Mommy, Why Do We Support Israel?

The Billy Blog recently wrote a blog that referred to President Obama's speech on Israel prior to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu coming to the states. In his blog, the head Billy Blogger wrote "Barack Obama really screwed over Israel." I'd say that's probably true from Israel's point of view, but that's just because for the last 60-70 years we have been pretty much friends with benefits with Israel, and we've been buying the condoms. The Arab world has noticed this, since they've been trying to get in our pants, but they're like the other guy we work with who we always laugh at his jokes, but let's face it, he's not getting anywhere near us outside the office. Anyone who wants to understand a lot of what President Obama says needs to read Pat Buchanan's book "Where the Right Went Wrong" in which he talks about George W. Bush's lack of realization that other countries listen to what the President of the United States says.

President Obama mentioned "land swaps" at the end of the call for the borders to return to pre-67 standards and called for a "demilitarized" Palestinian state. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt that he's actually trying to get these newly democratic Arab countries to think the number one international issue their governments have told them about for the past 60 years is being resolved amicably while building a buffer zone around the majority of Israel to spot whenever armies are being moved in to attack.

I can't stress enough how much the "Zionist" plays into the psyche of even the most liberal and educated Arab. I had an Iraqi once tell me, in English, that he was raised to believe the Jew was the source of all the world's evil, but he knew that was wrong. "It is the Zionist." We train Lebanese officers in America who will tell you all about David Ben-Gurion in a way that you would describe Hitler. If we really want the Arab states to police themselves democratically we have to do it in a way that allows for peace. Eliminating what they feel is the illegitimate occupation of the Palestinians is a huge step in that direction.

What is probably most interesting is that the Billy Blog referenced a story about the falsely predicted date of the rapture, and it has more to do with America's support for Israel than most Americans realize. Here's a video by someone I find pretty annoying that actually shows you what's going on with the Christian support of Israel:



The eschatology of Pre-Tribulation Rapture theology demands that Israel own the post-67 border area and the Jewish people tear down the Al Aqsa Mosque and rebuild the Temple. Essentially the right wing Christian movement supports Israel in an attempt to bring about the end of the world. No joke.

So next time you hear someone explaining why we should support Israel perhaps you should think about the satirical story that the Onion recently ran entitled "Government Official Who Makes Perfectly Valid, Well-Reasoned Point Against Israel Forced To Resign" and ask why. If you believe in Pre-Tribulation Rapture theology then by all means vote to bring about the end of the world, but if you don't think about what that relationship really gives us. So far it's been a lot of heartache and woe trying to keep it going with our booty call, Israel, and the guy we have to do business with for the oil, all the Arab states.

I love me some Donald Trump! Reply

I was reading my favorite Non-Ragin' Man blog, The Billy Blog, and saw that the Billy Blog Team had written a blog about the Donald. I have to admit that The Billy Blog Squad got me back for my 2nd Amendment blog. I am jealous because I had a blog kicking around in my head about Donald Trump, and my blog was a little more on the political side. The Billy Blog's team took a more fun look at the Donald. I didn't quite agree with their fun assessment, and I do have a problem with one issue about the President the Billy Blog brought up.

First, the issue about the President. The fine people at the Billy Blog wrote "You see, most people who appear as possible candidates for president are career politicians, afraid of “rocking the boat,” and so not only will they not dare to say anything controversial, but they may avoid any campaign specifics, or even any legislative votes on tough issues that could be brought up later! (See: Obama, Barack)" While I know that President Obama ducked some votes as Senator so as to preserve his status as never having voted for or against things that could come back to haunt him, the non-partisan group Politifact has an Obameter that tracks all the promises he made in the campaign. They track 506 promises. To me that's a lot of promises, but the people at the Billy Blog apparently demand promises somewhere around every hour on the hour. My personal opinion on the Donald's "promises" are that he promises to get tough and curse at people, which isn't really much of a promise, and if it was truly a Presidential trait to curse at things you don't like the American people could have elected my father many years ago. As with all things ragin' in Cajun land, you can decide for yourself.

I will say a Republican narrative about President Obama shows him as someone who lies and someone who never makes a promise. It's a very weird narrative to me, but one that has gained traction. As with all narratives I look to factual analysis to determine the truth of the matter.

As for the Donald this is where the Ragin' Man's blog becomes less fact based than he usually sticks to. Let me say that unlike the Billy Blog's Political Team, the best team named Billy, I do believe that Donald Trump is deadly serious about running for the Presidency and his more than usual showboating is a big part of his plan.

When I first heard about Donald Trump calling for the President's birth certificate and making claims of shouting down China and every government in the Middle East I was amused. I thought, like the Billy Blog's Institute for Campaign Excellence team, that "the Donald" was using this all as a vehicle to become more famous at a minimum, and hype his new Apprentice show at most.

I'll be honest with you at one point my brother, the head Billy Blogger over at Billy Blog Towers, had made a comment about those who opposed the President being called a racist as a default setting. I didn't agree with him because anyone who I had heard say that was very careful to point out that they begrudged no one their right to speak out on the policy issues. I was watching Ed Schulz go on and on about Trump's racism in asking about the President's birth certificate, and I reminded myself to write my brother from the exact same mother an e-mail indicating my flip-flop on the position. I thought Ed was being extremely cruel in his determination that Donald Trump was only going after the President because of his skin for political gain. After all Chester A. Arthur had his citizenship questioned because of his father, and the original birther lawsuit also was brought to eliminate Senator John McCain from Presidential contention because he was born in Panama. While it was fairly apparent to me that the President was born in the United States I did not begrudge a guy who didn't know how the right to privacy and abortion go hand in hand not understanding that the reason President Obama had not released his long form birth certificate was because the Hawaii Department of Health has only released "computerized abstracts" of vital records since May 15, 2001. That Donald Trump claimed to have sent investigators who somehow made him think the President's birth certificate was missing instead of just looking at any fact checking website seemed more grandstanding than anything.

As a result of these claims the President was forced to face a group that was once a fringe movement and had now taken a majority of the opposition party, and was showing no sign of stopping growth. He ended up sending a letter and counsel to Hawaii to do whatever was necessary to get the birth certificate published.

Little did I know the morning after I had resolved to tell my brother he was right President Obama released his birth certificate. I then watched something that would make me completely reverse my position AGAIN! Rather than say "Hey, I'm happy he was born in Hawaii like he claimed, now it's time to get to the issues" the Donald doubled down on worthless issues. It is important to note that he didn't even look at the President's birth certificate at the time he made the announcement, as the Daily Show showed as their "Moment of Zen" for the next two days.


No, in his press conference Trump asked to see the President's college transcripts. In his speech claiming victory by his action alone he talks about the President's possible bad grades as an undergrad and points out the President "gets to Harvard. … How do you get into Harvard if you're not a good student?"

This is where the light went on for me. I thought back to the time I read Bill Clinton's book "My Life" in which he talks about Ronald Reagan saying "I believe in states' rights." in Philadelphia, Mississippi to kick off his 1980 campaign. Clinton was born and raised in Arkansas and understood the implication of "states' rights" in the south of 1980 to mean a tacit endorsement of any racial policies the state enacts.

Now whether that was the case or not, even the scrum of writers at the Billy Blog can agree that the Ragin' Man was raised in a very conservative/Republican household. From that viewpoint I understand that Donald Trump is making the implication that the President of the United States only got into Harvard Law School because he is black. All he really needed to do to seal the deal is utter the words "affirmative action", a highly polarizing term I honestly haven't heard in national politics for about 8 years. Subsequent Republican operatives, including Andrew Breitbart, have brought up the issues of "what classes he took" being the reason for the transcript request. Trump has stated numerous times grades leading to his admission to increasingly prestigious institutions are his sole concern.

Let me say that I am nothing but non-partisan in my analysis for my blogs. I understand that Democrats are accused of starting class warfare. I don't know about warfare, but Democrats clearly promote class consciousness. That is to say, Democrats want you to realize what class you are really in and vote for your class' best interest, believing they will win when most Americans realize they aren't wealthy.

If what Trump is doing is not racist, it is at the very least promoting "racial consciousness." As with class consciousness Trump is trying to get people to realize their race and vote for him, believing he is looking out for the majority's interest. Why shouldn't he? The Republican Party is whiter than almost any other group in America outside of the KKK, so he's wooing the clear majority for the primary. Am I writing something inflammatory? Possibly if you don't analyze things when you watch them, but the real issue is what do we as Americans expect from our politicians?

I'll be honest with you in my assessment of this issue. Let me say that I'm not a huge fan of the President. He has done some things I think are really good, including raising his rhetorical response to terrorism and the Muslim world. Those things help the cause of America in our current conflicts. There are a lot of things he's done that I don't like when it comes to the PATRIOT Act and his refusal to pay for the wars we are currently fighting.



There were scandals about President George W. Bush's admission to Harvard graduate school and how much his father's position played into him being a member of the Air National Guard during Vietnam. Sarah Palin was even the victim of a conspiracy regarding whether her son Trig is hers or not. I don't worry about those issues, and I don't trust any conspiracies. I don't think anyone would turn down the use of their father's prestige to get into a very good school, just like I don't think anyone would turn down the color of their skin being the impetus for admission. As a very conservative teacher I had in high school said "if you don't use it, someone else will." The fact that they are now being nominated to the country's highest office on a major party ticket means they used their opportunities to better themselves more than most everyone I know.

What Trump is doing is trying to create a narrative around the President of affirmative action hire, and hang it around his neck for the duration of the campaign. I'm not sure that's an issue affecting the current state of our country, and I'm not sure I want a candidate who appeals to the color of your skin as the reason you should vote for him. For those reasons I am forced to disagree with the Billy Blog's outstanding crew and state that Trump and his many bankruptcies he never talks about when discussing how he can rebuild the economy should rebuild his combover before they should rebuild the Republican Party.

Donald Trump, YOU'RE FIRED!

Response to Billy Blog

This blog is a response to The Billy Blog's response to my own blog. Go check it out and leave a comment if you are so moved. My response was quote heavy and too long so I had to move it here. Since it was a response I didn't hyperlink my sources like I normally do so you can fact check easily.

My blog was a historical debate on the context of the 2nd Amendment. I would say your whole argument about the 2nd Amendment's new viewing is an excellent primer on the recent recreation of the amendment, and I would recommend it to anyone wanting the new scoop on 2nd Amendment poop.

I would submit you don't even really understand just how much the "self defense" argument in Scalia's decision was made to weigh into future decisions. Justice Alito, in the McDonald decision, even starts off his own decision by stating "this Court held that the Second Amendment protects the right to keep and bear arms for the purpose of self-defense and struck down a District of Columbia law that banned the possession of handguns in the home." Moreover the handgun ban was not passed by the US Congress, it was passed by the DC Council, which does have rules put on it by the US Congress as the recently arrested Mayor Gray will attest, but this law was in keeping with ordinances that were passed in towns in federally administrated areas of the west throughout the 1800's. Justice Scalia's majority decision hinged on DC's "prohibition against rendering any lawful firearm in the home operable for the purpose of immediate self-defense". This ruling is more in keeping with a "natural right" to self defense (which goes back to English Common Law) than in keeping with the actual wording of the 2nd Amendment as a whole, even with the due process clause of the 14th. Essentially if you apply the 14th to the 2nd then you have a choice to make. You can disregard the 14th Amendment's due process clause to the second clause of the 2nd Amendment, as was done because of the wording of the first clause in Presser v Illinois and Miller v Texas, less than 20 and 30 years after the 14th Amendment was ratified. This is done because the first part of the amendment shows that the states have a clear right and duty to regulate their militias. Clearly, this was the favored method historically which is all my blog says. I will state that a key part of any "well regulated" military group is a uniformity in their weapons. I doubt many founders would take issue with your state handing out weapons and drilling you once in a while, as was the case in early America. With a standing Army and National Guard we don't really have a need for it though outside of a Red Dawn situation.

I'll probably write a longer critique of your argument. Mine still stands as correct though as it has been a recent movement of the right to get the first clause to stand alone, while historically this was clearly NOT the case as you can see from the court decisions above. It has been understood since the ratification of the 14th Amendment in 1868 that the 2nd Amendment limits the power of the federal government as the decision in United States v Cruikshank stated "The Second Amendment...has no other effect than to restrict the powers of the national government." The last major gun case before Emerson was United States v Miller in which the unanimous decision stated "In the absence of any evidence tending to show that possession or use of a 'shotgun having a barrel of less than eighteen inches in length' at this time has some reasonable relationship to the preservation or efficiency of a well regulated militia, we cannot say that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to keep and bear such an instrument." Clearly the first clause impacted the second in 1939, unlike 2011.

Scalia even wrote in 1997's Printz v United States that the new tougher Brady Bill was unConstitutional because "We have thus far discussed the effect that federal control of state officers would have upon the first element of the "double security" alluded to by Madison: the division of power between State and Federal Governments." He made the argument that the federal law forced the states to enforce the law. Why would he argue such a thing instead of just stating the people have a right to bear the restricted arms? In 1997 the court did not have far right wing Justices Roberts and Alito who live to reinterpret the 2nd Amendment.

I guess in the end the most convincing piece of evidence for Scalia's own understanding of the Second Amendment is Scalia. "Undoubtedly some think that the Second Amendment is outmoded in a society where our standing army is the pride of our nation, where well-trained police forces provide personal security and where gun violence is a serious problem," Scalia wrote. "That is perhaps debatable, but what is not debatable is that it is not the role of this court to pronounce the Second Amendment extinct." What the right wing has done instead is to declare one half of it extinct.

My blog attempted to show an early understanding of the 2nd amendment and the context with which it would be viewed as historical narrative. Your own closing argument couldn't have been more prescient. Much like your ACLU argument, I'm pointing out that the right wing is attempting to get back to the founders on everything BUT the 2nd Amendment. Is it revisionist history? I'm not sure because our founders were not monolithic, so I'm sure there was a movement to allow for sub-state insurgencies by more than one founder. Is it a conspiracy? I don't think anyone who has read a newspaper or the court decisions of the last 100 years would say it is. To be a conspiracy you have to be quiet and small with a lot of power. It's a pretty large movement based on the number of NRA stickers I see daily. There are entire colleges being started just for this and other right wing causes. I'm glad it got you thinking though, and I don't begrudge your very current reading and understanding of the amendment. As the DC and Chicago bans were 5-4 votes, whereas the earlier cases were generally much larger decisions, I think the issue is very much alive today.