The vote was 390 to 5.
Meanwhile,neither Hamas or Israel accepted the idea of a ceasefire. Hamas fired thirty rockets from Gaza City into Israel today,while the Israelis closed in on Hamas targets.
The IDF is focusing on Jebalya in the northern half of the Gaza Strip, which shows that the Tzahal has no problem mixing it up in Gaza city's warren of alleys. They're notgoing tosimply walk in blind, and I don't doubt they'll have a few unpleasant surprises for the Green Hat guys.
Another target the IDF is focusing on is Rafah,the key to control of the Egyptian border, the Philadelphi Corridor and the arms smuggling tunnels.
That is very good news (particularly the margin). But who were the 5 opposed to the resolution? They should be voted out come next election. Even more so should anyone voting 'present', or not voting but physically present on Capitol Hill, be voted out come next election. 435 minus 395 (the number voting) equals 40 -- or my mathematics fails me. This is an unusually clear litmus test : WHOSE side are you on? Israel & the civilised West OR the terrorists? In the 1960s & the 1970s, we were eventually able to end war-criminal Lyndon Johnson's war against Vietnam by keeping track of the Congressional votes & targeting the nauseous, nasally, snobbish Vietnam-hawks for electoral extinction. In the 1972 primaries, we were able to decimate the left-over war-criminal-Johnsonites left over from the 1966 Senatorial elections (6-year terms), & created such an overwhelmingly pro-American-dove set of candidates in both parties that it literally didn't matter which party would win the 2 Houses of Congress. Nixon suddenly became a purely domestically-oriented president in April 1972 & ran a purely domestically-oriented campaign against Congressional spending to stay afloat. Sorry for the ancient history, but I do think that the current Far-Left with their barely-disguised anti-Semitism & and hatred for Israel closely parallels the Far-Right of the 1960s & 1970s and their barely-disguised hatred for the then-young people & hatred for anyone vaguely pro-constitution or what we would now term 'libertarian', a term which only existed in the phrase 'civil libertarian' in that era, & the path for foraging ahead against the current politically-correct hatreds is I think similar, though equally hard : emphasise your efforts on Congress (rather than on the Presidential beauty-contest). Think of this as being like 1964 or 1966 : we need to thoroughly vet members of Congress by their votes -- not their rhetoric before television cameras. Check those Congressional votes by your Representative & your 2 Senators. I have to admit that my letters over the course of the years to my Senators & Representatives might not have influenced them, but a lot of letters might. Be ready to vote against even likeable, affable people. In short, I think there is much more potential in influencing Congress than any president of either party. I saw dramatic change was possible when I was very young & enthusiastic!
ReplyDeleteIf I could append a quick addendum to my letter of yesterday, mid-term elections can be spectacularly useful. The 1994 mid-term elections resulted in the repeal of the Clinton taxes & forced welfare reform through. The 1946 mid-term elections created a wonderful 2-year Republican Congress which terminated the WWII (99 %, I think,) income tax bracket & allowed right-to-work state-level legislation. The 1866 mid-term elections' Radical Republican Congress allowed for a real effort at Reconstruction. Since no President is being elected, the television networks are bored & ignore it for the most part (other than an important 'name', like Kennedy) ; hence, it is possible to by-pass a lot of the usual activist gate-keepers & send some reformers in. I think that those of us serious re Israel & the war against terrorism could do much good if we keep score-cards re pertinent votes during these 2 years in preparation for the 2010 mid-term elections. I suspect that Obama will be so intent on drawing attention to his domestic agenda that it might be possible to influence him constructively re Israel by pressuring Congress to insist that he move decisively against Islamic terrorism as the price for permitting him to win many of battles on domestic issues. But this is the time for score-card keeping. Just my thoughts.
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