About wilbur mills. Mills told me that by the end of this week, he thought he would have something in shape to come down and discuss with you that he could present in the way of a packet that could be of interest. I told him i had read some articles lately that were a little bit disturbing that indicated something that was happening on the medicare and, indeed that, well, you know better than to the attention to those stories, and i said, i agree with you, wilbur. I just wanted to be reassured and he said, you know you cannot Read Everything you want, and this bill ultimately it has to have the mills stamp on it, and i said well, the president s view is that whenever you want to talk to him, that door is just wide open. He is happy to see you, and he said you just tell him again, as i told you lately last week that just as soon as i am ready to sit down and be able to present think to him that i could spell out that would make some sense and that would represent what would be of intere
He knew each and every member. He knew what they needed. He knew what they didnt want anybody to know. The part that i find just wonder russ is how in a day could he do what he did and how did he come to know so much about each and every member . You nailed it. He had this encyclopedic knowledge of not only the legislative process, but of the people around it. Hue better humphrey described lbj as a psychiatrist. He could read you. He knew it moerveated you. He knew what might motivate bob was different from what motivate linda or larry. He got that. And he used it. He exploited it. Theres an expression, that people are motivated by either love or fear. And you need to know the right combination in order to get them to act. Lbj got that and he used to apply something that was legendarily known in washington as the johns ontreatment or just the treatment. There was no doubt who was applying it. Johnson was the master of that and he used a combination of flattery or threatening or whateve
University, if you dont have your heart set on working in the u. S. Government or if youre retired. [laughter] but its hard to find people inside the Foreign Policy establishment who are willing to say what they think on this issue out loud. Just look at how chuck hagel and Samantha Power had to contort themselves during their confirmation hearings, and you see the lob bys continued lob bys continued influence. And please dont forget were still a long way from a deal with iran or a twostate solution, and the lobby will be working 24 7 to make sure that the United States doesnt do anything israel doesnt want. In short, reports of the lobbys demise have been greatly exaggerated, and given that fact, what do i think we ought to do about it . Ill just give you, i hi, four basic lessons here. Lesson number one, its just politics, stupid. First lesson i would emphasize is this is all about politics. Israel lobby is powerful because it has all the features that make an Interest Group powerful
Come to israels aid if survival at risk, but use american leverage to get a twostate solution, and we suggest a powerful proisrael lobby would be a good thing if its supporting smarter policies that were in americas and israels interest. We were not saying anything other countrier had not said before. People like george ball, michael, and what we wrote was also exon knowledge inside the beltway. Bill clinton said apack was, quote, better than anyone else lobbying in this town. Politicians as diverse as lee hamilton, chris clollings, barry goldwater, and Newt Gingrich had written or spoken about the power in the past. Even passionate defenders of israel like Jeffrey Goldberg had written proudly about clout. We provoked an extreme reaction, partly because we provided more depails about the lobbys influence, and partly because we were both rather middle of the road boring figures from wellknown universities, partly because we were not left wing, we were not muslim, not arab, not married t
State do not give to a single candidate to that state. Reportshe washington list of the top 10 recipients in 2012. You can see steny hoyer was num ber four in the house and ben cardin was number four in the senate. Neither faced a tight reelection campaign. One would assume some of the thousands of dollars these men got came from the Maryland Association of concerned citizens. Here the house candidates that pac gave to in 2012. Hoyer is nowhere to be found. Similarly, one searches for ben cardin. Instead, the Maryland Association for concerned citizens gave to candidates as far away as nevada, north dakota, california, but not a single candidate in maryland. A memo leaked reveals that aipac exercises and high degree of coordination over the smaller pacs. Instructs a subordinate topressure several to donate specific candidates. The first item is hard to read. Has done nothing , louisiana, and missouri race. They have given 500. They had 11,048. Try four 1000 bond more. This memo makes c