Tom Delay = Lunatic!

As noted by MSNBC today, "House Majority Leader Tom Delay has no speaking role at the Republican National Convention in New York this week."

Why silence the congressional leader? Because he's nuts. Meeting with jewish Republicans at the Plaza Hotel, Delay uttered the following nonsense:

"My friends, there is no Palestinian-Israeli conflict. There is only the global war on terrorism."

Stop and read that again. There is no Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Which is not to say, of course, that thousands haven't died. Delay only wants to convince a rabidly pro-Israel constituency that the Palestinians are nothing but a bunch of terrorists who need to be wiped out.

That may win votes from certain hardcore pro-Israel types but I daresay that if Delay walked around the street of Tel Aviv saying something like that, well, even most Jewish, Israeli citizens disagree. Most Israelis, outside of the extremist leadership, want some sort of compromise, two state solution. They realize that there is, in fact, a Palestinian-Israeli conflict. And they hope for a negotiated solution.

I hope the fact that most of the stakeholders in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict are more thoughtful than Delay will mean that the lunatic speaker's attempt tp garner votes for his party will fail.