If nothing else, Mitt Romney is a perpetual irony machine. Yesterday, Romney added to his legend by proclaiming that his three leading Democratic opponents - all U.S. Senators - lack his foreign policy experience. More ironic still, the one-term governor and international affairs neophyte leveled the charge while speaking in Midland, Texas, home of one George W. Bush. [..]
Sadly for Mitt Romney, his own cavalcade of foreign policy missteps, misunderstandings and comical gaffes show him to be not ready for prime time on the world stage. In April, for example, Romney downplayed the important of capturing Osama Bin Laden, declaring, "It's not worth moving heaven and earth spending billions of dollars just trying to catch one person." Playing to the crowd at a GOP debate just one week later, Romney pulled a 180, promising of the Al Qaeda chief, "He's going to pay, and he will die."
That stumble came just weeks after Romney's short-lived campaign to target state pension funds with investments in companies doing business with Iran. On February 22, Romney sent letters to Democratic leaders including New York Governor Eliot Spitzer, Senators Chuck Schumer and Hillary Clinton as well as state comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli urging a policy of "strategic disinvestment from companies linked to the Iranian regime." But as the AP quickly detailed, Romney's former employer (Bain & Co.) and the company he founded (Bain Capital) have recent links to recent Iranian business deals. Apparently missing the irony, Romney responded by saying of his Iran disinvestment PR scheme, "this is something for now-forward."
But Mitt Romney's most misguided - and dangerous - pronouncements concern the greatest American foreign policy and national security challenge of our age. In May, Romney anointed himself as the leading proponent of "conflation" in the war against Al Qaeda. Alarmingly and erroneously equating Sunni and Shiite, the guilty and the innocent, Romney claimed he has more than Osama Bin Laden in his crosshairs. Read on...
Ever heard of glass houses, Mitt? I guess it's to his advantage that his supporters would be culled from those who don't tend to examine bold claims too closely. Along the same lines, Matt Taibbi calls Iraq the issue that Republican candidates can't keep dodging and hope to win, but I don't think Matt has accounted for your average FOXNews viewer.
