I read the transcript and was most impressed. You should turn this into a manual on how to deal with RW talking points in a civilized discusion.

I didn't find any comments about the interview on Townhall. I would guess that the majority will not be positive, but one can hope...

Dave

"It was a long interview but they broadcast it in unedited form."

Did you mean edited form?

Did you mean edited form?

No. Because of its length, I thought they might edit it (it was taped). They didn't. They broadcast it in full - in 5 segments: unedited.

Too bad Obama didn't select you for Secretary of State!

Fascinating reading and the way you describe the interview in your post is exactly right. I am pleased to see you being interviewed so much recently as you're giving a view that is not often presented. HH was really trying to get you to equate Hamas with Hitler and you answered him perfectly, always stressing that first trying diplomacy is almost always the best choice. One, and there are many, good quote is below:

HH: To use force, to use military force, to bomb the hell out of him [Hitler] would have been appropriate after the anschluss?

GG: Not without efforts to avert that situation. And had those efforts failed, and those efforts truly exhausted, then it may have been, sure. Would it have been justifiable after only Austria and not before Czechoslovakia or Poland? You know, that’s hard to say. But certainly once a country starts indicating that they are a threat to their neighbors and to world security, and have the ability to carry that out, then force becomes something that is a lot more justifiable.

Hamas shouldn't shoot rockets at Israel, but Israel is criminal to protect itself. Pretzel logic based on prejudice and fantasy.

But 50% of what you've been noting and arguing about the past week is not only American policy towards Israel, but your notion that there is a squelching of dissent at work in this country (by forces unseen) that limit the ability for media and/or government officials to speak the "truth" of the conflict.

All subsequent reporting that I've seen on our cable networks notes the very issues you claim are ignored -- the death of Palestinian civilians, the disproportionate death toll of Palestinians versus Israelis in the conflict, and the general feeling that the international community must get involved.

You no longer speak of paranoid fears of media silencing at work in Congress and in our media.

I hope the next few weeks, when I expect we'll see more criticism of Israel across our country if this conflict continues, as well as your own amplification in the national media for speaking the very ideas you claim are anathema to the media you are a part of (oh O'Reillian irony), help you to rethink your position.

Claiming that there are hidden forces squelching dissent towards Israel treads in long familiar historical territory, and not only is it obviously not true on the facts, it is dangerous for what it inspires (as we saw in the uglier posts in your comments threads).

Also, I wish you'd told Hewitt he's a fraud. Watching him try to reinvent himself as a "thinker" in the age of conservative failure after his years of reactionary hate-filled spew is as hilarious as it is pathetic.

HH: And does Israel have a right to exist unqualifiedly?

GG: Absolutely.

Was an interesting one. Without qualifications? Really? No limits at all? And what does "Right to exist" mean, anyway? Who bestows this right? On what merit is it based?

Without qualifications? Really? No limits at all? And what does "Right to exist" mean, anyway? Who bestows this right? On what merit is it based?

What's without qualification is the right for Israel to exist -- exactly the same, as I made clear, as the right of Palestinians to have autonomy over their own land and sovereignty as a state.

That doesn't mean -- on either side -- that the parties are subject to no limits. It just means that any realistic hope for resolving the dispute has to recognize, as a core premise, that both sides have the right to security and sovereignty.

Hewitt's attempt to use Hitler in '33 at the end was disgraceful. I actually feel less intelligent for having read it. I can't believe someone with anything above a 5th grade education would try to draw retroactive Hitler comparisons with the Palestinians.

Of course, a number of blowhards in these threads like to compare Israel to Nazi Germany, so there's dolts across the spectrum.

"...(and much of what is going on remains unknown because Israel is still preventing journalists from entering Gaza in defiance of their own Supreme Court's order to allow access):"--Glenn

Part of the US military strategy since Desert Storm is to control the information and its flow outward from the atrocities committed. The Pentagon is a fine teacher in many facets of awe-inspiring warfare, not the least of these is to win over the press to your side, isolate them or simply put them in harm's way-- to essentially scare them into complying with the distorted messages that the military apparatus keeps grinding out.

We all know how positive we feel about Hamas rockets, US/Israeli phosphorus conflagration and Iraqi casualties when we get the pure, even-handed news reports from the cajoled or repressed press.

I have to disagree with anything Glenn says like an oppositional defiant 6 year old, and I'll completely disregard the actual FACTS (in this case, the content of the interview) in order to to do so.

Shorter shooter...I'm not sure a penis length of LESS than 1/4 inch is possible anyway...

Dave

...typically my reflex might be to not appear on such a right-wing outlet, if only because they demonstrate an almost criminal impulse to distort the points a progressive interviewee might try to make. and yet, as you say, it's important to use the opportunity to try to reach a new audience, else we all just wind up talking to ourselves.

the single greatest point you made is the primacy of diplomacy -- that war should always be the LAST option, something no bushite would admit. (as for proportionate response, that's another topic the hawks have trouble differentiating.) the second greatest point was to slap down references to hitler -- the right no longer recognizes how it has diminished the standing of the holocaust, by trotting out adolph every time they want to justify an action they endorse.

really well done, glenn. watch out, you may be invited back. which is, of course, the point.