How’s this for setting a stark contrast between yourself and the man you hope to take on in November 2012?
Mitt Romney pressed ahead with one of his favorite themes at Saturday night’s GOP Foreign Policy debate: namely, that the man who took out Osama bin Laden and Muammar Qaddafi is a weak President.
Obviously these two examples didn’t quite fit into that template, so he turned instead to what he called the President’s “greatest foreign policy failure”: Iran.
“If we re-elect Barack Obama, Iran will get a nuclear weapon,” he said. “If we elect Mitt Romney, Iran will not.”
Watch:
Thomas Lane
Thomas Lane is an associate editor at Talking Points Memo. He previously produced and reported for the BBC from its UN Bureau in New York. He is a dual citizen of the US and the UK.
What the hell does Mitt know about Iran? What are his qualifications??
Hell, I'll bet he can't even see Iran from his porch!
Chesire Every day since I came back to TPM, I've been like, "where is the dude with the weird smallish picture in an orange shirt and a dorky hat. That dude was awesome."
Yay! I found you again.
1. If Iran wants the bomb, it is going to get the bomb. regardless of how we feel about the matter. We have the capacity to slow their progress towards bomb development, but only at the risk of triggering a third Gulf War, which we are hardly in position to prosecute.
2. All by itself, the bomb really isn't that big of a deal, except as a psychological weapon. The bomb isn't terribly difficult to engineer and produce (for Christ's sake, the technology is sixty years old!). It doesn't become a threat until it is able to be married to a delivery system - that's the hard part. You don't just strap an A-bomb on top of a scud and light a fuse. You have to develop pretty sophisticated ballistic missiles with significant capacity AND a warhead that is compatible with the missile. Iran hasn't even begun to tackle those problems!
3. Nuclear weapons aren't particularly useful except as a weapon of last resort. Israel has had the bomb for what - a quarter century? It hasn't allowed them to dictate to their Arab neighbors. The only real use for a nuke is to deter invasion/attack, and as 9-11 proved, it ain't so great at even that! If any hostile state, like Iran, actually tried to use one against us or our allies they know they would be inviting massive nuclear retaliation.
4. Don't even try to bring up the paranoid delusion of a nuclear power turning a nuke over to a terrorist organization (- dear Lord, even the North Koreans know better than to pull that one!) First, no state would even consider donating their most sophisticated weapon system over to a group they don't have under direct control, and second, they are well aware that if New York were suddenly vaporized, it wouldn't take too long to trace the attack back to them - especially since we have proven that, when provoked, we're not terribly picky about technicalities like evidence.
In the end the only real effect of Iran getting the bomb would be to deter any prospective invasion of the Islamic Republic by the West, other than that, not a big deal.
What next? China and Russia might get nuclear weapons too!! Seriously, will this souless automaton of the plutocrats say how he will prevent the Iranians from getting the bomb? Whose sons and daughters will be this boob's cannon fodder?
I can't even imagine the things this man is going to be forced to say in the road up to his loss. Rationality are long off the table.
curious28nc Why are you assuming he's rational and moderate and just pandering to the nuts? Because he was a moderate as a governor of a liberal state? Right. Because that kind of thinking worked out great with George W. Bush, moderate compassionate conservative governor of a conservative state.
One more time, because it seems to be a point that's eluding a lot of people: what Republican presidential candidates say to the base is the truth about how they'll govern. The lies are the stuff they say to get the votes of the five or ten percent of low-attention indies who decide elections in this country after they clinch the nomination. Once they win, that's done. Once they win, Republicans have to pander to their base even harder than they do during the primaries because the political space for moderate Republican office holders to get reelected no longer exists and David Brooks "moderate" Republican voters simply will not punish Republican office holders for behaving like batshit insane imbeciles.
Take a look at the fate of the last moderate Republican, Bush I, and the voting behavior "moderate" Republican senators Snowe, Collins and Burr if you've got the slightest doubt about that.
I hate to tell you this, Mitt, but Iran will have a nuclear weapon no matter who is President.
Oops. sorry, FreedtoChoose. Perhaps, I should look at the previous post before submitting.
Whether Iran develops a nuclear weapon is independent of who is America's President. As Israel is believed to have nuclear weapons, Iran want some, too.
Romney really has swilled that neo-con Zionist Kool-Aid, hasn't he? What is he going to do, invade Iran? Attack it and bring the entire region into a conflagration? War, death, and destruction--Romney at his best.
9/11 happened while republicans occupied the white house.
and after 9/11, the republicans kept americans afraid with yellow and orange terrorist alerts.
virtually all acts of domestic terrorism over the past twenty years have been associated with the right wing.
george bush, republican, failed to get osama bin laden, or contain iran's nuclear program, or take substantive action against rogue nuclear proliferation, or contain the wave of illegal immigration from mexico. and republican arrogance and ignorance enabled terrorists to recruit many more your murderers than they might have, otherwise.
the american people have absolutely no reason to trust that any republican would be stronger on national defense than barack obama.
romney is just acting like a politician when he says crap like this. he knows it. smart people know it. and it just
provides further proof that the GOP is desperate, devoid of ideas, and has no integrity.
I guess Romney's planning to give Iran nukes out of pique if Obama is reelected. Or something.
Commie Dearest And, apparently, to "give" them some if he's elected and let Mormon Jesus decide who eats the downwind fallout.
shorter Romney: Please call me back AIPAC, I need you now more than ever.
The sideshow that is the GOP never fails to anger, annoy, and amuse.
So, Mitt, now you're a f**king wizard with a crystal ball?
If Romney wins, Iran will use it.
bayman If Romney wins they will have even more incentive to have a nuclear arsenal. Nukes are DEFENSIVE weapons.
NotesFromME bayman Thank you! It's about time somebody pointed that out!
If Obama wins, Mitt will use Maybelline foundation no. 19; if he loses, he'll use L'Oreal foundation ManTan for the Sears man!
Jesus Christ! Who is ladling the makeup on these cartoon candidates?
Ok that was funny. dcjdjay
What, is Mittens going to put his new complex (house) on hold and foot the bill for Iran if he loses? Hey, if Reagan did it, it must be good!
Aside from the fact that this empty suit will say anything to get elected, it seems to me its a dumb strategy to promise Americans you'll start a brand new war in the ME when we're cutting basic services to pay for the last two.
the republican party never backs away from fascist foreign policy jingo, but it seems less effective somehow nowadays.
I hope he is prepared to march the US troops in there alone .
I know my country would not follow this time.
Though we had stood by the USA in every other conflict.
I thought the USA was broke how would the pay for this one.
How would he know that there is no covert operation taking part in Iran.
After all President Obama didn't let the public know about Bin Laden until he was disposed of.
moseyon That's quite a leap you took there after the fifth stanza.
Mickey Bitsko :-) How about this one. Reports in the Fairfax Press this morning
US president Barak Obama will use next week visit to Australian to announce the US
will station Marines through a base in Darwin.
Rumor or truth I don't know at this time. I could be a covert operation to hijack our economy and take our unemployment rate 5% back to the USA :-)
Mickey Bitsko Correction Not I but It could be.
moseyonMickey Bitsko For what? Australia can handle pretty much anything that might happen in East Timor or Papua New Guinea themselves...
And I`m going to hold my breath until I`m president.
:"If Obama wins Iran will get a nuclear weapon, and if I win Iran will get a nuclear weapon and I'll blame it on Obama." Seriously, Mitt you're having trouble getting the GOP nomination against a field of midgets but you can face down Iran or were you planning on starting another war in the middle east because the public is worried that with Iraq winding down and Libya over there won't be enough fighting to keep them happy? Oh, wait that was your buddies at Halliburton and Blackwater (Xi, whatever).
And...?
Another idiot. Obama has been successful at cleaning up after the Bush administration. During his run for POTUS in 2008, he told us exactly what he was going to do and he did it. Except for Guantanimo (sp?), when he tried to return these people to their countries, those countries didn't want them back and when he suggested putting them in maximum security prisons throughout the U.S., he got a bunch of "NIMBY" (not in my back yard) complaints.
Romney is a very irritating personality. He reminds me of the Rich kid in school who only had friends because he bought them. Diffiinetly the 1%, now he wants to send kids of the 99% to war.
Nadeem Ahmed That's because he *was* the rich kid at school who bought his friends.
Meredith LeslyNadeem Ahmed He went to Cranbrook. They're all rich kids! Currently tuition for grades 9-12 is $27,450 for day school and $37,900 for boarding.
And if Romney wins, there'll be free casserole for everybody!
Five Things You Didn't Know about Romney:
Brett Cottrell I learned nothing about Romney on that site.
If Mitt wins we get a full scale world war where everyone gets to die. That way you'll be spared the immense poverty when he hands all your social security money to Goldman Sachs to gamble away in his unregulated paradise for the 1%.
Interesting that he can't seem to explain exactly what he's going to do differently. By inference, I guess he's going to attack them...and start another needless GOP bloodletting. What happens if there are no WMD this time?
craigatwoodworks ...even worse for our troops, what if he attacks and there ARE WMD's?
Not intended to be a factual statement.
Romney is like the rich kid in school who only had friends because he bought them. I very unlike able person
If either candidate is elected Iran is just as likely to either get nukes or get invaded, because there is no substantial difference in their foreign policy.
JohnPidaras AARGH!! It's the "there's no difference between the parties" trolls again!! Seriously, do you think President Gore's reaction to 9/11 would be to invade Iraq? Seriously?
Keep talking Mitt, and there won't be any "if" about the president winning.
I didn't see the debate, but I'm guessing no one had the wit to ask any of the candidates if they would cooperate with the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood as a means of removing the Iranian-allied Assad regime.
jonlester That's because none of the people on stage have any idea who the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood is...they all just assume they must be a bunch of Al Qaeda terrorists!
Didn't McCain use the same fear approach? Something along the lines of "if you don't elect me, there will be another terrorist attack on US soil"? Can Republicans provide anything other than fear?
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