AIPAC HEARTS THE GOP. Daniel Levy notes an interesting example of AIPAC's increasing self-identification with the Republican Party and, more than that, though he doesn't go here, the Christian Right. The story goes like this: The Foreign Operations Appropriations Bill came up in the House last week. With the Democrats in control, language was inserted into the bill amending the "Mexico City policy" and restore funding for groups whose reproductive health policies promote, in part, contraception and even the option of abortion. 164 Republicans voted against it. And that meant 164 Republicans voted against the $2.4 billion in aid to Israel. As Levy outs it, "what happened next is what really speaks volumes. Nothing. Silence from AIPAC. The GOP explained its position. AIPAC chose not to score the vote, nor to in any way publicize any issue it might have with opposition to a women’s right to choose being a higher principle than aid to Israel for the Republican Congressional minority." AIPAC, of course, will generally go after Congressmen for taking precious seconds to sneeze when they should be whipping support for this or that pro-Israel bill. They allow absolutely no distractions, or competing priorities, when the legislation is meaningless to Israel. They are absolutely singl-eminded when the question is aid. So their silence here was uncustomary, but, given their tilt in recent years, sadly predictable. As the JTA's Ron Kampeas reports, “AIPAC’s decisions to refrain from criticizing the GOP is likely to reinforce the view in some Democratic circles that the pro-Israel lobby has been favoring Republicans in recent years.” That's not the strange thing. The strange thing is that that view needs any reinforcement at all. And the question is whether Democrats will begin reacting to this shift. --Ezra Klein
