Obama attended the AIPAC conference today and tried to sell the fact that even though he wants to sit down with Iran with NO preconditions (but with preparations tho…whatever that means) he is still a friend to those who Iran wants to see annihilated:
“We will also use all elements of American power to pressure Iran,” Obama said. “I will do everything in my power to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. That starts with aggressive, principled diplomacy without self-defeating preconditions, but with a clear-eyed understanding of our interests. We have no time to waste. We cannot unconditionally rule out an approach that could prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. We have tried limited, piecemeal talks while we outsource the sustained work to our European allies. It is time for the United States to lead.”
On Iraq, he attacked McCain: “Sen. McCain offers a false choice: stay the course in Iraq, or cede the region to Iran. I reject this logic because there is a better way. Keeping all of our troops tied down indefinitely in Iraq is not the way to weaken Iran. It is precisely what has strengthened it. It is a policy for staying, not a plan for victory. I have proposed a responsible, phased redeployment of our troops from Iraq. We will get out as carefully as we were careless getting in. We will finally pressure Iraq’s leaders to take meaningful responsibility for their own future.”
What tough talk from the man who went to the left of Dick Durbin on the resolution to call the Iranian Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization:
TODAY, SENATOR BARACK OBAMA will speak before the annual conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), where he will execute a maneuver likely to become familiar to the American people in the months ahead: the pander pivot. That is, a sharp turn to the right to satisfy a vital Democratic constituency whose support he now needs.
The story begins nine months ago, when the Senate took up debate on the so-called Kyl-Lieberman amendment–a bipartisan measure that urged the U.S. government to designate Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) as a Foreign Terrorist Organization and a Specially Designated Global Terrorist.
These designations are more than just rhetorical; labeling the IRGC as a terrorist organization brings to bear a range of powerful sanctions that crack down on its ability to work in the global financial system.
The proximate cause of the Kyl-Lieberman amendment was a growing dossier of evidence from General David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker, documenting the IRGC’s role in financing, training, arming, and directing extremists in Iraq responsible for the murder of hundreds of American and Iraqi soldiers and civilians.
Of course, that’s not the full extent of the IRGC’s malign influence. The group is an acknowledged supporter of terror (a fact even Senator Obama concedes), training, financing and arming Hezbollah, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and most recently, the Taliban. At home in Iran, the IRGC now dominates the regime, with 9 out of 21 seats in the Ahmadinejad cabinet held by former IRGC and IRGC-affiliated officials. The IRGC is also a vital player in Iran’s licit and illicit economies, and dominates important sectors like construction.
Needless to say, the Kyl-Lieberman amendment won broad support in the Senate, passing 76-22. Senator Hillary Clinton voted for it, as did Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Senator Chuck Schumer, and Senator Dick Durbin.
Senator Obama, however, was one of a handful of senators who opposed the amendment–which had aroused the ire of the left-wing blogosphere. In the frenzied minds of DailyKos and Moveon.org, Kyl-Lieberman–or “Lieberman-Kyl,” as they preferred to call it–was nothing less than a stealth declaration of war on Iran.
The offending clause (a non-binding Sense of the Senate) suggests that the U.S. military presence in Iraq “will have critical long-term consequences for the future of the Persian Gulf.” It emphatically does not suggest either that we “use our military presence in Iraq to counter the threat from Iran,” as Senator Obama’s website falsely claims, or that “we should maintain our forces in Iraq with an eye toward blunting Iranian influence,” as Senator Obama frets.
That reading of the amendment is incomprehensible to most, including Durbin, the senior senator from Illinois and one of Obama’s chief supporters. “It’s rare that Barack and I disagree on an issue of this magnitude,” Durbin told Bloomberg Television at the time. “I have the same concerns that Barack Obama does about this administration and what they might do with the power that they have. But I don’t think this resolution gives them a green light to do anything.”
Nonetheless, Senator Obama (who perceived the issue as a key wedge against the warmongering Senator Clinton) seized on the amendment–and proceeded to spend the next nine months boasting to every anti-war audience he could find about his brave opposition to it.
In subsequent debates, speeches, and interviews, Senator Obama kept up the attack. On his website, he offers only three points about his Iran policy; opposition to Kyl-Lieberman is one of them.
This week, in a speech before AIPAC, Senator John McCain condemned Senator Obama for his opposition to Kyl-Lieberman. “Over three quarters of the Senate supported this obvious step, but not Senator Obama,” McCain said on Monday. “He opposed this resolution because its support for countering Iranian influence in Iraq was, he said, a ‘wrong message not only to the world, but also to the region.'”
To acknowledge the fact that Iran is a big sponsor of terror is not a bad thing, as Obama apparently thinks it is. Its the truth. This was just a resolution to deem them sponsors of terror, no calls for military force or anything like that…but still he opposed it.
So now he tells AIPAC that hey, I will oppose Iran from getting a nuke by just sitting down with them over tea.
Here comes the era of Jimmy Carter II.
UPDATE
Hillary backing Obama on Iran….interesting:
In a sign that Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-NY, is beginning to make peace with the notion that Sen. Barack Obama, D-Illinois, will be the Democratic presidential nominee, the former First Lady just vouched for her primary opponent to a group he has had some troubles wooing, Jews.
“I know Senator Obama will be a good friend to Israel,” she told the pro-Israel group AIPAC, saying that she knows Obama understands the issue.
“And let me underscore that I believe we need a Democratic president in the White House,” Clinton said.
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