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Notes -
Do you believe it's normal for sitting politicians to collude with foreign spy agencies, including access to classified information that their own domestic intelligence won't share (or maybe can't share, we're just assuming that Israeli intelligence isn't giving any fake information to Lindsey Graham to manipulate him towards Israeli interests after all) in order to manipulate the feds?
I'm not sure I would call that normal lobbying.
Not in the US. Here is the definition of "collude"
Now kindly answer my questions:
What exactly is your objection? That Israel attempts to influence the US government? That it lobbies friendly members of the American legislature to lobby the US president? That it spies on people? That it uses that information to improve its influence efforts?
Certainly one could make the case that countries shouldn't try to lobby or influence the governments of other countries. Do you share that view?
Are you claiming that Israel has done something unlawful? If so, exactly what law was broken? (I won't ask if you believe Israel did something secret, since you said "they don't even try to hide it"
I'm trying to understand your position here, because I strongly suspect that you don't actually have a principled objection to Israel's conduct.
Ok, so here's the question. It was reported that Saudia Arabia's senior royalty repeatedly lobbied Donald Trump to attack Iran. How many posts have you made complaining about this?
So I take you object to Jewish Americans and Christian Zionists lobbying the US government to take pro-Israel action?
Perhaps not, but the accusation on the table was that Israel engaged in lobbying which was either secret or illegal. It seems that accusation was false.
Please show me where I stated or implied that if it's not illegal, then it's okay. Please QUOTE me.
TIA.
Not really -- you did not object at all to similar Saudi conduct until it was brought to your attention and you were specifically asked about it.
So I take it that you object to US membership in NATO as well? Also, how many posts have you made referring to [[Cuban-Americans]] in an ominous way?
It was you who decided to inject yourself into our exchange and pretend I took I position which I never took.
No, here's what you said in response to me:
You pretended that I took the position that "no laws broken" = "ok"
Thus, I am politely requesting that you either (1) show me where I took such a position by QUOTING me; or (2) admit that I took no such position and apologize.
Last time I will ask.
Thanks for the apology. And the answer to your question is very simple. The individual, in effect, accused Israel of "collusion" The very first definition of "collude" that I found requires that the behavior at issue be either secret or unlawful. He'd already admitted that the behavior was not secret. So the only question left was whether it was unlawful. That's why I brought it up.
Of course I agree that behavior can be both lawful and wrong. My main argument here is that standards should be applied consistently and fairly. If you have a kind of isolationist attitude; you think that America should never stick its neck out for other countries (whether it's Israel, South Korea, England, France, Saudi Arabia, or Bahrain), then fine. I have no problem with that.
Actually, that's not totally true. The problem I see with isolationism is that some Great Power is going to dominate the Persian Gulf, and the major seas for that matter. I'm not sure how practical it is for the US to simply stay uninvolved in all the sh*t that will inevitably go down. But I don't have a strong opinion on this.
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