Wednesday, September 4, 2013

Adelson New Obama Ally; Sides With Obama on Attacks

Bloomberg reports:

Lobbying on Syria has inspired coalitions of the unlikely, aligning President Barack Obama with Sheldon Adelson, the Republican billionaire who spent about $70 million trying to defeat him last year, in the push for a military response to the use of chemical weapons.[...]

The support Obama is getting from pro-Israel groups in the U.S. is important because of their history of political influence. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee and other Jewish groups have long helped secure continued U.S. aid to Israel, mobilizing activists who visit or call lawmakers. The effort is supplemented by several political action committees that donate to candidates depending on their support for Israel.[...]

The Republican Jewish Coalition, which counts Adelson as a board member, yesterday sent an “action alert” to its 45,000 members, directing them to tell Congress to authorize force. “This is not a partisan issue,” the coalition said in its message.

It spent $6.4 million against Obama last year, according to the center, a Washington-based research group that tracks campaign spending.

Adelson, a Las Vegas casino owner, supports the coalition’s Syria message, his spokesman Ron Reese said in an e-mail.

Obama’s proposal also gained support from other U.S.-based Jewish organizations, including AIPAC, the Anti-Defamation League and the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations.
Their advocacy began after a telephone briefing yesterday with White House deputy national security advisers Tony Blinken and Ben Rhodes, who outlined the case for action against Syria, according to a participant who asked for anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to discuss it publicly.

2 comments:

  1. Will Adelson be the first one in then or is he more than willing to sacrifice other people's children?

    ReplyDelete