Looking like I was wrong - does appear that Netanyahu indeed intends to release Palestinian prisoners in order to get the PLO to the negotiating table - that surprises, I assumed all along it was some kind of ruse but apparently he's serious - but of course he knows that the chances of these negotiations going anywhere are extremely slim, and he must know that he's set up a situation here where if the cabinet votes the release down [a good chance of that happening from what I read] everyone is going to call Israel the villain - and also he's setting up the situation where PLO drags out negotiations till all or most of the prisoners are released then pulls out at end declaring it a victory because of the free prisoners and because they've made Israel look weak in eyes of Arab street. I'm not getting it - unless they've planned out the course the negotiations are going to take and the way prisoners are going to be incrementally released so that at a certain point there'll be no way for the PLO to walk away without looking like the ones who have no real interest in peace - that could be what they're thinking - pretty risky, but I'm willing to be convinced that it's a good play.

update: release passed by cabinet 13-7 - fairly strong support, which suggests to me that something along the lines of strategy outlined above must be in play here - although, if PLO suspects same would not be surprised if they insist on all prisoners being released before negotiations can begin, which far as I'm concerned Israel would be crazy to agree to.

Obama in meeting with Vietnamese leaders draws line of comparison between Jefferson and Ho Chi Minh - ah... are there even words to express how absolutely awful a president this guy is? Amazing. Raises an interesting question though: does he do stuff like this on purpose knowing that it will thoroughly piss off the right, which maybe leads to some writhing in pain overreaction and then when the media covers the overreaction but ignores the reason for it the image of republicans as intemperate fools is further driven home for ignorant Obamaphiles everywhere - or are these just unguarded moments when the true uber liberal Alinskyite slips out from behind the covers and we get to see the real Obama? Don't know, but it almost hurts one's brain thinking about the mess that's gonna be left behind by the time this man is finished torturing us with his nonsense.

Yes, how we remember back to when the great Obama braved offense to his deepest sympathies and finally made a visit to Israel and then congratulated himself for forcing an apology from the evil Netanyahu to the admired and beloved Erdogan over the malingering Mavi issue - and we wondered, what's Bibi thinking here, what with the facts and Israeli public opinion both declaring clearly there was nothing to apologise for? We concluded that Netanyahu must be thinking that if he declines Dear Leader's most generous offer to humiliate and demean Israel before Islamist Turkey, that just confirms what the Obama already very much wants to believe, that all Mideast problems begin and end with Israeli intransigence, and what does that do for us? Nothing. But if he agrees, with conditions of course, it's a virtual certainty that Erdogan takes actions to undermine that agreement, for amity between Israel and Turkey would not serve his Islamist agenda at all - and then we get to hold this bitter reality over Obama's head the next time he tries to gives us the high hat and say to him 'don't try and lecture us on how to operate in this rotten little corner of the world - we get it, you don't'.

And now Erdogan has done as expected - well, in actuality he started shitting on the agreement the day after the phone call - but a couple of weeks ago his deputy PM blamed recent riots in Turkey on sinister Jewish plotting and now he has said they will not accept compensation payment for damage caused from Israel unless it is accompanied by a clear admission by Netanyahu of Israel having done something wrong and oh so very bad, which goes against the agreement. Now, I suppose Bibi could take complete leave of his senses and cave to the demand, but unless hell is in the process of freezing over I'd suggest disabusing oneself of that expectation.

There's an aspect to the Anthony Weiner farce that no one seems to be talking about and the liberal media wants apparently to avoid talking about, or at least dress up in dissembling narratives - namely, what the hell is Weiner's wife doing staying so humiliatingly loyal to a guy who quite clearly has some significant issues? Well, McCarthy over at National Review has an opinion on that which if you're inclined to grant legitimacy and credence to leads one's thoughts down some pretty disturbing trails, both as concerns Obama's seemingly incoherent at best, grievously misguided at worst Mideast policy directions but also liberal elites view of Islamism in general.

All things being equal, as the putative free thinkers of America who reject the moralistic asservations of irrational piety, liberals should be in the front lines of scepticism towards Islam, just as they should be in the front lines viz criticism of any moralizing dogmatism spewed forth by a religion - and, sure enough, when it comes to the US they're ever ready to pounce with great outrage and umbrage taking at some idiot thing some Christian fundamentalist has uttered - but when it comes to Islam, they're much more forgiving, much more tolerant, much more willing to champion the warm euphemisms of understanding - even the calling of Islamic based terrorism Islamic based terrorism is frowned on by these people as being insensitive. Not hard I guess to figure what this is about: Christian extremism is linked to conservatism in America - moreover, Christianity in it's missionary guise is seen as a perfect expression of the arrogance of white privilege and, in its Puritan form, the acquisition of wealth - accordingly, indulgence of Islam and its excesses becomes a proxy for directing contempt at the things the liberal elite loves to hate: notions of white privilege, capitalism, the military.

Russia's communists used to view the West's uber liberals as convenient gateways into America, both for the spreading of propaganda to the gullible but also of course for the infiltration of national security operations. Why would anyone think Islamists wouldn't view and manipulate America's uber liberals in the same way? If the constitutions of the United States and France and England etc etc placed theocratic principles ahead of secular ones the uber liberals of the West would be with justifcation screaming Christian fascism from morn till night - but Islamism they're willing to tolerate - a case of the enemy of my enemy is a friend?

What if, when Obama leaves the stage, the Democrat that follows doesn't revert back to some Clintonian-like moderation and bipartisanship but instead builds on the model Obama has fashioned - which essentially amounts to taking Democrats' core constituencies of minorities, women, youth and the media and squeezing every last bit of advantage and electoral gain out of them? It pits one half of the country against the other half, it breeds anger and bitterness and distrust, and it perforce corrupts the media, thereby effectively hollowing out the first amendment - but if it wins elections, increasingly marginalises and demonises conservative thinking and thus slowly but surely pushes the country left, who cares, right?

So, if the Obama playbook of maximizing potential from core constituencies while not even bothering to appeal to conservative concerns becomes the go to approach of Democrats, what happens to the country? Well, the scheme could fail - but my guess is that only happens if the GOP substantially improves its game by doing much better at messaging, much better at mitigating toxic effects of biased press and media, much better at nominating candidates with broader appeal - problem with that is two fold: even if they manage that, demographics may undermine their efforts regardless; but more immediate problem I think is that it's much harder for conservatives to nominate people who can make the broader appeal while not completely pissing off the extremes of the base than it is for liberals and that's because, with the media's help of course, it's much easier to paper over the idiocy of the far left than it is to drown out the idiocy of the far right as far as moderates are concerned. The far left hates Hillary, but if she sounds like she'll be, at least in some vague ideological sense, Obama part two, they'll vote for her - but how do you get the far right to vote for someone like Christie?

So, assuming the GOP fails or proves incapable of effectively countering the Obama way, what happens? I'd say, because the Obama way is entirely dependent on the media and press playing along even when they apparently don't realise they're playing along [see press' glowing reviews of Obama's wholly disingenuous and beside the point Trayvon Martin performance], I'd say conservatives and many moderates who lean right will start to view the political process, at least as far as Washington is concerned, as illegitimate - they'll start to think of the country as having fallen to a quiet coup enabled by the media. What happens then is anybody's guess - could the country actually split apart? Seems unlikely but who knows. My guess is you get probably sort of what you have now, ie if GOP can keep control of the house that'll mean continuing gridlock in Washington which inevitably results in more and more power and initiative shifting to the states. Right now the only good governance you're seeing in the country is happening at the state level and not surprisingly most of those well run states are conservative. If things play out that way it may force Democrats into rethinking the wisdom of the Obama way.

Or the country could break apart.

I'd like to be able to give Obama the benefit of the doubt when it comes to his little Trayvon Martin performance yesterday - I'd like to think he sincerely thought he was doing something helpful or at least doing something he felt he had no choice but to do, what with the liberal media intent it seems on provoking a race war and he being the first black president - but I can't. All I hear when he speaks is a disingenuous guy willing to say or do anything if there's political gain it for him - including, with eye towards IRS scandal creeping closer and closer to the White House door, breaking the law. He's a used car salesman with better diction. With his presidency increasingly distressed, an economy still in need of life support from the Fed, unemployment still way too high, Obamacare falling apart, foreign policy in shambles, an impeachable scandal lurking just off stage, he needed to change the subject, divert attention. The man's a huckster peddling ideological snakeoil to the gullible. I'll give him his due, though, he's good at it, he's got a knack for manipulating these moments and of slickly promoting a partisan point of view but in terms that the media interprets as moderate and reasonable. And that's the key and the thing that's truly disturbing - Obama is what he is and I never expected him to be anything other than what he's proven himself to be - but the way the media and press have allowed themselves to be corrupted by ideological preference is something to be truly worried about - I have trouble seeing how a democracy is not threatened when the press willingly gives up its right to free speech in the name of a political agenda - it's deeply troubling and seems certain to lead to something bad.

So, is Kerry to be congratulated for getting Israel and PLO back to negotiations? Ah... no. I mean, sure, it's possible this is a positive turn, but in reality it's all theatre far as I'm concerned - raise enough of a fuss as Kerry has done and Israel has no choice but to agree because world opinion is always at the ready to call them unreasonable - which is exactly why the PLO also agrees since they know any failure will be blamed on Israel and any success [highly unlikely] credited to them - in short, it's a farce with Kerry as director.

Now, some want to believe that Israel's willingness to give up prisoners as a concession to get the PLO to the table means that they actually are holding out hope for this thing - and must admit I'm a little confused as to what they're thinking in making this gesture - but most likely explanation to me is that this is their way of mitigating backlash when talks collapse, as in 'you see, we gave up these prisoners so of course we were serious about reaching an accommodation, but...' - etc etc etc. It does seem questionable if not flat out risky or misguided giving up these prisoners to serve a process you deem doomed to fail - and so logically one might assume they in fact don't see it as doomed to fail - but not I'm not buying it.

"... is it that, as idealists, liberals cannot abide any notion of inequality, for such offends and ultimately threatens the ideological purity of their abstractions, and this explains both their strong inclination towards the comforting illusions of socialism and their irrational, near pathological fixation on the perceived evils of white privilege?..."

Right now, this looks to be the best thing to come out of that grotesquery of left wing absurdity and delusion that was the Zimmerman trial.

Now, c'mon - I bash Kerry for his idiotic peace mission - and now Jerusalem Post is reporting Israel has agreed to negotiations based on '67 borders? This is very hard to believe - but the story is saying PLO has agreed to recognize Israel as Jewish state, so... possible I guess - still seems highly improbable, there's got to be more to this story. My understanding of IDF strategic thinking is that there was no way you could ever go back to the '67 borders - but a combination of changing military technology which modifies tactical realities plus the PLO recognizing Israel could I guess get you there conceivably - still, there's gotta be another shoe to drop here. I'd hate to be in a position of having to apologize to Kerry.

[update: Bibi denies it, at moment sounds like just more game playing from the PLO - sorry, John, apology goes back in pocket for the nonce]