The New York Times' Thomas Friedman noted last week, "For the first time in a long, long time, a Democrat is running for president and has the clear advantage on national security policy." Part of this, the columnist argued, is that Mitt Romney acts "as if he learned his foreign policy at the International House of Pancakes."
Romney hopes he can help change that impression, though, with a speech this morning, titled "The Mantle of Leadership," delivered at the Virginia Military Institute. The Obama campaign is marking the occasion with a new television ad that will run today in Virginia.
For those who can't watch clips online, the spot highlights "Romney's gaffe-filled July tour of England, Israel and Poland," as well as his ugly effort to exploit American deaths in Libya for partisan gain, which generated bipartisan disgust.
Of course, it's a 30-second ad, and there are only so many examples the Obama campaign can squeeze into a short commercial, but the list of Romney's troubles on international affairs isn't short. Indeed, the AP reported over the weekend that Romney caused another diplomatic problem when he condemned Spain's fiscal policies last week in a way that didn't make sense.
Deputy Prime Minister Soraya Saenz de Santamaria said about Romney, "What I see is ignorance of what is reality."
This comes on the heels of a similar Romney incident involving Japan, which came on the heels of Romney insulting, to varying degrees, literally every other member of the G-8.
And the problem isn't limited to diplomacy. The New York Times reports today that Romney's own advisers say "they have engaged with him so little on issues of national security that they are uncertain what camp he would fall into, and are uncertain themselves about how he would govern."
The larger pattern raises serious questions about Romney's capacity to lead on the global stage.
Especially in light of this morning's speech from the former one-term governor, consider what we've learned recently about Romney and how he would take on the role of "leader of the free world."
On the Middle East peace process, Romney has said he intends to "kick the ball down the field and hope" that someone else figures something out. His handling of the crisis in Libya "revealed him as completely craven." On Iran, the candidate and his aides can't even agree on one policy position. On Afghanistan, Romney occasionally forgets there's still an ongoing, deadly war underway.
It's an area of embarrassment that refuses to go away -- remember the time Romney "fled down a hallway and escaped up an escalator" to avoid a reporter asking his position on the NATO mission in Libya? Or how about the time he said there are "insurgents" in Iran? Or when he flip-flopped on Iraq? Or when he looked ridiculous during the incident involving Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng?
Perhaps my personal favorite was when Romney tried to trash the New START nuclear treaty in an op-ed, but flubbed every relevant detail, prompting Fred Kaplan to respond, "In 35 years of following debates over nuclear arms control, I have never seen anything quite as shabby, misleading and -- let's not mince words -- thoroughly ignorant as Mitt Romney's attack on the New START treaty."
And this only touches on the 2012 race. As we talked about in March, Romney had even more trouble during his first presidential campaign, making huge errors of fact and judgment he still hasn't explained.
Remember the time Romney told ABC News he would "set a deadline for bringing the troops home" from Iraq -- but only if it's a secret deadline? How about the time Romney, more than four years into the war in Iraq, said it's "entirely possible" that Saddam Hussein hid weapons of mass destruction in Syria prior to the 2003 invasion? Or the time Romney pretended "Hezbollah and Hamas and al Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood" were all the same thing? How about my personal favorite: the time Romney made the bizarre assertion that IAEA weapons inspectors were not allowed entry into Saddam Hussein's Iraq?
He's even picked a fight over President Obama's strike on Osama bin Laden, ignoring the fact that Romney took an entirely passive attitude towards the al Qaeda leader, saying "it's not worth moving heaven and earth" to get the terrorist responsible for 9/11. Around the same time, Romney said he would not order a strike into Pakistan to get bin Laden, rejecting Obama's willingness "to enter an ally of ours" to target the terrorist leader.
If Romney's remarks this morning are supposed to make up for a record like this one, it'll have to be one heckuva speech.
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You see what happens now, when you have people like the Republicans, extremists of hatred, and the extreme wealthy want to be so power craving, corrupt, arrogant, greedy, hypocrites, and deceiving. Look at Europe how the people are protesting and fighting and even in America. Human nature never changes and on top of it wanted to deny the truth about Jesus being about rights, freedoms, choices, love, compassion, understanding, etc for all people. And religious hypocrites want to keep denying the Gospel of Thomas is the real thing and denying that Jesus understood our human nature too well as he looked to want things better for everybody. We have a major collapse of our economy plus the worlds and what do Republicans want to do oh let’s do it again. Talk about con jobs, deceptions, and lies. How much longer must these lies continue just for power and control of foolish man-made things? Do you actually think Republicans can continue with these deceptions and lies, when they have become so transparent? Control of the economy is easy when you know human nature just by changing a few regulations and laws for the corrupt rich. And what happens misery, despair, violence, and death. Perhaps, it is finally time to learn this lesson and make sure our children of the future never forget it.
I was at a local event the other day. One where the crowd is a bit better off than the average middle or working class family. A lot of smarmy faces were over at the Romney for President booth gathering up their lawn signs for Romney/Ryan 2012.
All the while my mind, as I witnessed these well-to-doers, reeled in the what if mode about a President Romney launching a nuclear strike to send a message, or to help an ally, or to squash an enemy, or to simply make room for a larger parking lot in Asia.
With a Romney presidency all future bets are off! Our well to do brethren just don't see it! -Kevo
He just needs to do just what he did during the debate - look upbeat and confident, remember his numbers and lie like a dog.
You are absolutely correct sir . That other stuff is ancient history ...almost 3 months old .
Us , we were busy watching American Idol . Who's running again?
Furrin policy: Israel good, the rest a bunch a commie nazis.
Pizza and Chinee food good, and that's all the furrin we need in God Fearing America.
And you hippy liberals with your fancy "passport" need to use it- and don't come back!
(The above represents a LARGE voting bloc!)
I thought of suggesting that your simile would work better as lie like a rug, but then I got this image of him going round and round and round chasing his tail before tiring and settling in whatever position he found most convenient.
"What I see is ignorance of what is reality."
I haven't run across a better description of all Republicans.
Unfortunately this strategy will probably work.
Anybody who has not make up their mind at this point are most probably not paying attention about what has been going on in the campaign. Whoever bought any answer Romney gave in the presidential speech bought it in the premise that he looks more confident than President Obama was throughout the debate, not knowing what he has been saying throughout the whole campaign.
Anybody who had been paying attention and know how he did say:
about the middle east crisis will watch his speech this morning and throw up when he said:
I'm really wondering what Netanyahu thinks about Romney, really....
The puppet-man will govern as he is instructed. If he wins this will be the first time we will have a "Puppet in Chief".
Have you completely forgotten about 2001 to 2009?
Lost my mind - I must have started believing the lie - Bush years did not exist it is just a figment of the Democrats imagination.
Sort of. Ann will be in charge of redecorating.
Obama did this to all of us by tanking the debate and allowing Romney to lie with impunity. Of course the master exploiter Romney will stick his chest out and declare Obama to be the appeaser. We will all suffer through this until Thursday when Joe destroys the boy blunder.
I hope so too. I think Biden needs to debate Romney not Ryan. Make Ryan answer for the top of the ticket's ever changing position on ... everything. Make him answer for the things that Romney 9.0 said during the debate.
Ignore Ryan. Ryan could lie well enough to defend his own record, but he's shown he's had a hard time defending the positions of Multiple Mitt.
"tanking the debate"? really? He might not have had the stellar performance we expected, but one misfire and you and some pundits are ready to wring your hands, say "OMG< OMG, the sky is falling". Remember Mitt Romney is a lying $O$, and this President has accomplished a great deal and will be back...
Yup Judy, tanking the debate. Thats what playing it safe does to someone in a competition. Of course I agree that he will stage a comeback, but I disagree strongly with his pre-debate strategy of trying to not lose. We are in a new era of politics where hypocrisy and dishonesty don't destroy campaigns like they used to. It's all about perception, and Romney looked strong to low information people who don't know or care about facts. Romney won't win unless he changes the trajectory significantly, and allowing him to lie without effective and timely pushback is his foot in the door.
No problem. It really comes down to showing the rest of the world how it's done by repealing Obamneycare, cutting taxes, and building up our nuclear stockpile to keep those people in line.
The rest of the world -- assuming anyone cares what they think -- will be grateful to have someone in charge who looks Presidential.
Since Mitt has always avoided having any of his skin in the game, he can continue to be a chicken-hawk. Without the draft, a great number of people have been able to avoid thinking of the human cost of war. Veterans know the pain. The troops and their families know the cost. The wealthy know the profit in creating and using the toys of war. This election needs to be a referendum against blood for oil politics.
Huh? Mitt's skin is the game. Just look at it -- doesn't it look Presidential? Way superior to the incumbent's skin.
Spain is upset that Gov. Romney called them out and the AP writer's defense is that Spain isn't as bad as some of the other European countries?
Low by European standards? Seems to mean that there were lots of other examples Romney could have used. Sort of seems to say that Romney is right, we just can't believe he said it.
Romney was wrong when he said that 46% of our GDP is govt spending.
It's more like half that. Around 23%.
this is my rooty tooty fresh and fruity i-hop foreign policy.
I am Mitt and i approve of this menu.
But he's white, and that goes a long way in some circles...
The New York Times reports today that Romney's own advisers say "they have engaged with him so little on issues of national security that they are uncertain what camp he would fall into, and are uncertain themselves about how he would govern."
More NYT bullsh!t... Does the name John Bolton ring a bell? What more should a good president do than turn over foreign policy to Benny NutAndYahoo and John Bolton?
For someone like me, who's been borderline obsessed by history, foreign policy and national security issues since, literally, I was a kid and who studied that stuff in college before deciding to turn to something that actually offered a chance of making a living, Mitt's utter lack of preparedness is terrifying.
GWB was shockingly ignorant of foreign policy and unprepared for that part of the office--and look how well that worked out for us--but I'm telling you he was George Frakking Kennan, Henry Kissinger, Cordell Hull and, well, his dad, all rolled into one compared to Romney.
When it comes to foreign policy, Romney isn't "OMFG! This guy who wants to drive the school bus has bad eyesight, impaired judgment and anger management issues!" scary. Romney is "OMFG! This guy who wants to drive the school bus doesn't know how to drive and doesn't think there's anything to learn that he can't pick up on the fly while he's driving down the Interstate at top speed and talking on his cell phone!" scary.
It's not that he's ignorant. It's that he's the kind of ignorant that thinks anything he doesn't already know isn't important and anything he doesn't understand must be easy.
He's worse than Palin. He hasn't been plucked out of provincial obscurity, dropped onto the national stage and expected to hold forth on topics that have heretofore never been of much interest to him the way she was. He's been running for president for ten f**king years and for all ten of those years he hasn't bothered to bone up on this stuff. Apparently hasn't even asked someone smart for a reading list. Just didn't think it was sufficiently relevant to this office that has been his consuming obsession for more than a decade to bother with.
And, as may be apparent, it makes me absolutely flonging crazy that so few people seem to grasp--and even seem to be going out of their ways to avoid grasping--what a huge problem this is. It makes me crazy that so few people seem to get that if you decide you want to be president and spend a decade in pursuit of that goal and, in all of that time, don't bother to do anything to cure your very evident deficit on foreign policy and national security knowledge, that's absolutely disqualifying.
It makes me feel like Jack Lemmon's character in "The China Syndrome."
@ Steve -- So well said, it should be disqualifying.
Regardless of any policy, I've always seen Mitt Romney as the Pres. Candidate from Steven Kings the "Dead Zone" Full of style and a selfish need to win at any and all costs.
Does the GOP/RNC "Liar and Chief" remember that the Cold War is over? He was speaking like a politician from 1968. The GOP/RNC "War Hawk and Chief" is still living in the failures of the "Bush Doctrine" on Foreign Policy. The nation is unable to afford another war America. Our nation is unable to afford the the "Bush Doctrin." Again!
Mitten's has Condi Rice as one of his foreign policy advisors and her specialty is the Soviet Union. Mitten's has John Bolton as his chief foreign policy advisor and his specialty is blowing the top floors off of the U.N. building. 'Nuff said?
War, what is it good for?
- obscene profits for the militarization industry
- spreading the payola around lots and lots of congressional districts
- career military officers getting promoted
The true ideas concerning the Foreign Policy of the GOP/RNC "War Hawk and Chief" was already seen on video. The speech today was written by either "Chump-Change-Cheney" himself or by one of his past GOP/RNC cronies that once worked in the State Department.
Ah but he looks Presidential.
It will be a case of gross political malpractice if Obama doesn't take a very aggressive stance and pound away at Romney's many clueless moments during that third presidential debate, which is mostly limited to foreign policy.
Mitt Romney claiming President Obama didn't support the democracy movement in Egypt is a joke. Will TRMS please dig up the footage from the beginning of the Egyptian uprising where Republicans were warning president Obama not to throw Musharraf under the bus while this President was pushing more support for the protesters in the streets? President Obama's first address in the Middle East was about bringing democracy to the Middle East and took place in Cairo, the center of the Egyptian uprising. Talk about knowing where to deliver a message. Will someone please point out how many millions of dollars we are already giving to the democracy movement in the Middle East?
Obama deserves losing the election if he loses the foreign policy debate with Romney. This should be an historic ass kicking with Obama making Romney cry uncle.
England? ENGLAND?! Our country is the UNITED KINGDOM OF GREAT BRITAIN AND NORTHERN IRELAND. FFS this really pisses me off when Americans think they can refer to the UK as "England". It's infuriating.
Mitt wants to arm the Syrian rebels. Papa Bush gave arms to Saddam Hussein and they used them to attack Kuwait. It's never a good idea but we do it over and over.
A vote for Mitt is a vote for WWIII, Mitt's not smart but he is a good salesman.