Virginia News Headlines: Tuesday Morning

What They¹re Saying About Last Night¹s Debate (0.00 / 0)

From the Obama campaign:

What They're Saying About Last Night's Debate
President Obama: "Clear victory"..."Strong leader"..."Score this one for the President"
Mitt Romney: "Botched"..."Meek"..."Lost"..."Too much valium"..."Flat-out lying"..."Not claiming victory"

CBS poll: "Well, Scott, the uncommitted voters in our survey - immediately after the debate was over - gave a clear victory to President Obama this evening."

James Carville: "If this had would've been a Little League baseball game, they would've called the thing after four innings."

Neil Cavuto:"I think that Mitt Romney botched a lot of things tonight."

Larry Kudlow: "I think there's a little too much valium in the Romney presentation tonight."

Matt Dowd: "But for the commander-in-chief, strong leader... he actually lost that strong leader tonight to the President."

Chuck Todd: "They're not claiming victory tonight... at times I felt like he was giving a book report, that there were a lot of world book facts that would show up in some of his answers."

John King: "There's no question debate coaches would score this one for the president."

Joe Trippi: "I just want to call this debate the big hug, because I think that's what Romney was doing. He decided he was going to hug Obama on policy after policy, not disagree with him."

Chuck Todd: "I was surprised at how meek at times Mitt Romney was."

Norah O'Donnell: "He repeatedly said that the President was right on issues, that he concurred with him on a number of issues. In fact, it was President Obama who said that Romney was having a hard time differentiating himself."

Martha Raddatz: "President Obama humanized what he was talking about. He talked a lot about the troops. He talked about the survivors from 9/11. He talked about the people in Israel. So if, in fact, he was going towards the female vote, he probably got their attention with that sort of approach."

ABC Fact Check: "One was when Mitt Romney repeated what he said before, that the President went on an apology tour when he became president. We've looked at all those speeches on those foreign trips. The President didn't apologize for America."

Howard Fineman: "The Obama people insist - and I think with some good reason - that Mitt Romney was just flat-out lying, not to put too fine a point on it, on the question of whether he, Mitt Romney, was willing to support direct federal help, the kind of help the President put forth, for the auto industry."

David Gergen: "I do think that the Democrats and President Obama have a legitimate argument. The guy who came into these debates was not the candidate we saw in the primaries. We go back to the etch-a-sketch."

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by: lowkell @ Tue Oct 23, 2012 at 11:00:03 AM UTC

Video: Romney laughably claims Syria is Iran's "route to the sea!" (0.00 / 0)

Of course, a quick look at any Middle East map will show you that Iran already has a long coastline, hence doesn't need a "route to the sea." In addition, Iran doesn't BORDER Syria, so there's no way it could be Iran's "route to the sea." Third, that statement shows a complete misunderstanding of the Syria-Iran alliance, which isn't about a "route to the sea," but about a number of other things (e.g., projecting Iranian power into the Levant region). Romney's frighteningly, deer-in-the-headlights clueless on foreign policy. Of course, his main "foreign policy" experience came when he was a Mormon missionary in France, dodging the Vietnam War draft and eating baguettes.

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by: lowkell @ Tue Oct 23, 2012 at 11:04:24 AM UTC

STATEMENT: THERE WAS ONE COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF ON STAGE TONIGHT (0.00 / 0)

STATEMENT: THERE WAS ONE COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF ON STAGE TONIGHT

CHICAGO -- Obama for America released the following statement from Campaign Manager Jim Messina in reaction to tonight's debate:

"Tonight America saw its Commander-in-Chief and someone who's not ready to be Commander-in-Chief. President Obama dominated tonight's debate because he was strong and steady and outlined a clear vision to make Americans safer and maintain our country's leadership in the world. He demonstrated that he knows a President has only one chance to get it right - and Mitt Romney has failed the Commander-in-Chief test every single time, including many times tonight. Romney was unclear, uncertain and unsteady, and his policies are reckless and wrong. President Obama will build on the progress of the last four years, honor our veterans, do some nation building here at home, and move us forward, not back to the same dangerous policies that crashed the economy and crushed the middle class."

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by: lowkell @ Tue Oct 23, 2012 at 11:05:37 AM UTC

Video: Obama - "If We Asked Pakistan for Permission, We Wouldn't Have Gotten Bin Laden" (0.00 / 0)

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by: lowkell @ Tue Oct 23, 2012 at 11:13:24 AM UTC

Video: Kerry - Romney Hid His Positions, Would Send Wrong Message To The World (0.00 / 0)

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by: lowkell @ Tue Oct 23, 2012 at 12:18:38 PM UTC

Video: Determination - Obama for America TV Ad (0.00 / 0)

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by: lowkell @ Tue Oct 23, 2012 at 12:21:13 PM UTC

Video - Biden: Romney Showed He's Not Ready To Be Commander-in-Chief (0.00 / 0)

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by: lowkell @ Tue Oct 23, 2012 at 12:35:50 PM UTC

Video - Romney Debate Strategy: Pretend to Agree with the President (0.00 / 0)

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by: lowkell @ Tue Oct 23, 2012 at 12:36:30 PM UTC

Video - Nicholas Burns: Romney Left His Positions Behind, Raising Serious Questions (0.00 / 0)

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by: lowkell @ Tue Oct 23, 2012 at 12:37:18 PM UTC

Video - Beau Biden: Romney Proved He'll Say Anything To Get Elected (0.00 / 0)

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by: lowkell @ Tue Oct 23, 2012 at 12:58:27 PM UTC

Something I noticed (1.00 / 1)

*Romney offers little contrast to Obama (I mean, why didn't Romney just ENDORSE Obama last night? He might as well have...)

In other words, Romney and Obama pretty much agree on most foreign policy issues.

*Robinson: Romney's weakest performance (Because Romney has absolutely no clue on foreign policy. ZERO.)

If Romney has no clue, that would mean that the President barely has a clue on foreign policy, wouldn't it? At least, if they agree on so much (and they do) then I think it stands to reason that the President is only marginally better than Romney (if at all), right?

For what it's worth (and lest anyone think me to be some Romney partisan), I don't trust either of them on foreign policy (or any other policy, for that matter). Either one will get us into another costly war, this time with Iran. Either one will continue to unnecessarily kowtow to Israel to the detriment of the United States and the peace process.  Either one will continue to murder innocent civilians in countries like Yemen and Pakistan in undeclared wars waged with aerial drones.

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by: pcaharrier @ Tue Oct 23, 2012 at 13:12:29 PM UTC

LOL (2.00 / 1)

I mean, seriously, if you couldn't see the light years worth of difference in terms of substance and knowledge by Romney (clueless, Etch-a-Sketching, redrawing the map of the Middle East so that Syria borders Iran, etc.) and Obama (knowledgeable, commanding, authoritative, etc.), then I don't know what to tell you. Also, realize that Romney's surrounded by Bush/Cheney, warmongering neoconservatives. So, now matter what he said last night, who he's chosen as his top foreign policy advisers tells us a lot more about what a Romney foreign policy would be (more of Bush/Cheney - shuddderrrr) than whatever nonsense he was spewing last night, including that he supposedly "agrees" with Obama on most everything (as usual, with pathological liar Willard, you can't believe a word he has to say on ANY subject).

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by: lowkell @ Tue Oct 23, 2012 at 13:37:40 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Lights years worth? Not hardly. (0.00 / 0)

It literally frightens me that Romney is surrounding himself with some of the people he's chosen for foreign policy advisers.  Don't get me wrong.

I'm looking at the President's actual policy decisions. He's started de facto wars in Yemen and Pakistan through the use of drones and in a few cases has used those drones to kill American citizens.  He almost falls over himself to convince people that he fully stands with Israel ("if Israel is attacked, America will stand with Israel. I've made that clear throughout my presidency.").  He is putting forward a policy toward Iran ("the toughest, most crippling sanctions ever") that will lead to war sooner or later ("we're not going to take any options off the table"). He sent American forces to Libya without congressional authorization.  He signed a bill codifying the indefinite detention of American citizens without charges or trial. He engages in baseless scaremongering on China.  He said of the sequestration cuts (including reduced defense spending) "It will not happen."  He sent 50,000 additional soldiers to Afghanistan as part of a second "surge" (much like President Bush did). He talks about labeling China a currency manipulator and what would amount to instituting tariffs (possibly setting off a trade war).

All of those positions are essentially identical to ones held by Romney.  What's more, they're extremely similar to what I would have expected to see had President Bush been in office over the last four years.  Obama and Romney (owing to their association with the two major political parties) are part of the bipartisan foreign policy consensus that exists in Washington.  The fact is that they agree on foreign policy much more than they disagree.  Where there are any differences, they are marginal.  Elect one of them and you'll get pretty much the same foreign policy as the other one.

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by: pcaharrier @ Tue Oct 23, 2012 at 14:06:50 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

We'll just have to agree to (strongly) disagree (2.00 / 1)

on this one.  

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by: lowkell @ Tue Oct 23, 2012 at 15:35:59 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Video: Andrea Mitchell Says She's Fact Checked "Apology Tour," and it did NOT HAPPEN (0.00 / 0)

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by: lowkell @ Tue Oct 23, 2012 at 18:54:17 PM UTC