- What are we to make of the latest changes in Obama's
entourage, ponders Eric Walberg
-
- Obama has just lost his close friend and chief of staff,
Rahm Emanuel, who is making the unusual transition from national to municipal
politics. He is also losing his closest adviser David Axelrod (pragmatist
Emanuel described their difference as prose versus poetry) and his mentor
and director of the National Economic Council Larry Summers.
-
- Why are Obama's three closest advisers -- all Jewish
-- leaving? There is no pat answer. Axelrod is no friend of Summers, having
suggested in an email the latter would be more comfortable in the "cafeteria
at Goldman Sachs". He claims he is homesick. Obama's Keynesianism
probably finally got to Summers, who prefers tax cuts. Emanuel, a former
congressman, a talented ballet dancer, son of an Irgun terrorist, and an
Israeli soldier during the first Gulf war against Iraq, leads us to the
real answer.
-
- As a very, very strong Zionist (dual citizen? sayan?),
he is Israel's canary in the White House. Israel boycotted Obama's UN speech
at the Millennium Goals Summit in September, and has subjected Obama to
dose after dose of humiliating treatment, the latest when Netanyahu asked
for the pardon of Israeli spy Jonathan Pollard (serving a life sentence)
in exchange for a temporary halt in settlement expansion. Netanyahu defiantly
visited Pollard in jail in 2002 and he is celebrated as a hero in yearly
commemorations in Israel. There seems to be an eerie replay of 1991, the
last time the White House seriously tried to stop the settlements. The
Israel lobby abandoned Bush then and destroyed him in the 1992 elections.
-
- The writing is on the wall: Obama is a one-term president.
That is if he is even allowed to finish his first term. Obama was never
popular in Israel. When he tried to add Israeli critic Chas Freeman to
his team as chair of the National Intelligence Council in 2009 AIPAC blew
a fuse. Now there are even threats against his life as a result of his
stance on settlements and his reluctance to attack Iran. Loud protests
in front of Netanyahu's residence witness crowds burning effigies of Obama
"the new Pharaoh", "the descendant of slaves" who must
be put in his place.
-
- Obama, son of a Kenyan Muslim and American expat radical,
is facing equally vicious bigotry by non-Jews. He is attacked at home by
Americans of more traditional backgrounds who call him a communist and
are incensed by his unusual origins and his unrepresentative entourage.
Apocalyptic movements and rightwing "patriotic" militias, which
grew under Clinton but abated under Bush junior, are increasing rapidly
under Obama, and more staid but equally frustrated Americans conduct political
"tea parties", confused and desperate for both stability and
real change.
-
- For despite the radically different appearance of Obama's
"change" administration (including the colourful Emanuel), his
policies have provided neither stability nor any real change. They are
remarkably like those of his predecessor. The unwieldy and disappointing
healthcare reform aside, the bankers and generals have been given just
about whatever they ask for, Guantanamo stays open and torture continues.
US troops stay in Iraq and Afghanistan. The economic morass Obama inherited
from Bush merely deepens.
-
- And what is Emanuel's legacy? According to critics, he
was responsible for scuttling the real public healthcare option, leaving
it in the hands of private insurers. He was courted by a litany of Wall
Street officials and business leaders from day one. Emanuel's White House
calendar was filled with the likes of Comcast VP David Cohen (who just
happened to have mergers pending), Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan,
JPMorgan's Jamie Dimon, and New York Daily News owner Mortimer Zuckerman,
who showed up three times in two months.
-
- With the Republicans poised to take control of one or
both houses in November, Rahmbo, as he is affectionately known for his
ruthless strong-arm tactics in the political ring, can safely jump ship
just before it sinks. He is clearly betting that his friendship with Chicago's
darling, America's first black president, will see him to victory in safely
Democratic Chicago.
-
- But, why the municipal ring? Yes, his "friend"
Obama is toast. But is it possible Emanuel's sudden interest in local politics
is because he realises presidents, senators and the like have very little
real power to make decisions anyway? That a mayor can at least leave a
visible legacy -- bike paths, community centres, parks? Or is he just bored,
looking for a challenge where he can flex his muscles anew, flit gracefully
across the political stage yet again as prince charming seducing the sleeping
Miss America?
-
- Whatever his motives, Rahmbo epitomises the shallowness,
the effeteness of American politics today. The president of the most powerful
nation on earth is powerless. A stuffed shirt. A photo op. A cultured Afro-American
presiding over the most brutal empire the world has every known. Emanuel
"made him" and has decided to leave him to his fate, to yet again
play games with the US media and political circles, like a virtual performer
orchestrating a grand reality game.
-
- Pundits are mixed in assessing his chances. His strongest
supporters are Chicago's white moneyed class and the business community,
who favour Emanuel's run because of his history as a Washington power broker,
says political analyst Charles Dunn. "His pockets are overflowing
with IOUs" and he will be able to call in past favours, giving him
a huge advantage over his many competitors.
-
- But he has little appeal to the 35 per cent of Chicagoans
who are black and the 28 per cent who are Hispanic. His challengers are
predominantly minority candidates, including James Meeks, a state senator
and Baptist minister, and Chicago City Clerk Miguel del Valle. Many minority
leaders, including several aldermen, have already made statements saying
they will not support Emanuel's candidacy. The field is very much open.
In fact the call among those unhappy with machine politics in the Chicago
is "Abre" -- "Anyone but Rahm Emanuel", which translates
into Spanish as "Open".
-
- As a Jew, Emanuel is very much a supporter of minority
rights, but these real minorities understand that Jewish support for them
from the likes of Rahmbo is only skin deep, so to speak. CNN's Hispanic
host Rick Sanchez shocked Americans last week for saying as much on air.
Sanchez is constantly ridiculed by Jewish TV satirist Jon Stewart, and
finally fought back, calling Stewart a "bigot" with "a white
liberal establishment point-of-view", saying CNN and the media are
largely run by Jews and elitists. Of course, he was immediately fired,
but no one can dispute the truth behind his outburst. Says analyst Peter
Myers, "Other minorities are accorded status only on condition that
the Jewish minority remains number one."
-
- Compounding Emanuel's difficulties is the expected candidacy
of Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart, who is white (but not Jewish), and well-liked
among black and Latino voters because of his highly publicised refusal
to evict renters of foreclosed buildings and his prosecution of the owners
of a historic black cemetery who illegally exhumed 300 bodies for profit.
-
- Is any of this of importance to the world at large? Do
the departures of Emanuel, Axelrod and Summers portend a more even-handed
policy on the Middle East -- a defiance of Israel in the remaining two
years of his one-term presidency? Will he suddenly cut Israel's massive
aid budget and insist it withdraw from occupied lands? Will (largely Jewish)
bankers and other elite miscreants be subpoenaed and jailed for their many
crimes, as happened to an earlier Chicagoan, Moses Annenberg, who was jailed
for tax evasion in the 1930s under president Roosevelt?
-
- The answer is of course "no". I mention Annenberg,
because he was a Jewish Chicago media magnate and underworld figure brought
down by a president who still wielded some power. His son Walter Annenberg
continued in his father's less-than-pristine footsteps, but covered them
with the Annenberg Foundation, lavishing money on "good causes".
He rightly realised he could use a liberal facade and his newspapers to
make or break politicians, rather than be broken by them.
-
- Like Obama and Emanuel, Annenberg's story is the stuff
of legend. His publishing empire grew and grew, he was Nixon's ambassador
to the UK and so charmed the Queen that she made him an honourary knight
(Americans disdain such unseemly titles). All the time he was "conservative"
Ronald Reagan's "best friend" according to Nancy Reagan.
-
- The "liberal" Barack Obama first gained political
prominence as an activist with the Annenberg Foundation's Education Challenge.
Annenberg, who died in 2002, would be delighted to know his charitable
works in Chicago helped elect the first black president, whose "Israel
first!" chief of staff would go on to become the city's first Jewish
mayor, putting the real minorities in their place. Will Emanuel sail to
victory on a pro-Israeli whirlwind, or can a plucky Dart prick the Zionist
balloon and bring the circus to a halt?
-
- ***
- Eric Walberg writes for Al-Ahram Weekly http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/
You can reach him at http://ericwalberg.com/
|