Issues spur pro-Israel PAC (AIPAC)

[Wordie]

Note to the Mods: This is an article about AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. As such, it is allowed in LBN per DU Rules, which say this: If a discussion is primarily about US policy in Israeli/Palestinian affairs, it is sometimes allowed in other forums. As a discussion of this powerful U.S. lobbying group is clearly a US policy issue, I would hope that you, as Mods, would allow it to remain. Further, if there are posters who do go off topic, in spite of my request to everyone below, I would greatly appreciate it if those posts could be deleted, rather than the entire thread dungeonized. Thanks.

Note to everyone else: Frequently, threads about US/Israel issues get dungeonized to the I/P forum, when the discussion goes OT into a flame war. I would appreciate it if as much as possible we attempt in this thread to keep comments limited to US policy issues, and how AIPAC may influence those, rather than going OT and getting the thread dungeonized. The DU rules say this: If a thread is on a different topic, but later goes off-topic and becomes a discussion of Israeli/Palestinian issues, the moderators may move the thread to the Israel/Palestine forum. This is an important enough issue that it deserves a discussion in the larger forums, so your cooperation is appreciated.

This is an article about AIPAC and the election of Howard Friedman, a Baltimore native, to the presidency of the organization. It starts out by stating that the organization faces enormous challenges, and lists those as the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran, whose president has called for Israel to be wiped off the map, the newly-elected Hamas government of the Palestinian Occupied Territories, and the scandals involving former key AIPAC staff members, who were fired by AIPAC last March for what another staffer describes as "conduct that was not part of their jobs and was beneath the standards required of AIPAC employees."

Issues spur pro-Israel PAC
Iran arms, Hamas, leak case loom as Baltimore native takes the helm
By Julie Hirschfeld Davis
Sun reporter
Originally published March 8, 2006

WASHINGTON ...Shortly after Friedman is to take AIPAC's helm April 1, former staffers Steven J. Rosen and Keith Weissman are scheduled to go to trial on federal charges that they received classified information about terrorism from a Pentagon analyst, Lawrence A. Franklin, and passed it to a journalist and an Israeli official in violation of the Espionage Act.

The case has called into question AIPAC's greatest asset - its high-level connections with officials throughout the U.S. government - and sparked bitterness among some pro-Israel activists and American Jews who believe AIPAC is being unfairly targeted for tactics that are commonplace among top lobbyists in Washington.

Friedman brushes aside questions about the case, contending that AIPAC has never been stronger and noting that the group's membership has swelled by 25 percent over the past two years. Its annual policy conference this week drew a record 5,000 people, with prominent speakers from the Bush administration and congressional leaders from both parties.

...Despite AIPAC's contention that Rosen and Weissman acted on their own, the lobbying powerhouse has hired a law firm to scrutinize the way it does business and advise its leaders on any changes that might be needed "to ensure that nothing like this can ever happen again," said a person close to the case, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to disclose the review.

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/nationworld/bal-te.aipac08mar08,0,4762500.story?coll=bal-nationworld-headlines

The article also mentions how VP Cheney chose the AIPAC meeting, held earlier this week, to escalate the rhetoric against Iran, saying the US would institute "meaninful sanctions" if Iran didn't abandon its plans for a nuclear program.

[president4aday]

1. "the specter of a nuclear-armed Iran". Change the "n" in Iran to q.

[Wordie]

3. Yes...the parallels are amazing, aren't they? eom

[Just Me]

2. Well, I OBJECT to AIPAC being treated like a "lobbying firm",...

,...and to the extend that it is a "lobbying firm" I fucking reject their buying off our nation's interests.

Okay? :grr:

[Wordie]

6. An earlier SC decision left things in limbo...Congress should act, imho.

Recent Developments in Campaign Finance Regulation

In Akins, Supreme Court Rules FEC can be Sued by Citizens to Enforce Disclosure Statutes

FEC v. Akins
U.S. Supreme Court
June 1, 1998

Requirements of Classification as a Political Committee ("Major Purpose Test"): Unaddressed by Court (And this is the problem, imho, which needs to be addressed by Congress -Wordie)

...The underlying question in the case was not the standing of the plaintiffs, however. Instead, it concerned whether the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), a membership organization and lobbying group supporting pro-Israel policies, met the technical definition of a "PAC" under the FECA, and therefore had to comply with FECA's disclosure requirements.

The FECA provides that any organization that spends $1000 on campaign-related activity is a PAC. However, the Supreme Court in Buckley v. Valeo indicated that, at least in some cases, only organizations whose "major purpose" is electing or defeating candidates may be regulated as a "PAC."

AIPAC admitted its activities included activities related to elections, including setting up meetings between candidates and its members, and distributing candidate position papers to its membership. However, AIPAC claimed these activities all constituted communications with their membership, which are exempt from regulation under FECA. Thus, despite this activity, AIPAC asserted, and the FEC agreed, that AIPAC was not a "political committee," and thus was not required to comply with legal requirements applicable to political committees.

...In the end, however, the Supreme Court declined to decide whether the $1000 test or the "major purpose" test was applicable - i.e. whether or not AIPAC was a "political committee" subject to FECA. Instead, the Court sent the case back to the lower courts to reconsider the case in light of the decision that the plaintiffs had standing, and in light of the recent lower court cases.

http://www.brookings.edu/gs/cf/headlines/akins.htm

And when I say that I think Congress should act, I don't necessarily mean against AIPAC specifically, but that the laws should be refined so that all campaign donations fall under the same rules.

[Wordie]

7. Does anyone know to what other organizations this glitch in the law may

apply to? Are there other membership organizations that function as PACs so far as donations go, but are not classified as such, so that they don't fall under the rules set up for PACs? I am completely unaware of how widespread this may be.

[president4aday]

4. "tactics that are commonplace among top lobbyists"

Note that this claim is never substantiated.

Does anyone really believe divulging classified information to a foreign power is "commonplace", even among "top lobbyists"?

and even assuming that "everybody does it", does that make it right?

[Wordie]

5. Welcome to DU, president4aday!

:hi:

Yeah, I think the classified info thing is pushing it.

That said, it very well may be that "everyone does it," indeed. Imo, that's a good argument for reforming our laws about lobbying. That may be the solution to a large part of the problem. There should be further limitations on the ability of money to buy access.

[mom cat]

8. K&R ... & thanks.