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Entry: The Kissinger Connection Link: http://www.takimag.com/site/article/the_kissinger_connection#1187 Post contents: To Mr. John Ball: Good sir, I saw only a couple of references to Israel (as a state) above, and hasten to underline one novel idea: Criticizing the actions of some Jews is not, in and of itself, anti-semitism, and it is not criticizing Israel. This is elementarily true in the exact same way that criticizing the policies of the current US administration is not anti-Americanism. Americans, in some goodly numbers, disagree with the heavily interventionist stance adopted by the present US administration. Jews, in some goodly numbers----indeed, Israelis, in some goodly numbers---disagree with the heavily interventionist stance adopted by the present Israeli administration. AIPAC, in other words, is not Israel, nor is the present Israeli administration a simple shorthand for "Israel" or even "the Jews." The present US administration, in other words, is not simple shorthand for "America" but rather "the American government." America has stabbed its share of allies in the back (must one really enumerate them? in my abbreviated lifetime we've betrayed the Czech, the Hmong, the South Vietnamese and the Iraqi Shia and Kurds after Gulf War 1), and protestations of eternal loyalty always bring to mind Disraeli's comment (perhaps it was Gladstone) that nations have no permanent friends, nations have permanent interests. I for one believe that our American truly vital national interests are better served by pursuing a non-interventionist, non-isolationist foreign policy of the British, Great Game school of "masterful inactivity." (In sum, watch carefully for emerging threats but do not stir up the hornets' nest absent good cause.) I agree that the Likudnik, AIPAC, neocon line is far too accepted in American governance today. Once more, however, I don't see any extended discussion on the crimes of the state of Israel in the above comments. Perle is no more Israel than Richard Cheney is America; Perle is Perle, and Cheney is Cheney, and that is that. best regards Sent at: 2008 05 16