GOP Senate mucksters (undoubtedly with the encouragement of Israel Lobby fellow travelers like Bill Kristol) are still traipsing through the ooze to find material with which to smear Chuck Hagel. The latest is a letter from 25 Republican Senators demanding before they agree to a vote on his nomination, that he release records of any “foreign funding” of any corporate entities with which he’s been affiliated. Not only has such a demand never before been made of any cabinet nominee; not only is it not clear that Hagel is in a position to demand that such companies release such information; there isn’t even a hint of who those foreign entities might be and how they might have any connection to Hagel himself.
Now the smearmeisters at Breitbart have smoked out the GOP position more clearly. But as is usual, Breitbart can’t even get the story right when it’s reporting what Republicans are saying. The far-right media scandal sheet claims the Senators demanded which foreign funding Hagel himself received:
…One of the reasons…Chuck Hagel, has not turned over requested documents on his sources of foreign funding is that one of the names listed is a group purportedly called “Friends of Hamas.”
Not at all what the letter demanded. Further, Breitbart’s alleged source says that one of the foreign entities funding Hagel was “Friends of Hamas.” I’ll bet you dollars to donuts there is no entity called Friends of Hamas (though there might be if James O’Keefe created one and sent money to Hagel under that name). That’s why Breitbart is the media nuthouse that keeps on giving as far as I’m concerned.
Now, Israel’s Maariv has picked up this report and published it as if it was credible, since Maariv can’t tell the players in U.S. media or politics without a scorecard. It adds breathlessly, the claim hasn’t been proven nor has it been denied by Hagel. It also claims with no basis in fact, that the charges have raised a firestorm in Washington. In fact, the dunderheads at Maariv claim, Hagel’s non-denial increases suspicions that the senator received funds from “questionable groups.” Holy mackerel. If Hagel doesn’t deny what smutmeisters write then it must have legs.
Should anyone in the GOP want to know why they took a drubbing last November, let this sort of garbage serve as Exhibit A. How can any American except certifiable lunatics and Tea Partyers take seriously such lunacy coming from a major national political party. With performances like this they’ll continue sinking farther and farther into oblivion and irrelevance.
Real journalists in the U.S. (as opposed to Breitbart) write that Hagel is likely to be confirmed and that the Republicans wouldn’t even be able to find 60 votes for a filibuster should they choose to do so. That’s just for a reality check after we’ve taken a walk on the wild side of slash and burn journalism à la Breitbart.
This is what a big injection of zionist money does to American politicians’ minds. There is no doubt a big payoff waiting (possibly a check stashed in Sheldon Adelson’s desk drawer) for the GOP’er who hits a home run and knocks Hagel out of the running for Defense Secretary.
How much more ridiculous and unseemly will it get before the US public takes notice?
They’ve noticed, Mary. They don’t care. Muslims are bad. Israelis are good. The rest is noise.
Typo alert. You write “lunatics and Tea Partyers” and should read “Tea Partyers and other lunatics”.
The purpose of a stock market listing is to raise funds.
There is usually no bar on whether or not foreign entities, individuals, pension funds, banks etc, can buy shares.
So practically every one of those 25 Senators will have had “contact” with corporations receiving foreign funds, as will any US Citizen with a pension, shares or a job with any employer listed on the stock exchange. Or, indeed, any citizen of any western country with a non-state pension, shares or a job with a stock exchange-listed company.
It’s actually extremely difficult to do a useful job in any western economy without having some contract with foreign funding, though employment as an elected politician would isolate a person from this and most other realities.
I usually adopt the strict mental discipline of referring to heads of state, ministers and other potenates as “the customer of-” so that I approach Arab Sheiks and Chinese Communist Party Officials alike in the proper frame of mind.
I predict this whole string of smears will collapse when it is discovered the group is actually called ‘Friends of Hummus” & was mainly funded by Sabra Hummus.
Is there any truth to the rumor that the Israeli branch of the John Birch Society has funded campaigns of Mr. Hagel? If true, the committee certainly should investigate this possibility!
The picture of Ted Cruz, above, calls to mind precisely the Saturday Night Live take-off of all the anti-Hagel hearings that just showed up on Mondoweiss.
I don’t expect the senators to cringe or complain about the SNL “take” — I expwect them to preen!
You predicted Hagel wouldn’t be nominated by Obama. He was.
All this nonsense will similarly amount to nothing.
Hagel will be confirmed.