The effort to confirm Chuck Hagel as the next secretary of defense never seemed in as much trouble than it did this weekend. The Senate failed to pass a cloture measure last Thursday that would have cut off debate about the nomination. A new revelation about yet another offensive statement by Hagel in which he claimed the U.S. State Department was controlled by the Israeli Foreign Ministry not only forced the former senator to issue another unpersuasive and ambivalent disavowal. It also raised the possibility that many of the national Jewish organizations that had been silent about the nomination would now help build pressure on pro-Israel Democrats to abandon Hagel. But the building evidence of Hagel’s unsuitability and incompetence was not the subject of much of the conversation on the weekend cable talk shows and in the opinion columns of newspapers. Instead of Hagel, the liberal talking heads, reporters and columnists were all agog about the supposed beastliness of Senator Ted Cruz.
The freshman from Texas has ruffled a lot of feathers in his first six weeks in office on both sides of the aisle. His rough questioning of Hagel during the committee hearing and subsequent questions about the nominee’s financial records also raised the hackles of some senators and Washington insiders but there’s something slightly suspicious about the over the top reaction to Cruz on the news shows as well as from New York Times and Washington Post columnists. Even if we were to accept their dubious assertion that Cruz’s take-no-prisoners style of political combat is a shocking departure from the traditions of DC politics, the sudden interest in slamming the Texan is nothing more than a transparent attempt to change the subject just at the moment when Hagel’s nomination seems to be hanging in the balance. The herd instinct of liberal journalists is prompting them, as if on cue, to try and gull the public into thinking the real issue at stake here is not the elevation of a prejudiced and unqualified man to run the Pentagon but the supposed bad manners of one of Hagel’s most energetic critics.
Let’s first dispense with the notion that Cruz is, as left-wing bloviator Chris Matthews would have it, the second coming of Joseph McCarthy. Cruz’s demand for Hagel’s financial records and suspicions that some of his speeches or other advocacy activities since he left the Senate might have been financed by foreign powers may have seemed harsh. But his queries, which are spoken of as being nothing less than smears, are not as unreasonable as the talking heads assume them to be. Anyone with even a passing knowledge of Middle East studies in academia and non-profit agencies is aware that Saudi Arabia and other gulf principalities have been throwing money around in that sphere like it was going out of style for decades. I doubt anyone had to pay Chuck Hagel a cent to spout his views encouraging outreach to Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran or criticizing Israel and its supporters. Yet if his speaking honorariums did come from dubious sources, is that really none of the public’s business now that he is slated to be secretary of defense? Hagel’s controversial views on the Middle East that he has been forced to disavow in order to gain confirmation are a matter of record. To compare Cruz’s questions to McCarthy or a witch-hunt is the real smear here.
But the real insight to be gleaned from this sudden interest in Cruz is that it is a desperate diversionary tactic. Cruz’s elevation to the rank of the liberals’ public enemy number one is nothing more than a bait and switch scheme to help the White House shove Hagel down the threats of a clearly reluctant Senate.
Cruz may well prove to be an important player in the Senate but the timing of the rush to brand him as emblematic of everything that liberals detest about conservatives is a little too convenient. If the hapless Hagel, whose befuddled day in front of the Senate Armed Services Committee deepened the already serious doubts about his fitness for high office, can be transformed into a victim of Cruz’s inquisition rather than an obviously unqualified nominee then it will be possible for President Obama to successfully strong arm a dubious Democratic majority into rubber stamping his pick. It is this sort of political funny business and not Ted Cruz’s rough edges that is the real scandal.
'Bad Manners' is far more important than substance, these days.
Well, If Israel controls the US government, they are doing a pretty incompetent job. n nI would have thought if that were the case, Iran's leadership would have been decapitated, and its nuclear program in smithereens, rather than Obama sending love letters to Khamenei and nominating Jew hater Hagel for secretary of defense. n nAnd that goes triple for Israeli control of the US State Department. Whoever it was at the Mossad that ordered the US State Department to denounce building in Jerusalem should be fired immediately. No more falafels on the government's shekel.
The real problem is that Washington calls most of the shots in Jerusalem. This must stop. If the US and Western Europe wants to jump off a cliff, must Israel also follow suit?
I saw Senator Cruz speak during the hearing. He came off to me as respectful and made it clear that his statements and requests for additional information were being made only because of Hagel's positions and statements. If a Senator had asked for these "extra" items from, say, John Kerry, whom I dislike and feel is undeserving of Secretary of State, I would cry foul. Although Kerry has made outrageous comments and is on the left with regard to foreign policy thought, he is still within the right/left/U.S. nucleus of foreign policy direction. Hagel is well outside of that. The further outside, the more scrutinized one should be. It seems like simple common sense to me. Although respect is required – and was provided – lack of added scrutiny for this potential appointee IMO would be an abrogation of the Senate's duty to advise and consent.
I am very thankful for Ted Cruz and we need more like him and I am glad that he ruffling some feathers, they need to have that happen. Keep it up Cruz. How come no one ever is offended by some of the moon bats on the left that make out rageous statements.
Might makes right, is why. They are in power,and have the 'authority' bestowed by 2 generations of liberal higher education and the 'Lion of the Senate', serial womanizer and good swimmer Teddy Kennedy.
Oh yes! Generations of leftist-nutter gobbledygook from kindergarten on up to our leading academic institutions has yielded these zombies in our political, academic, and media classes. I use the term zombie for its technical definition: Bereft of an inner consciousness.
Sad isn't it that Teddy is still influencing our politics from the grave.
Or SNL's disgusting distortion of the hearings.
<>ahadhaamoratsim, are you aware that in that 2/19/13 Tobin post on Hagel's nomination, your response to Grumpy_Old Man was taken down, along with his comment, and along with my concurrence in your comment? And meanwhile the whacked contributions of cloture remain up?! n nI don't know the criteria here for what constitutes "unacceptable" comments, let alone who the censor is, but if comments that are free of obscenities and expressions of bigotry, that aren't libelous or personally abusive, or otherwise offensive or inappropriate, are going to be taken down without evident rhyme or reason, I won't waste my time commenting here.
Perhaps it was Cruz's suggestion that Hagel must disprove the "fact" that he had been paid off by Saudi or N. Korea by releasing every detail of his life that raised hackles. McCarthyism in response to anti-Semitism is no virtue.
it's the same thing they're doing with Benghazi, which the uniter Obama called "political stuff" that had more to do with the campaign than anything really wrong. now that's taking projection to a new level; if anybody was spinning Benghazi for votes, it was Obama, Hillary "What difference does it make?" Clinton, and their Democrat henchmen (henchpersons?).
Wow. n nThank God for the Second Amendment. n
Although with the current ammunition shortage – - –
at the least, Cardinal Oscar Andres Rodriguez Maradiaga recognizes the church has an anti-Israeli position.. n nheh
Yes. He's not too smart, is he? Either that, or in his environment of old time Inquisition-founded South American Catholicism, it's a given, a common understanding, a 'doesn't everyone think that way' sort of thing.
Ted Cruz is like straight single malt Scotch Whiskey: pure, undiluted and unaltered. He promised Texans he would go to Washyourtongue and represent their interests, not to be "clubby" or to "make friends". It is a testament to his intellectual, moral, and spiritual strength that he hues to his promise and inner lights. n nThe article above equivocates about Cruz, rather than giving him the Go Button. But this is David Frump style New York gray and straddle compared to Breitbart Right Back In Your Stupid Face.
I am old enough to remember not only Joe McCarthy but his fellow witch hunters on HUAC, and the only thing missing on Cruz’s part was McCarthy’s 5 o’clock shadow.
What that piece of Tea Party garbage, Cruz, was asking for were the financial records of all the organizations that had invited Hagel to speak, records that, legally, for better or worse, are not available to the public.
I would ask Cruz how much money HE has received from that turncoat, Sheldon Adelson, who has said that he regrets having served in the US Army and not Israel’s.
In fact, Hagel's nomination has never been in trouble. This entire process has been farce from the beginning. Most Republican senators lack the guts to challenge Obama on anything, but want to pretend to be tough on his nominees. The fix has been in for Hagel from the git go, and he will now be confirmed in short order once Congress returns, sufficient opposition having been demonstrated to fool the peasants outside the beltway.
You must be kidding! Chuck Hagel has fans! They don’t like Israel. Who likes Israel unless he dislikes himself? nThat’s right. U.S. State Department run by Israeli Foreign Ministry – Israel is An “Apartheid” State, Netanyahu A “Radical”… nHere you go my hero. You’re confirmed without begging Israel for forgiveness. You’re the third besides Obama & Kerry who got the Whitehouse twice and confirmed displeasing Israel. nMcCain is right. REPUBLICANS WILL REGRET THIS. Hagel ain’t neither appeasing nor apologizing to Zionists controlling within-the-beltway to get confirmed. Israelifirsters foolishly sporting Hagel christening is a game that keeps ‘em on headlines though deep-down they know that they are digging their own graves in the Donuthole. In order to let lummy Hagel go to Brussels and chair NATO summit this week. Hagel most get Flummox Warring Industries interested in his appointment to go and gonoph Louisiana’s David Vitter Dachshund as hostage to extort him to come outta hiding and vote IN-FAVOR on the rampage or get Obama use the Gorm vulgar substitute for (God) damn Executive Branch to VETO the filibuster and buy REAL Dante Alighieri hat for Antonin Scalia. nHere’s today’s Israeli hymn mantras to put Hegel’s votes to death. nu2721How Dare Ted Cruz? nu2721Jewish Groups Must End Silence on Hagel. nu2721Interest in Hagel Speeches Isn’t Racist. nu2721GOP Must Hang Tough on Hagel. nu2721Is a Hagel Filibuster Still Possible? nu2721New Hagel Story Could Alter the Equation. nu2721The Hagel-Cruz Bait and Switch. nRed-Tapeworm Republican Frugals gonna frogmarch outta Capitol hill deliberately to celebrate President’s (Jack Daniel’s) Day and most-importantly a toss-for-Death-to-Hagel as their Zionists masters in Tel Aviv ordered them to do so. Sawbones Merkley’s filibuster requires 60 votes for Hagel to be confirmed. Harry Reid’s whiz-bang Cloture was 58-40. Remember the Senate is only 100. It means Hagel most get the Warring Industries in his appointment to kidnap Louisiana’s David Vitter dog to extort him to show up and vote in favor for him or ask Obama to use the Executive Branch to VETO the filibuster and buy REAL Dante Alighieri hat for Antonin Scalia in order let Hagel go to Brussels and chair NATO summit this week. It’s a walking Circus devil-may-care. n