Romney Comments at Fundraiser Outrage Palestinians

[CarsonPalmer]

Well Romney's trip was not all bad. He picked up an endorsement of Lech Welesa in Poland. That should endear him to the Polish-American bloc, maybe.

It's no longer those days; there's not much of a Polish-American bloc and any of them who care enough to know Lech Walesa will know that he got an equal condemnation from Solidarity.

[Mr Bean]

Well Romney's trip was not all bad. He picked up an endorsement of Lech Welesa in Poland. That should endear him to the Polish-American bloc, maybe.

It's no longer those days; there's not much of a Polish-American bloc and any of them who care enough to know Lech Walesa will know that he got an equal condemnation from Solidarity.

If you asked the average Polish-American these days if this endorsement would change the views of the Polish-American bloc they would most likely respond "There is a Polish American voting bloc?"

That voting group only existed when Poland did not. It's been twenty four years since they were relevant to anything because the last time anyone cared was the 1988 Bush senior elections.

[Irbis]

If you asked the average Polish-American these days if this endorsement would change the views of the Polish-American bloc they would most likely respond "There is a Polish American voting bloc?"

That voting group only existed when Poland did not. It's been twenty four years since they were relevant to anything because the last time anyone cared was the 1988 Bush senior elections.

Eh, I don't know. So called "Polonia" (old emigration) still exists, though yes, fragmented and about the only thing they have in common is hate of anything left-wing and deeply rooted xeno/religio/rusophobia. If they vote for Romney, it will be not thanks to Wałęsa, but because to them Obama is THE END OF WHITE MAN'S CIVILIZATION COMMIE GAY.

[Mr Bean]

Eh, I don't know. So called "Polonia" (old emigration) still exists, though yes, fragmented and about the only thing they have in common is hate of anything left-wing and deeply rooted xeno/religio/rusophobia. If they vote for Romney, it will be not thanks to Wałęsa, but because to them Obama is THE END OF WHITE MAN'S CIVILIZATION COMMIE GAY.

But it's not because of Polish national identity which means they would be lumped in with the Fundie groups not Polish groups.

[PhilosopherOfSorts]

I'm kind of surprised that its just the Palastinians who were insulted here. Romney says that the Israelis are doing better due to their culture, which doesn't sound bad at first, but it reveals some stereotypical thinking. Israeli culture is Jewish, and Jews are stereotypically good with money, so of course they're more prosperous than the Palastinians.

I don't know, maybe I'm reading too much into it.

[Pelranius]

I'm kind of surprised that its just the Palastinians who were insulted here. Romney says that the Israelis are doing better due to their culture, which doesn't sound bad at first, but it reveals some stereotypical thinking. Israeli culture is Jewish, and Jews are stereotypically good with money, so of course they're more prosperous than the Palastinians.

I don't know, maybe I'm reading too much into it.

After all John Sununu did for Romney, you'd think that poor Cuban-Palestinian from New Hampshire would deserve a little respect.

Romney also compared U.S.-Mexico and Chile-Equador in the same speech, which is especially astounding when you consider his Hispanic outreach problem.

[Todeswind]

Why would any of these comments damage his chances? The vast majority of American doesn't even recognize that Palestine is a country. I don't mean they support Isreal, I mean they do not even recognize the sovereignty of Palestine as.... anything. Something like 60-80% of America supports Israel depending upon the poll you look at.

A new poll, conducted by CNN, has found that 67% of Americans express sympathy for Israel rather than Palestinians, whereas only 16% expressed sympathy for Palestinians over Israelis. (This represents a rise of sympathy for Israel among the American public from 60%, and a drop of sympathy for Palestinians from 17% recorded in 2009). The CNN poll, conducted during May 24-26, 2011, also found that an overwhelming 82% of Americans regard Israel as either a U.S. friend or ally (44% regard Israel as an ally, 38% regard it as a friend), as opposed to a mere 17% of Americans who regard it as unfriendly or an enemy (12% regard it as unfriendly, a mere 5% as an enemy). Also, more than two-thirds of Americans – 67% – view Israel favorably (23% very favorably, 42% somewhat favorably) as against 33% of Americans who do not (24% somewhat unfavorably, 9% very unfavorably). 35% of Americans say the U.S. should take Israel’s side in its conflict with the Palestinian Arabs, while just a mere 1% favors backing the Palestinians (‘CNN Opinion Research Poll,’ May 31, 2011).

Making negative comments about Palestine is only slightly less popular than making negative comments about palestine, in other words a safe issue. You aren't going to see the democrats speaking out against this because it is wildly unpopular to do so. The general opinion of a sizable portion American public is that Palestine isn't a country, it has never been a country, and will never be a country.

From Romney's point of view the Palestinians aren't important enough to really matter in US politics, even the Muslims as a whole only constitute some 0.6% of the population in the USA.Note that this is not my opinion on the subject and I have no intention of defending it.

[General Mung Beans]

After all John Sununu did for Romney, you'd think that poor Cuban-Palestinian from New Hampshire would deserve a little respect.

Romney also compared U.S.-Mexico and Chile-Equador in the same speech, which is especially astounding when you consider his Hispanic outreach problem.

Mexico definitely but Chile is another Hispanic country.

[Block]

Why would any of these comments damage his chances? The vast majority of American doesn't even recognize that Palestine is a country. I don't mean they support Isreal, I mean they do not even recognize the sovereignty of Palestine as.... anything. Something like 60-80% of America supports Israel depending upon the poll you look at.

Erm how many other non-Arab countries recognize Palestine as a country? Not many, last time I checked.

[Sea Skimmer]

You must have checked back in the mid 1980s then, because better then two thirds of the world recognize them. Its really only the US and US allies NATO or otherwise that have not, plus a few random places. Course, most of the states that recognize them are totally unwilling to take any action that would influence Israel and more then one directly buys weapons from Israel, so the real value of such recognition is very limited.

[Todeswind]

You must have checked back in the mid 1980s then, because better then two thirds of the world recognize them. Its really only the US and US allies NATO or otherwise that have not, plus a few random places. Course, most of the states that recognize them are totally unwilling to take any action that would influence Israel and more then one directly buys weapons from Israel, so the real value of such recognition is very limited.

100ish countries last time I counted. And I think 150 (including the USA) have some sort of diplomatic relation with Palestine in some way. It's unlikely to matter in the long run, Israel seems quite determined to assert their sovereignty.

EDIT: It bears mentioning that Palestine has only 40 permanent embassies from other nations inside of it.

[Danny Bhoy]

You must have checked back in the mid 1980s then, because better then two thirds of the world recognize them. Its really only the US and US allies NATO or otherwise that have not, plus a few random places. Course, most of the states that recognize them are totally unwilling to take any action that would influence Israel and more then one directly buys weapons from Israel, so the real value of such recognition is very limited.

100ish countries last time I counted. And I think 150 (including the USA) have some sort of diplomatic relation with Palestine in some way. It's unlikely to matter in the long run, Israel seems quite determined to assert their sovereignty.

EDIT: It bears mentioning that Palestine has only 40 permanent embassies from other nations inside of it.

Palestine could be covered from Amman for other embassies. It's all a question of resources and level of bilateral ties. For most countries who are not involved directly or indirectly in the MEPP, there's prob no need to have a resident embassy in Ramallah when it could be covered from say Amman. Not quite the same thing, but S'pore has barely a half dozen resident diplomatic missions in Europe, but that don't mean the EU area in general is no important.

[Todeswind]

Yeah the EU might not be the "unimportant" party in that exchange. It seems infinitely more likely that the EU nations didn't view a permanent mission in S'Pore as being financially necessary. The problem is that you can more or less map how important a nation considers another nation to be by if they've chosen to send a permanent diplomatic mission to it (provided they aren't enemies).

A much more telling factor would be how many nations S'Pore has permanent missions in.

[Danny Bhoy]

Yeah the EU might not be the "unimportant" party in that exchange. It seems infinitely more likely that the EU nations didn't view a permanent mission in S'Pore as being financially necessary. The problem is that you can more or less map how important a nation considers another nation to be by if they've chosen to send a permanent diplomatic mission to it (provided they aren't enemies).

A much more telling factor would be how many nations S'Pore has permanent missions in.

Just resident S'pore embassies/high commissions/Permanent Missions (UN, ASEAN etc.) abroad, around 30ish maybe?

Damn near every EU member country has an embassy in S'pore - not just the EU permanent delegation and the big countries since they are the ones with the most extensive global presence, but even the smaller ones like Denmark and Ireland, some of whom even accredit their embassies in S'pore to third countries in the region.

[Broken]

I wish Romney would take his "analysis" one step further and look at the economic and social conditions within the United States itself with comparisons between Red and Blue states. On per capita GDP (based off a quick glance at wikipedia stats)only Wyoming and Alaska make the top ten among the red states while only New Mexico and Michigan are blue in the bottom 10. Then look at levels of higher education, teen pregnancy, divorce rates, and other social factors and it just really doesn't look good for the "culture" of the red states.

[Sea Skimmer]

100ish countries last time I counted. And I think 150 (including the USA) have some sort of diplomatic relation with Palestine in some way. It's unlikely to matter in the long run, Israel seems quite determined to assert their sovereignty.

Seems it is in fact 139 now. The world has 190 recognized states who don't have any sort of sovereignty dispute, and 33 nations don't recognize Israel.

EDIT: It bears mentioning that Palestine has only 40 permanent embassies from other nations inside of it.

That doesn't meant that much, poorer countries tend not to maintain permanent embassies everywhere, and either rent temporary properties which are often only small parts of buildings, or just have arrangements with other states to act as representatives. Heck, it was only about a hundred years ago that this was also the case for all nations, the US before WW1 had something like five or six permanent embassies around the world.