system and the consequences of American isolationism, saying:

Iran presents us with daunting and difficult challenges. By now, I suspect, some of you may be getting wistful for the days of Woodrow Wilson when discussions about America and the Middle East could focus on Persian poetry. But before you get too wistful—also remember that those were the days when the principal strategic challenge confronting the President of the United States was a great power conflict in the heart of Europe between Germany and her neighbors—a conflict of nationalistic hatreds and geopolitical rivalries that twice ignited into world war and claimed the lives of tens of millions of people, including hundreds of thousands of Americans.

In an October 7, 2002 speech at the Woodrow Wilson Center, Lieberman concluded his remarks about “Post-Saddam Iraq” with a similar reference to Wilson.

In his address to Congress on April 2, 1917, asking for a declaration of war, President Wilson said, “We shall fight for the things which we have always carried nearest our hearts: for democracy, for the right of those who submit to authority to have a voice in their own governments…for a universal dominion of right by such a concert of free peoples as shall bring peace and safety to all nations and make the world itself at last free.”

We won that war. But we lost the peace. We lost it because America was not ready to take on the international responsibility that Wilson understood we must accept to secure the peace. We learned the folly of that withdrawal and isolationism as instability and despair created fertile soil for fascism and eventually another world war.

Lieberman, much like his neoconservative fellow travelers who we have mentioned in recent weeks (see our posts on appeasement and reverse linkage), is using the same talking points and arguments to justify yet another preemptive war in the Middle East. On Wednesday at CFR he argued that: Iran is a grave threat to U.S. interests since Iranian nuclear weapons could fall into the hands of terrorists; the Iranian mullahs seek to remake the Middle East and destroy U.S. allies; U.S. credibility in the region hangs on whether we are willing to act militarily; and that a failure to act will lead to the same disastrous consequences as when the U.S. adopted an isolationist foreign policy after World War I.

While it was surely unintentional, the parallels to his arguments for the invasion of Iraq under the false pretenses that Saddam Hussein was hiding a chemical weapons program are unmistakable.