NOBODY HATES JUST MEXICANS:

Of course, many true friends of Israel have long bristled at the more familiar actions of the ultra-nationalist right in Israel: the oppression of the Palestinians, the growth of Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank and the tolerance of Jewish hooligans violently rampaging in Palestinian areas. 

Compared to these outrages, the so-called "judicial reforms" might seem to be a nuanced matter. But in fact, they are a dagger striking at the heart of the notion that America and Israel have shared values. 

The proposals included measures letting the government to appoint cronies to the Supreme Court, override even its puppets on the court via its majority in parliament and remove critical checks on corruption. Down the road, they include removing "fraud" and "breach of trust" from the list of crimes officials can be charged with -- two of the three charges Netanyahu is currently facing in his trial.

Given that Israel lacks a formal constitution -- its idealistic 1948 Declaration of Independence and a series of easily amended "basic laws" are no substitute -- and that the same coalition controls the government and the parliament, these proposals amount to a near-Putinization of what has until now been a liberal democracy for 75 years. Netanyahu would effectively control all three branches of government.

This reflects a vulgar view of democracy as amounting to a tyranny of the majority, wildly out of sync with the American system of checks and balances on top of guarantees for each citizen secured by the Bill of Rights.

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