via Lobe Log
by Jim Lobe
As I noted in the piece published on IPS Friday, “It’s All About Israel,” Israel and the presumed threat posed by Iran to its security dominated Chuck Hagel’s confirmation hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) Thursday. It was the one opportunity Committee members — [...]
via Lobe Log
It was Eric Alterman who observed in The Nation a year ago:
If a Jew-hater somewhere, inspired perhaps by The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, sought to invent an individual who symbolizes almost all the anti-Semitic clichés that have dogged the Jewish people throughout history, he could hardly come [...]
via Lobe Log
Neo-Cons Hit Post-Cold War Low
Nearly six weeks after launching their campaign to derail the prospective nomination of former Sen. Chuck Hagel as Obama’s second-term secretary of defense, hard-line neo-conservatives, led by Bill Kristol, Elliott Abrams, the Wall Street Journal’s Bret Stephens, and Washington Post blogger
via Lobe Log
Well, here it is, the day after. The Israeli elections are over, but the form of the next government is not at all clear. Most likely, Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud Beiteinu party will form a government with Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid party being the main partner. This is by far the most [...]
via Lobe Log
Since his nomination as Secretary of Defense and even in anticipation of it, the right-wing media has been accusing Chuck Hagel of being anti-Israel with the help of GOP grandstanding from senators such as Lindsay Graham of South Carolina.
“Hagel, if confirmed to be secretary of defense, would be the most [...]
via Lobe Log
The smear campaign against Chuck Hagel did not begin on Dec. 14, 2012. The former Nebraska senator’s opposition to war as the preferred means of conducting foreign policy made him a maverick during the post-9/11 Bush years. Although most Republicans agreed with Hagel’s socially conservative positions on domestic issues, his nuanced [...]
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President Barack Obama will nominate former Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel for Defense Secretary to replace Leon Panetta, according to Democratic officials.
Politico predicts that “is likely to ignite a raucous confirmation battle.”
The AP meanwhile reports that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell will be taking a wait and see [...]
via Lobe Log
Over at the National Interest Jacob Helibrunn wonders whether neoconservative pundit William Kristol’s advising of Mitt Romney and influence over Republican party foreign policy thinking has contributed to their respective decline:
What about the GOP? It’s soul-searching time. A good case could be made that the author, [...]
via Lobe Log
Robert Wright points out why a first-term President Mitt Romney would be more susceptible to hardline pressure on Iran than a second-term President Barack Obama:
Second-term presidents think legacy, and nothing says legacy like peacefully and enduringly solving a problem that’s been depicted as apocalyptic. So expect Obama to pursue serious negotiations [...]
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Two must-read analyses of the Iran portion from last night’s final presidential debate are brought to us by TIME’s Tony Karon and the Arms Control Association’s Greg Thielmann. (This TPM headline also sums up the entire debate quite nicely: “Romney’s Final Debate Message: I’ll Be A Better Obama”.)
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