Barack Obama made a decision yesterday to make an issue of a brief passage in the Knesset speech by President Bush. Though the President never mentioned the Senator by name, and spoke only of those who “seem to believe that we should negotiate with terrorists and radicals,” Obama seized on the remark and launched a major controversy, claiming that the White House (despite consistent denials) clearly intended to make a “false political attack.”

  As I noted yesterday, this decision on the part of Obama involved obvious political calculation: Bush is less popular than McCain, so why not occupy a few days worth of sound bites in a Bush vs. Obama exchange?

  The problem for the Democratic candidate is that while trying to associate his rival, Senator McCain, with President Bush, he may have inadvertently linked himself with a figure even less popular than the President: the sanctimonious and appalling  Jimmy Carter.

  Today in Saudi Arabia, White House aide Ed Gillespie (traveling with the president) shouted to the press that in his remarks Mr. Bush had Mr. Carter in mind, not Senator Obama. Obviously, Carter fits the description in the Bush speech better than Obama – given his insistence on meeting directly with the terror masters at Hamas. The context of the Bush speech also makes the Carter reference more appropriate than any inference that he was targeting Obama: speaking to the Israeli parliament, there would certainly be far more concern with Carter’s embarrassing adventure in Hamas-astan than with Obama’s suggestion that he would negotiate with Ahmadinejad.

  Obama, in fact, has said he wouldn’t negotiate with Hamas – which raises a big question: why yes to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, but no to the elected Palestinian leaders of Hamas? Hamas advocates violence, refuses to recognize Israel, is pledged to genocide against the Jewish state, and rejects all prior agreements made by the Palestinian authority --- and Ahmadinejad takes exactly the same position on all these issues. Obama said he wouldn’t negotiate with Hamas unless they recognized Israel, rejected violence, and pledged to honor prior agreements. Then why negotiate with the President of Iran—who hasn’t met even one of those pre-conditions?

  And when it comes to Ahmadinejad’s status as an elected leader, not just a terrorist chieftain, his election in Iran (where the mullahs threw out all candidates who weren’t sufficiently “Islamic”) was probably even more suspect that the most recent Palestinian elections that were won by Hamas.

  Obama, in other words, is totally and profoundly inconsistent here ---and the developing controversy now links him to Jimmy Carter.

   Since Obama now says he disapproves of Carter’s “fun” (the very word the ex-President used in a USA TODAY interview describing his trip), would he agree with Mr. Bush’s remarks as applied to President Carter? If not, why not?

  In other words, the current battle between Bush-and-Obama places the Illinois Senator on the side of the pathetic former president.

  Do many Americans believe Carter did the right thing in negotiating with the killers and thugs of Hamas (where they later attacked Carter and claimed they never reached the “understanding” the Georgia jerk described)?

  It’s arguable that Obama made a smart bet to assume that people hate Bush so deeply that they would instinctively prefer any other approach to foreign policy – no matter how ill-considered or poorly defined.

  But if he’s betting that the American public has more confidence in the thoroughly discredited, 84-year-old walking hemorrhoid from Pains (okay, Plains), then that’s a bet Barack could well lose.   

“Well, hopefully, that Hamas now that they are going to govern, will be motivated to renounce this commitment to the extinction of the state of Israel. Then we can do business again ..."



Update:  McCain's comments at the NRA meeting today:

"Earlier today, Senator Obama made a few remarks I would like to respond to. I welcome a debate about protecting America. No issue is more important. Senator Obama claimed all I had to offer was the 'naive and irresponsible belief' that tough talk would cause Iran to give up its nuclear program. He should know better. I have some news for Senator

Obama: Talking, not even with soaring rhetoric, in unconditional meetings with the man who calls Israel a 'stinking corpse' and arms terrorist who kill Americans will not convince Iran to give up its nuclear program. It is reckless to suggest that unconditional meetings will advance our interests.

"It would be a wonderful thing if we lived in a world where we don't have enemies. But that is not the world we live in, and until Senator Obama understands that reality, the American people have every reason to doubt whether he has the strength, judgment, and determination to keep us safe."

Think Senate races don't matter this year?  These are the folks who would be voting on judicial nominations.  In light of the California Supreme Court's ruling on gay marriage, here's a quick run-down some of the Democratic Senate candidates up for election this year ...

Al Franken (MN) – Franken has stated he wouldn't have voted for the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).  (CNBC’s “Tim Russert,” April 1, 2006).

Rick Noriega (TX) – Noriega was one of only nine Representatives to vote against banning gay marriage and civil unions in Texas.  (Dallas Morning News, May 1, 2003).

Mark Udall (CO) – Voted against a ban on same-sex marriage in the Colorado House -- and in the U.S. House, he twice voted against a Constitutional amendment defining marriage as between a man and a woman.

Tom Udall (NM) – An advocate of domestic partnership who has said the issue of same-sex marriage does not belong in the Constitution. Udall twice voted against a Constitutional amendment defining marriage between a man and a woman in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Mark Warner (VA) – Attempted to block a legislative ban on all legal recognition of gay relationships.  He also recommended striking partnership contract provisions from the Affirmation of Marriage Act for the Commonwealth of Virginia.