Hoping Bibi’s Schalit photo-op could be a Dukakis moment

As my colleague Dimi Reider posted yesterday, the social networks are swamped with pictures of PM Binyamin Netanyahu popping up in famous historical photos, after seeing him in almost every picture that the government released yesterday during the Schalit prisoner swap.

The momentum seems to be in full swing, and anyone who opened up their Facebook this morning was most probably met by a whole new batch of funny photos. Here are a few more:
Hoping Bibi’s Schalit photo-op could be a Dukakis momentHoping Bibi’s Schalit photo-op could be a Dukakis momentHoping Bibi’s Schalit photo-op could be a Dukakis momentHoping Bibi’s Schalit photo-op could be a Dukakis moment

I can’t help but hope that the PM’s efforts to promote himself so aggressively yesterday could actually backfire somehow. It reminded me of the notorious Michael Dukakis photo, which some claim lost him the campaign. Dukakis was trying to play it strong on defense, even though he wanted to cut “Star Wars.” Didn’t work out too well.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVg8Ztn6sgg[/youtube]

Bibi’s trying to be the “national father”, despite negotiating a controversial deal – that could have been signed much earlier – to free the “national son.”

Could Bibi’s ego bring him down? I doubt it. But it has the potential of shedding more light on his character and on his true motives.

Speaking of ego, one interesting thing I heard last night was that Channel 10 reporter Raviv Drucker counted how many times Bibi used the word “I” in his 10 minute speech at the airforce base yesterday. 37 times. Thirty seven!