“Soft despotism is a term coined by Alexis de Tocqueville describing the state into which a country overrun by "a network of small complicated rules" might degrade. Soft despotism is different from despotism (also called 'hard despotism') in the sense that it is not obvious to the people."
Let's hear it for the the safe pick for the April Fool, Joe Biden. Vice president calls for changing attitudes about violence March 31, 2010 9:19 PM
Biden on violence against woman
PEORIA, Ill. -- Vice President Joe Biden, speaking Wednesday at an anti-violence event in central Illinois, called for "educating the whole society" to dispel cultural attitudes that lead to sexual assaults.
Biden was joined by Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood and Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., at the Center for Prevention of Abuse fundraiser, attended by 1,100 people at the Peoria Civic Center.
The vice president, a former Democratic senator from Delaware, discussed his work to pass the Violence Against Women Act in 1994. In advancing the legislation, Biden said, he had to confront state laws that permitted rape within a marriage and combat cultural assumptions that women "ask to be raped" when they wear short skirts or walk alone late at night.
"No man, no man, no man, under any condition other than self-defense, has the right to raise his hand to a woman. No condition. None. Zero," he said.
The vice president, who said he used to target men's groups when talking about these issues, reminded the men in the room they too are potential victims of rape.
"Why don't you report it? Because you're ashamed," Biden said. "You don't want your friends to know a man raped you. ... How about women in our society? How easy do you think it is for a woman to go home and say, 'I've been raped'?"
Biden also thanked those at the event who assist victims of assault and abuse.
"You're doing God's work," he told them.
He also praised Durbin for his anti-violence work in the Senate and LaHood, a former Republican congressman from Peoria.
Biden said LaHood was "literally the first name that was raised to be in the Cabinet ... which goes to show you this is an all-Illinois team."
While in Peoria, the vice president stopped by two local institutions, George's Shoeshine and the Spotted Cow, an ice cream joint.
George's is a favorite stop for LaHood, and also has been visited by President Barack Obama and former Presidents George W. Bush, Ronald Reagan and Gerald Ford.
Owner George Manias, who has shined shoes for 63 years, said of Biden: "He talks just like an ordinary person, a nice guy."
In honor of Biden, the Spotted Cow renamed its chocolate chip ice cream "Chip off the Old Biden." During the visit to the ice cream parlor, Biden, Durbin and LaHood met with local business people.
"Nobody messes with Joe' but when they do , Obama does nothing but sends a woman to do a man's job.
After the humilation of the US by Netanyahu and his crazies on the way far right, Obama didn't order Biden to get his sorry shanked-ass back to DC.
Biden remained in Israel with his stinging red face and for what? To wait a week for a five day old knish from Bibi?
Message to the Planet: Obama, that's the way he rolls, easy, real real easy.
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Netanyahu voices regret in settlement row with U.S. Jeffrey Heller JERUSALEM Sun Mar 14, 2010 5:45am EDT Related News " (Reuters) -
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu voiced regret Sunday for the announcement of a Jewish settlement plan that has strained ties with Washington and threatens the revival of Middle East peace talks.
In his first public remarks on what Israeli commentators called his most serious crisis with Washington since taking office a year ago, he gave no sign he would meet Palestinian demands to cancel a project for 1,600 new settler homes.
"I suggest not to get carried away and to calm down," Netanyahu told his cabinet at its weekly meeting, after a reprimand by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
"There was a regrettable incident here, that occurred innocently," Netanyahu said, referring to an announcement by a government ministry during a visit last week by U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, of planned construction in an area of the West Bank that Israel has annexed to Jerusalem.
The timing of the disclosure deeply embarrassed Biden, whose visit coincided with Palestinian agreement to restart peace talks suspended since December 2008 in the form of indirect, U.S.-mediated negotiations with Israel.
"It was hurtful and certainly it should not have happened," Netanyahu said of the announcement by the Interior Ministry, controlled by the pro-settler, ultraorthodox Shas party, a partner in his governing coalition.
Netanyahu said he had appointed a team of senior officials "to pinpoint the sequence of events, to ensure procedures will be in place to prevent these kinds of incidents in the future."
CLINTON REPRIMAND
A senior U.S. official forecast "a dicey period here in the next couple days to a couple of weeks" as Palestinians demanded the reversal of the settlement plan.
Palestinians fear settlements on land Israel captured in the 1967 Middle East war will deny them a viable state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
In unusually blunt remarks, Clinton called Israel's behavior "insulting" after it approved the project while hosting Biden.
Although she stressed Washington's ties with the Jewish state were "durable and strong," she told Netanyahu in a telephone call Friday he must act to repair the relationship.
Clinton accepted that Netanyahu was taken by surprise by the settlement housing approval. However, her spokesman said she told him it was a "deeply negative signal about Israel's approach to the bilateral relationship ... and had undermined trust and confidence in the peace process."
Israel's ambassador to the United States, Michael Oren, was summoned to the State Department Friday to meet Deputy Secretary of State Jim Steinberg in a further sign of U.S. displeasure, a senior U.S. official said.
U.S. President Barack Obama is seeking better U.S. relations with the Arab world, which backs the Palestinians, as he seeks to bolster alliances in the oil-producing region, notably against Iran as it develops nuclear technology and against Islamist enemies such as al Qaeda.
Aides to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said he was waiting to meet Obama's peace envoy, George Mitchell, when he returns to the region in the coming days before deciding whether to go ahead with the "proximity talks."
A senior U.S. official indicated that Washington might focus on playing down the significance of the past week's approval for future house building -- "this was a year away at minimum," he said -- and expressing understanding for Netanyahu's difficulties.
The official described the prime minister's position as "perilous" because of his coalition's dependence on pro-settler groups.
(Additional reporting by Adam Entous and Arshad Mohammed in Washington, Ori Lewis in Jerusalem and Ali Sawafta in Ramallah; editing by Andrew Dobbie)
Israel blindsided Vice President Joe Biden's fence-mending mission Tuesday by announcing a settler building boom in East Jerusalem.
The move to expand an Orthodox Jewish settlement by 1,600 units embarrassed Biden, who was trying to jump-start "indirect" talks with the Palestinians.
Biden showed his anger by arriving 90 minutes late for dinner at the residence of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
"I condemn the decision" by Israeli Interior Minister Eli Yishai to build in the area of the West Bank annexed to Jerusalem by Israel, Biden said in an unusually undiplomatic statement.
He called the announcement "precisely the kind of step that undermines the trust we need right now and runs counter to the constructive discussions that I've had here in Israel."
The flareup came ahead of Biden's visit Wednesday to the West Bank for meetings with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, whose aides suggested the proposed talks with Israel through U.S. special envoy George Mitchell might now be canceled.
"Israel is not interested in negotiations, nor in peace," Abbas aide Nabil Abu Rudainah told Reuters.
Earlier, Biden pledged an enduring U.S. commitment to Israel's security and to preventing Iran from going nuclear. Netanyahu repeated Israel's longstanding demand that the Palestinians recognize Israel as a Jewish state.
Israeli newspapers said the blowup with Biden had effectively scuttled immediate prospects for direct talks with the Palestinians and damaged relations with Israel's closest ally. New York Daily News
First praise, then a rebuke: Biden’s Israel visit turns sour
US Vice-President condemns plans for hundreds of new homes in occupied territory
By Donald Macintyre in Jerusalem Tuesday, 9 March 2010 Independent
The Israeli government last night managed to overshadow a high-profile visit by the US Vice-President, Joe Biden, with an announcement of controversial and politically highly sensitive plans to build 1,600 new homes for Jewish residents in Arab East Jerusalem.
The announcement from the Interior Ministry – which drew a sharp and swift rebuke from Mr Biden himself – came only hours after the Vice-President had personally congratulated the Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, for "taking risks for peace".
The disclosure of the plan, infuriating the Palestinian leadership the day after it had finally agreed to US-brokered indirect "proximity" talks with Israel – followed an explicit appeal on Monday by President Barack Obama's Middle East envoy, George Mitchell, to both sides in the conflict "to refrain from any statements or actions which may inflame tensions or prejudice the outcome of these talks".
The Vice-President declared last night that he condemned the "substance and timing" of the announcement, "particularly with the launching of proximity talks" as "precisely the kind of step that undermines the trust we need right now and runs counter to the constructive discussions that I've had here in Israel".
The Interior Ministry had said earlier that there would be 60 days to allow appeals against the plan for a substantial expansion of the existing Ultra-Orthodox East Jerusalem "neighbourhood" of Ramat Shlomo. Most of the international community, which has never accepted Israel's unilateral annexation of East Jerusalem, regards the district as a settlement.
Saeb Erekat, the chief Palestinian negotiator, reacted angrily to news of the expansion. "With such an announcement, how can you build trust?" he said. "This is destroying our efforts to work with Mr Mitchell. It's a really disastrous situation. I hope that this will be an eye-opener for all in the international community about the need to have the Israeli government stop such futile exercises."
Israeli officials indicated last night that the revelation had come as a "surprise" to Mr Netanyahu, who was not consulted about its timing by the right-wing Interior Minister, Eli Yishai, leader of the Sephardic Ultra-Orthodox party Shas, and a key component of Mr Netanyahu's ruling coalition.
In a hasty damage limitation exercise last night, Mr Yishai's spokesman said the meeting of the committee which approved the plan had been "determined in advance" and insisted "there there is no connection to US Vice-President Joe Biden's visit to Israel". His statement added that Mr Yishai had "updated" Mr Netanyahu "this evening".
Nevertheless Palestinian leaders will point to the disclosure as strong evidence of what they see as the relentless growth of Jewish settlement construction in East Jerusalem and a further vindication of the demands they have made – in vain – for a total halt to such expansion in order to improve the atmosphere for negotiations with Israel.
Mr Netanyahu last year rejected the urgings of President Barack Obama for a settlement freeze to help kick-start peace talks and instead announced a 10-month temporary and partial freeze, one which did not stop Israel's announcement on Monday of 112 new homes in the – also Ultra-Orthodox – settlement of Beitar Illit.
The rapid expansion of Ultra-Orthodox housing east of the "green line" that was Israel's border up to the Six Day War in 1967 is driven as much by the desire to accommodate the large families of Israel's rapidly growing Ultra-Orthodox population as by the ideology which informs much of the rest of Jewish settlement in occupied territory.
But that makes little difference to the fears of Palestinians that "facts on the ground" are being created which make it increasingly difficult to envisage the contiguous Palestinian state in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and Gaza which they regard as the only acceptable outcome of peace talks.
Meir Margalit, a Jerusalem council member for the leftist Meretz Party, said that "the fact that Eli Yishai couldn't restrain himself for another two-three days until Biden left Israel means his intention was to slap the US administration in the face". He added that the announcement was "a provocation to the US and to the Prime Minister".
The latest row will create unwelcome difficulties for a visit in which Mr Biden has been seeking to proclaim strong US loyalty to the security interests of Israel – which is increasingly restive about Iran's nuclear ambitions – as well as helping to kick-start negotiations with the Palestinians.
Obama needs to do a Rev Wright on old Joe and get his embarrassing dumb ass over to the Naval Observatory and let him attend to his roses. It is is just a matter of time before Obama will tire of having to pick up after the irrepressible Biden. There simply is no known verbal remedy of kaopectate that could ever plug him up. Maliki noticed.
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Iraq's Maliki says Biden criticism "out of date" Tue Feb 10, 2009 By Waleed Ibrahim
BAGHDAD, Feb 10 (Reuters) - Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki took issue with the new U.S. administration on Tuesday, calling Vice President Joe Biden's criticism of the slow pace of reform in Iraq "out of date".
Before leaving Washington last week to deliver a major foreign policy speech in Germany, Biden chided Baghdad for failing to settle disputes over the city of Kirkuk and to enact a law dividing oil revenue, among other issues.
"I think our administration is going to have to be very deeply involved. We are going to have to get in there and be much more aggressive in forcing them to deal with these issues," Biden said.
Asked about Biden's remarks on Tuesday, Maliki, an increasingly assertive leader whose followers won surprise victories in provincial elections last month, fired back.
"I believe talk about applying pressure on the Iraqi government or taking hard measures against it no longer works," he said at a news conference in Baghdad with visiting French President Nicolas Sarkozy.
When I first heard the Biden remarks, I was not totally surprised. I mentioned in a thread some months ago that my personal experience with Biden was that he loved to be the center of attention. Well he certainly exceeded my expectations. Now I need to say one thing to the McCain campaign:
Talk about nothing else but this, Bill Ayers and Reverend Wright.
Talk about nothing else but this, Bill Ayers and Reverend Wright.
Talk about nothing else but this, Bill Ayers and Reverend Wright.
Talk about nothing else but this, Bill Ayers and Reverend Wright.
Joe Biden has really put his foot in it with the Catholics
Joe Biden loses Barack Obama the Catholic vote Gerald Warner Sep 19, 2008 Telegraph
More, as promised, on Senator Joe Biden (why should Sarah Palin get all the coverage?). Remember, you read it here first: on September 11 this blog reported a mounting backlash from Catholic bishops against Biden, Barack Obama's "Catholic" pro-abortion running mate. At that time I estimated eight bishops had come out to denounce Biden; the total is now 55. Beyond that, Biden is being trashed across every state of the Union by Catholic newspapers, TV and radio stations, and blogs. It is a tsunami of rejection.
The story has now hit the secular media. Last Saturday Time magazine asked: "Does Biden Have a Catholic Problem?" By Wednesday the issue had moved onto the front page of the New York Times. Joe the Jinx has blown it, big time. Biden has only himself to blame: he started this war, with his notoriously undisciplined mouth. He knew the dangers. Last August, Archbishop Raymond Burke, former Archbishop of St Louis and now Prefect of the Apostolic Segnatura in Rome, said communion should be denied to pro-abortion politicians "until they have reformed their lives".
Archbishop Chaput of Denver had already announced Biden should not receive communion because of his pro-abortion views. Defiantly, Biden took communion in his home parish in Delaware in late August. On September 2 the Bishop of Scranton, Pennsylvania (a crucial swing state) banned him from communion in his diocese. That is effective excommunication. Then came the crucial provocation. On NBC's Meet the Press programme on September 7 Biden grossly misrepresented the Catholic Church's teaching on abortion and audaciously cited St Thomas Aquinas in his own cause.
That did it. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had already done the same thing on the same programme, in her instance citing St Augustine. Even the torpid US bishops could not have false doctrine glibly broadcast by public figures, misleading their flock. So the counterattack described here last week began, culminating in a statement from the US Bishops' Conference. The bishops of Kansas City have also issued a pastoral letter on the subject. It is open season on Biden.
There are 47 million Catholic voters in the United States. One quarter of all registered voters are Catholics. At every presidential election in the past 30 years the Catholic vote has gone to the winning candidate, except for Al Gore in 2000. This year 41 per cent of Catholics are independents - up from 30 per cent in 2004. Psephologists claim practising Catholics were the decisive factor in the crucial swing states in 2004: in Ohio 65 per cent of Catholics voted for Bush, in Florida 66 per cent. They were drifting away in disillusionment from the Republicans and split 50-50, until Joe Biden worked his magic. This is electoral suicide by the Democrats.
