Sam Stein posted an article on Huffington Post asking whether Barack Obama needs "the Jewish vote". I find many things wrong with this article, the least of which is being lumped into a group that supposedly votes in blocs.

The GOP has resorted to outright lies in this campaign – and it’s only May.

The primary process isn’t even officially over yet, and prominent GOP officials – members of the leadership of the House – are already distorting Barack Obama’s words beyond any boundaries of truthfulness.

But --  as we saw last night in Mississippi -- if the GOP thinks they can steal this election with the old playbook of fears and smears, they have another thing coming.

Details below ...

Last year, First Lady Laura Bush infamously said of the costs of the Iraq war for the American people, "no one suffers more than their President and I do."  Now we know why.  While U.S. troops were sacrificing life and limb in the battlefields of Baghdad, President Bush sacrificed...golf.

Justin Raimondo has a column at antiwar.com about Barack Obama's relationship with the Israel lobby. He says "grovel" which may be unnecessarily inflammatory so I'll edit the diary title to include the Atlantic interview which was the point of the review.

I find this a bit perturbing. I am eager for an actual peace process, not a fig leaf. But is this fringe hackery?

Poor Obama. No matter how much he tries to placate the Israel lobby, they just won't take yes for an answer. The Lobby has been after him for months, trying to dig up "evidence" that someone with the middle name of "Hussein" is necessarily an enemy of Israel. The best they could come up with so far were the Rev. Jeremiah Wright's jeremiads, which didn't have much of an effect at the polls, as the North Carolina and Indiana primary results – and subsequent national polls – attest.

Now I think, as a supporter of Obama, that he needs to address Israel and Palestine.  More after the jump...and a chance to discuss whether this is beyond the pale and a link to Jeffrey Goldberg's Atlantic online article after the jump, which is what Raimondo is talking about.

As he heads off to Israel to commemorate that nation's 60th anniversary, George W. Bush is nothing if not optimistic about the prospects for Middle East peace.  Even as his negotiating partners are incapacitated by scandal and internal conflict, the lame duck President reiterated his January promise to produce an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement by the time he leaves office eight months from now.

According to House Minority Leader John Boehner, Senator Obama recently declared Israel to be a "constant sore":

"Israel is a critical American ally and a beacon of democracy in the Middle East, not a ‘constant sore’ as Barack Obama claims," Boehner said. "Obama’s latest remark, and his commitment to ‘opening a dialogue’ with sponsors of terrorism, echoes past statements by Jimmy Carter who once called Israel an ‘apartheid state.’"

Not to be outdone, Rep. Eric Cantor of Virginia said:

"It is truly disappointing that Senator Obama called Israel a ‘constant wound,’ ‘constant sore,’ and that it ‘infect[s] all of our foreign policy.’ These sorts of words and characterizations are the words of a politician with a deep misunderstanding of the Middle East and an innate distrust of Israel," Cantor said.

So, of course, Obama said nothing of the sort, right? Right.

It was early April when an Arutz Shiva article by Gil Ronen entitled Arab-American Activist Says Obama Hiding Anti-Israel Stance came to my attention. More than once, it was forwarded to me directly or cited in blog entries claiming they'd found Obama's Achilles heel with Jewish voters. At the core of Ronen's piece was this quote from Ali Abunimah describing an encounter he had with Obama in 2004:

"As he came in from the cold and took off his coat, I went up to greet him. He responded warmly, and volunteered, 'Hey, I’m sorry I haven’t said more about Palestine right now, but we are in a tough primary race. I’m hoping when things calm down I can be more up front.' He referred to my activism, including columns I was contributing to the The Chicago Tribune critical of Israeli and US policy [and said:] 'Keep up the good work!'"

Ronen goes on to describe Abunimah's apparent close relationship to Obama and flesh out his case for what Obama was "hiding." There was just one major problem: The article he cited by Abunimah arrived at no such conclusions.

Right-wing pro-Israel blogger Ted Belman has recently embarrassed himself by joining the stampede of conservative Republicans so desperate to keep Senator Barack Obama out of the White House that they'll say just about anything to scare people out of voting for him.

Make no mistake, Belman and his ilk are scared.  The smear tactics which worked so well against John Kerry in 2004 just don't seem to be working on Obama.  So, what's an ideologue to do?  The answer, apparently, is to take a gaggle of absurd accusations against Obama, combine them into a hastily written hodgepodge of rumor and innuendo, and throw them out into the blogosphere in the hope that "a lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes."

Here's what the smear-mongers want you to believe:

(Note: I didn't see this diaried yet. If it has been I'll delete this one.

I've been posting about our local fundraising efforts the past few days, but this smear by Republicans John Boehner and Eric Cantor seemed more important.)

While it's despicable that GOP "leaders" such as Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA) and Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) would choose to slice out only the few phrases that would make the presumptive Democratic nominee for president look bad (and they have to actually ignore those phrases' real intent even at that), it's equally deplorable that a well-respected journalist such as the Sun-Times' Washington Bureau chief and political columnist Lynn Sweet would let them get away with the distorted half-quoting via her own half-baked he-said/they-said stenography at her to-the-minute blog.

[FYI, Lynn Sweet has been a Chris Matthews regular as she has covered the Obama campaign from one of his hometown papers for well over a year.]

Remember that ridiculous email that went around about Barack HUSSEIN Obama being a Muslim, or whatever it said? Well, there's more. Buckle up.

A few weeks ago I got into it over the phone with my Bubbe about Hillary vs. Obama. She had a bunch of reasons why she liked Hillary. I don't really care what she thinks about Hillary - my only point was that Hillary had already lost so it was time to get behind Obama. She said she doesn't like Obama. But of course she'll vote for him against McCain.

So now she sends me this email titled: Jews Can't Vote for Obama and be Pro-Israel at the Same Time. And you know what? It's total CRAP. So here is the truth, next to the lies. PLEASE start emailing this around to Jews you know!!!

This is a re-post of a diary I posted more than a year ago; with some revisions.

I love Israel.  I really do.  I lived there for three years (1985 - 1988).  In many ways, I find it to be a much better society that the one we've got going here.

I hate AIPAC.  I once, by accident, attended an AIPAC dinner (I was invited to fill up a table).  I wanted to retch. They are repulsive.

I love Israel.  I hate AIPAC.  More below the fold

Let me just say that I am sorry if this topic has been discussed in another diary somewhere else. I first learned of its existence yesterday when I came across this article in the NY Times over the weekend. However I just read the actual piece referenced by the NY Times article and let me say, I enjoyed reading it because it reinforces the reason why I support Obama so much; it's so amazing how Obama's progressive, nuanced and reasonable approach to various issues, syncs with mine.

Anyway, so this piece is a piece written by Jeffery Goldberg of "The Atlantic", in which he interviews Barack Obama on a number of topics that center on Obama’s exposure to Zionism; his views on the rightful existence of Israel as a Jewish state; the continuous suspicion he receives from some Jews here at home and so on.  Most importantly it clues one in as to how the Obama White House might approach Mid-East policy.  

Barack gave a very lengthy interview with Atlantic Magazine on Israel.

It is nuanced, gives some insight into his personal relationship with the Jewish Community and the irony of his Jewish "problem". Ps. Note that I don't think he has a Jewish Problem. He has a senior problem of all races and gender.

Given the occasion of Israel's 60th anniversary, and Senator Obama's comments on his position on Israel, much has been written in criticism of his remarks. I am writing this as more of a way to ask questions I have on the bigger issue, because there is a lot to be considered here. I commented a few days back about Obama's remarks and was directed to this article, by John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt, which I read completely and started more research. But that has only brought up more questions and concerns that I want to ask here while trying to stay as objective as possible. Exactly how does support to Israel benefit US interest? How much power does Israel, through its lobby, actually have in shaping US foreign policy?

The Council on Foreign Relations announced on Friday, May 9, that Dr. Trita Parsi, President of the National Iranian American Council and author of Treacherous Alliance: The Secret Dealings of Israel, Iran, and the United States, received the Silver Medal for his "unique and important book [that] takes a closer look at the complicated triangular relations between Israel, Iran, and the United States that continues to shape the future of the Middle East."

The peripatetic Dr. Parsi emailed friends and colleagues, including Pittsburgh's World Affairs Council, of this good news on Friday; distributed the analysis quoted below the fold of the latest "secret dealings between Iran" and others regarding Iranian nuclear plans on Saturday morning; then discussed his award winning book before a rapt Pittsburgh audience on Saturday afternoon.

On May 2, Pittsburgh radio KQV/ World Affairs Council featured Dr. Parsi in a Global Press Conference interview.

10 minutes with comedic cuts thrown in.

Domestically, we lament the death of political discourse and lose our bearings over sound bites.  It could be worse.  Instead of going to war over a lie, we could go to war over a phone system.

A private telephone network built by the Shiite Hezbollah organisation is at the centre of a political storm that has brought Lebanon perilously close to a new civil war.

I'm not making this up.  I'm not that creative.  Remember that Israeli assault on Lebanon a couple years ago?  You know, the one that Israel basically lost.  You know why they lost?  You're not going to believe this...

Are you going to let a terrorist tell you how to vote?

John McCain thinks you should.