Today in his speech on the Middle East and North Africa, President Obama said that “a lasting peace” between the Israelis and the Palestinians “will involve two states” and that “the borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines.”

For some reason, the Beltway media is treating this as some kind of breaking news. Foreign Policy reported that Obama is altering U.S. policy, and the Washington Post claimed that the Obama administration referred to the 1967 border as part of the solution “[f]or the first time.”

Next came the right-wing outrage that Obama hates Israel. Matt Drudge published the talking points soon after the speech ended with the headline, “Obama sides with Palestine.” Mitt Romney then accused Obama of “throwing Israel under the bus.” Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) said Obama “betrayed” Israel, saying on Twitter, “Obama’s call for 1967 borders will cause chaos, division & more aggression in Middle East & put Israel at further risk.” The far-right Simon Wiesenthal Center, which purports to promote tolerance, basically called Obama a Nazi, saying that “Israel should reject a return to 1967 ‘Auschwitz’ borders.”

But Obama’s pronouncement today isn’t new. Even President Bush in 2005 endorsed a two-state solution with negotiations based on the post-1949 Armistice, pre-1967 borders:

Any final status agreement must be reached between the two parties, and changes to the 1949 Armistice lines must be mutually agreed to. A viable two-state solution must ensure contiguity of the West Bank, and a state of scattered territories will not work.

And the 1967 borders were the basis for the two future states in negotiations during the Clinton administration. Then-Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, now Israel’s Defense Minister, signed a document “understanding that the negotiations on the Permanent Status will lead to the implementation of Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338.” UNSR 242, passed in November 1967, calls for the “withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict.”

NBC’s Chuck Todd noticed all the commotion, tweeting, “Surprised at venom re: 1967 lines. Has been part of the proposed solution for years.”

Ali Gharib contributed to this post.

This past weekend, famed guitarist Carlos Santana reacted to the Arizona copycat immigration bill that was recently signed into law in Georgia by Gov. Nathan Deal (R). “The people of Arizona, the people of Atlanta, Georgia, you should be ashamed of yourselves,” Santana stated at Sunday’s MLB Civil Rights Game at Turner Field. Santana called the law “anti-American” and reasoned that its passage is “about fear, that people are going to steal my job.” Santana responded, “No we ain’t. You don’t clean toilets and clean sheets, stop shucking and jiving.”

Roy Beck, founder and CEO of the anti-immigrant group NumbersUSA which fervently supports Arizona’s immigration law, believes Santana has “reached a new low in hate speech“:

Rock guitarist Carlos Santana may have reached a new low in hate speech against American workers when he took to a microphone on the field before the Atlanta Braves-Philadelphia Phillies game yesterday. [...]

Santana is like most bigots who speak, not from knowledge or facts, but from the emotional hatred stuck in their guts. [...] The people of Georgia who supported and pressed for the new mandatory E-Veriy law were operating in the best traditions of the Civil Rights movement and should have been given the civil rights award at the baseball ceremony.

Instead, the ceremony was dominated by Santana who shamed himself and tarnished the civil rights tradition with his hateful diatribe against the most vulnerable members of our national community.

You’d think Beck would choose his words more carefully given how sensitive he is about how people describe his own ideology. A year ago, NumbersUSA took issue with posts I wrote that included excerpts from troubling videos it was promoting on its website — one which made the case against Mexican migration and the “exportation of poverty” and another that included speakers who, in the past, have expressed concerns about an “illegal alien invasion” and the spread of bilingualism. Beck’s organization submitted a complaint to YouTube and had Think Progress’ entire YouTube account shut down.

In 2009, a NumbersUSA employee sent Think Progress a sharply worded email threatening to sue us for libel after I wrote a post which linked back to a Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) report that identified NumbersUSA as an anti-immigrant group and quoted a respected researcher who challenged several of the group’s questionable research findings.

And during the march for immigration reform in 2010, Beck accused three pro-immigrant female mimes of threatening him and his bodyguards with “constant efforts at crushing physical intimidation” instigated by “blowing hateful whistles” and waving balloons.

Yet, Beck isn’t nearly as touchy when it comes to the rhetoric coming from people who support his organization. During a public conference call hosted by NumbersUSA last year, one NumbersUSA supporter suggested portraying women from Mexico as the “new welfare queens.” Meanwhile, during the 1990′s, Beck was editor of The Social Contract, a journal started by John Tanton that “routinely publishes race-baiting articles penned by white nationalists.”

Santana’s comments were controversial, but they pale in comparison to some of the overtly racist diatribes that have been published by the Social Contract Press and they hardly qualify as hate speech. There are plenty of reasons to believe that Arizona’s approach to immigration would lead to rampant racial profiling and potential human rights violations. Two courts have already stated that it is likely unconstitutional. That’s pretty much the antithesis of what America stands for.

Today in his speech on the Middle East and North Africa, President Obama said that “a lasting peace” between the Israelis and the Palestinians “will involve two states” and that “the borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines.”

For some reason, the Beltway media is treating this as some kind of breaking news. Foreign Policy reported that Obama is altering U.S. policy and the Washington Post claimed that the Obama administration referred to the 1967 border as part of the solution “[f]or the first time.”

Next came the right-wing outrage that Obama hates Israel. Matt Drudge issued the marching orders soon after the speech ended with the headline, “Obama sides with Palestine.” Mitt Romney then accused Obama of “throwing Israel under the bus.” Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) said Obama “betrayed” Israel, saying on Twitter, “Obama’s call for 1967 borders will cause chaos, division & more aggression in Middle East & put Israel at further risk.” The far-right Simon Wiesenthal Center, which purports to promote tolerance, basically called Obama a Nazi, saying that “Israel should reject a return to 1967 ‘Auschwitz’ borders.”

But the problem is that this just isn’t new. Even President Bush in 2005 endorsed a two-state solution with negotiations based on the post-1949 Armistice, pre-1967 borders:

Any final status agreement must be reached between the two parties, and changes to the 1949 Armistice lines must be mutually agreed to. A viable two-state solution must ensure contiguity of the West Bank, and a state of scattered territories will not work.

And the 1967 borders were the basis for the two future states in negotiations during the Clinton administration. Then-Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, now Israel’s Defense Minister, signed a document “understanding that the negotiations on the Permanent Status will lead to the implementation of Security Council Resolutions 242 and 338.” UNSR 242, passed in November 1967, calls for the “withdrawal of Israeli armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict.”

NBC’s Chuck Todd noticed all the commotion, tweeting, “Surprised at venom re: 1967 lines. Has been part of the proposed solution for years.”

Ali Gharib contributed to this post.