For months, polls showed Obama languishing at about 60 percent of the Jewish vote, a critical chunk short of the 75 percent or so Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) garnered in 2004. But exit polls from the Tuesday election showed Obama matching those results, garnering about 78 percent of the Jewish vote against 22 percent for Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), his Republican rival.
The story of how John McCain came to be friends with a Jewish anti-war protester speaks to his ability to attract praise from across the political spectrum. These days, however, Democrats say the Arizona lawmaker is no longer acting like the maverick of past years.
But there\’s also a less benign explanation for the media\’s negligence, and it\’s captured by something President Andrew Jackson said nearly two centuries ago: \”If the people only understood the rank injustice of our money and banking system, there would be a revolution before morning.\”
In recent weeks, John McCain\’s advisers have said that Israeli-Palestinian talks would not be a priority, but in Thursday\’s debate Sarah Palin sounded a different note.
\” . . .The separation of church and state is the foundation for religious freedom in our great country. Shame on you Rabbis for Obama . . .\”
Joseph Stalin is reputed to have said, \”Those who cast the votes decide nothing. Those who count the votes decide everything.\” I think he had it half right.
\” . . . I am just an average person that fits the person you describe in \”Post-Palin Depression.\” I do not have a therapist, but I have been in depression for almost two weeks now . . . \”
You have to go back to Spiro Agnew and his bullyboy ventriloquists, Pat Buchanan and William Safire, to find this kind of sneering contempt for educated people.
The mounting anxiety over Iran\’s nuclear program is sparking campaign chatter over a possible Israeli strike and prompting a bipartisan effort to revive long-stalled sanctions legislation in the U.S. Congress
It would be far healthier for American democracy, as well as for our community, if we would reject the use of Israel as a partisan issue and look at the policy areas where candidates from the two major parties truly do differ.
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