If I still gave a fuck about the situation in Israel, I’d write something like this*. Thanks Tim.
(* – except for the following: Strike the line starting with “As Israel’s most important friend…” and the sentence immediately after. Replace with approximately “No surprise there, we are talking about a State after all. When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Explain again why this is any of the business of the US?”.)
Edit: Greenwald notes that in polls on the subject us plebes overwhelmingly favor butting out — while our alleged representatives overwhelingly favor the opposite — and adds the following (emphasis all his):
By itself, the degree of full-fledged, absolute agreement — down to the syllable — among America’s political leaders is striking, even when one acknowledges the constant convergence between the leadership of both parties. But it becomes even more striking in light of the bizarre fact that the consensus view — that America must unquestioningly stand on Israel’s side and support it, not just in this conflict but in all of Israel’s various wars — is a view which 7 out of 10 Americans reject. Conversely, the view which 70% of Americans embrace — that the U.S. should be neutral and even-handed in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict generally — is one that no mainstream politician would dare express.
In a democracy, one could expect that politicians would be afraid to express a view that 70% of the citizens oppose. Yet here we have the exact opposite situation: no mainstream politician would dare express the view that 70% of Americans support; instead, the universal piety is the one that only a small minority accept. Isn’t that fairly compelling evidence of the complete disconnect between our political elites and the people they purportedly represent?
Yup. It’s also evidence that, contrary to conventional wisdom, numbers mean zilch. The percentage on those polls could go to 99% and it still wouldn’t matter, treating Israel like the 51st state benefits the Rapturists & the owners of the companies that make the weapons we send there, therefore it will happen, period. People who argue in public for removing ourselves from the conflict there get smeared as anti-semites not from truth, or even because the people making the charges think so, but because saying “if we don’t then what are we going to do about all these extra missiles?” exposes the real interest involved. Better for it to seem like largely sideline bickering than to have people question the worth of intervention itself.
