Mitt Romney Arrives In Israel. Back In London, Queen Elizabeth Offers A Fond Farewell To The “Kvetching Nudnik”
Sunday, July 29, 2012. Jerusalem. It’s dry and hot in Jerusalem tonight, although it’s cooling a bit now that dusk has descended into a starry night. Still, as a person who’s schvitzed in temps above 60 degrees, I continue to swelter in my hovel at the lowly inn reserved for journalists, a world of no ice, no booze, no water, no bed. Here, traipsing after the Romney campaign for readers like you, soldiering on, my friend, is the only choice for your reporter. I embrace it!
I never kvetch, but please note for a future lawsuit that my requests for air conditioning go ignored. My seemingly reasonable plea for a door is dismissed with a shrug and a snarl. Will they provide a toilet? I wonder. Or a tennis racket so I might take a languid swat at the big-as-chipmunk mosquito now in greedy possession of my iPad? And what reputable hotel calls a nectarine carton a “desk”; a mid-size toolbox a “sofa”? Gornisht! Apparently, these charitably entitled “hoteliers” do not understand the caliber of this particular journalist with whom they are dealing.
Yet, I must reflect, seasoned as I am after years of peripatetic travel, I’ve experienced worse — in London last week I resided in a leak-prone dinghy, adrift on
the Thames, assailed each night by gangs of nocturnal lampreys, minds set on extreme mischief. Because of those pesky predators, sleep escaped me. Consequently, when, during the day, they rested, I rested, thereby causing me to miss every event in Governor Romney’s London Olympics visit. Following Mitt Romney on his 
foreign adventure has been plenty tough. But I like tough. I’m old school.
I’m submitting this unedited report on the fly, so pardonez les typos. Since arriving here on Saturday night, my journalist pals have been busily attending to, well, journalism. I’ve caught up on sleep. One pal, in a quick comment a few hours ago, informed me that Mitt had a few of what I’d label minor verbal miscues in London. He told me that, thus far, candidate Romney has managed to put the bad memories of his London trip in the rear view mirror. What miscues? What bad memories? From the admittedly little I’ve heard thus far about the London leg, I still don’t quite understand the brouhaha.
Moving on, I’ve just returned from Jerusalem where a half hour ago at dusk and backed up by the Old City’s Tower of David, candidate Romney concluded his initial public appearance. Amidst the approaching 8:45 pm conclusion of Tisha B’Av, the annual commemoration of the destruction of the First and Second Jerusalem Temples, he scored well with the crowd which included Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Clearly, Governor is among friends. He’s known the PM for many years.
His speech began amidst a slight breeze as he recognized and thanked his good friend, “BiBi” Netanyahu, inadvertently identifying him as a “beloved mamzer,” most likely confusing the Hebrew word mamzer (“bastard”) with chaver (“friend”), an understandable mistake for a non-Hebrew speaker.
Seamlessly, he then launched his substantive remarks but not without a humorous introduction crafted especially for his Israeli crowd by his Romney Team Comedic (see graphic below). (Reporter’s note: Governor Romney’s heretofore absent humorous consciousness has improved markedly here in Israel due the tutelage of comedians Sarah Silverman, Richard Lewis, and Andy Prager, all Jewish, and each of whom was brought on board specifically for his appearances in the land of milk and honey.)
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Then, with the ease of a man in full, he affected a serious demeanor and informed the audience,
“Mr. Prime Minister, I am here neither to co-opt nor to criticize President Obama’s miserably insufficient national policy based as it is upon naive assumptions, knee-jerk socialism, and deeply ingrained atheistic secular humanism. As you know, it is an American tradition for opposition politicians like me to not criticize our President while we are overseas no matter how inept, unpatriotic, and Muslim a foreign born President might arguably be. Therefore, I shall not do so.”
In this diplomatic and patriotic spirit, he pressed on. “If elected,” he vowed,
“I shall stand with Israel when it acts against Iran as soon and as violently as possible after the beginning of my administration, should Israel choose to do so, about which I will make no suggestions today or on inauguration day next January.
Displaying the political acumen and old-school savvy he has displayed since arriving on Israel’s shores last night, he recognized a political slippery slope directly ahead. Like the expert skier he is, he pulled up short. In statesmanlike manner he did not challenge the higher and steeper slopes by appearing to directly influence Israel’s national security policy, particularly in light of the Obama administration’s ongoing attempt to employ economic sanctions against the Iranian regime rather than military power.
“Of course,” he indicated,
“I cannot be seen to be advising Israel to very soon devastate Iran with American-purchased weapons of major – but not mass – destruction. However, I can say without reservation and merely in passing and without haphazardly crossing any diplomatic lines, I would urge you to do so if I were in a position to do so without thereby interfering in even the smallest fashion with my government’s present misguided and pro-Iranian policies. That Rubicon, I shall not cross.”
Laughter and applause rose from the assemblage.
Thereafter, the presumptive GOP presidential candidate spoke at length of the weapons and munitions his campaign’s military advisers, his spouse Ann Romney, and his five sons had
“merely suggested offhand for use in any decision the Israeli government might quite soon make to grind Iran into the dust.”
In summation, Governor Romney displayed photos from an overhead projector of Iranian secret agents operating within Mossad, heretofore classified material at the “Eyes Only” level, which he explained, “I absentmindedly removed from the office of the head of England’s MI6 last Thursday in London.” His concluding stroke was a professional powerpoint presentation
“demonstrating just how easily Israel, with only a scintilla of outside assistance from a large western nation, could subdue the entire Iranian continent within even less time than the full year Newt Gingrich promised during his ill-fated presidential run.”
Concluding his long but ultimately noncommittal speech, the Governor thanked Israel for “being here, right where it is, with its palm trees of just the correct height and girth.” Then, bidding all a good evening he inadvertently and understandably confused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with Benjamin 
Disraeli, the long deceased Victorian era British PM. Then, moments later he corrected himself by addressing Mr. Netanyahu as “Golda,” as in Golda Meir, also, like Disraeli, long deceased yet astonishingly similar in gender, size, and bone structure to the Israeli Prime Minister (see photo at right for comparison).
Candidate Romney was clearly flying at military power at the finish line. A marvelous speech, a marvelous start to his fundraising visit to the fondly beating heart of Judaism.
Now, writing from my stable-like hotel room on my 1947 Remington typewriter (no Internet for me!), I must rush to completion so as to fulfill my self-inflicted filing deadline. Stay tuned, as more will come as events dictate, and they always do, yes, they always do. For this reporter anyway. Nonetheless, like General Patton loved war, I, too, do love it so. “It” being hardheaded forthright journalism, Until my next exclusive report, I bid you adieu from my desert outpost whose sizzling dry and parching air I breathe in and out, in and out . . .
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