Romney, Bush, Cheney, and Middle East Policy

[imreallyperplexed]

Given that a number of righties are taking issue with President Obama's speech to AIPAC this morning, it seems worth musing about Republican front-runner, Mitt Romney's "loosey-goosey" position on Iran. It looks like Mitt may be reading the tea-leaves and shifting his stated position on Israel and Iran to seem closer to that of Ron Paul. Since there likely won't be any more debates (where someone might call him on past positions on Iran) and he has a very well-funded (and totally unaccountable) Super Pac to spread "mistruths," I think that it is proper to suspect that Romney may well try to "play politics" with the Middle East. Sad but true.

To give my suspicions a little more substance, here are two examples of Romney supporters with ties to the Bush-Cheney foreign policy team.

This link details the antics of John Bolton, Bush's former ambassador to the UN.

http://mediamatters.org/research/201202290019

Bolton endorsed Romney.

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2...fense-posture/

Liz Cheney is another example:

http://www.tabletmag.com/scroll/9293...within-limits/

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,326374,00.html

Sadly, Darth Romney, the flip-flopper in chief is even worse on Iran than folks like Gingrich and Santorum. Though I strongly disagree with both Gingrich and Santorum, at least they are honest and straightforward. Romney - at best - is assured to flip-flop on these issues. At worst, Romney is a bald-faced liar in the Bush-Cheney Middle East tradition. Given what I have seen from Romney, GWB, and Cheney, I go on the assumption that he is a bald-faced liar who has no credibility.

 

[BitterPill]

Romney's foreign policy team is top-heavy with Bush's neo-cons:

George W Bush has not been a central topic in this GOP election cycle but significant elements of his administration are lurking in the shadows of the Romney campaign. Twenty three of Romney's senior advisers served under Bush in some capacity, several serving in key roles in the administration. ​

http://milwaukeestory.com/index.php...licy-advisers-served-under-george-w-bush-360/

Some people never learn, and Romney is one those.

 

[NightSwimmer]

Mitt Romney doesn't have a policy position. If he were to be elected, we'd have foreign policy by committee, and that committee would consist of the same PNAC neocons that ran the George W. Bush White House. Mitt's just a spokes-model.

 

[fairsheet]

The Fox/GOP's cut/slash/austerity meme would never work. It didn't work for Reagan and we'd be silly to assume that it will work now. Therefore, a theoretical Pres. Mitt would be left with no choice but to do exactly as Reagan did. He would need to pimp foreign fear/hate, in order to justify massive increases in federal spending, in the military/defense sphere.