Here’s a letter that I sent to the NYT regarding my thoughts on lobbies --- and those in power that they lobby.

Re “A Lobby, Not a Conspiracy,” by Tony Judt (Op-Ed, April 19), and subsequent letters:

All this debate and argument about an Israel lobby, how influential it is, and even whether it is taboo to discuss an Israel lobby, seems to miss an important point.  Namely, that any lobby, no matter how powerful, is really only a well-heeled supplicant seeking to influence those ruling and in power.

The more intriguing question would seem to be, who are the entrenched powers who don’t ever need to lobby, but rather rule --- and are the recipients of lobbying?

Is there an even more taboo question yet to be raised about the ‘old economy’ ruling-elite empire, which is the focus of all such supplicants?

Alan MacDonald
Sanford, Maine

Well, what do ya know, a reprisal of bygone days in Egypt and the Holy Land.  This time though, turns out that there’s been a reversal of the standings, in that it’s the Palestinian who’s the slave and the Jew who rules.  The Jewish settlers and their supporters shou ld have known this would come to be, because that’s what conquest always does.  Needless to say, I remain steadfast in my support of the slave..  And since none of us will be free until the last chain is broken, once again, let my people go.

I was raised as a Fundamentalist Christian child whose mother (mine!) believed that the recognition of the State of Israel in 1948 meant that she would witness the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. (I was born in 1938.)

I say that by way of establishing my “bona fides” for a lifelong interest in our policies toward Israel ... not scholarly, but fascinated.

I found the “working paper by John Mearsheimer, professor of political science at the University of Chicago, and Stephen Walt, professor of international affairs at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, called ‘The Israel Lobby’ was printed in the London Review” (to borrow from Molly Ivins) consistent with my perceptions from following the news regularly since childhood.

I, also, pretty much agreed with Ms. Ivins:

Molly Ivins: Pro-Israel ‘Nutjobs’ on the Attack at:
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20060424_molly_ivi ns_pro_israel/

From http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/711997.html

“As a teacher I have also been struck in recent years by a sea-change in the attitude of students. One example among many: Here at New York University I was teaching this past month a class on post-war Europe. I was trying to explain to young Americans the importance of the Spanish Civil War in the political memory of Europeans and why Franco’s Spain has such a special place in our moral imagination: as a reminder of lost struggles, a symbol of oppression in an age of liberalism and freedom, and a land of shame that people boycotted for its crimes and repression. I cannot think, I told the students, of any country that occupies such a pejorative space in democratic public consciousness today. You are wrong, one young woman replied: What about Israel? To my great surprise most of the class - including many of the sizable Jewish contingent - nodded approval. The times they are indeed a-changing.”