More of the Same?

Have we not warned?: Obama "is" one of them and he was/will continue to be groomed by those who put him at the throne of power.

Washington Post: It's a Mitzvah

A mere 12 hours after claiming the Democratic presidential nomination, Barack Obama appeared before the American Israel Public Affairs Committee yesterday -- and changed himself into an Israel hard-liner.

He promised $30 billion in military assistance for Israel. He declared that the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps' Quds Force has "rightly been labeled a terrorist organization." He used terms such as "false prophets of extremism" and "corrupt" while discussing Palestinians. And he promised that "Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel, and it must remain undivided."

On the campaign trail, he routinely scolded Clinton for supporting a hard-line anti-Iran resolution that labeled the Revolutionary Guard terrorists. He also vowed to meet with figures such as Ahmadinejad during his first year in office, without precondition, and he voiced sympathy on the campaign trail for the Palestinian cause.

But the AIPAC crowd was ready to forgive now that Obama has the nomination. They stood to applaud for more than a minute when he entered the cavernous hall to music that could have been for a Superman movie soundtrack. He hugged and kissed his way across the dais.

He got right to the "provocative e-mails" that have been spreading lies about him being a Muslim plant and other such things. "Let me know if you see this guy named Barack Obama, because he sounds pretty scary," the candidate said, reassuring the crowd that he is "a true friend of Israel."

Indeed, he almost sounded as if he were Jewish. "I had grown up without a sense of roots," he explained. "I understood the Zionist idea, that there is always a homeland at the center of our story."

Vowing to stop Tehran from getting a nuclear weapon, the newly minted nominee apparent added: "I will always keep the threat of military action on the table to defend our security and our ally, Israel. Do not be confused."

How could they be confused? As a pandering performance, it was the full Monty by a candidate who, during the primary, had positioned himself to Hillary Clinton's left on matters such as Iran. Yesterday, Obama, who has generally declined to wear an American-flag lapel pin, wore a joint U.S.-Israeli pin, and even tried a Hebrew phrase on the crowd.

Obama even outdid President Bush in his pro-Israel sentiments. On the very day that Obama vowed to protect Jerusalem as Israel's capital -- drawing a furious denunciation from the Palestinian Authority -- Bush announced that he was suspending a move of the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem.

The transformation -- mostly in tone, but occasionally in substance -- might qualify as what Obama likes to call the same old Washington "okey-doke."