It's amazing how bad Romney bumbled this

[smorkingapple]

As soon as I heard the news, I was already getting the chills hearing the Jimmy Carter, 1979, weak, blah blah blah stuff for the next week plus. You know the media just wanted any reason to keep this race close. You know the Repub base was looking for any reason to re-ignite the "he loves Muslims, hates America, and makes us look weak card". This was literally a teed up softball for him.

This is Politics 101 and somehow this clown still completely shit himself. Here's how I would have played this using my completely craven and cynical mind:

1) Give out a standard condolence speech, giving thanks for service, reminding us how dangerous the world is and how America is a beacon for freedom or some shit like that. No need to mention Obama at all. He could have even thrown in some bit about being "briefed" about the situation as if he was actually in the loop. He would have looked "Presidential".

2) Wait 2-3 days, stick to normal economic themes and focus on the "Israeli rift". Let the surrogates do the dirty work. Build up steam on this front but do it slowly.

3) Give a major foreign policy speech, hit Obama hard on being weak, no friend of Israel, being Jimmy Carter part 2, say he's an appeaser, let the birther dogs loose, use the $$$ he has built up and just go hard at Obama with negative shit.

He could have easily carried this for a week, maybe more if more people died or another riot jumps off. The media would have lapped this up since they needed something to change the narrative of Obama coasting in for victory after the convention debacle. Obama put on defensive, forced to explain why he's not Jimmy Carter, how he is Israel's friend, all of that bullshit.

Somehow the "seasoned political vets" in the Romney campaign didn't understand how to capitalize on this. Somehow the candidate himself didn't see how this could have worked for him and turned his campaign around.

Ignore the incompetence showed as Commander in Chief here, from a pure political standpoint this was malpractice.

Bravo Mitt!!! Keep up the good job!!!!

[jpbroo]

1. Agree

As much as i'm sure we all agree that the statement from the Cairo embassy was akin to apologizing for our value of freedom of speech and hurting their "muslim feelings" I do agree Romney would have been better served to wait this one out.

[shraby]

2. Who in the world would ever want Romney to do the right thing? I'm pretty pleased as

punch that he didn't. He showed his ass. People can see his ass is dirty and unprincipled. The Dems know it, now many more do.

[Bluenorthwest]

4. The embassy statement was an attempt to quell violence and save lives-it was diplomacy.

It apologized for nothing and no one here will agree with you on that. What Mittens did was flat out stupid and risked the lives of our embassy personnel for his own gain, and that smirk at the end defines him and his blood soaked Party. I'm sure you agree.

[magical thyme]

8. um, that statement was no apology

for freedom of speech or anything else. It was a disavowal of the hatred and bigotry contained in a disgusting piece of filth that was intended to deliberately insult and smear a billion or so people in the world.

And it was a statement intended to quell the increasing anger at said filth in hopes of saving lives.

I think we can all agree that Romney 1. lied in attributing this statement to President Obama, 2. lied in calling the statement an apology, 3. is a self-serving, narcissistic, sociopathic creep who tried to score cheap political points off of the murders of people who actually work in service of our country.

To paraphrase First Lady Michelle Obama, "Running for President doesn't change who you are. It reveals who you are."

Despite his best attempts to hide who he really is, yesterday we got a good close look at who Mitt Romney really is.

[Indpndnt]

9. Lol! What reality are you from?

That statement was no apology. Your own apologies must be very unique if you think that statement qualified.

I think you're lost. **Edit** Tombstoned already! I knew you meant to post in freeperasylum.

[UCmeNdc]

16. No, I do not agree the statement from the Embassy was 6 hours before any violence broke out

The statement from the Embassy was made 6 hours before the demonstration and violence started. It was an attempt by Embassy staff on the ground to head off the problem that the embassy anticipated the film will cause. It was an attempt by the Embassy staff to distance the United States views away from the views presented in the film. In other words the Embassy working within the country knew this film views were being portrayed as being the United States' views of Muslim society by extremists within the country.

[lunatica]

17. What apology?

There was no apology. You really have to try harder than that.

[TwilightGardener]

22. WTF??

[frylock]

23. no, actually we don't all agree on that..

only an idiot would conflate condemn with apology. only an idiot.

[catbyte]

3. Weldome to DU!

Mom to Taz, Nigel, and baby brother Sammy, members of Dogs Against Romney, Cat Division
"Dogs Aren’t Luggage--HISS!”

and

"THANK YOU, DU, FOR SAVING OUR HOME!"

[jberryhill]

5. Yes, but

Obviously when a shit potato like this one pops up, you would at least want to see how it's handled before jumping in.

He did the same thing with the Chinese dissident.

Everyone knows the challenger is not the president, and it increases his cred to say, "We will not comment on a developing and sensitive international matter," wait till it reaches an interim break point, and then, even if it is handled well, find some thing or other to criticize.

I'm thinking he wants to look "decisive" and "action oriented", but he's coming off as unhinged.

Of course, the underlying cause could be that he's unhinged. But, for a guy with no convictions, no core beliefs, and no humanity, he even has to feign outrage when his principles du jour are being offended.

[TroyD]

6. Rasmussen is going to show ROMNEY back in the lead today

Just saw this on Twitter, although the poll isn't at RCP yet.

[Jennicut]

12. Scott Rasmussen is miscalculating on this. 47 to 46%? Laughable.

Fox News poll last night was an Obama five point lead and that was done from the 9th to the 11th, so very recent. If Rasmussen wants his polls to be taken seriously, he needs to deliver actual real polls.

[fleur-de-lisa]

7. He's being pressured by the rightwing shills to grow a pair of grapes . . .

but since he is devoid of any human characterisitcs, he doesn't have aclue as to when it's appropriate to speak, and what makes an appropriate statement. He is in full panic mode.

[SmittynMo]

11. Or as Palin called it, a stick

She's clueless too.

[TroyD]

13. I'd like someone to ask Palin what her foreign policy expertise is

I hope the rumor about FOX considering not renewing her contract next year is true.

[frylock]

24. look for CNN to pick her up if that's the case

[SmittynMo]

10. Rmoney is on a train with the bridge blown out ahead of him

and doesn't have a clue what's about to happen. Their campaign has been a total disaster for the past 3 months, daily.

[fleur-de-lisa]

14. It just keeps getting better . . .

Just when I begin to think he cannot POSSIBLY make things worse for himself, he sinks to a new low! Why is this election even remotely close? Because the pollsters and media hacks say it is!

[SmittynMo]

18. I think the biggest reason it's "supposedly" close is,,,

the right has an extreme hatred for Obama, and will vote for anyone the right puts in there.

[TroyD]

19. True. They're guaranteed a large chunk of the vote

It's just the reality of the 2 party system. When there are only 2 parties, anyone who doesn't like one party is pretty much forced to vote for the other one.

So all the people who dislike Obama vote Republican, even if the nominee is vile, and even if it's voting against their own interests.

Romney could say he murders little children and buries them in his backyard, and he will still get 45% of the vote.

[k2qb3]

15. This is the result of birtherism blowing back.

Remember four years ago the exchange McCain had with the "he's a muslim" lady? The hard right hated McCain for that, they've convinced themselves McCain lost because he didn't attack hard enough. So for four years they've been building a caricature of the president, muslim, kenyan, communist, he's apologizing for American values and isn't a real American, etc...but the idea has been he's not legitimate, he's not really the POTUS.

So now ever since the conventions in their desperation the right wing opinion makers have been pressuring Romney to get tough and hit the usurper hard. When the statement was made I'm sure those same opinion makers pointed it out to Romney, "here's a great chance to hit him hard on the apology meme we've been pushing for years, that invokes all the rest of the birther stuff".

So Romney makes a clumsy misleading political attack calibrated for that caricature, and it lands on the POTUS in the midst of a terrorist attack that killed a US ambassador. Oops...

What I can't understand is how he could be so foolish as to double down at that point, his advisers must be morons to allow him to give a presser like that. The birther crowd loved it because they're blinded by their hate, but everyone else is appalled by it. Now an event that could have been bad for the president politically has hurt Romney with everyone but the birthers, and none of them were undecided.

[CTyankee]

20. By the time this happened, I pretty much predicted that Romney would completely eff this

up. On the international stage, Obama and Hillary Clinton are hands down pros who know what they are doing. My political radar, developed over years of seeing certain realities in American politics (and destroying some of my favorite fantasies)told me that we'd come out winners in this.

You could also see the handwriting on the wall with Romney'sprevious track record of stepping in shit at every turn. No way was he suddenly gonna come up roses...

[Mtndreamer]

21. And people want to wait for the debate..

Myth has shown how dumb he is, and his small knowledge of foreign affairs.

Wonder what he was doing in Vt. during the DNC, obviously not reviewing Foreign Affairs..

But he does have a nice smirk though..

[MissMarple]

25. I think Romney chose to do it. What responsible advisor would encourage him do it?

They all must be winger ideologues suffering from a serious case of group think. But, primarily, Romney's a narrow visioned control freak.