Posted on 08/20/2008 12:52:38 PM PDT by Free ThinkerNY
Rudy Giuliani headed today’s Team McCain conference call, discussing the trip taken by Barack Obama adviser David Kurtzer to Syria in July. Giuliani, the recent selection for the GOP convention’s keynote speaker, took the opportunity to reassert himself on national security and foreign policy. Michael Goldfarb and Randy Scheuneman also took part in the call.
Mayor Giuliani told the conference that the fact that the trip was not disclosed at the time shows Obama’s inexperience and irresponsibility on foreign policy. Giuliani pointed out that Obama included Assad on his list of world leaders he would meet without preconditions. He says Kurtzer advised the Assad regime on how to handle the Bush administration, and Obama should have disclosed this at the time.
“The American people are entitled to a president who knows how to conduct foreign policy,” Giuliani said, “which includes having passed Diplomacy 101.” Giuliani also pointed out that another Obama adviser had met repeatedly with Hamas, and also hadn’t disclosed it. How many more of these meetings have taken place, and how many more will Obama’s team undertake before the election?
Scheuneman clarified that the Eli Lake article reported that the meeting took place with the Syrian foreign minister, and underwritten in part by Syrian corporations. This comes at a time when Syria sponsors terrorist organizations, stands accused of several assassinations in Lebanon, and refuse to cooperate with the IAEA. Why would anyone go to a conference on the rule of law in a nation with this track record?
Questions:
* On lobbying: There’s a big difference between being a declared lobbyist and going on covert meetings with hostile regimes.* NBC: How would the party respond to a pro-choice VP selection? — All choices have pros and cons. The GOP isn’t, in Giuliani’s estimation, a one-issue party. He thinks that the importance of the election will generate full support for John McCain. He wanted to ensure he could pick a running mate that would allow him to sleep at night, and he knows McCain will take this selection seriously.
* Is lobbying that big of a problem? — There’s nothing inherently wrong with lobbying or employing former lobbyists as long as everything is disclosed. The worst cases, though, have been pretty bad — which is why there is such understandable sensitivity.
Rudy would make an excellent choice for AG.
NBC: How would the party respond to a pro-choice VP selection?
“All choices have pros and cons. The GOP isn’t, in Giuliani’s estimation, a one-issue party. He thinks that the importance of the election will generate full support for John McCain.”
They really are preparing us for a pro-choice VP.
I disagree...;)
Could it be that Obama is trying to undermine US foreign policy with these trips?
Jr’s best friend Tony Rezko is a Syrian muslim.
Sic ‘em.Rudy is a great attack dog.
Daniel's bio confirms that he is an advisor to Obama. Is the source wrong about the name?
Rudy would make an excellent choice for AG.
No he wouldn’t. He continuously overstepped into prosecutorial abuse while a US Attorney. Case in point: Timothy Tabor, a 29 year old Wall Street trader perp walked by Giuliani in the 80’s, who never was even charged with a crime in the end. His life was ruined by Giuliani’s quest for power.
I wonder how O’s contributors are enjoying all his international base touching and feeling?
Did they know they were backing a “King of Da World” not just a U.S. President?
How’s that going to benefit Mr. and Mrs. Regular Guy in Middle America?
O throws money around like there is no end to it. Think of all the “poor people” who could have been fed and clothed!!
Much concern has also been expressed about Obama's top Midde East adviser, Daniel Kurtzer, who has long been seen as one of Israel's greatest foes in Washington.
Earlier this month, Kurtzer stressed Jerusalem must be included in any negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.
Kurtzer, a former U.S. ambassador to Israel, has been identified by Israeli leaders, including prime ministers, as biased against Israel and is notorious for urging extreme concessions from the Jewish state. He was appointed as a primary Obama adviser on the Middle East earlier this year.
Obama's appointment of Kurtzer raised eyebrows among the pro-Israel Jewish community.
"We oppose the appointment of Kurtzer because of his long, documented record of hostility to and severe pressure upon Israel," said Zionist Organization of America National Chairman Morton Klein.
Kurtzer has been blasted by mainstream Jewish organizations, including the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations.
He has angered Israeli leaders many times for pushing Israel into what they described as extreme concessions to the Palestinians.
"With Jews like Kurtzer, it is impossible to build a healthy relationship between Israel and the United States," Benjamin Nentanyahu was quoted saying in 2001 by Israel's Haaretz newspaper.
Former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir said Kurtzer "frequently pressured Israel to make one-sided concessions to the Arabs; he constantly blamed Israel for the absence of Mideast peace, and paid little or no attention to the fact that the Palestinians were carrying out terrorist attacks and openly calling for the destruction of Israel."
Morris Amitay, former executive director of the America-Israel Public Affairs Committee, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in 2001: "Kurtzer ... will use his Jewishness as a protective cover for his anti-Israel views."
The ZOA points out Israel's leading daily, Yediot Ahronot, editorialized on Kurtzer's negative influence against Israel:
"Possibly more than any other U.S. State Department official, Kurtzer has been instrumental in promoting the goals of the Palestinians and in raising their afflictions to the center of the U.S. policymakers' agenda," the paper stated.
Kurtzer first rose to prominence in 1988 when, as a State Department adviser, he counseled the Reagan administration to recognize the Palestine Liberation Organization led by Yasser Arafat. The PLO had carried out scores of anti-Western attacks, but in the late '80s Arafat claimed to have renounced violence.
In 1988, Kurtzer was noted as the principal author of a major policy speech by then-Secretary of State George Shultz in which the U.S. government first recognized the "legitimate rights" of the Palestinians.
Haaretz reported in 2001 that Kurtzer had a "vocal conflict" with an Israeli government official in Philadelphia in the summer of 1990 after Kurtzer "attacked the Israeli government for refusing to include the PLO in the peace process [and] said that this constituted the main obstacle to peace."
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