Israel honors Obama, but not from under a bus!

Although Mitt Romney is somewhere off in California looking after his investments, including the car elevator at his  homestead, he's still suffering some blows to  his futile campaign rhetoric.   We can all remember that he and his allies  accused President Obama of being "disrespectful" to Israel  - and in his words "threw Israel under the bus".  ("The beginning of  the end, as we know it for the Jewish state," huffed then-Rep. Allen West, of Florida, who later  lost in November, too.)

Alas, among the many who didn't  take Mitt seriously was Israel.  Israeli  President Shimon Peres announced that Obama will   be honored with the "Presidential Medal of Distinction'"  when he visits in March  for his "unique and significant contribution to strengthening the State of Israel and the Security of its citizens."

The medal compares with France's Legion of Honor.  Better that you stick to car elevators, Mitt, things that you know about.

Is Mitt going 3 for 3 to earn hockey's hat trick?

Mitt Romney's travelogue to three overseas cities was intended to demonstrate his keen understanding of foreign policy among friends - in contrast to that ill-suited president in the White House from Chicago or wherever.

So he began by insulting the Brits while in London and then following up by pouring gasoline on the Palestinians with insensitive remarks at a fund-raiser in Jerusalem that included the Midas-like casino owner Sheldon Adelson.  It may have played well  as his Jewish breakfast hosts reached for their wallets, but it was a translated as "racist" and "offensive" by a  senior aide to President  Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority.   How's that for well-considered diplomatic moves to bring the
 two sides together in the smoldering region? Pandering that trumps diplomacy?

As Romney arrived in Poland, we awaited  his comment that he can see two kielbasa shops from  his front porch. Once  upon a time, a contemporary historian reflecting on Pope Leo X's love of the arts, observed that he would have made a "perfect pope if he had even the slightest knowledge of religion."

Is that what would accompany Mitt 's "diplomacy" to the Oval Office?

Mitt in Israel: Allies, but not in Heaven

NEWS ITEM FROM MSNBC:

"Romney will also give a public speech while in Jerusalem - his first such engagement thus far during his foreign trip - that is expected to be heavy on praise for America's most important ally in the Middle East, with whom Romney has repeatedly called for the U.S.  to 'lock arms' on the international stage."

We wonder whether Mitt, a man of deep religious convictions, will also remind  the Israelis of the basic Christian tenet that Jews cannot  enter Heaven unless they convert.