Romney's Palestine gaffe today

[remirol]

Really? I have never heard that one.

Listen closer to your right-wing nutjob friends.

False dichotomy.

Recitation of fallacy names does not an actual fallacy make.

If the Palestinians are ready for peace then it might be that the only course of action is that an armed stand off continues until the Palestinian leadership/culture changes. (Perhaps continued International Aid to Palestine could be made dependent on them removing glorification of terrorists from their curricula/TV - might help the next generation to be less unreasonable.)

If they aren't shooting, that's progress towards peace and away from the other two alternatives. Which is what I said in the first place, and why I said "nobody should pretend it will be easy". Derp.

 

[Giz]

Listen closer to your right-wing nutjob friends.

Cite any mainstream rightwing newspaper or republican?

Recitation of fallacy names does not an actual fallacy make.
.

And argument by assertion doesn't prove that assertion.

If they aren't shooting, that's progress towards peace and away from the other two alternatives. Which is what I said in the first place, and why I said "nobody should pretend it will be easy". Derp.

If you think that probably the best that can be hoped for is a long Cold War with limited counter-terror engagements then congratulations! You agree with Mitt Romney!

 

[remirol]

Cite any mainstream rightwing newspaper or republican?

"No True Republican".

If you think that probably the best that can be hoped for is a long Cold War with limited counter-terror engagements then congratulations! You agree with Mitt Romney!

It's worth keeping in mind that when you find yourself writing down what you think my thoughts are, you're almost certainly arguing against a strawman and should go back and try again.

 

[Giz]

"No True Republican".



It's worth keeping in mind that when you find yourself writing down what you think my thoughts are, you're almost certainly arguing against a strawman and should go back and try again.

Oh dear - the only strawman here is the ridiculous Straw-Romney/Straw-Republican that you are arguing.

Try again!

 

[Tricky]

One of these two statements is true:

• Acheiving meaningful, long-lasting peace in the Palestine-Israeli conflict will be difficult if not impossible.
• It is a waste of time trying to convince Palestines and Israelis to work toward more peaceful coexistance.

Which one of these statements do you think Romney was making?

 

[theprestige]

One of these two statements is true:

• Acheiving meaningful, long-lasting peace in the Palestine-Israeli conflict will be difficult if not impossible.
• It is a waste of time trying to convince Palestines and Israelis to work toward more peaceful coexistance.

Which one of these statements do you think Romney was making?

I think he was probably making the statement he actually made. I speculate that you're actually asking, what is the more reasonable interpretation of that statement?

(I also speculate that you've already made up your mind about the answer, but for whatever reason don't actually want to present and discuss your interpretation.)

Anyway, the way I read it, it's something close to the second statement. I don't think a Romney administration would consider it such a complete waste of time that they would dismantle all the peace process infrastructure already in place, or discontinue all diplomatic outreach.

I think, instead, Romney's statement signals a few things:

• Bias towards the status quo--no new or major peace initiatives;
• Support for our ally, Israel, with less concern about Palestinian complaints, since they will complain regardless, will remain intractable, and will not reward our concessions at Israel's expense with any significant concessions of their own;
• High threshold for access to the President's attention. Former secretary of state with the "prospect of a settlement"? Not good enough. I think if the Israeli government came to the White House and said "we've been making unprecedented progress with the Palestinians through back channels, and we could really use your support at this point to make it happen", Romney would be much more likely to "delve into it";
• And, finally, that it's not America's job to make peace between Israel and Palestine. It's something they'll have to work out amongst themselves. American interests don't seem to have been much helped by staying at the negotiating table with the Palestinians, and American interests probably won't be much harmed by backing away from the negotiating table. Maybe the way forward is to stop playing the Palestinian "peace process" game, for a change.