Posted on 08/21/2004 9:54:50 AM PDT by Happygal
Yasser Arafat was reported on Thursday as having issued 'an unprecedented mea culpa admitting that he had made mistakes and promising to rectify them'.
In a speech to the Palestinian parliament, which has been increasingly critical of him and his aides, Mr Arafat conceded that his leadership has not been blameless.
'There were wrong actions, by some institutions and some [officials] were irresponsible and misused their positions,' he said. 'There is nobody immune from mistakes, starting from me on down.'
'Starting from me on down' - We can accept the complete sincerity of at least that part of Mr Arafat's declaration. And we can also accept that Mr Arafat now feels under pressure from his own party, and that he is feeling a bit insecure in his own leadership, though not at present directly threatened.
There are, however, some direct threats to the present EU leadership in Europe, which has up to now, been highly critical of Israel and has often favoured Arafat.
Rosemary Righter, probably the best-informed and most objective observer of Middle Eastern affairs, published an article on Thursday under the rather startling but accurate headline: 'Big two sidelined as new Europe deposes old'.
Rosemary's article opens with a metaphor, again rather startling, but again, fundamentally accurate. She writes: 'The king lies there like a beached whale, but he is not yet dead, nor will he die for another ten dreary weeks. His ministers are still formally in office, lingering until November 1 like ghosts, in a machine just ticking over.' She is speaking of course of Romano Prodi, whose successor as President of the European Commission has not only already been crowned, he is already shaping the character of his own reign.
As Rosemary crisply and accurately writes: 'France and Germany have had things their way for over fifty years, setting the agenda and embedding in EU thinking a "social model" that combined France's dirigiste tradition with Germany's welfare-padded consensual brand of "Rhineland capitalism". With enlargement, they can no longer expect to dominate EU decisions.'
Of the new team taking over, Rosemary singles out Noelie Kroes, whom Rosemary describes as "a redoubtable Dutch entrepreneur" and our own Charlie McCreevy.
Ms Kroes has sat on the boards of dozens of multinationals. Rosemary says Ms Kroes has 'zero hang-ups' about what the French call 'capitalisme sauvage' and having privatised the Dutch postal and telephone services at home can be expected to be dry-eyed at pleas for the preservation of similar monopolies'.
Rosemary expects - I am sure rightly - that the reforming Noelie Kroes will find an ally in our own Charlie McCreevy. My readers will be interested in what Rosemary has to say about Charlie, which runs as follows. 'In creating a genuinely open market [Noelie] will have a powerful ally in former Finance Minister [of Ireland] Charlie McCreevy, whose tax-cuts and supply-side reforms made Ireland the success story that most inspires "New Europe"'.
These momentous changes are obviously focused on Europe, but they will also have a significant reverberation throughout the world, especially in the United States. In the Presidential election campaign, the Bush camp will, I think, have the sense not to gloat publicly over the results of European elections, but the American Campaign to Re-elect the President will nonetheless have learned of these European developments with sober satisfaction, especially in that they constitute a check to French inclinations and ambitions.
Many French politicians - probably most of them indeed - have a visceral detestation of American leadership, as having replaced the rightful predominance of France in the world.
The obvious target for French resentment is the President of the United States unless, like President Clinton, he goes out of his way to butter up the French incumbent.
President Bush, having failed to win French support for his Middle Eastern policies, made no such efforts, and Franco-American relations have hardly ever been worse than they have been in the days of the ascendancy of Jacques Chirac.
John Kerry, especially in the early days of his Presidential campaign, courted Chirac and Chirac responded favourably to the courtship of Bush's challenger. But by now Chirac's attitudes matter very little, internationally speaking.
The new European members, having been alternatively patronised and snubbed by Chirac, feel they owe him nothing, and are happy enough to rally to the American President; no doubt largely in the hope of favours to come.
In the American Presidential contest, present polls show the candidates running about even, and of course a very serious setback in Iraq could at any moment lead to a victory for the Democratic candidate. Failing such a setback - which I think on the whole quite unlikely - the stage seems set for a second term for President Bush.
Two scheduled events, within the next two weeks are likely to favour the President. The first set of events is the three televised debates between the Presidential candidates to which Senator Kerry - as I think, unwisely - challenged the President, and to which the President agreed, with a promptness that may well have dismayed the more prudent of the Democrats.
Almost all the advantages here seem to lie with the President's camp. He is surrounded by experienced advisers, themselves surrounded by scores of experienced and well-informed experts. These are certainly already working on perceived weaknesses in Kerry's position and ready to discharge their batteries at the moment when they seem likely to do the most damage.
Kerry, for his part, has no corresponding assets.
The second Republican asset is the coming Republican National Convention. Traditionally Republicans are more disciplined, in their public behaviour, than Democrats. I would expect the Republican Convention to display a massive show of unity, with even Republicans who have in the past shown themselves to be a bit fractious, joining in prominently.
By the end of the Convention I would expect the Republicans to be looking like winners, and that usually creates a band-wagon effect. There are also Republican assets, which have hitherto been only partially unveiled. One of these is the Jewish vote: pivotal in four States: New York, Massachusetts, Illinois and California - and significant in a great number of others. Normally, with a definite, though not great, advantage for the Democrats.
But I don't think that will be the case this time round. Candidate Kerry in early speeches has spoken of 'holding the balance even' between Jews and Arabs, and his speeches went down quite well with Arafat and his followers. But for that very reason these speeches did not go down well with American Jews.
In consistently keeping Arafat at arms length, while having his door always open to the Jewish leaders, Bush, while saying very little on the subject in public, has, I believe, made sure of most of the Jewish vote. And I think that support, with other factors, will guarantee Bush a second term as President of the United States.
O'Ping! :-)
That article is highly unlikely to be true. I know from firsthand observation that the Jewish community in the US is considering support for Bush more seriously than any other GOP candidate in my lifetime. The weight of Kerry's anti-Israel positions combined with his frothing, craven and highly visible anti-semitic allies, will put an end to the Dem's Jewish franchise.
I don't think so.
But his support for Israel will get a higher proportion of the Jewish vote than any Republican in years, and perhaps have financial effects as well-- there are doubtless many liberal Jews who will unenthusiastically vote for Kerry, but keep their wallets closed.
One very promising trend is among young Jews-- there is a generational shift taking place, and Republicans will do very much better among them in decades to come.
-ccm
Good point. It seems that younger Jews and foreign born Jews tend to be more conservative.
However, just looking at the few Jewish neighborhood (zip codes) that I happen to know about in my limited experience, on fundrace.org and newsmeat.com...donations are strictly Kerry.
This is disgusting. Bush (and 140,000 American soldiers, 900+dead), saved the Israeli Army from a "death march" across Jordan and Iraq to Baghdad in an effort to stop Husseins money funding suicide bombers. The only other alternative was to "Nuke" Baghdad, but Damascus, Cairo, Riyadh and Tehran, would have to follow.
This is an ugly and insensitive question, but: Did German Jews vote, overwhelmingly, for Hitler in 1932? I hope not, but sometimes I have to wonder.
I don't think so.
But his support for Israel will get a higher proportion of the Jewish vote than any Republican in years, and perhaps have financial effects as well-- there are doubtless many liberal Jews who will unenthusiastically vote for Kerry, but keep their wallets closed.
One very promising trend is among young Jews-- there is a generational shift taking place, and Republicans will do very much better among them in decades to come.
-ccm
accidental repost, please ignore #12.
Their parents remember right-wing anti-semitism. But these days, any objective observer would conclude that most of the anti-semites are left-wing.
Put an end to the Dem's Jewish franchise? How I wish it were true. Frankly, I don't understand either the Jews or the African-Americans having such loyal, blind support for Democrat candidates. And as much as I would like to believe that both groups would see that conservatives are more in tune with them and their best interests, I don't see it either switching their voting patterns. But, I hope you're right.
Today's NYT piece on Bush FINALLY getting out of Sharon's way on West Bank settlements is his only hope of securing Jewish support. He needs to act quickly to distance himself from the Powell/Bush-41 crew on hardlining Israel for their Arab buddies.
If that was "an ace in the hole", then I would be tempted to recount the whole deck of cards: there might be more than 4 aces, to say nothing of other cards.
JWR is an explicitly conservative web site, and a good one, but hardly representative of Jewish opinion as a whole.
-ccm
Maybe Marafat is coping on in his old age
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.