I think I already bestowed this title on Jeffrey Goldberg, but I’m going to point out again how he is, indeed, a Master of Juvenile Scorn on the same level as yours truly (and that is a rare, rare, rare honor given by me).
Here’s a fact that might astonish Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer, whose book, “The Israel Lobby,” posits the existence of a nefarious, all-powerful Jewish lobby that works in direct opposition to American interests: The “Lobby” (they love to capitalize the word, to accentuate its alleged uniqueness) has failed to convince two successive American administrations, one Republican and one Democratic, to attack Iran’s nuclear sites. So much for Jewish power.
Here’s another fact that might astonish Walt and Mearsheimer: It turns out that the Jewish lobby wasn’t even the main lobby working to bring about an attack on Iran. It was, according to the treasure trove of State Department cables released by Wikileaks, the Arab lobby — whose lead lobbyist is, by the way, the King of Saudi Arabia (which is a big job, since he’s also in charge of the world’s oil supply) — that was at the forefront of an intensive, even ferocious, anti-Iran lobbying effort. For Walt and Mearsheimer to acknowledge that the Arab lobby, and not the Jewish lobby, was the prime mover of this issue would mean that they would have to recall their book, and somehow stuff back into a bottle all of the anti-Semitic invective they unleashed in the book’s wake. So don’t expect an apology anytime soon.
In sum, what we have here is a situation in which all of the Semites in combination have been proven impotent in their attempt to move American foreign policy. Which suggests that American foreign policy might actually be made by Americans. This is definitely a tough week for the neo-Lindberghians.
He should be a regular read for us all.
I think we were separated at birth. I’ve found my long-lost brother. Welcome to the family!
yes, yes, and yes !
Also: there is a certain Rorschach quality to the big info-dump. Owing to the .. schizo-quality of much public diplomacy, those analysts who are more interested in *analyzing* than, say, shooting the messenger can find a lot to be happy about. The anti-war kids? check. On the other hand, aren’t the documents the first “officialish” suggestion that Europe may be at risk from long-range missiles lobbed from Iran? Also: th’ Leaks have – in my view – done more to isolate North Korea than anything the US or UN could have done. The truth is out: China – now fully integrated into the system of Global Capitalism – would prefer dealing with South Korea. But, really, the notion that this Information has “damaged U.S. diplomacy” really doesn’t hold up. Diplomatic Language, unlike ordinary language, conceals more than it reveals. Diplomats knows this, governments know this: now the citizenry, whether they like it or not, know it.
Did you see the crap he wrote about how people shouldn’t give to the JNF to help fight the fire.
Goldberg is very idiosyncratic.
In the end, he’s willing to call out Sullivan and Mersheimer and Walt and those types.
But beyond that, his judgement is quite suspect.
Yaacov Lozowick agrees with Goldberg about not donating to the cause. I don’t find Yaacov’s judgment suspect.
That’s a good point. I respect Lozowick. (I respect Goldberg too, I just find
his judgement on Israel suspect outside of debates with Sullivan and Mearsheimer/Walt.)
I could list why I think Goldberg Lozowick have made a mistake on the Israel
fire issue. But I don’t want to sideline a thread that’s about something else.
So I’ll hold off. If you write a comment that you’d like to see why they are quite
off base on this one, I write a comment on it. Otherwise, I respect that this thread
is about something else.
I enjoy your site.
After your comment, I was intrigued so I went and read what Lozowick had to say.
He said he agreed with Goldberg, but I think he read Goldberg too quickly because
what Lozowick says in “Fire on the Carmel – Followup” is that people shouldn’t
give charity to Israel to help in the replanting and recovery from the blaze because
Haiti, Pakistan, etc need the money more.
Goldberg said something different. He said, while the fire was blazing, that we shouldn’t
give money to Israel to help Israel put out the fire. That’s crazy. In fact, Lozowick, while
saying he agreed with Goldberg, argued that the fire was so bad that, even if Israel was
well-prepared, it would have been able to deal with such an extreme fire. Goldberg basically
said if Israel doesn’t have a big enough fire department to deal with it, that’s their own
damn fault which is wrong for a bunch of reasons, but I won’t go into it since it would
be off-topic for the thread.
No, feel free to take the thread off-topic. Nobody else is commenting on it. :-)
Goldberg’s “no tears” argument about fire disasters applies to the United States as well.
According to his argument each cluster of two or three counties in the US
(some of which are bigger and many of which are richer than Israel) should
stock enough firefighting equipment to handle the worst-case scenario fire,
and equipment should never be shared between clusters of US counties.
It would be economically crushing for each Israel-sized sub-region of the US
to have to stock enough emergency equipment for every type of emergency to be
able to make due without assistance from other areas.
It would be unthinkable to have idle firefighting capacity in one region
of the US while another region is strained to the breaking point fighting a record-setting fire.
Similarly, the it is extremely unreasonable to have idle firefighting equipment in all but one country
in a region of the globe while a record-breaking fire rages in the remaining country in that region.
Small countries, like small governmental units in the US, cannot stock enough emergency equipment
for every type of extreme emergency. Instead they need to be able to share, just like fire equipment
is shared across different parts of the United States.
Israel does its part. In earthquakes and other disasters Israel sends teams of
relief workers. It is far from unfair for Israel to expect the same when it is hit with
a major disaster.
Perhaps it would be better if countries made “fire insurance” treaties in which they
pledged certain amount of money or equipment into an international pool and then could call on the pool when disaster struck.
Up till now this has not been necessary: the current informal system works pretty well. It would be ashame if honest but mistaken arguments like Goldberg’s derail it.
Okay, now I get where you’re coming from, Jonathan, but I can’t agree. Except for the treaty idea; that’s a pretty good one.
Israel has to be prepared for a massive attack by missiles from the north, west, and possibly east, as well as long-range missiles from Iran. If the missile attack comes during the dry months of the year, there will be huge fires. There are going to be fires anyway, because Israel uses natural gas, and there are gas tanks and gas lines all over the country. So there are going to be fires if Iran or its proxies attack.
I really can’t argue with what Goldberg is saying. I’d rather contribute money to the poor and elderly Holocaust survivors in Israel than to the JNF firetruck fund. The fact that he said this while the fire was still ongoing doesn’t make a difference. He has a point: Israel was woefully unprepared for a raging forest fire, and while they are rarely as bad as the Carmel fire, forest fires happen in Israel. Israel was absolutely unable to fight the fire herself. And that means that Israel has a weakness that must be fixed.
Again, I can’t argue with Goldberg about his not wanting to put money towards the Israeli government. It’s his opinion, his money, and his choice.
We’re not talking about damage from an earthquake. We’re talking about Israelis complaining that the fire departments have been unfunded for years. We’re talking about Shas ministers refusing firetrucks from Christian Zionist organizations, which, if true, is criminal negligence in light of what just happened. We’re talking about a major strategic weakness, not a once-in-a-century happening.
Don’t think that Iran, Hezbollah, Syria, and Hamas aren’t taking notes. They certainly are. Israel must protect herself from massive fire outbreaks, because the terrorists are already scheming to light another big one.