NAYs —25

Akaka (D-HI)
Bingaman (D-NM)
Boxer (D-CA)
Brown (D-OH)
Byrd (D-WV)
Clinton (D-NY)
Dodd (D-CT)
Durbin (D-IL)
Feingold (D-WI)
Harkin (D-IA)
Inouye (D-HI)
Kennedy (D-MA)
Kerry (D-MA)
Lautenberg (D-NJ)
Levin (D-MI)
Menendez (D-NJ)
Murray (D-WA)
Reed (D-RI)
Reid (D-NV)
Rockefeller (D-WV)
Sanders (I-VT)
Schumer (D-NY)
Stabenow (D-MI)
Whitehouse (D-RI)
Wyden (D-OR)

Obama, walking the razor’s edge, manages somehow to stay above it all.

Advantage, Obama.

William Kristol on Columbia University:

Ahmadinejad Yes, ROTC No
Lee Bollinger’s choice

Unlike Kristol, I think that this is in fact an excruciatingly difficult decision for Bollinger and that the exercise of freedom of speech certainly is involved. For that reason, I say: let the monkey speak.

Kristol does make one crucial point, however—the one that gives this situation such a nasty edge:

In fact, the introduction with “sharp challenges” by Bollinger makes the situation even more of a disgrace. Now there will be the appearance of real dialogue, of Ahmadinejad answering challenges, which further legitimizes the notion that Holocaust denial, say, is a subject of legitimate and reasonable debate.

This is the sick-making part—that an American naif like Bollinger will be conducting the “dialogue.” Bollinger is fine for the American audience. but Ahmadinejad will be playing to the audience at home, and across the Muslim world, too. For that reason, he should be confronted with questioners who understand how he thinks.

Sophisticated Iranian American expats should have at Ahmadinejad. That would be a sight to behold.

Jules Crittenden unloads on Columbia University’s Lee Bollinger for inviting the monkey to ape some words. Then he comes up with a brilliant idea:

I think the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum or maybe the Simon Wiesenthal Center should invite Ahmadinejad to speak.  Pack the hall with Auschwitz survivors … Encourage them to show up in stripes and shaved heads. Entitle the forum, “This Is What We’re Talking About.”

Then Crittenden gets down to talking about his favorite newspaper:

Every morning I get down on my knees and thank Allah I don’t work at the New York Times, and don’t have to call terrorists and murderers “Mr.” Supposedly the pinnacle of my profession.  Never mind the shoddy reporting and shameful editorial positions. It’s hard to pinpoint any one thing, but all the ass-kissing kowtowing to convention has to really suck the brains and the soul right out of you. …

I am blessed to work at one of the last great American newspapers [the Boston Herald].  Every day, we fight for our very existence in shoddy digs.  We don’t have the resources to do the things we used to do. …  They call us hacks and sneer at our sensational headlines.  That’s OK.  Let them.  At least we’re honest.

Indeed.

Marvin Kitman does Keith Olbermann as he calls for  all-entertainment-all-the-time “newscasts”:

[W]hat CBS (and all the others) need is a new Ed Murrow. Good news! There’s already one out there on the launchpad who has demonstrated his qualifications. I’m talking about Keith Olbermann of MSNBC. He has the journalistic chops and the mind, heart, instincts and courage. …

Olbermann, who looks more like a high school teacher than a glitzy TV anchor, is the one who cuts and dices the news of the day into five segments, what he and his staff consider the day’s top stories, illustrated with news reports from NBC News correspondents, interviews with newsmakers, whom he treats courteously, interspersed with signature witty interjections (calling 9/11 Rudolph “Giuliani’s red badge of courage”), further interrupted by new ways to look at the news.

What are these new ways of looking at the news [e.a.]?

Olbermann does news quizzes and a puppet theater … he created comedic puppet “re-enactments” of news stories, using printed photographs glued to popsicle sticks, hand-held in front of a blue screen. Olbermann did the voiceovers himself. …

What I like about Olbermann as a newscaster is that he makes the evening news look like life itself, very absurd but serious, very angry, very stupid, very silly, very snarky, very much about pop culture. 

Kitman was once the media critic of Newsday.

Matthew Yglesias has it bad:

Obviously, expressing willingness to hold diplomatic discussions with Iran’s leaders is a political blunder whereas running around the world threatening to attack them like Rudy Giuliani is politically savvy toughness.

How bad?

Pot-kettle-black bad. Beyond-ignorant-whippersnapper bad. Blindly-striking-out-with-any-weapon-at-hand bad [e.a.]:

So I suppose that by the same token, promising to expand NATO to include Israel — thus committing the United States to the armed defense of the borders of a country that lacks internationally recognized borders — also reflects the politically savvy toughness rather than, say, a dangerous ignorance of what NATO is or how it works or international relations more broadly.

His commenters call him out:

What’s this, is Mr. Yglesias now claiming that Israel doesn’t have internationally recognized borders? If Israel doesn’t have internationally recognized borders, how can Mr. Yglesias complain about Israeli settlements? Has Mr. Yglesias finally come to recognize that the so-called green line is a cease fire line, not a border? If the green line is not a border, as Mr. Yglesias is now claiming, then the settlements East of the green line are not illegal but subject to negotiation as to the final borders.

…

There have been hints in your posts all along, but with your statement that Israel is “a country that lacks internationally recognized borders” you have fully and finally revealed yourself: as someone who basically questions Israel’s very right to exist. Instead of reacting to the NATO proposal on the merits, you dismiss the entire country as a worthless aberration…

Commenter SoCalJustice provides evidence, through links, that the movement to ease Israel into NATO has been going on for a long time (as has the metamorphosis of NATO itself):

From a year and a half ago:

Italian Defense Minister Antonio Martino recently announced that in his opinion, the time has come to include Israel in NATO as a regular member, and he intends to raise the issue at the meeting of NATO defense ministers next week.

From last April:

Israel, NATO conduct Red Sea naval exercise

And from June:

Israel moves closer to NATO missions

Assistant NATO Sec.-Gen. John Colston sounds dangerously ignorant of what NATO is or or it works or international relations more broadly.

But, so far all I’ve seen is a nut (Friedman) and an Italian defense minister.

Here’s another one:

Admit Israel to  NATO

Ronald Asums, executive director of the German Marshall Fund’s Transatlantic Center in Brussels, served as deputy assistant secretary of state for European affairs from 1997 to 2000

Here’s NATO’s Deputy Assistant Secretary-General for Political Affairs and Security Policy Dr. Patrick Hardouin calling for expanded Israel-NATO ties about a year ago:

NATO: Israel ties must remain strong

Here’s Czech Deputy Prime Minister Alexandr Vondra and former Spanish prime minister Jose Maria Aznar calling for Israel (and Australia and Japan) to join NATO:

European leaders suggest Israel join NATO

There are several countries not exactly near the North Atlantic in NATO.

http://www.nato.int/structur/countries.htm

Turkey, Bulgaria, Greece, Romania - all closer to the Middle East than the Atlantic.

I’ve got a link of my own, from March 2007:

Supreme U.S. commander in Europe calls Israel ‘model state’

Gee, what’s going on here? I thought everybody knows that slavish, unconditional support of Israel such as (supposedly) Hillary Clinton’s is, “obviously, a disaster.” 

Well, whaddaya know? It turns out that there are people out there—people who play an active role in our national defense, foreign allies, people like that—who don’t consider Israel a liability. What a surprise, eh?

Some people need to get out more. Rudy Giuliani isn’t one of them.