Charlie Rangel, the 84-year-old ethically challenged Democrat from Harlem, sounds like he’s well into second childhood.

Rangel posted a Twitter message to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday that sounded for all the world like he was challenging him to a fistfight behind the bus stop after school.

The occasion was Netanyahu’s planned speech to a joint meeting of Congress next month. He was invited by House Speaker John Boehner to talk about the threat posed by Iran’s nuclear program, but Democrats from the White House on down are acting like Netanyahu’s the real threat here.

Bibi: If you have a problem with our POTUS’s foreign policy meet me at AIPAC but not on the House floor. pic.twitter.com/HN7eLaIbg1

— Charles Rangel (@cbrangel) February 11, 2015

Besides how inappropriate the obvious bullying belligerence and thug look (“You gotta problem?” doesn’t seem like a good way to address the prime minister of any country, much less a U.S. ally), there’s the question of Rangel’s sanity. Octogenarians don’t generally do well in physical combat with men 20 years their junior.

And whatever Rangel’s combat experience in Korea might have meant once, it’s not likely to have carried over enough to handle a former Israeli commando. (And at 84, Rangel probably couldn’t take Angela Merkel.)

Of course, Rangel was playing to his progressive audience — its doubtful Netanyahu follows him on Twitter — so the tough guy act might have won him some fans, but the saner world had nothing but scorn.

For Rangel and the president he’s pretending to protect.

You have a screw loose, @cbrangel, if you think this is the proper way for you to address a world leader pic.twitter.com/U4WnBOUy77

— Cameron Gray (@Cameron_Gray) February 11, 2015

@Cameron_Gray @cbrangel ⬅️Would not know a real leader if it fell on his head. Just another Obama puppet that can’t think for himself.

— LisaBeth (@NLUVWMIKE) February 11, 2015

@cbrangel Twitter tough guy openly threatening @netanyahu now? You’re pathetic.

— Baldwin (@baldwin100) February 11, 2015

Pathetic is right, but he’s not alone in trying to turn the speech standoff into some street fight over “respect” — and race.

In Politico Wednesday, Rep. Hank Johnson, D-Ga., said Netanyahu’s acceptance of the Boehner invitation showed a misunderstanding of American government, but then made it clear he was looking through a racial lens.

“It’s not simply about President Obama being a black man disrespected by a foreign leader,” he said. “It’s deeper than that.”

So no matter what issue is, it’s all about race for some libs. (And they don’t like Jews much, anyway.)

But for the parts of America, who know it’s not 1965 on the Edmund Pettus Bridge anymore, Rangel’s Twitter post was just the latest in a career of embarrassments for  the congressman.

@Cameron_Gray @cbrangel Have you paid your taxes yet, Charlie? Just wondering.

— Moshe Ben Avram (@moshebenavram) February 11, 2015

@Cameron_Gray I’d take @cbrangel more seriously if he weren’t a crook, a tax cheat and a poor man’s Al Sharpton. He’s downright disgraceful.

— CFLancop (@CFLancop) February 11, 2015

This one might just say it all:

@Cameron_Gray @cbrangel pic.twitter.com/FQXxCSJ1V2

— Michael (@MIKEM_LINY) February 11, 2015

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Joe Saunders

Joe Saunders, a 25-year newspaper veteran, is a staff writer and editor for BizPac Review who lives in Tallahassee and covers capital and Florida politics. Email Joe at [email protected].

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