| In which the Old Grey Lady fights yet another rear guard action against facts damaging to the Democrats at home, because her readers have been getting grief from conservative friends and relations who get their news elsewhere. Key paragraphs below. |
[NewYorkTimes] Jeremy Bird,
| ...Mr. Obama’s national field director in 2012 and founding partner of the political consulting firm 270 Strategies... |
the architect of the grass-roots and online organizing efforts that powered President B.O.'s presidential campaigns from reliably Democrat Chicago, aka The Windy City or Mobtown
... home of Al Capone, a succession of Daleys, Barak Obama, and Rahm Emmanuel,...
, is advising a similar operation in Tel Aviv. But this time it is focused on ousting Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel.
American strategists have for decades signed on to work in Israeli political campaigns, with Democrats usually aligned with the Labor Party and Republicans often backing Mr. Netanyahu's Likud party. There is no evidence to suggest that Mr. Obama or any of his senior aides had anything to do with the move by his former top campaign official, who has never worked at the White House, to join the effort to defeat Mr. Netanyahu.
| "Everybody does it, and anyway you've got no proof." |
But Mr. Bird's involvement in the elections is drawing attention when tensions between the two countries are so acute
| Golly, why is that, d'you suppose? |
that what is usually considered standard practice for American political consultants in Israel is now seen as a provocation.
| They always demand the avoidance of even the appearance of misbehaviour. But it's odd that in this case the consultants weren't hired by a particular party, but are offering their work for the benefit of all Liberal/Left parties who want to take advantage of it. |
"It's clearly a data point that people are looking to that indicates how the relationship has tanked," said Matthew Brooks, the executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition. He added that Mr. Bird reflects "the hypocrisy of this White House, which wants to stand on the notion that they're not playing politics when in fact their fingerprints are all over this."
The White House has repeatedly said its highest priority is keeping partisanship out of the relationship between the United States and Israel, citing that principle as Mr. Obama's rationale for refusing to meet with Mr. Netanyahu during his visit.
| Does anyone at all actually believe this claim? |
Asked about the suggestion that Mr. Obama was tacitly backing an effort to oust Mr. Netanyahu, Josh Earnest, the White House press secretary, said, "The long tradition of bipartisan support for the U.S.-Israel relationship has served both our countries well for generations, and President B.O. will continue to go to great lengths to shield our alliance from the smallness of party politics."
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