More trouble for Mitt Romney

Mitt Romney's campaign is in trouble. His off the cuff comments to a private gathering of very rich people have been very damaging, to the extent some Republicans are privately saying that fifty days out from polling, the election campaign is over. That is premature, but there's no doubt Romney now has to steady his operation and quickly get it back on track.

The US media is concentrating on his comments dismissing 47 per cent of the electorate, or Obama supporters, as freeloaders.

It is a revealing quote. It suggests that if elected, then Mitt Romney would not be a president for all Americans and would devote little time "to worry about those people." Given he thought he was making the comments away from cameras or reporters or people who couldn't afford the 50 thousand dollar entrance fee that suggests there was a candour in words he would never dream of uttering in public.

His words will continue to resonate for days, and if the Obama campaign has anything to do with it, until election day.
But perhaps more significant are the comments that the Republican presidential candidate made about Palestine and the Middle East.
Mitt Romney supports a two state solution; that is an independent Palestine existing alongside the state of Israel. Not only is this US government policy, it is also Israeli government policy. During a trip to Jerusalem in July, the Republican Presidential candidate told Haaretz newspaper: "I believe in a two-state solution which suggests there will be two states, including a Jewish state. I respect Israel's right to remain a Jewish state".

Yet in private, Mitt Romney says if he's in the White House he would do nothing to try to reach a peace settlement in the Middle East, and that a Palestinian state is unfeasible.