I am stockpiling opinions just in case I run out of them.

[stilltrucking]

The G.O.P. Stalinists Invade Upstate New York

BARACK OBAMA’S most devilish political move since the 2008 campaign was to appoint a Republican congressman from upstate New York as secretary of the Army. This week’s election to fill that vacant seat has set off nothing less than a riotous and bloody national G.O.P. civil war. No matter what the results in that race on Tuesday, the Republicans are the sure losers. This could be a gift that keeps on giving to the Democrats through 2010, and perhaps beyond.

The battle for upstate New York confirms just how swiftly the right has devolved into a wacky, paranoid cult that is as eager to eat its own as it is to destroy Obama. The movement’s undisputed leaders, Palin and Beck, neither of whom has what Palin once called the “actual responsibilities” of public office, would gladly see the Republican Party die on the cross of right-wing ideological purity. Over the short term, at least, their wish could come true.


http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/01/opini ... ch.html?em

[stilltrucking]

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/04/opini ... .html?_r=1

[the mingo]

Did Maureen dye her hair ? Umm, sexy.

[tinkerjack]

Is that your opinion Mingo?

another news bimbo?

I kind of like the way she looks, I hadn't thought sexy, I just like the way she looks.
and I sure dig the way she writes most times.

It is 1927 boys, and it is Weimar Germany. I never thought Obama was going to be elected. It is amazing how the corporate shills like Rush Limbaugh are able to set their zombie armies on the march. I suppose if I had children I would be more hopeful for America. Children do that I think, they give you hope for the future. Me I am out of here, I leave no hostages to the future. Except for nephews and nieces. Not the same I don't think.

I had a dream once that I fathered a child, it was in 1974. Never forget that sweet dream. I was sleeping on some bales of hay beside my elephants in Montreal. For a while the abortion was totally forgotten.

I wonder if she was a man would you wonder if he dyed his hair?
I wonder what lip gloss Sarah Palin uses. I wonder if she has that shit tattoed on. Sarah is very sexy, oh yeah, that is why 90 percent of the calls I get for her "stunning autobiography" are men. I sure love her knees. I would vote for in a heart beat if I could just see more of her.

I have a hard time taking the NY Times seriously these days. I still read it but with a sense of betrayal about Iraq. Dowd is nobodies fool, unlike Judith Miller I think.

[the mingo]

I'd never seen a full color picture of Maureen before you posted it here. One of the local rags carries her column sometimes but there is just a small black & white of her at the head of it. She reminds me a bit of Sandra Cisneros. It's that wide angle face. You're right if she were a man I wouldn't spend a moment on the color of his hair. Never said she was a bimbo, just that she was sexy. Yum. If she were around I'd take her down to see General George Armstrong Custer's Favorite Half-Breed Indian Scout Car.

[stilltrucking]

"Natural selection, as it has operated in human history, favors not only the clever but the murderous." Barbara Ehrenreich



No I don't feel much romantically inclined to her mingo. But I do like that blouse she is wearing. I bet it is silk. I love the feel of a woman in a silk blouse.

[tinkerjack]

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/08/opini ... wd.html?em

[stilltrucking]

“We help companies to grow by helping them to raise capital,” he said. “Companies that grow create wealth. This, in turn, allows people to have jobs that create more growth and more wealth. It’s a virtuous cycle. We have a social purpose.”

When Arlidge asked whether it’s possible to make too much money, whether Goldman will ignore the people howling at the moon with rage and go on raking it in, getting richer than God, Blankfein grinned impishly and said he was “doing God’s work.”

Whether he knows it, he’s referring back to The Protestant Ethic and The Spirit of Capitalism — except, of course, the Calvinists would have been outraged by the banks’ vicious — not virtuous — cycle of greed and concupiscence.

‘Goldman Sachs Gets Swine Flu Vaccine’

[stilltrucking]

Although a handful of donors were invited to the premiere state dinner Tuesday night — as well as erstwhile allies Craig and Hillary — many donors and passionate supporters are let down by Obama’s detachment, puzzled at his failure to make them feel invested when he’s certain to come back to tap their well soon enough.

It is especially puzzling given that Obama faces tough midterms and a less-than-certain re-election — and given that we all now know someone on the unemployment line. (A new poll shows Obama and Sarah Palin neck and neck among independents, but then it is a Fox survey.)

Bill Clinton may not have cared any more about contributors than Obama does, but he was such a talented politician that he made them feel as though they were in “a warm bath,” as one put it.

Obama is more like a cold shower.



http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/25/opini ... Eazt7KFhsg

[jackofnightmares]

A Game That’s Not So Great
By MAUREEN DOWD
Published: December 12, 2009
KIRKUK, Iraq

Puppets just aren’t what they used to be.
___________________________________________________

By MAUREEN DOWD
Published: December 15, 2009

Doubts About Certitude

[stilltrucking]

Blunder On The Mountain

Flying over the waves of snow-covered mountains that make Afghanistan a natural fortress and a sinkhole for empires, it’s impossible not to think of Osama’s escaping from Tora Bora as one of the greatest bungled opportunities in history.

Flying over the waves of snow-covered mountains that make Afghanistan a natural fortress and a sinkhole for empires, it’s impossible not to think of Osama’s escaping from Tora Bora as one of the greatest bungled opportunities in history.
Unlike the Bushies, who tried to play down Osama’s importance the longer he was on the lam, Gen. Stanley McChrystal acknowledged in recent Congressional hearings that “he is an iconic figure.”

“It would not defeat Al Qaeda to have him captured or killed,” he said, “but I don’t think that we can finally defeat Al Qaeda until he is captured or killed.”

“The Battle For Tora Bora: In December 2001, a Delta Force commander and his team had Osama bin Laden cornered in the mountains of Afghanistan. What happened next has been the subject of nearly a decade of speculation and dispute. Herewith, the untold story.” by Peter Bergen
http://www.tnr.com/magazine-issue/december-30-2009

[stilltrucking]

What the hell is wrong with the NY Times. This is the second time this year that I have clicked to open an article there and received a warning from my anti-virus program.



From the New Times dot come. If you need a virus on your computer you can get it here
http://newsweek.washingtonpost.com/onfa ... d=talkbox1

Carter's apology to Israel
Former President Jimmy Carter offered the following words in a letter addressed to the Jewish community: "We must recognize Israel's achievements under difficult circumstances, even as we strive in a positive way to help Israel continue to improve its relations with its Arab populations, but we must not permit criticisms for improvement to stigmatize Israel. As I would have noted at Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, but which is appropriate at any time of the year, I offer an Al Het for any words or deeds of mine that may have done so."
The remarks should be welcomed especially in light of both the healing they could bring and the deep awareness of Jewish liturgical tradition which they reflect. I wonder in fact how many Jews would reach for the penitentiary prayer, Al Het ,as their model for public apology. Yet here we have a devout Baptist, sufficiently learned and comfortable in a tradition not his own, doing so. That alone is noteworthy.
Like many of Mr. Carters past comments, his words appear well-intentioned and sincerely offered. And yet, like so many of his past utterances, these latest mix profound sensitivity with much potentially unhelpful ideological baggage.
For starters, who is the "we" to whom he refers? If it is only himself, then he should say "I" and be done with it. Doing otherwise distances him from the responsibility he claims to take. On the other hand, if he is speaking for others, it would be helpful to know for whom he speaks. Are his comments also an admission that he has rallied a great many people to a position which he now regrets having taken? If so, that too should be noted.
It's also somewhat troubling that his comments are offered to the "Jewish community". His past comments, which attacked Israel as an apartheid state and worse, were not problematic because they offended Jews; they were problematic because they were rooted in faulty comparisons and flawed analyses of very complex realities that did not fit with Carter's idealized understandings of "big bad Israel" and "good little Palestine".
Too often, Mr. Carter made the easy, and dangerous, decision that whoever held the smaller weapon was automatically more moral. While such thinking assuages the moral concerns of those who are inherently uncomfortable with power, it is often false. While it is certainly true that power, especially military power, is easily abused, so is a people's lack of it - often becoming an excuse for horrific forms of terrorist violence.
On the other hand, when Jews scream "anti-Semite" at every critic of Israel, including Mr. Carter, as too many do, we help create the very pitfall into which he fell. If all critique of Israel is presumed to be motivated by hatred of Jews, it can be presumed by all critics that Israel really is a state only for and about Jews, in which case many of their critiques would be appropriate.
However hurtful, offensive, or wrong-headed some of Mr. Carter's observations were, there is no evidence that they were motivated by hostility to Jews in any way. If anything, they were probably a product of an honest, if inappropriate, idealization of Jews and Jewish tradition.
One hopes that with these newest comments, the former President is moving from a continuous cycle of idealization followed by disappointment to a realistic embrace of the moral complexity of life in Israel. And it could be that his reference to the Al Het signals that move.
Perhaps his knowledge of Jewish prayer is such that he embraces their literary pattern of speaking, at least in the case of the Al Het penitentiary prayers to which he refers, in the collective "we". If that is the case, then Mr. Carter's words are a profound statement that he stands with the Jewish people as one who enters a synagogue on the holy days, as one who sees his fate bound up with other members of that prayer community, and as one who is willing to bear that fate alongside them. They are not all perfect, but they are all together.
If that is the case, then his actions will soon bear out his words and this will prove to be a momentous moment in Mr. Carter's relationship with Israel and the Jewish people. It would represent a shift from his being an outsider, admittedly one animated by wonderful ideals, to one who accepts that the pursuit of such ideals has real implications for people, including him, and their security. I hope that President Carter's words mark that shift because whatever road to peace will be found in the Middle East, will demand at least some measure of that sense of shared fate, if not destiny, by all people in the region.
Comments
Please report offensive comments below.




What a non-piece of reporting. It seems the Post is falling down the hole of the media which is to report not on ISSUES and POLICY but merely the arguments that surround these things. Tabloid journalism.
It would be nice to discuss the substance of President Carter's comments. That is where the debate of ideas lie, not in the food fight you choose to report.
Posted by: rosiedean | December 24, 2009 9:14 AM
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Israel is a state, not a religion. Zionists usually condemn critics of Israel as critics of Judaism, i.e., antisemites...the old bait-and-switch.
Here's some info about Israel, the state:
"Jewish villages were built in the place of Arab villages. You do not even know the names of these Arab villages, and I don't blame you because geography books no longer exist, not only do the books not exist, the Arab villages are not there either. Nahlal arose in the place of Mahlul; Kibbutz Gvat in the place of Jibta; Kibbutz Sarid in the place of Huneifis; and Kefar Yehushu'a in the place of Tal al-Shuman. There is not one single place built in this country that did not have a former Arab population." (Moshe Dayan quoted by Ha'aretz, April 4 1969.)
“If I were an Arab leader, I would never make terms with Israel. That is natural: we have taken their country . . . We come from Israel, but two thousand years ago, and what is that to them? There has been anti-semitism, the Nazis, Hitler, Auschwitz, but was that their fault? They only see one thing: we have come here and stolen their country. Why should they accept that?”
(David Ben-Gurion to Nahum Goldmann, WJC)
On West Bank settlements:
--Israeli database shows that 38.8 percent of Israeli settlements built on Palestinian land
--The Israeli Supreme Court declared in 1979 that the seizure of private land to establish settlements for security purposes is illegal
--Official data shows that 32 percent of the land in settlements established after 1979 is private land. (New York Times, 3/14/07)
--UN declared that the Israeli wall is built partially on illegally-annexed Palestinian land
The only constant in Israeli policy is that settlement on the West Bank and Jerusalem will continue, no matter what promises are made or lies told to American presidents. Roads will be built to balkanize any future Palestinian state, and Palestinians will not be allowed to use them.
Settlements will be built, with tacit or explicit government support, and then the Israeli army will move in to "protect" the settlers.
Meanwhile, the U.S. continues its assistance to Israel, which in the 1970s, reached $1500 for every Israeli man, woman or child.
Why is this in the U.S. interest?

Posted by: tmaertens | December 24, 2009 9:05 AM
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CARTER ONLY SAYS WHAT IS RIGHT AND YES THE JEWS ARE NOT CHOSEN ,YOU ARE SIMIANS LIKE US ALL ,IT IS ONLY RELIGION THAT SEPARTES HUMANITY .THERE IS ONE RACE ,BUT RELIGION HAS DIVIDED HUMANITY AND IT WILL CONTINUE TO DO SO AND WE ALL WILL PAY THE PRICE...RELIGION IS TRULY THE OPIATE OF THE MASSES...WITHOUT DOUBT...THE JEWS ,CATHOLICS,PROTESTANTS,ETC,ETC...IT IS ALL BUNK,WITH YOUR HOLIER THAN THOU....RELIGION HAS BEEN A MASSIVE HINDRANCE FOR ALL OF HUMANITY!!!!
Posted by: suliman57 | December 24, 2009 9:01 AM
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Ive never heard anything out of Israel or that part of the world except an excessive whine and it's almost constant. Get a clue! It's 2010.. it time for you to wake up and join the rest of 21st century society instead of trying, like others in the world, to turn the clock back to previous centuries and different times. Linear time, as we know it, doesn't work like that. Deal with it..
Posted by: rbaldwin2 | December 24, 2009 8:57 AM
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Jimmy Carter has always hated the Jews. One letter ain't gonna change that.
Posted by: JPVanderbilt | December 24, 2009 8:56 AM
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To all you anti jews.
Hope it's you that dies in the next gas chamber. Hope they take the gold fillings from your teeth as war booty. Hope they make lamp shades from your skin after they cook your a&&. May it be your children that they experiment on. Your wives, mothers, and grandmotehrs. They can be the ones that serv the soldiers for pleasure. You deserve everything that is described above for the racial hate you continue to show towards that ethnic group. Die in pain people, die in pain.

Carter is a fool. Always was, always will be.
Posted by: LiberalBasher | December 24, 2009 8:54 AM
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Nice to see this article bring out the israeli bashers and anti semites in support of Carter. Funny how Carter feels the need to apologize but so many readers do not, could it be that they consitutue the hate Israel and Jews no matter what crowd, I think so. And I am not trying to slam anyone who is anti israel as anti semtic, but rather when a person like Carter uses his bully pulpit to systematically and continously uses his access to the public media, and tries to enhance his message by traveling to Gaza and using it as a back drop to push his lefty, biased message, then you are engaging in spreading anti semtic propagander. When you intentionally name your book in such a way as to label Isael as an aparthied state, when the reality is the opposite, you are an anti semite. That is Carter's legacy. He failed as President and he has failed as the world statemen he aspires to be. No Nobel Prize, which we now know is just a polticial statement, no apology and no fake forgivenss from ADL will clean his slate. Cater is the first openly ex president who has systematically worked against US intiersts and that includes his Israel bashing. To me his apology is as worthless as the other anti israel rants on this site because they are born out of emnity, not logic, and give succor to our enemies, radical Islamic terrorists. Maybe with tonight being Xmas, the anti semites writing here will take a moment and relaize that Jesus was Jewish and that charitianity and Judism are tethtered by history. Compared to the Koran that supports jihad as the way to make the world Islamic, the anti Israel crowd, including Carter, might wake up and realize that a deal with the devil is no deal at all. And that includes the morons that support Iran's nuclear rights.
Posted by: RealityCheck28 | December 24, 2009 8:46 AM
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The worst president before Flight Suit Boy actually grew some nads and spoke out against Israeli terror. And now he is running away again. Repulsive.
Posted by: PontiusPilot | December 24, 2009 8:45 AM
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too little too late...
but good news...
obama may end up being worse than carter...
and as for his son...
don't run...
people are tired of the carters, bushes, clinton's and obama's...
any relation to any of these should stay out of politics...
Posted by: DwightCollins | December 24, 2009 8:41 AM
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Jimmy Carter----A great man. Enough said.
Posted by: Thependulumswings | December 24, 2009 8:38 AM
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Anybody who subscribes to gay marriage (like Carter) always make bad judgments. Most often, they have a twisted mind. Colin Powell, Dick Cheney and Bill Clinton belong to such group.
Posted by: spidermean2 | December 24, 2009 8:36 AM
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Hirshfield's analysis is silly. He ccaricatured Carter's understanding of Israel as "big bad Israel" and "good little Palestine". Jimmy Carter has probably a better understanding of Israel and what used to be known as the "Palestine question" than most American Jews. He is far more vilified by American Jews than he is by Israelis. The notion that Carter needs to "learn" something about Isreal is about as pompous as it gets.
Posted by: jheath531 | December 24, 2009 8:36 AM
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He is a bigot and no better than a clansman in a white sheet. He thought other people agreed with him (and judging by some comments here, some do). Hes not sorry, he hasnt changed his mind, he just figured out his opinions and bigotry isnt mainstream and decided to go back in the closet with it.
Posted by: m052699 | December 24, 2009 8:34 AM
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Carter was a pathetic president and I only began to think of him as a good man once he summoned the strength, unique among American politicians, to speak honestly about Israel.
Now he's backing off from that. Is he going to go the way of that foreign agent Joe Lieberman (R-Israel)?
Posted by: PontiusPilot | December 24, 2009 8:34 AM
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Too Little, Too Late!
History has already judged Carter & his administration as one of the weakest most ineffective ever!
=============
The worst President EVER!
Posted by: lindy226 | December 24, 2009 8:33 AM
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The Camp David Accords were a significant achievement - a step unmatched since. So those who dismiss his views on Israel with simple insults rather than a discussion of his views must be too young or too biased to remember how greatly President Carter changed the context at that time.
Posted by: gerardm | December 24, 2009 8:32 AM
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GRANDSON, CONGRESS, CONGRESS, GRANDSON,
CONGRESS, GRANDSON, LIAR,LIAR,LIAR! JIMMY THE LIAR THE FALSE CHRISTIAN. PS I'M IRISH AND HAVE NO DOG IN CARTERS HUNT.
Posted by: khm53 | December 24, 2009 8:30 AM
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It's impossible for Carter to apologize properly to our Israeli masters. He must grovel, as must we as a nation before god's chosen swine.
Posted by: branfo4 | December 24, 2009 8:19 AM
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I think President Carter is a good President,cared for all people to include Israel's and Arabs, unfortunate no one can criticize Israel for anything even though what they have don to the Palestinian if its don to any one else , the Jews all over the world would be the first to complain, never again, i think that peace can be possible if the talk start in the US between Arab, Islamic, and Jewish American, for we can convince Congress that we want peace in the US, peace can be achieved. wishing all the best of a holiday seasons, and Peace, Salaam, and Shalom.
Posted by: LutfiUSMC | December 24, 2009 8:07 AM
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Jimmy Carter was the best President in the last 70 years, but, as he said on NPR about a year or two ago, being anti-Israel is political suicide.
Posted by: mangograss | December 24, 2009 7:52 AM
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Jimmy Carter has nothing to apologize for, he's been telling the truth all along about the apartheid state of Israel. Good for him that he is addressing the people of Israel directly.
Posted by: likovid | December 24, 2009 7:51 AM
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Carter is pathetic. The ONLY reason he's trying to make mends with the Jew Community is because his GRANDSON, Jason Carter, is RUNNING for the Georgia State Senate and the district his grandson is running in, DeKalb, has a large number of Jewish voters.
It's purely political, and I know the truth hurts you Noble Peace, International types.
I certainly won't forget the Summer 2006, when with thousands of Hezbollah rockets falling on a strategic partner, Carter questioning Israel's right to defend itself.
Hopefully, the voters in Georgia won't be fooled by Carter's two faced lies to get HIS GRANDSON A POLITICAL SEAT.
Posted by: johnnyapplewhite123 | December 24, 2009 7:41 AM
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Too Little, Too Late!
History has already judged Carter & his administration as one of the weakest most ineffective ever!
Carter both in office & out of office
showed himself to be a small-minded, unprincipled man.
One apology to an ethnic/religious group
will not change his past actions, sentiments, and their impacts on the U.S.
and the world.
That his grandson is running for a Congressional seat certainly has nothing to do with his apology or does it?
Posted by: Concerned14 | December 24, 2009 7:39 AM
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Why would you apologize??
You only said the truth about the terrorists (ISRAEL). ISRAEL is nothing but a terrorist state, and the US bows to its and cannot say anything. US lawmaker knows that ISRAEL is responsible for 9/11 and they cannot do a damn about it. WAKE UP AMERICA.
Also, all the banks money has been transferred to ISRAEL. GOLDMAN SACK and so on sent all the money to ISRAEL and asked the government for BAILOUT. WAKE UP AMERICA
Posted by: simonbm | December 24, 2009 7:39 AM
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I still admire Jimmy Carter for having the courage to speak the truth about Israel. He is the most honorable President we have had in my lifetime (I'm 72). I deeply regret the suffering of Jews in WWII, and I wish Jews to be treated as respectfully as other ethnic and religious groups are treated. But the Jews display a sense of special entitlement which is not becoming to them, and their mistreatment of Palestinians should be condemned. Former President Carter owes no mea culpa to anyone.
Posted by: arussell91 | December 24, 2009 7:37 AM
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Just what did Carter receive for his so-called apology to the terrorist apartheid state of Israel for identifying them as the terrorist apartheid state that they are?
Posted by: fixitj | December 24, 2009 7:35 AM
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As one who well remembers carter's presidency Jimma was a devoted servant of the Israel lobby and his recent change of heart in the past is too little too late. In any case it is apparently not genuine.
If there is a God, Israel is God's plague on the United States for it's sins.
The United States will never know peace as long as it is chained to Israel. Every dead soldier in Iraq was sacrificed on the alter of "Israel Ueber Alles!"
Posted by: SSTK34 | December 24, 2009 7:29 AM
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To be fair:
1. Abraham founder/father of three major religions was either the embellishment of the lives of three different men or a
mythical character as was mythical Moses, the "Tablet-Man" who talked to burning bushes and made much magic in Egypt.
Many of the 1.5 million Conservative Jews and many of their rabbis have relegated Abraham to the myth pile along with most if not all the OT.
Current crisis:
Realization that the Jews are not god's chosen people.
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.h ... 94DA404482
2. Jesus was an illiterate Jewish peasant/carpenter/simple preacher man who suffered from hallucinations and who has been characterized anywhere from the Messiah from Nazareth to a mythical character from mythical Nazareth to a mamzer from Nazareth (Professor Bruce Chilton, in his book Rabbi Jesus). Analyses of Jesus’ life by many contemporary NT scholars (e.g. Professors Crossan, Borg and Fredriksen, On Faith panelists) via the NT and related documents have concluded that only about 30% of Jesus' sayings and ways noted in the NT were authentic. The rest being embellishments (e.g. miracles)/hallucinations made/had by the NT authors to impress various Christian, Jewish and Pagan sects.
The 30% of the NT that is "authentic Jesus" like everything in life was borrowed/plagiarized and/or improved from those who came before. In Jesus' case, it was the ways and sayings of the Babylonians, Greeks, Persians, Egyptians, Hittites, Canaanites, OT, John the Baptizer and possibly the ways and sayings of traveling Greek Cynics.
http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/theories.html

For added "pizzazz", Catholic/Christian theologians divided god the singularity into three persons and invented atonement as an added guilt trip for the "pew people" to go along with this trinity of overseers. By doing so, they made god the padre into god the "filicider".

Current crises:
Pedophiliac priests, atonement theology and original sin!!!!
3. Luther, Calvin, Joe Smith, Henry VIII, Wesley, Roger Williams, the Great “Babs” et al, founders of Christian-based religions or combination religions also suffered from the belief in/hallucinations of "pretty wingie thingie" visits and "prophecies" for profits analogous to the myths of Catholicism (resurrections, apparitions, ascensions and immaculate conceptions).
Current crises:
Adulterous preachers, "propheteering/ profiteering" evangelicals and atonement theology, all male hierarchies and strange banking and funding.
Posted by: ccnl1 | December 24, 2009 7:14 AM
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AGGRESSION on this page. Pres Carter offered an apology, did he not? Yet there is much scorn in the hearts of many on this page. I see the strength, softness and compassion of Pres Carter. Do you see this? In yourself?
Posted by: mainetimes | December 24, 2009 6:57 AM
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Well, Carter has contributed another important lesson in this regrettable pirouette.
He's demonstrated the power of the Zionist lobby, known for its ability to tip races with suddenly appearing money and candidates to deliver its message to anyone who would defy them.
Notice, I said Zionist lobby, not Jewish lobby. The brave Jews who dare to face the withering attacks the lobby can mount in their community deserve everyone's respect, and recognition that this is not a battle against Jews but a battle against a nationalistic delusion that distorts our foreign policy.
Posted by: arvay | December 24, 2009 6:33 AM
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In order for Carter to completely apologize he must be completely transparent. This will require him to fully disclose his funding of the Carter Center.
Follow the money and it will detail that he and his center have been on the payroll of Arab/Oil interests.
*******************************************
If one were to follow your logic then the entire US senate and congress would need to disclose the money & influence exerted on them by the Israel Lobby. Not a pretty sight I would say. You don't want to go there and embarrass our 'for sale' leadership.
Posted by: smokberry2002@yahoo.com | December 24, 2009 6:33 AM
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In order for Carter to completely apologize he must be completely transparent. This will require him to fully disclose his funding of the Carter Center.
Follow the money and it will detail that he and his center have been on the payroll of Arab/Oil interests.
Posted by: newcap | December 24, 2009 6:12 AM
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Why should President Carter apologize for something that we all know is TRUE.
There are few holocaust survivors who deserve an apology from the Germans.
The Jews are just cashing in like they always do. They will never learn.
Posted by: smokberry2002@yahoo.com | December 24, 2009 6:12 AM
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Carter had the courage to say what everybody knows – at least since the “symbolic weight” of the Holocaust fades and diminishes Israel’s legitamacy: Israel is by its own standards based on apartheid and can not change in the future. So there is no reason for an apology, only if someone thinks that apartheid is something dreadful and not a political necessity for Israel.
Posted by: buchmarkus | December 24, 2009 5:31 AM
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Mr. Carter's apology is insincere in my opinion. For years he has spent time defending his poor choice of words regarding Israel and the horribly inaccurate association with that nation and the former apartheid regime in South Africa. This has given rise to a new trend in Anti-Semitism that creates other false associations between Israel and the Palestinians by making allusions that Israel is the same as Nazism, its policies towards the "so-called" occupied territories are akin to Jewish Ghettos in Warsaw, or that Gaza is a virtual concentration camp. Mr. Carter is guilty of allowing this kind of vile and vulgar relationship develop.
There is one other point that cannot be ignored. Carter would like to see his grandson elected to public office, but he is now afraid that perhaps he has stepped on too many Jewish toes, and Jews will campaign against his grandson. I know if I were living in Georgia and in the district where his grandson lives, I would campaign and vote against electing this hypocrite and his family. Never Again is the message that we must take to the streets in Georgia. Israel was double-crossed by this man, and we American Jews should not simply forgive and forget turning the other cheek to him and his family because he would like to be thought of as a "good" and "wise" Christian. The minute he became a mouth piece to Arab oil interests and Palestinian Terrorist Groups, Carter's reputation and credibility diminished. That hasn't changed. Carter must come out and openly fight this new-wave of Anti-Semitism at home and abroad before I will ever begin accept his vacuous apologies and hidden agenda.
Posted by: kerryberger | December 24, 2009 5:11 AM
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The only thing president Carter has to apologize for is allowing the settlements to continue to expand unabated outside the original UN partition of 1947, as they have during every presidency since President Truman’s initial tragic mistake. He should have cut all foreign and military aid to this racist state until they climbed back into their original border, about one-third the size of the present border.
Rick Jones, Fredricksburg, VA
Posted by: rick22407 | December 24, 2009 5:08 AM
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Carter was relevant for 4 sad years. Beyond that, I'm not sure why anyone cares anymore.
Posted by: Ombudsman1 | December 24, 2009 5:02 AM
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Considering how much the US has done for Israel; the serious burden to the US taxpayer, and the loss of reputation for fairness in the world, I believe Mr. Hirschfield displays a great ingratitude in nit-picking the Nobel Peace Prize winning former President's comments.
It is easy to to get the impression as a non-jewish US citizen, that the Israel Nation and associated US lobby feel they have carte blance to any action, and to expect full US support, without even our concurrence.
It is simply not the United States responsibility to protect any ill-conceived action by Israel. Rather it is Israels responsibility to protect its primary benefactor. They can do so by behaving rationally, responsibly, and most of all, fairly to the Palestinians, and to all nations.
Posted by: bsumpter3 | December 24, 2009 4:14 AM
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Jimmy Carter is an idiot who can't get over the fact that the American public repudiated him en masse after his first, worthless, term. Why people continue to pay any attention to him on any subject is a great mystery to me!
David A. Jewell
Philadelphia
Posted by: dajewell | December 24, 2009 4:05 AM
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Carter has relatively little to apologize for, and his critics have much, much more that should be said in apology to him.
Carter's book "Peace not Apartheid" was right on the money. His one fault is that he is probably overly optimistic about what negotiations with Hamas might produce.
But Israel should negotiate with Hamas, knowing that there is little chance of success. Why? How many governments are denouncing the government of Sri Lanka for having crushed the Tamil rebels? None. And why is this? Because the Sri Lankan government bent over backwards to try to negotiate with them and went out of their way to try for a peaceful settlement, making compromises of the kind that Israel has NEVER made with the Palestinians. When this failed, THEN the Sri Lankans went to full-scale war and they crushed the Tamils in a way that Israel has never attempted with the Palestinians. No one complained. There's a lesson here for Israel.
Posted by: ripvanwinkleincollege | December 24, 2009 4:04 AM
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"Ok well now ol Jimmy just owes America an apology for almost losing the cold war and F#!king up our economy."
Posted by: Homunculus
***
Carter began the military build-up usually attributed to Reagan by rebuilding the Navy.
Carter initiated the strategy of confronting the USSR in Afghanistan later adopted by Reagan.
Carter inherited the screwed-up economy from Nixon and Ford. He appointed Volker to the Fed, beginning the process of conquering stagflation; Volker and his monetary policy were again adopted by Reagan.
Carter had his flaws, yes. However, you miss them entirely and blame him for problems where his policies actually set the ground for Reagan's latter accomplishments.
Posted by: j2hess | December 24, 2009 3:22 AM
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Dear Brad,
I am sure that Carter, asking forgiveness in good faith, was hoping to open dialogue with people such as yourself. You give his serious remarks a mostly serious response. What is not serious is the inclusion of little cuts such as the suggestion that he ever thought of the situtation as a confrontation between "big bad Israel" and "good little Palestine".
There are moral complexities, indeed. But we should not let inspection of the complexities lead us to overlook the differentials of power and suffering between the Israelis and the Palestinians, or the past and ongoing losses of land and livelihood. Carter's Al Het was well-offered and well taken; perhaps examinations of conscience and apologies are due in the other direction also?
Posted by: j2hess | December 24, 2009 3:14 AM
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Ok well now ol Jimmy just owes America an apology for almost losing the cold war and F#!king up our economy. Thank god for Reagan putting America back on track and snatching victory from near defeat with the Soviets. I'll take "Obama" over that idiot Carter any day of the week, and I'm conservative. At least Obama has a pair.
Posted by: Homunculus | December 24, 2009 3:12 AM
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Cater, is a doddering old jackass !
Posted by: dashriprock | December 24, 2009 2:50 AM
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Prophets. Hmmpf!
In the old days we just stoned them when they got too uppity.
Posted by: patrick3 | December 24, 2009 2:39 AM
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But will he now publish a book proclaiming Israel isn't an apartheid regime? Will he go on a lecture tour to correct the damage he has done to Israel through the baseless slander he has spread? If not, his apology isn't worth that much and becomes just window dressing in his on going relationship with Jewish donors to the fund he manages.
When Carter goes all out against the BDS crowd (bias, discriminate and slander) then it will be time to accept his apology.
Posted by: shilotoren | December 24, 2009 2:33 AM
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Carter's apology has that wimpy style so often used by people who can't quite say "I was wrong" -- "If I offended anyone I apologize," or in this case, "we must not permit criticisms for improvement to stigmatize Israel. I offer an Al Het for any words or deeds of mine that may have done so."
As in, "Someone explain to me again, what did I do that was wrong? It is possible, at least conceivable that I did something wrong. Well, gee, if I did, I'm sorry."
After he made that statement that the "overwhelming majority" of critics of Obama are racist (white citizens who have the audacity to criticize their own president), Carter, a guy I used to like, lost all credibility with me.
Posted by: kls1 | December 24, 2009 2:32 AM
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Carter is a humah hemmoroid.
Posted by: birvin9999 | December 24, 2009 2:21 AM
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Hirschfield's comments are thought-provoking, but maybe deeper than need be. Carter, while not our most successful President, is a decent man who has contributed enormously to international peace since he left office. I think he truly wants to see a fair Middle East peace (justice for Palestinians, security for Israel) and he doesn't want to offend Jews. His support for Palestinians does not mean he doesn't also support Israel. Since the 1967 war Israel has missed many chances to work out a lasting peace. Withdrawal to pre-'67 borders is essential. Carter may be a Baptist, but it shouldn't be held against him for his efforts to bring parties together. Israel doesn't mind criticizing, but seems a bit thin-skinned when it is criticized. Lighten up. Wish our ex-President well in his efforts.
Posted by: eaglepeak | December 24, 2009 1:33 AM
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Jimmy is just as guilty for murdering Israelis as Hamas and the rest of the Arab/Muslim national army.
That he would devote his final opportunity to securing peace in Palestine while his country is at war is just another reason he didn't get that last opportunity.
While he still believes it's okay for Arabs to discriminate against Jews by not allowing them to build their homes (an improvement for the region) in semi-autonomous Arab territory, he's sorry for hurting the feelings of Israelis. Well sorry if it hurts your feelings Jimmy, but f**k you.
Posted by: rpatoh | December 24, 2009 1:16 AM
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Jimmy Carter seems committed to a fair, lasting peace agreement between Israelis and Palestinians. He is not hostile to the Jewish community.
Obviously most people who criticize some Israeli policies, especially their military actions and quasi-apartheid system on the West Bank, are not anti-Semitic. Thinking they are is as absurd as those African-Americans who think anyone opposed to affirmative action, reverse discrimination, programs is a racist.
Posted by: Aprogressiveindependent | December 24, 2009 1:11 AM
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This is always a difficult subject for so many reasons. For one thing, most American's understanding of the history of the region ends with the New Testament and picks up again with WWII. There were nearly 2000 years of events in between that have profoundly shaped the current situation.
The pain of the Jews at the Diaspora and later the Shoah, the pain of Palestinians dispossessed from their homes in the creation of the state of Israel, the terrible events since then are not easily healed and the opinions of Americans (whether pro-Israel or pro-Palestinian) may only deepen the wounds. Given the relationship between Israel and the US, it is possible that we cannot be active brokers of the peace because we are not an unbiased third party.
Pro-Israel and pro-Palestine solutions seem only to perpetuate the problem. The rash actions on both sides perpetuate the problem.
It is fatuous, if correct, to say there is no easy solution. I think that the answers must be found in regional rather than nationalistic thinking, perhaps with a two state system with a regional authority to mediate and manage resource allocation (water, arable land, mineral rights, etc.); and perhaps Jerusalem should be an independent city-state belonging to neither Israel or Palestine, instead being a neutral zone co-administered.
Or maybe, like so many other solutions, those would fall into intractable morasses, too.
Posted by: Ilikemyprivacy | December 24, 2009 1:10 AM
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BS"D
Shalom u"Brocho,
How nice that the former President, who in that capacity recognized Education Day USA and the importance of the US commitment to fulfillment of the universal laws of morality known to humanity since the days of Noah as the Noahide laws, which were again revealed and commanded to all people at Sinai through the hand of Moses, wich require that any non-Jews who desire legally reside in the land of Israel must abide by the seven basic laws of civilized life, including not to kill others. The renunciation of political violence in the land of Israel by those who seek to usurp the right of the Jewish people to reside and settle the land of Israel, is the key issue for actual progress in fact on the ground towards peaceful coexistence. While the US maintains her own law of war claims to the sovereignty of the Jewish land (especially Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria), albeit cestqui est, in trust for the Jewish people, by virtue of our conquest of the Germans and Ottoman Empire and the terms of the Treaty of Peace at Versailles and the US-UK Convention assenting for the US to control of the Mandate by the British in trust for the Jewish people, any acts of violence against Jews or Americans in the land of Israel, is an act of seditious conspiracy and treason against the United States' as yet unresolved and undetermined claims to the sovereignty of Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria. The full authority and weight of the US and our commitment to the universal laws of civilization, should be brought to bring to justice any perpetrators of political violence against the Jewish people or Americans in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria. It would also seem that the status quo of Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria would color the natives thereof, regardless of ethnicity or religious faith, to allegiance to the US under the Fourteenth Amendment and the Treaty of Versailles, as explained by John Bellinger in the Zivotofsky case, and thus all the native persons should be US noncitizen nationals, unless and until the US shall recognize the sovereignty, or restore the sovereignty, of the Jewish people to Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria by relinquishing our law of war claims thereto.
With Hatzlocho vliBrocho, for continued good health and all success as you set your heart for good,
Dr. Paul Maas Risenhoover
Rosh Yeshiva, Yeshiva Bnai Noah
Executive Director, The Robin Hood International Human Rights Legal Defense Fund
27-1 Yu Nung Rd. 5th Fl. 1-2, 5A3, East District, Tainan City 70164, American Formosa
Posted by: ilovelibby | December 24, 2009 12:35 AM
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Carter's comments were appropriate; his "apology" wasn't. Israel is long overdue for a wake-up call.
Posted by: jrw1 | December 24, 2009 12:19 AM
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I think this is a refreshingly balanced assessment of the situation. I do appreciate the condemnation of some groups who attack any criticism of whoever happens to be in power in Israel at any time as "antisemitic". There are certain groups who will not accept the legitimacy of honest criticisms of Israeli politics which are routine in Israel itself, when they are made by people in the US.
Posted by: twm1 | December 24, 2009 12:02 AM
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Who the he11 cares what this old fool says or thinks. He was our worst President... until the current one.
Posted by: waterfrontproperty | December 24, 2009 12:00 AM
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"...whatever road to peace will be found in the Middle East, will demand at least some measure of that sense of shared fate, if not destiny, by all people in the region."
Hey Hirschfield! Try peddling this line of horse hockey to the people who have been displaced by illegal Jewish settlements.
Posted by: sasquatchbigfoot | December 23, 2009 11:47 PM
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CCNL1, what you don't think Judaism isn't also complete mumbo jumbo BS? The idea that God has a "chosen people" and that God gave them land--all a bunch of complete crapola.
Posted by: bendan2000 | December 23, 2009 11:39 PM
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Carter is a Christian and believes his way is the only way. This mind-set oozes out of everything he says and does. His attitude will not change until he comes to grips with the fact that his Jesus was not deity but a simple preacher man whose life was elevated to "god status" by the real founders/con artists? of Christianity, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John and Paul.
Posted by: ccnl1 | December 23, 2009 6:24 PM
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[stilltrucking]

The Big Zero by Paul Krugman

So let’s bid a not at all fond farewell to the Big Zero — the decade in which we achieved nothing and learned nothing. Will the next decade be better? Stay tuned. Oh, and happy New Year.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/28/opini ... wbtTBLg82Q

[stilltrucking]

OVER the past year, Americans have spent an average of 11.8 hours a day consuming information, sucking up, in aggregate, 3.6 zettabytes of data and 10,845 trillion words. That, said the University of California, San Diego, researcher who computed these figures, is triple the amount of “content” that we consumed in 1980.

Thanks to this gargantuan download from all forms of media, we now know vastly more than we did a year ago about bankers’ bonuses, Sarah Palin, “death panels,” Glenn Beck, where Barack Obama was born, Jon and Kate, and cocktail waitresses who have spent quality time with Tiger Woods.

Hidden among that avalanche of diverting gigabytes were some developments of more enduring significance. Here are just a few:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/29/opinion/29falk.html

[mtmynd]

Gosh! That NYT article spits out numbers that baffle this boy. But within that list I was smitten (is that correct?) by this one.

TEEMING WITH PLANETS Astronomers are closing in on identifying distant worlds that may have the right conditions to support life. Techniques for detecting “exoplanets” are becoming more sophisticated, and over 400 have been discovered so far — 30 in October alone. This year brought two particularly intriguing finds. One is Gliese 581d, orbiting a star at a distance that could indicate surface temperatures not so different from Earth’s. Astronomers also discovered a “waterworld” composed mostly of H2O, which would be a prime candidate for extraterrestrial life if it were just a little farther from its sun.

What science has discovered in space in such a short amount of time, plus the instruments of discovery is truly wondrous for a fellow from what is quickly becoming 'the past'...