{"id":17502,"date":"2012-12-19T13:01:23","date_gmt":"2012-12-19T21:01:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=17502"},"modified":"2012-12-19T13:01:23","modified_gmt":"2012-12-19T21:01:23","slug":"stand-up-to-the-smear-brigade-sign-the-white-house-petition-in-support-of-chuck-hagel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2012\/12\/19\/stand-up-to-the-smear-brigade-sign-the-white-house-petition-in-support-of-chuck-hagel\/","title":{"rendered":"Stand Up to the Smear Brigade — Sign the White House Petition in Support of Chuck Hagel"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Israel lobby\u2019s smear campaign<\/a> against Chuck Hagel is an absolute<\/a> outrage<\/a>: they are hurling every mudball they can get their hands on at him, and of course the main charge is \u201canti-Semitism\u201d \u2013 because he wont\u2019 kowtow to the Lobby and proudly declares that, while he supports Israel, \u201cI’m a United States senator. I’m not an Israeli senator.\u201d<\/p>\n

To ordinary Americans, of course, such a sentiment is called patriotism: to the Lobby, it\u2019s high treason. Welcome to Bizarro World<\/a>!<\/p>\n

I was on Twitter last night, and I was sickened to see that the \u201cbuzz<\/a>\u201d is that because the evil Washington Post<\/em> has come out editorially against Hagel, his nomination is supposedly doomed. I thought to myself: Really?<\/em> Is the editorial page editor of the WaPo, a notorious neocon, really going to dictate the future of American foreign policy? Do these people really have that kind of power \u2013 or do we, the people, have the power?<\/p>\n

I decided to put this question to the test. So I posted a White House petition on the White House petition web site supporting Hagel\u2019s nomination and urging the administration to fight for him.<\/p>\n

We have until January 18, 2013, to get 25,000 signatures \u2013 on which occasion the White House will have to<\/em> respond in some manner.<\/p>\n

This is important. If the War Party gets away with this vicious campaign of character assassination, then they can get away with anything. The American people want out of Afghanistan, just like they want out of Iraq \u2013 and they overwhelmingly oppose war with Iran, which the War Party is pushing like hell. Hagel opposes their war plans: he has opposed the murderous sanctions on Iran, and has advocated diplomacy over military action. He has consistently and bravely stood up to the Israel lobby, and refused to sign on to their numerous \u201copen letters\u201d urging the administration to kowtow to Tel Aviv.<\/p>\n

No, the Washington Post<\/em> editorial board doesn\u2019t have the last word when it comes to the vital issue of war and peace \u2013 not if you speak out and let your voice be heard. Yes, we can have an effect \u2013 but only if you act now<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

One month \u2013 25,000 signatures. It\u2019s doable \u2013 so let\u2019s do it.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Please go here<\/a> to sign the petition.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Israel lobby\u2019s smear campaign against Chuck Hagel is an absolute outrage: they are hurling every mudball they can get their hands on at him, and of course the main charge is \u201canti-Semitism\u201d \u2013 because he wont\u2019 kowtow to the Lobby and proudly declares that, while he supports Israel, \u201cI’m a United States senator. I’m […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-17502","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"meta_box":{"disable_donate_message":"","custom_donate_message":"","subtitle":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17502","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17502"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17502\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17504,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17502\/revisions\/17504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17502"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17502"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17502"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=17502"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}