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WHAT HAPPENED Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama are taking the U.S. presidential campaign overseas. McCain is visiting Colombia and Mexico this week, and Obama announced over

the weekend plans to travel to Britain, France, Germany, Israel, and Jordan in July. Obama is also planning to travel to Iraq and Afghanistan this summer. (_The Christian Science Monitor_)

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weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox. Colombia and France are hardly battleground states, said John Harwood in _The New York Times_’ The

Caucus blog, but “votes can be won there.” Meeting with foreign leaders and giving speeches on the international stage gives candidates a “gravitas” that reassures U.S. voters. Obama needs

to reassure voters more than McCain does, McCain can’t afford to cede one of his “few political advantages.” “Things are slipping away for McCain” in the election, said Craig Crawford in

_Congressional Quarterly_’s Trail Mix blog, and if he’s fishing for a winning tactic, acting presidential abroad may be a loser. Voters are more interested in bread-and-butter issues this

year, and “the ‘I’m-already-president’ routine” hardly worked for Hillary Clinton. Maybe McCain figures “he can’t win anyway and will just pretend for a while.” McCain has more than looking

statesmanlike in mind on his trip south, said Chuck Todd, Mark Murray, and Domenico Montanaro in MSNBC’s First Read blog. He’s also wooing Hispanic voters, a group with which “McCain has

strong credentials.” He’s losing them to Obama because of the GOP’s “anti-immigration crusade,” but traveling to Latin America will help by getting “him lots of coverage in America’s

Spanish-language media.” With McCain’s clear advantage in foreign policy leadership, said Gregor Peter Schmitz in Germany’s _Der Spiegel_, Obama’s trip to the Middle East will be especially

important for his campaign. But Obama is extremely popular in Europe, and “pictures of him alongside European leaders” can’t help but make him look more presidential, too. A free daily email

with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com The McCain-Obama matchup is “not a traveling roadshow to be shared with foreigners,” said David Ignatius in

_The Washington Post_, but the world “cares passionately about where America is heading,” so maybe it should be. The two candidates should consider Dubai’s offer to host a presidential

debate. Iraq, Iran, and Mideast policy are a big part of this election, so why not debate them in the region?