President Obama's Difficulties Are Much Deeper than Prime Minister Netanyahu

President Obama’s Problem is not Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu Speaker of the House John Boehner has invited Israeli Prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congress Tuesday. The President’s response has been one of hostility, mixed with ostracism. The President and his aides have publicly castigated the Israeli leader and the Speaker. He refuses to meet with the Prime Minister during his visit to Washington. Clearly a climate exists between the two leaders. We are led to believe that it’s personal between the two leaders. The President acts like the prime minister is a satrap who has stepped out of line. That’s not the President’s first problem. The current confab is not personal. It is based on a fundamental disagreement over the proper place of the Israeli nation. President Obama is anti-Israel, but because of domestic politics, he cannot take the public position. He shares the anti-Israel animus of many of the world’s elitist classes. Israel is to blame for the conflict because: A) It’s soldiers kill innocent Palestinians; B) It will not return to its 1967 borders; C) It will not trade land for peace; D) It does not accept the right of return. If only Israel would disappear, then peace would break out throughout the Mideast! Anti-Semitism did not die out with the collapse of Nazi Germany. It lay quiescent until recently, Now it’s spreading through the academic community worldwide and bubbling up elsewhere. The second problem is the President’s race to a deal with Iran, which he views as his legacy. The partially leaked details of the proposed agreement reveal a turkey. Even some of his advisors have to recognize that. His strategy to keep Iran from dropping the Bomb on Israel is to let Iran build the Bomb, albeit it at a slower pace. Neither the Russian nor the American leaders wanted to start a nuclear war. They wanted to survive. The Ayatollahs believe that if they and their families die in a nuclear exchange with Israel that they will go straight to Allah with everlasting bliss. The Ayatollahs have vowed to eradicate Israel from the face of the earth. Israel have to take these statements seriously. The Jewish people have experienced anti-Semitism for two millennia and suffered through the Holocaust. They will not go quietly in the future. The President’s third problem is himself. He is a petulant, narcissist. He has trouble with opposition. He said it best: “That’s the best thing about being President. I can do anything I want.” He believes it so strongly that he expects everyone to follow him. The President quite often acts like a bully. In his State of the Union Address on January 27, 2010 he excoriated the Supreme Court for its Citizens United decision a week earlier. The Justices had to sit there with no chance to respond. Congressman Paul Ryan, Chair of the House Budget Committee, was invited the next year to a Presidential Address on the budget at George Washington University on April 13, 2011. The assumption was that it would be a conciliatory dress seeking common ground on the budget. Instead he ripped into the Republican plan with Congressman Ryan sitting in the front row. The President expects to be followed, especially by the Congressional Democrats. Some will, but most, especially the Jewish members of Congress, are placed in a difficult political position. They will attend Prime minister Netanyahu’s speech tomorrow. The President’s normal approach of demonizing an opponent will not work with the Prime Minister. The more his Administration attacks the Prime minister, the more support the Israeli leaders receives at home from Jewish voters. He went ballistic when Speaker Boehner invited the Jewish leader to address a joint session of Congress for the third time. His programmable National Security Advisor, Susan Rice, said “I think it’s destructive of the fabric of the relationship.” Speaker Boehner responded: “What is destructive, in my view, is making a bad deal that paves the way for a nuclear Iran.” Prime Minister Netanyahu has clearly stated: “It is my sacred duty as the Prime Minister to make Israel’s case.” This century’s Winston Churchill added: “U.S. leaders worry about the security of their country..… Israeli leaders worry about the survival of their country.”