Say this for Mitt Romney, who wraps up his three-country tour in Warsaw today: He knows who America’s allies are — and is ready to say so out loud.
Unlike a certain US president.
And never mind the tendentious focus by President Obama’s media lapdogs on Romney’s supposed “gaffes” abroad.
“Mitt Romney to rekindle Cold War spirit with speech in Poland attacking Russia,” blared Britain’s leftist Guardian. “After gaffe-strewn UK visit and controversial remarks in Israel, US presidential hopeful turns to symbol of anti-Soviet triumph.”
(Heck, why not just accuse him of inciting Armageddon?)
Maybe what the media resent is the contrast Romney’s trip makes all too clear: that, unlike Obama, he understands that the world consists of good actors and bad, that some nations deserve America’s unwavering friendship — and some don’t.
That some will have America’s back when it truly matters — and some won’t.
And that the difference matters.
Certainly, he’s not afraid to takes sides.
America’s bond with Israel is more than “strategic,” Romney said in Jerusalem (calling it, without hesitation, Israel’s capital). “It’s a force for good in the world.”
In Britain, he vowed to display a bust of Winston Churchill — the one Obama returned in ’09 (despite the White House’s lies on Friday that it didn’t) — as a symbol of abiding American-British unity.
His decision to visit Poland was meant to show his respect for US-Polish ties and his appreciation for Poles’ fear of Russia.
No wonder Nobel winner and ex-Polish President Lech Walesa all but endorsed Romney yesterday.
(And how telling that he saw fit to vow that Poland would “help the US restore its leadership position.”)
By contrast, Obama — to varying degrees — has back-pedaled and pivoted away from all three US allies.
* He snubbed the Brits by returning the Churchill bronze and downplaying the US-UK “special relationship.”
* He’s chagrined Israelis by morally equating their hopes for an end to Arab terror with bogus Palestinian demands for greater respect and autonomy; by refusing to recognize Jerusalem as their capital, and by calling for a peace plan based on pre-’67 borders.
* And he’s left Poles and other Eastern Europeans feeling vulnerable, after canceling a missile-defense system planned for there — a decision correctly seen as subordinating their best interests to Moscow’s regional ambitions.
Yes, Romney drew a stark contrast.
Too stark, it seems, for pro-Obama folks.
Too bad about them.