re: #11 sliv_the_eli

Not cowards.

Then don’t say that it’s an act of cowardice, please.

And, yes, there are “politics and diplomacy” involved in this, but the basic rules of diplomacy are that you respect another sovereign’s choice of its capital city.

Really? Where’s that listed in those ‘rules’ exactly?

Consequently, while the position that successive U.S. presidents have taken on this issue is one that can readily be explained on the basis of politics or even self-interested economics, it is nevertheless, in my view an act of moral cowardice.

Only if you take a particularly blinkered and useless view of the world. I’d say the act of moral cowardice is those who oppose the US moving off of the oil economy. That is the root cause. While our economy is so entangled, there is not a real option to start pissing off the Arab states. It’s not cowardice to not take the option that leads to goddamn economic disaster.

The path to hope for Israel lies in getting off oil. That is all. It doesn’t lie in the US calling Jerusalem the Israeli capital. That is a symbolic issue that would not do a damn bit of actual good.