First, the key quote is not the one you cite, but the one where Romney specifically attacked Obama’s declaration of willingness to launch a raid into Pakistan if a sufficiently valuable target were found there.
Second, the claim is not that Romney is “actively opposed” to killing bin Laden, but that his stated positions raise doubts that he has the judgment and courage to actively support doing so.
Two distrortions in one statement – how very efficient of you.
Oh, puh-leeze. A statement of truth “has failed” because the side inconvenienced by that truth squeals and tries to change the subject from the facts to the “controversy”? By this “logic”, the theory of evolution “has failed” because creationists won’t shut up and face reality.
Yeah, I thought that was interesting too…especially since Clinton had chances at bin Laden and didn’t try it.
That bit of irony noted, I think the ad is otherwise fair game. Green lighting that mission was a very ballsy move. If it went badly, Obama knew he’d catch hell for it, maybe even doom his chances for a second term. He did it anyway. I respect that, even though I hope Obama loses the election.
You are incorrect; Obama in fact, as one of his first actions after inauguration, signed an executive order to close Gitmo in one year. Then the Republicans whipped up a hissy fit of fear and fury over it, a passel of Democrats cravenly followed suit, and the poltroons in Congress passed legislation blocking the closing.
I think the point they’re trying to make here is that Obama understands that some things are more important and bigger than columns in an actuarial table. Some things are worth fighting for even if the accountants say they’re not. Romney wasn’t so much “I’d never kill OBL” or “OBL doesn’t matter” but rather “My numbers tell me that OBL isn’t worth the risk:reward ratio”
They’re drawing a distinction between someone who’ll do the right thing because it’s right versus someone who’ll do the right thing when there’s a net profit in it.
You’re absolutely right, because I chose the wrong words. Obama didn’t change his mind. More accurately, Obama made a promise (and got votes for something) he ultimately could not deliver on.
Funny you should bring up Carter and “Desert One”. Carter made the same sort of ballsy decision that Obama did, except that it ended rather poorly.
So? That’s the chance you take in super high-stakes geopolitics. These are tough operations and a bajillion things can go wrong. In Carter’s case, it went sideways. In Obama’s case it went swimmingly. Yay for Obama… but both men made the hyper-gutsy decisions that, IMO, were correct to make. Both knew the incredible risks to their presidencies, and both were willing to make the right call. Yet Jimmy gets no credit for his decision. Totally unfair.
Funny, too… these guys are both considered by the knuckle-draggers to be “bleeding-heart liberal chicken shits; adverse to any aggressive military action that could lead to American bloodletting”… :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes: Yeah. Right .
Let us never confuse from whom the true balls hang.
I’m not sure that this is what you’re implying here but, one *could *make the case that while it was nice to get Obama, we had no business doing so in a country we are not at war with-- i.e. we violated Pakistan’s sovereignty.
Thing is, no one–certainly not Romney–will voice that complaint after the fact because crushing Osama’s terrorist ass was just too popular. Still, it’s a fair point to make (whether you personally agree with it or not).
Fuck Pakistan and their sovereignty. It’s not like they were ever going to get him, and it’s not like they’re going to actually do anything but bitch about us doing it.
You’re damn straight Obama needs to run on killing OBL. It’s one Hell of an achievement, and the Republicans are just bitching because they can’t take credit for it. Obama is undeniably, indistinguishably in the right on this one and there isn’t a damn thing the GOP can say against it.
Plus, it destroys the idea that Dems are weak militarily, which is a major boon for them.
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He did it anyway. I respect that, even though I hope Obama loses the election.
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I don’t want to derail the thread, but I found this interesting. I’d like to know why you want Obama to lose, given that you’re capable of giving him credit for the bin Laden kill. Not sure where I’d put it or what I’d call it but I think this would be an interesting thread.
He says there are limits on how much he would commit to killing bin Laden, and indicates that he wouldn’t have gone as far as Obama did. I don’t think that’s an unreasonable inference. He was wrong about the “another terrorist will take his place” thing, too. Al Qaeda has had trouble replacing bin Laden, and the data recovery that took place at his home was devastating for them.
Nah. People will quibble with anything. It doesn’t mean the ad failed. The fact that Romney felt compelled to say the ad was fair but unfair tells you something.
He did try it; he didn’t go far enough and finish the job. I didn’t want to take the thread off course but I did want to say something about that earlier. Maybe after the camera went off, he said something like “and ah wonder if ah could have finish him off in 1998 if I hadn’t weakened mahself politically by getting caught with my hand in the nookie jar.”
I’d dispute that characterization. They missed him by a slim margin and destroyed a training camp, and the bottom line is that they should have kept trying. Worrying about bin Laden’s prestige compared to the importance of capturing or killng him was stupid. I realize that’s a judgment made in hindsight, but their priorities were wrong. I’m not sure what would have happened on September 11th if they’d killed him - in 1998 it might’ve prevented the attack; in late 2000 probably not - and there are a lot of parties that share the blame there. Given the dysfunction in the intelligence community maybe some kind of attack was inevitable. But I think it’s very reasonable to point out that Clinton also had his chances and didn’t finish the job.
