Those of us in the U.S. find ourselves embroiled in that recurring cabaret often euphemistically called “election season.” It is a time for those of us that prefer to be informed to prepare to read the political platforms that are to be revealed in coming conventions and to evaluate the candidates to which they have been matched.

As it happens, I’ve read an already released party platform a few days ago that offers a fresh look at many of the problems that we face as a nation and that ought to have a place in U.S. national political dialogue.

Though I certainly don’t agree with the entirety of the platform, I found much of it to be sensible or at the very least no more objectionable than what is expected from either of the major parties in the coming election.

Some Platform Highlights –

Because not everyone has the time (or wants) to read these things, I’ve taken the liberty of surveying and summarizing what I found to be some of the more interesting points of the platform in question. It calls, in part, for—

In the “Taxation and Fiscal Policy” section:

Reduction of government size only while safeguarding essential government services to the public. Reductions in taxes “with particular consideration for low and middle income families.” Tax policy with an eye toward the unequal effect of taxes on those being taxed. Strong support for the Federal Reserve and the tools available to it.

In the “Business and Economic Policy” and “Small Business” sections:

Massive highway, air, and maritime programs to support economic expansion. Federal loans to small businesses and strong support for the Small Business Administration. Closer federal scrutiny of mergers and enhancement of anti-trust enforcement. Vigorous SEC regulation to protect investors and small businesses.

In the “Labor” section:

Raising the minimum wage. Applauding collective bargaining and labor unions and suggesting that the government ought not interfere with these, save to protect their rights. Providing federal assistance to struggling workers. Guaranteeing the integrity of private pensions with the force of law. Equal pay for equal work.

In the “Health and Welfare” section:

Federal programs to accelerate the building of public schools. Federal support for free vaccines and adequate medical care. Historic increases in science research funding. Federal assistance for the training of scientists. Community organizing, vocation rehabilitation, home ownership stimulus and low-rent public housing. The “extension and perfection” of social security.

In the “Agriculture” section:

Regulating production to create a “soil reserve” for the future. Protection for clean water and soil. Coordination between federal and local concerns to implement research, education, service, and regulatory programs. Federal loans to ensure stability and productivity. Support for cooperatives.

In the “Federal Government Integrity” section:

The presumption that there ought to be legal limits to lobbying power and the determination to stop cases of improper influence of money in politics.

In the “Post Office” section:

Radically expand the service. Modernize operations. Promotion based on training and safety and increases in compensation and fringe benefits.

In the “Civil Rights” section:

Combating federal employment discrimination and discrimination in interstate commerce. Liberty, due process, and equal protection of the law for all people. The belief that “true progress” is attained through “education, understanding, and good will.”

In the “Immigration” section:

“[A]n immigration policy which is in keeping with the traditions of America in providing a haven for oppressed peoples, and which is based on equality of treatment, freedom from implications of discrimination between racial, nationality and religious groups, and flexible enough to conform to changing needs and conditions.”

In the section on “The Future” of the nation:

Continued “vigorous support” for the United Nations. Assistance to underdeveloped areas around the globe and a “policy of impartial friendship” for states across the Middle East, whether predominantly Arabic or Jewish. Freedom for all peoples and an end to colonialism. A “progressive elimination of the barriers” to the free flow of information around the world.

In the “Guarding and Improving our Resources” section and a few related sections that follow:

The conservation and safeguarding of natural resources for the greater good and for future generations. Extensive financing and protection of national parks, national forests, and wildlife refuges. Studies to gauge the effects of works projects on wildlife.

The Party in Question –

All of the detail above is prefaced by a statement of values that includes, amongst other things, the following:

“We are proud of and shall continue our far-reaching and sound advances in matters of basic human needs—expansion of social security—broadened coverage in unemployment insurance —improved housing—and better health protection for all our people. We are determined that our government remain warmly responsive to the urgent social and economic problems of our people.”

“We firmly believe in the right of peoples everywhere to determine their form of government, their leaders, their destiny, in peace.”

and

“America does not prosper unless all Americans prosper. Government must have a heart as well as a head. Courage in principle, cooperation in practice make freedom positive.”

Just who is this presumably center-left or even left-leaning party (at least by today’s standards), steadfast in support for the United Nations, unions, public services, regulation, and conservation? The Democrats? The Greens?

Hardly. This is the Republican Party platform of 1956.

I encourage those that are interested in what they read above to revisit, if only for a few minutes, a very different political landscape than the one seen in the U.S. today.

Important Caveats –

The items outlined above are a quick and selective reading of the 1956 platform. There are many statements in it that I didn’t include or summarize in the list above because they might have given up the (admittedly prosaic) game in this case, and that are more in keeping with the Republican rhetoric (though not rhetorical style) of the present. It remains possible that I’ve missed the part of the platform that clearly and directly foreshadows the Romney/Ryan campaign of the present.

These items have also been presented a-historically. 1956 was, of course, 1956 and 2012 is clearly not 1956. One could plausibly argue that it is not only the platforms that have changed, but the facts on the ground as well. I haven’t taken the time to find or read the Democratic platform from the same time period, nor to track the evolution of following Republican platforms with reference to history over the same period.

Despite these omissions, and the necessarily limited nature of the conclusions that can be drawn, what is striking about this list is the number of positions represented in it that in today’s U.S. political landscape have been framed as either left or far-left in nature, and the at times expansive, optimistic, and pragmatic tone of the writing, even about such economically risky and potentially oppressive (we’re told today) propositions as unions, environmental regulation, and the United Nations.

Where Are the Conservative Intellectuals? –

It was Jeff’s waning search for conservative intellectuals that led me to the document, and while it doesn’t provide names or faces, it supports the sense that the conservative intellectual of the present—inasmuch as today’s conservative movement is willing to own him or her—is a different kind of thinker than was the conservative intellectual of the past.

The search will no doubt continue, but for those on the right with aspirations to renew the conservative intellectual tradition, one flip answer to Jeff’s question as to the whereabouts of the conservative intellectuals might be that they have taken up residence in some cases in the past.

Might I suggest the Republican Party Platform of 1956 as an important initial resource for young, headstrong conservatives?

Finally! Finally there is a row between the US and Israel over the resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. President Obama found the steel in his backbone to tell off Prime Minister Netanyahu. The formula Obama used was not new, but, significantly, one put forth most recently as part of the Mahmoud Abbas-Salam Fayyad plan to request the recognition of the UN for a Palestinian state within the 1967 boundaries. Obama zeroed in like a hawk on the borders issue and, lo and behold, he ruined most of Netanyahu’s week in Washington.

It has already been pointed out that Obama himself mocked the Palestinian UN plan as leading to only symbolic results. Or that he left the issues of Jerusalem and the refugees to a later stage of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations. And, finally, that the 1967 borders is a red herring, a non-issue, since Obama also recognized that the final Israeli-Palestinian border will involve territorial swaps. In fact, it has been suggested that by now even Netanyahu wishes to hang on only to “settlement blocs” and is ready to concede the rest of the West Bank.

This, then, appears to be no more than a spat between those who view the glass empty and those who see it as full. We seemed to be asked: should we focus on the land to be kept or ceded? Focusing on the words, however, would be misleading. It is the tune that makes the music.

Obama has been looking since his inauguration for a formula to jolt to life the moribund Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. His first, unsuccessful, formula was a settlement freeze. He received bad advice: experience has shown the settlements can either expand or shrink, but cannot be put in the freezer. This time, he wrapped the settlement issue within the borders controversy and created the possibility for real traction. Obama has broken the ice and herein resides the significance of his statement on the 1967 borders.

Netanyahu’s response was that the 1967 borders are indefensible; hence Israel will not consider them. But let’s consider for a minute the notion of “defensible borders,” or for that matter “natural borders” – these are concepts from an era of static warfare long gone. Netanyahu’s willingness to conjure them demonstrates his brain-freeze. Even the 1973 Israeli-Egyptian “defensible borders” were anything but. To attach the term to the long fingers of settlement that extend Israel’s borders by jutting into the West Bank in Ma’ale Adumim and Ariel shows contempt for even the most minimal military logic.

Netanyahu’s refusal to work with the President brings into the open his immobility. No matter how much hoopla will surround his Congressional address, Netanyahu’s talk of commitment to peace has been revealed as empty. This should have consequences.

Last time the Security Council called on Israel to freeze its settlements, echoing Obama’s own call, the US vetoed the resolution and exposed the gap between its words and actions. For the new formulation to carry real weight it needs to be attached to a concrete political move. I suggest that Obama’s call for using the 1967 cease-fire lines as the starting point for solving the territorial aspect of the Israeli-Palestinian dispute opens the door to US support for the UN’s expected September resolution. It is time for the US to walk through that door.

A US vote for, or even abstention from, such a UNGA resolution, would fit well with the reasons Obama provided for his new approach. The President explicitly pointed out his intention of saving Israel from itself, from the demographic, technological, and democratic deficits it is likely to incur the  more  it remains in the occupied territories. Similarly, a UN General Assembly resolution in favor of an independent Palestinian state within the 1967 borders serves Israel’s interests first and foremost.

The UN resolution would privilege the two-state solution to the conflict, the only outcome that would allow a Jewish-majority Israel to find its legs again and flourish. This would focus the peace-process on real political outcomes and away from the recently-invented insistence on Palestinian recognition of Israel as the homeland of the Jewish people. Making the two state-solution into the internationally favored and sanctioned option would also marginalize the slowly rising tide of one-staters and bi-nationalists. To wit, the latter options are intellectual constructs that never had deep roots and command only partial support even among their adherents. After all, the vast majority of Palestinians do not espouse it, and the overwhelming majority of Israelis view it as a threat. They direct attention away from the solution most Palestinians and Israelis favor, two states, side-by-side.

Will the US match words with action? We will be able to tell the seriousness of President Obama’s new formulation from his attitude toward the expected September UN General Assembly resolution.

Nahed Habiballah, a Ph.D. student at the New School, works on the sociology of religion in the public sphere. We first met in Jerusalem at a conference on the politics of small things in Israel and Palestine.  After the conference, she took me, and also Elzbieta Matynia, to visit the city of Ramallah and her family home (on the other side of the Wall); the wall built by Israel under the pretext of security that appropriates more Palestinian land.  She is a Palestinian holding Israeli citizenship.  Her father came from a small town near Nazareth, but she was born and raised in Jerusalem. She later spent her undergraduate years at the University of Haifa, working as an archeologist after graduation with the “Israeli Authorities of Antiquities.”   The paranoid politics of Israel-Palestine insists upon clarity, where complexity such as hers is the general rule. I asked her what she thinks about recent events, particularly about a recent op.ed. piece in The New York Times.

Israel’s ambassador to the United States, Michael B. Oren, recently published an op-ed piece in The New York Times arguing that the failure of the peace negotiations is a result of the Palestinians and/or the Palestinians Authorities’ refusal to recognize the State of Israel as a Jewish state.  Oren backs his argument by saying that the United Nation created a Jewish state in Palestine in 1947.  He failed to mention, though, that the resolution to which he refers, Resolution 181, the Partition of Palestine, created at the same time an Arab state in Palestine, more over that Palestine was divided almost equally between the two states, and Jerusalem was to be under International jurisdiction. Now Israel occupies 78% of Palestine, and Oren is only interested in one half of the resolution, ignoring the other.

To be sure, the Palestinians have already made significant concessions in the pursuit of a peaceful settlement.  The Palestinians have recognized the existence of the state of Israel as mandated by the Oslo agreement signed in 1993 within 1967 borders, which means that the Palestinians have recognized Israel in 150% of the land allocated to it by the resolution 181. Not only that, Israel keeps building settlement on the 22% of the land left for the Palestinians.

An interesting question that was raised by the Palestinian leaders lately is “What are the borders of the State of Israel that Natenyahu wants us to recognize as a Jewish state?” Does anybody know the answer to this question? Israel is the only country in the world that does not define its borders. So before we talk about recognition of a state, let Oren tell us the exact borders of this state.

The Palestinian minority in Israel has responded to the ongoing discriminatory actions with obedience to the state and has used the democratic means available to them to object to such actions. Clearly Oren and the current Israeli government do not acknowledge the injustices that are inflicted on this group because to them those Palestinians are guests in their homeland, recognizing the Jewishness of the State will only reinforce this.  The UN Partition Plan mentions that the state of Israel is the land for the Jews; it did not endorse an ethnocratic state which discriminates against its Palestinian minority. By demanding the recognition of the Jewishness of the state, the rights of the Palestinians who are living in that country is under attack.

The Palestinian Authority and people do not deny that Jews have lived in the land of Canaan throughout history.  But we also understand that the region is the cradle of Judaism, Christianity and Islam and know that people from all religions have lived there. What we question is exclusive Jewish sovereignty.
Peace is threatened by the new political culture within Israel which has allowed for the dwindling of the democratic character of the State for an ethnocratic one.