Things are going to get a lot worse before they get any better. Liberal Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren, a presidential-maybe, is going to Israel. Matt Viser at the Boston Globe says she needs to pad her skimpy foreign policy brief:
A Warren aide said the freshman senator is planning to join a congressional trip to Israel, but given her aggressive schedule campaigning on behalf of Senate Democrats it likely will come after the midterm elections in November.
That trip could raise speculation that Warren is trying to add to her foreign policy portfolio ahead of a potential presidential run, but it also could be seen as her playing catch up to other freshman senators who have already traveled abroad.
Here is a defining moment: Senator Warren running away, at Netroots on July 18, when a reporter asked her about the Gaza slaughter.
This goes in the same file as Hillary Clinton throwing Obama under the bus on his Israel policy and Andrew Cuomo standing there like a potted plant with Netanyahu yesterday and Rand Paul throwing his old self under the bus on his former criticisms of Israel. I believe that it’s about money, pure and simple, campaign contributions. The perspicacious Tom Friedman explains the Israel lobby’s efficacy:
if you and I were running from the same district, and I have AIPAC’s stamp of the approval and you don’t, I will maybe have to make three phone calls and I can raise my whole– I’m exaggerating but I don’t have to make many phone calls to get all the money I need to run against you. You will have to make 50,000 phone calls. So that pulled the whole spectrum to the right
P.S. Steve Israel just went to Israel, too. Since he got back, he’s been working the phones, trashing Hamas, and going round to the Jewish Federations, the pro-Israel group. Again, I believe this is about money. He’s the head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. He has to raise a lot of money in that job. And as Willie Sutton said…