Looking for clarity and balance

…and not finding it in the heavyweights of the mainstream media on some issues.  That’s not news. What is news that I haven’t heard anywhere else is that there’s a debate going on — out loud and in public now — over Israeli influence in America. The July/August 2006 issue of Foreign Policy magazine blazes new trails in that direction, and the result is a compelling forum with intellectual honesty and at least some effort at charity and goodwill.

The cover asks “Does the Israel Lobby Have Too Much Power?” and it’s a head-turner. The editors give some background to this bombshell:

Political scientists John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt sparked a firestorm when they raised questions about the power the Israel lobby wields over U.S. foreign policy. Now, in an exclusive FP Roundtable, they face off with four distinguished experts of the Middle East over whether the influence of the Israel lobby is ordinary or extraordinary.

In the lead article “Unrestricted Access” these two academics open with the simple declaration: What the Israel lobby wants, it too often gets. And they proceed to state what you just never hear anyone say out loud: America’s relationship with Israel is difficult to discuss openly in the United States. And that’s why we never hear it.

But why? Professors Mearsheimer and Walt studied that question and published a strong, lengthy, fact-filled article in the March issue of the London Review of Books to answer it.

Our goal was to break the taboo and to generate a candid discussion of U.S. support for Israel, because it has far-reaching consequences for Americans and others around the world.

Dinstinguished foreign policy expert Dennis Ross weighs in as well in this issue of FP, with his own reaction to the professors’ belief that the Israel lobby pressured George Bush into the Iraq war. Here’s what Dennis Ross thinks:

The reality is, neither the Israel lobby nor neoconservatives convinced Bush to go to war. September 11 did. Prior to 9/11, Bush’s Iraq policy was one of “smart sanctions”—the containment of the Iraqi regime, not its overthrow. His worldview changed on 9/11.

In this same issue, another article, “A Dangerous Exemption” by Zbigniew Brzezinski asks “Why should the Israel lobby be immune from criticism?” The former national security advisor to President Jimmy Carter, Brzezinski, is a foreign policy expert, and opens his remarks with this:

Given that the Middle East is currently the central challenge facing America, Professors John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt have rendered a public service by initiating a muchneeded public debate on the role of the “Israel lobby” in the shaping of U.S. foreign policy.

I’m glad to see this debate. We should have more of it, on this and every other issue affecting our national security and the fabric of our culture. Unfortunately, public discourse tends to be mean-spirited these days, and politics have descended into the “scorched earth” strategy.

This FP roundtable debate offers some good points on each side. It gives you a lot to think about. News coverage should be well-rounded like this, especially on the larger issues.

As Mearsheimer and Walt concluded, our national and international problems won’t be addressed properly if certain groups enjoy disproportionate influence, which can be said about any hot topic besides the Middle East. These problems defy easy solutions, they point out, but they won’t get resolved if Americans can’t debate their honest questions “freely and dispassionately.”