July 11, 2012, 3:36 PM
| Comments (8) | | |
 |
| |  |
I have not had the opportunity to read the court decision on Olmert. And so my thoughts on his acquittal have little to do with the merits of the prosecution in the three cases adjudicated by the Jerusalem District Court.
I have a problem with corruption investigations against politicians generally and against Ehud Olmert specifically. In general, I find these sorts of investigations against politicians inherently biased. I take my cue from the Federalist Papers, and there I believe it was James Madison who explained that the presumption has to be that politicians are all corrupt. Their power puts them in contact with powerful and wealthy men who use their proximity to politicians to advance their interests. The larger government is - that is, the larger government's influence over the economic life of a society, the greater the likelihood of corruption. The more power a politician exerts over the economy, the larger his propensity to take bribes from people interested in making a profit.
This is the way of the world. And in our world, where governments control enormous welfare states and therefore exert massive influence over the economic life of a country, the assumption ought to be that all politicians are corrupt.
This assumption then leads to the clear conclusion that every corruption investigation and prosecution of politicians is inherently discriminatory. If all politicians are on the take to greater or lesser degrees, then the decision regarding who to investigate is essentially a decision about who to single out. And therefore, all corruption investigations of politicians are by their nature unjust. The investigations are themselves corrupt.
These understandings led Madison and his colleagues to the conclusion that all government should be limited as much as possible. It also led them to call for a system of checks and balances so that all arms of government checked one another's power.
In Israel, (and increasingly in the US as we see with the Obamacare ruling), the third branch of government - the judiciary - has become increasingly unhinged from this system. In Israel, the judiciary has effectively co-opted the state prosecution. Under the de facto control of the judiciary, the prosecution has leveraged itself into a position where, like the judiciary, it appoints and promotes its own without answering to elected officials. This situation has weakened severely Israel's democratic system, attenuating the ability of the public to control its government or trust its institutions.
It is due to these twin issues - the assumption that power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely and therefore all people with power can be assumed to be corrupt; and the imperial nature of Israel's legal system - that I view all corruption scandals in Israel with great suspicion. We have consistently seen the tendency of the legal fraternity to selectively prosecute corruption allegations in order to advance the fortunes of the Left against the Right.
And this brings me to my special difficulty with the legal prosecution of Olmert.
Objectively speaking, Olmert was the worst prime minister that Israel has ever had. And that is saying a lot. He had stiff competition from Ehud Barak, but he managed to outdo him in incompetence and general failure to meet the challenge of the office he aspired to in his unmitigated shamelessness and hubris.
Olmert lost the war with Hezbollah in 2006. He lost Israel's campaign against Hamas in 2008-2009. He failed to block Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons. He weakened Israel's international position and its alliance with the US. And so on and so forth.
The public never forgave him for his failed leadership in the 2006 war. And rightly so. There can be no forgivIng or forgetting his decision to send forces to their deaths in battle AFTER he had already accepted the ceasefire ensuring that none of their action would make any difference. I believe that 34 IDF soldiers died in the last 36 hours of the war that took place AFTER Olmert had agreed to the ceasefire.
And this brings us to the issue of his alleged corruption.
The Israeli media specifically, and the left generally holds the lion's share of responsibility for the outbreak of the 2006 war due to its massive propaganda campaign to coerce successive governments into withdrawing from southern Lebanon in 2000. Had Israel not run away in May 2000, Hezbollah would not have been free to attack Israel in 2006. It's that simple.
In 2006, the media were unwilling to acknowledge the cause for the war - them. So right after it was over, they sought to bury it and forget all about it. But the public would not put it behind them. The reservists called up to serve in the war and risk their lives for a war their government decided to lose formed a protest movement and marched on Jerusalem demanding Olmert's resignation.
The establishment tried to deflect their anger first by seeking to discredit them. Led by Channel 10's Raviv Drucker, the media sought to castigate the reservists by accusing them of being closet right wingers whose only goal was to avenge the expulsions from Gaza.
When that didn't work, they tried to punt by forming the Winograd Commission to investigate the war. The mandate of the committee was to begin its investigation with what happened AFTER the unilateral withdrawal of May 2000. By so determining the mandate of the commission, the establishment ensured that no attention would be paid to the cause of the war - Israel's withdrawal from Lebanon.
But even the Winograd Commission's findings couldn't assuage the public's hatred for Olmert. So the media decided to sacrifice him to the wolves of the state prosecution on corruption charges. They decided that Olmert had to be sacrificed to protect their ideology. And so he was. It is a scandal of historic proportions that Olmert was ousted for anything other than his unforgivably failed leadership of the country in war. His alleged corruption was at best a tertiary concern.
There is now some talk of Olmert making a political comeback. All I can say to that is that if the Israeli public is stupid enough to allow him back in power, then we deserve what we get. But I don't believe this talk.
The one possible silver lining in all of this is that Olmert's partial acquittal has put the prosecution in the dock. If its failure to convict Olmert finally empowers the Knesset to reign in our out of control prosecutors, then perhaps it can be said that there was a divine plan to all of this. But since I am in no position to understand God's design, all I can say is that there are no heroes in this story. The bad guys won, and the bad guys lost.
| Comments (8) | | |
|
'it can be said that there was a divine plan to all of this'
It's easy to understand what the divine plan is.
Whatever the U.S. and the international community have been pushing on Israel ,it's the opposite. G
God didn't bring Israel back smack in the middle of dar al harb for his army to be restrained as the U.S. has been forcing Israel under it's fake peace scam for many decades now.
By Israel's falling into the Trojan peace trap of restraint this has emboldened Iran and their Islamic partners thereby insuring that the next war will be nuclear and casualties in the millions.
Almost two decades of a Trojan false peace foisted on Israel by the West has weakened Israel to the point where the next war will be nuclear.
The stupidity of land for jihad and rockets Road Map lie leads to what the Jewish prophets warned about many millenia ago.
'And this shall be the plague with which the Lord will strike all the people who fought against Jerusalem:
Their flesh shall dissolve while they stand on their feet,
Their eyes shall dissolve in their sockets,
And their tongues shall dissolve in their mouths.'
Zechariah 14
Egypt with it's advanced US weaponry and missiles along with Lebanon's advanced weaponry and Syria's chemical and biological weaponry and advanced Hamas missiles supplied by Iran will make this a nuclear war without any doubt because that is the only way Israel weakened by a diabolical false peace ,restraint plan will survive the planned onslaught by their Muslim neighbors.
Caroline, as usual you say it best:
It appears the Israeli leadership somewhat like their American counterparts (true politicians) are more concerned about themselves then those they represent.
This government should be more about securing the Holy Land G-d provided for them and not worry about world opinion.
The land is not negotiable, G-d willed it to the Jews and His will abrogates all others.
By the way, notice how world opinion speaks out against the rain of Hamas rockets into Israel.
Olmert was not the real problem. He was a reflection of what many people in Israel wanted at the time he was in office.
God has a plan for Israel. What is that plan? Lessons have to be learned but there is good news beyond the bad news.
What is the purpose of life? The purpose of life is to develop character.
That means learning the difference between right & wrong - then choosing to do what is right.
How can we know the difference between right & wrong? The answer is - by keeping God's law.
The ten commandments show us the difference between right & wrong.
We develop character by making choices.
Why did Israel go into captivity in the past? It was primarily due to Sabbath breaking & idolatry.
The Sabbath was & is part of the law. The Sabbath & the law should be kept today if people want to be blessed by God.
It was also a major sign to help identify God's people.
The majority in the professing Christian world keep Sunday.
The organization with headquarters in Rome changed the Sabbath from Saturday to Sunday.
But they had no authority whatsoever to do so.
Therefore all Protestant groups who keep Sunday are not honoring God, but instead are bowing down before the authority of the Roman Catholic Church.
Sunday is not a sign like the Sabbath. Instead it is a mark - it's called "the mark of the beast."
America & Britain have choices to make. So does Iran, Egypt, Germany & all nations.
The lesson God is going to teach the nations is that all human forms of government are doomed to fail.
That is why this earth will soon be plunged into World War III.
Obama's bad choices are bringing America down. Britain's bad choices are bringing England down. Israel's bad choices are bringing the Jewish state down.
By the time Armageddon & World War III are over - Iran, Egypt, Germany & all other nations who fight against Jerusalem are "going down" too.
"Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling...and in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it"(Zechariah 12:2,3).
The majority in the world today do not understand God's design. But when the Kingdom of God is set up on this earth immediately after World War III, then everyone alive at that time will understand God's design in The Wonderful World Tomorrow.
"They shall neither hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea"(Isaiah 11:9).
Thank you Caroline for your sharp analysis, for using your skill to put and express things that many of us feel in their guts but lack the words to explain.
Thank you for assuming the role of a prophet of our times.
Olmert was ousted for his inability to deliver consolidation (HitKanSut)
Olmert will be re-deployed if he promises to deliver consolidation this time round
its that simple
Excellent Caroline. There is no question that Ehud Olmert should never be allowed to run for public office ever again. Not because of this so called corruption scandal, but simply because he is incapable. Olmert is only one issue. Once again the Left has used an opportunity to put forth their flawed and inherently ridiculous concept of where Israel stands in the world today. What they consistently fail to realize is that our enemies tend to ultimately seize these issues and blow them totally out of proportion. Of course no one knows G-d's plans, but I would dare to hope that He expects us to use these lessons to further our best interests in terms of survival. We will never get the world to love us, but we also don't have to look like the town fools.
Caroline,
As I read your commentary I was drawn to the similarities between the Israeli and American political scene in a Deja Vu moment. There are only two forces at work in this world exemplified as good and evil, light and darkness, positive and negative, right and left. These forces by nature either gather or scatter. Those who would gather G-d's people back to Israel to be a positive light to the world are invariably good, right thinking, selfless people. Those who would sell the land out from under the people and trade their freedom and security for the price of peace are self aggrandizing, left thinking people whose flawed motives are, and have been inherently evil down through the ages from the days of Cain and Able.
there was a protest outside the american embassy in jerusalem. women in green and some kibbutz folks met for the first time to protest
about olmerts plans to throw out all the jews from the shimron and judae areas. the only thing that stopped him was the war.