2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumRomney’s ‘Apology Tour’ Attack Line Crashes on the Shoals of Reality
Romneys Apology Tour Attack Line Crashes on the Shoals of Realityby Jonathan Chait at New York Magazine
http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2012/09/mitts-apology-tour-line-crashes-against-reality.html?imw=Y
"SNIP........................................
Pretty much everybody in politics, Republicans included, is shaking his or her head over Mitt Romneys ham-handed attack on the Obama administration and equally clumsy follow-up today. But Romneys strategy here was a perfectly straightforward application of the foreign-policy principles that have guided his campaign from the outset.
In the wake of his defeat in the 2008 GOP primary, Romney almost immediately started running for the 2012 nomination. At that time (well before the depth of the financial crisis was clear), Obamas main political weakness appeared to be foreign policy. He was inexperienced in the field and associated (through a 2002 speech against the Iraq War) with a vulnerable dovish wing of the party. Whats more, he seemed vaguely foreign, and many Americans incorrectly believed he was Muslim. All this set the stage for Romneys planned line of attack that Obama did not sufficiently love or appreciate his country and inappropriately coddled Muslim extremists, a line set forth in Romneys campaign book No Apology, which castigated Obama for undertaking an international apology tour.
Now, the apology tour was a figment of the right-wing imagination. But this was beside the point. The point was that it set the tone Romney wanted: Obama apologizes for America to the bad guys, and Romney would stand firm for America.
And so, when militant Islamists attacked an American embassy, Romney automatically reverted to this line, releasing a statement charging that the Obama administrations first response was not to condemn attacks on our diplomatic missions, but to sympathize with those who waged the attacks. This was triply false: (1) The statement in question was not made by the Obama administration but by the embassy staff, (2) it was not a response to the attacks but a (justifiably panicked) attempt to preempt them, in keeping with a long-standing bipartisan practice of distancing the U.S. from inflammatory religious provocation, and (3) it was not an expression of sympathy with attackers or other militants.
..........................................SNIP"
Xipe Totec
(43,890 posts)Myths and legends die hard in America. We love them for the extra dimension they provide, the illusion of near-infinite possibility to erase the narrow confines of most men's reality. Weird heroes and mould-breaking champions exist as living proof to those who need it that the tyranny of ''the rat race'' is not yet final.
Speck Tater
(10,618 posts)"reality" is irrelevant to them. They prefer to remain in their fantasy world.
rhett o rick
(55,981 posts)If they lived in a fantasy world there might be hope they could come out of the dream. But IMO they are not dreaming it's their reality.
young_at_heart
(3,772 posts)An age-old line of attack. Obama's origins are iffy, he's 'different', too peace-loving, not a 'real' American,etc.,etc..
Romney is the "true" American who really loves this country and will do whatever it takes. When you think about it, this line of attack is pretty nasty and certainly has no honor attached to it.
applegrove
(118,778 posts)that party has completely gutted itself of anyone with any depth. Not that they had much to start with....well they had eisenhauer.
Cha
(297,655 posts)for spelling it out.
Thanks applegrove.
Cha
(297,655 posts)Romney is his own worst Enemy and he would be America's Number 1 Enemy.