Romney’s boo-boo

31 July 2012 08:53 pm

Mitt Romney has blundered on the foreign policy front. Hardly out of the woods for not being a politician in his credentials to lead the world’s superpower, the Republican presidential candidate seems to have walked the suicide path of his career.
His top-of the-voice sermon in Jerusalem, in which he merely tried to portray himself as the sole defender of Israel’s ideology across the Atlantic, is bound to land him in problems. His pronouncement of Jerusalem City as the capital of Israel and uncalled for castigation of Iran speaks volumes of his ignorance in real-politick. He might have befriended Benjamin Netanyahu, and his Zionist likes, with his fiery oratory, but that is unbecoming of American leadership. At times when Washington is trying to recast itself in a changed world, especially in the Middle East since the Arab Spring, such a chauvinistic and unrealistic outlook by Romney was unwarranted. It goes without saying that there is no dearth of pro-Israel elements among the Democrats, and even President Barack Obama’s heart may also lie close to Tel Aviv’s interests, but the point is pitching the United States and the nation in a state of warfare is myopic leadership. The current US administration’s cautious approach on Iran and the Middle East had won it many friends, irrespective of the fact that it had done literally nothing in addressing the Palestinian-Israeli impasse.

Romney, with hardly 100 days to go to polls, has to do some serious homework. All his words and deeds to this day have been reactionary. Whether it be economy, social care, immigration or external relations, he has tried to put in a couple of adjectives and adverbs in the script in utter contrast to what his opponent Obama has to say. Such an approach might win him a few political constituencies and additional votes, but it won’t be enough to lead the nation from the front. When Romney speaks of ‘moral imperatives’, while assuring the United States a sort of liability in defending the Jewish state, he is mistaken. This is tantamount to contempt of belief that people across the world have in US abilities as the torchbearer of democratic values, human rights and liberalism. Aligning Washington as a client state of Israel is a great disservice to the nation. Romney is in need of some wise advisers, and certainly not  those who debrief him on the so-called utility of gun-diplomacy.

(Khaleej Times)