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December 2013

Daniel Seidemann is an Israeli who runs a non-governmental organization, Terrestrial Jersusalem, that describes itself as " an Israeli non-governmental organization that works to identify and track the full spectrum of developments in Jerusalem that could impact either the political process or permanent status options, destabilize the city or spark violence, or create humanitarian crises." According to NGO Monitor, Terrestrial Jerusalem receives its funding mostly from Europeans and one U.S. foundation and actively seeks to undermine Israeli policies which seek to maintain, among other things, a unified Jerusalem under full Israeli control. Seideman has written that he sees some measure of re-division of Jerusalem as inevitable and considers Israeli actions as contrary to the peace process:
Upon my arrival in Israel more than forty years ago, I too subscribed to the "Jerusalem mantra," whereby Jerusalem was "the-eternal-undivided-capital-of-Israel-that-would-never-be-redivided" (one word, and a noun). It was consensus, the impermeable devotion to an article of faith. The harsh realities in the ensuing years undermined that faith, and finally, in the summer of 2000, during President Clinton’s Camp David summit, it collapsed. It then became apparent, and has remained so, that the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians will end within the borders of a politically divided city. Jerusalem was deflowered at Camp David.
We have noted before the problem of Palestinian rock throwing, and how it is minimized by Western media as not consequential. Particularly when the rocks are thrown by children, it's no lose for anti-Israeli groups:  If the rock lands its mark, the mission was accomplished; if the child also is arrested, it's doubly good because the phalanx of international and Israeli leftist photographers will be there to record the moment as reflecting Israeli brutality (as just happened with the Bedouin protests). Seidemann recently was the victim of such rock throwing while stalled in traffic in East Jerusalem. His account of the event got particularly attention because he blamed Israeli occupation of East Jerusalem not the rock throwers (for an alternative, more accurate legal history of why East Jerusalem is not illegally occupied, see Prof. Eugene Kontorovich's lecture, The Legal Case for Israel).

A few months ago a picture of John and Teresa Heinz Kerry having dinner with Bashar and Asma Assad in 2009 resurfaced. The timing was awkward because it came just after the Secretary of State condemned Assad as a "thug," and compared him to Adolph Hitler for his use of chemical weapons. The problem with Kerry's meeting with Assad isn't just that it happened. It was the beginning of a relationship - with the approval of the Obama administration - in which the future secretary of state attempted to cultivate the dictator, apparently with the intent of weaning him away from Iran. Even after Assad's brutality towards protesters became undeniable, the Wall Street Journal reported that the administration wasn't ready to give up on him:
The killing of at least 70 people around the central town of Homs in the past five days, according to activists, brought to an estimated 1,100 the total toll in Mr. Assad's months-long crackdown and sparked tougher condemnation from the Obama administration. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton urged other Arab states, Russia and China to join in protesting the violence. ... Mrs. Clinton's ambiguity highlights the frustrating U.S. courtship of Bashar al-Assad. For more than two years, Mr. Obama's foreign-policy team has tried to woo Mr. Assad away from America's regional nemesis, Iran, and persuade him to resume peace talks with America's regional friend, Israel. For more than two years, Mr. Assad has frustrated the U.S. with the promise of reform and the practice of repression.
One detail in particular about the Obama administration's first term outreach to Syria sticks out, "Mr. Kerry, meanwhile, became Mr. Assad's champion in the U.S., urging lawmakers and policymakers to embrace the Syrian leader as a partner in stabilizing the Mideast." When it came to Syria John Kerry was out in front.

The post on Friday regarding Obama's lawlessness has generated some furious defense of Obama by one commenter, and even more furious pushback by other readers, An increasingly dangerous presidency. The defense of Obama, that no court has found him to have violated the law, is both wrong and off point. The problem with Obama is the completely political basis for his decisions whether to honor or ignore the law. For example, if granting a waiver helps him with political allies, he grants it; if not, not. This is not the rule of law, or the good faith exercise of administrative discretion, it is the use of discretion for political purposes. That in many, but not all, instances he can get away with it because of the separation of powers and the hesitancy of the judiciary to get involved in administrative decisions in no way justifies the conduct. Lawlessness includes a lack of predictability to enforcement of the law, and that is what we have in this administration. The prior post was based on Charles Krauthammer's column on lawlessness of the Obama administration. Here Krauthammer expands on his point, via RCP:

The Obama administration just announced that it has met the completely arbitrary, dumbed-down goals it set for healthcare.gov. These goals were not what was supposed to exist on October 1, but what the administration believed it could meet and therefore met in order to declare the website fixed.  Operation Fixed Website: Feds will declare healthcare.gov fixed no matter what. https://twitter.com/ZekeJMiller/status/407148182011777024 https://twitter.com/amandacarpenter/status/407149347533361152

From J: East St. Louis isn't too fond of O. Spotted today on I-64. Thanks for all you do. Happy Hanukkah.   ...