Mitt Romney: 'We can't lead the world by hoping our enemies will hate us less'

Coincidence or not, President Obama and a Republican frontrunner who would replace him, Mitt Romney, gave dueling speeches to American veterans today. Romney to the Veterans of Foreign Wars in San Antonio, Obama to the American Legion in Minneapolis.

As we often do, we are publishing the full texts of both addresses so that Ticket readers can see for themselves the scope and nuance of the men's spoken words.

First, some Romney excerpts:

Today we are united not only by our faith in America. We are united also by our concern for America....

Have we ever had a president who was so eager to address the world with an apology on his lips and doubt in his heart? He seems truly confused not only about America’s past but our future....

We stand near a threshold of profound economic misery. Four more years on the same political path could prove disastrous...

This is the first time in my memory that massive defense cuts were proposed without any reference to the missions that would be foreclosed and the risks to which our country and its men and women in uniform would be exposed. Cuts of this magnitude can only be the product of one of two mistaken beliefs.

On the one hand is wishful thinking that the world is becoming a safer place. The opposite is true.  Consider simply the Jihadists, a near-nuclear Iran, a turbulent Middle East, an unstable Pakistan, a delusional North Korea, an assertive Russia, and an emerging global power called China.  No, the world is not becoming safer.

And so, on the other hand, that leaves us with the belief that America should become a lesser power. It flows from the conviction that if we are weak, tyrants will choose to be weak as well; that if we could just talk more, engage more, pass more U.N. resolutions, that peace will break out.  That may be what they think in that Harvard faculty lounge, but it’s not what they know on the battlefield!

But American leadership is more than a budget fight. America must lead with clarity of intent, a commitment of purpose and unlimited resolve....

Our Air Force is now older and smaller than it has been for decades. Our Navy has fewer ships than it is has had since World War One. The Navy says it needs 313 ships to fulfill its missions around the world.  It only has 284 ships and we’re on track to drop down to the low 200s....

During World War Two, we built 1,000 ships per year with 1,000 people in the Bureau of Ships – the purchasing department, if you will. In the 1980’s we built 17 ships per year, with 4,000 people in purchasing. Today, for 9 ships a year, it takes 25,000 people!

We’ve lost a couple of years, but we haven’t lost our way....

Now, here is the full Romney text:

Gov. Mitt Romney's Address to the Veterans of Foreign Wars, as provided by his office

It’s a privilege to be addressing the veterans who defended our liberty in the past, and who defend the memory and dignity of every veteran today.

I was born in 1947 – a quintessential baby boomer. I grew up in the shadow of....

Ron Paul: Could he win the Iowa caucuses?

Could the guy from Texas possibly win the Republican Iowa caucuses come January? And kick off the actual GOP nomination race with a surprising big bang?

By 'the guy from Texas' we don't mean Gov. Rick Perry, who announced his own candidacy before a gathering of conservative writers in South Carolina Saturday. He could well win it too.

But we're talking now about the other Texan in the Republican race, the elderly 11-term congressman named Ron Paul.

Once upon a time the libertarian-like Paul was considered a fringe candidate.

He still is.

The trouble for mainstream Republicans is that Paul's devoted disciples just keep on carving out apparent victories for the kindly old guy, whose son Rand is now a U.S. senator from Kentucky. The senior Paul is an Air Force vet and retired ob-gyn. He's now five years older than John McCain was when everyone said John McCain was too old to move into the White House.

History would suggest he has little or no chance of becoming the nominee, let alone the president. But history also suggests that a dedicated band of hardcore believers could in a crowded field produce an upset win for Paul come that chilled caucus night in January. It worked for Huckabee, who won the caucuses in 2008 after finishing second in the 2007 straw poll.

Most of the attention from Saturday's Ames Straw Poll has focused on another House member, Michele Bachmann of Minnesota via Iowa. With a gritty determination and fresh appeal, Bachmann captured the straw poll win, which is meaningless except from a PR point of view.

It thrust her onto five of the Sunday blab shows making rare forays outside the Beltway, giving her a national podium to reach millions of Americans. This week she's in South Carolina.

But less noticed was Paul's showing, second place, only 152 votes behind the media starlette. Think he would have been invited onto all five Sunday shows?

Uh, no.

But it's interesting to speculate on Paul's outlook. Since 2008, the issues and the electorate have moved in his direction.

Everyone agrees Tim Pawlenty is a really decent guy, accomplished as Minnesota's governor and well organized in Iowa. But he badly trailed Paul Saturday and dropped out Sunday. Why?

One good reason is Pawlenty's calm, reasoned demeanor did not reflect the high-octane....

Iowa GOP Debate: No Perry or Palin, but plenty of verbal punches

  
Tim Pawlenty and Michele Bachmann swiped at each other; Rick Santorum and Ron Paul traded shots; Newt Gingrich slapped Fox News; Mitt Romney was all business but was nice to Herman Cain; and Jon Huntsman Jr. said his economic plan "is coming."

The GOP debate Thursday night in Ames, Iowa (on a far less glitzy set than CNN used for its June debate in New Hampshire), two days before the Ames Straw Poll, was hardly the lovefest that some critics might have expected, with half of the press panel drawn from the perceived conservative stronghold of Fox News Channel.

The candidates went after each other, went after the president, and a few times, went after the questioners.

(Only candidates polling 1% or higher in nationally recognized polls were invited. Among those left out was Thaddeus McCotter, who is nevertheless participating in the straw poll.)

Held at Iowa State University, the debate featured questions from Fox News Channel anchors Bret Baier ("Special Report") and Chris Wallace ("Fox News Sunday"), and Washington Examiner writers Byron York and Susan Ferrichio.

Among the highlights ...

Obama, as suspected, disregarded the Afghan troop drawdown recommendation of Gen. Petraeus

Testifying before a Senate committee today, the commander of allied forces in Afghanistan confirmed under oath what many had suspected: 

In his speech Wednesday evening, President Obama disregarded the preferred troop drawdown choice of his top general, David Petraeus, now headed to become director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Obama clearly appeared to be paying attention to the anti-war left wing of his party and to war-weariness reflected in polls after a 10-year conflict that began when he was a mere state senator.

Obama was in Manhattan again tonight for a series of Democratic fundraisers, including one with TV hostess Whoopi Goldberg, with the June 30 first-quarter reporting deadline approaching.

The widely-admired four-star general was the architect of the successful Iraq troop surge that Obama also opposed as a U.S. senator but that has now enabled him to drastically reduce U.S. forces there.

The 58-year-old Petraeus couched his committee answers in the standard Washington etiquette acknowledging civilian control of an obedient military.

However, his forthright replies rapidly reverberated across the Capitol, where so many in the political business are so ready to believe that the accelerated troop withdrawals were ordered by the Democrat more to enhance his troubled reelection plans, than because they would enhance the cause of crushing terrorist forces in Afghanistan.

Under questioning, Gen. Petraeus admitted today, "The ultimate [drawdown] decision was a more aggressive formulation, if you will, in terms of the timeline than what we had recommended."

He then quickly added, "The fact is, there has never been a military commander in history who has had all the forces that he would like to have, for all the time, with all the money, all the authorities, and nowadays all the bandwidth as well.”

"Obviously, he preferred options that gave more time," Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates confirmed to Agence France Press. Gates too is leaving the Defense Department after years of service under two presidents and reportedly disagreeing with Obama over starting a third war by attacking Libya.

Michigan's Sen. Carl Levin, a Democrat who's been pressuring Obama for....

What they're saying about Obama's plan to withdraw troops from Afghanistan

President Obama gave his latest Afghanistan war speech Wednesday evening, announcing his decision to withdraw 10,000 of the 100,000 U.S. troops there by the end of this year and another 23,000 by the fall of 2012.

His complete speech text is right here.

Here are some excerpted reactions to the president's decision from across the political spectrum.

GOP House Speaker John A. Boehner of Ohio:

I am pleased the president recognizes that success in Afghanistan is paramount. Continuing to degrade Al Qaeda’s capabilities in Afghanistan and the surrounding region must take priority over any calendar dates. It’s important that we retain the flexibility necessary to reconsider ...

Obama starts Afghan troop drawdown with 10,000 this year, 23,000 more before 2012 election

 

President Obama's remarks on Afghan war and U.S. troop drawdown, as provided by the White House

Good evening. Nearly ten years ago, America suffered the worst attack on our shores since Pearl Harbor.  This mass murder was planned by Osama bin Laden and his al Qaeda network in Afghanistan, and signaled a new threat to our security – one in which the targets were no longer soldiers on a battlefield, but innocent men, women and children going about their daily lives. 

In the days that followed, our nation was united as we struck at al Qaeda and routed the Taliban in Afghanistan. Then, our focus shifted. A second war was launched in Iraq, and we spent enormous blood and treasure to support a new government there. 

By the time I took office, the war in Afghanistan had entered its seventh year. But

Obama's speech on the Afghanistan war: Draining a political mess of his own making

Here's some important new information that President Obama should certainly leave out of his big Afghanistan speech Wednesday evening:

Only 12% of people in our most important regional ally, Pakistan, now have a positive view of the United States. And only 8% express confidence in the American leader to do the right thing, according to a new Pew Research Center poll.

This could have something to do with deadly U.S. drone raids on Pakistan and the assassination of Osama bin Laden there in a commando incursion; a whopping 14% of Pakistanis think the latter was a good thing.

Full Transcript of Obama Speech

Obama's speech from the White House this evening will be his third major address on Afghanistan, now ...

As Obama talks war, Americans see economic gloom: 66% wrong track and only 23% sense any recovery

It's been 11,194 days since Gov. Ronald Reagan delivered his devastating closing lines in Cleveland during the last debate of the 1980 campaign against President Jimmy Carter.

Reagan said:

Are you better off now than you were four years ago? Is it easier for you to go and buy things in the stores than it was four years ago? Is there more or less unemployment in the country than there was four years ago?

Is America as respected throughout the world as it was? Do you feel that our security is as safe, that we're as strong as we were four years ago?

And if you answer all of those questions yes, why then, I think your choice is very obvious as to whom you will vote for. If you don't agree, if you don't think that this course that we've been on for the last four years is what you would like to see us follow for the next four, then I could suggest another choice that you have.

Within three days, internal Carter tracking polls detected the incumbent's narrow lead melting into a Reagan avalanche that cascaded into 12 years of Republican dominance in the White House.

In the 503 days remaining before the 2012 presidential election, you may hear a Republican candidate ask some similar rhetorical questions, according to a new Bloomberg National Poll out this morning.

In fact, you may have already heard something along these lines.

Twenty-five months into what was supposed to be the economic recovery of the Obama-Biden administration, the poll finds a whopping 66% of Americans believe the country is on the wrong track. They no longer buy the oft-used inherited-big-economic-hole line.

Reagan had some rocky economic times too during his first two years, but his wrong track numbers never topped 57%.

Despite all the Joe Biden promises, only 23% of Americans say they see any signs of economic recovery. Only one-in-ten expects employment to recover within two years.

In fact, Americans 44-34 say they are worse off now than when Aretha Franklin sang and Barack Obama took the oath of office with a 69% approval rating.

Ominously for Democrats, who already suffered the loss of the House last election day, a sizable majority (55%), including 40% of Democrats, now agree with the congressional GOP position that tax and spending cuts are more likely to reduce unemployment than Obama's preferred stimulus spending.

Even worse for national leadership campaigns that usually rely on morning in America optimism for success, another 55% of poll respondents say their children are condemned to a lower standard of living than their parents have today.

This all sounded somehow strangely familiar to us early this morning. But how could that be? The Bloomberg findings had just come out.

So, we went back and re-read our published transcript of the GOP presidential campaign announcement speech of Gov. Jon Huntsman from Tuesday. His new advance people experienced a rash of rookie mistakes on opening day.

But here's what Huntsman said on the same site near the Statue of Liberty where Ronald Reagan launched his successful 1980 campaign:

Today Americans are experiencing, through no fault of their own, something that is totally alien to them -- a sense that the deck is stacked against them by forces totally beyond their control.

No matter how hard they work, save and plan, the opportunities are not there for them as were present for previous generations. Perhaps saddest of all, we have lost faith in ourselves.

For the first time in history, we are passing down to the next generation a country that is less powerful, less compassionate, less competitive and less confident than the one we got.

You don't suppose Huntman's done some polling too and detected the same corrosive currents that are historically so politically lethal for incumbents?

 -- Andrew Malcolm

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Photos: J. Scott Applewhite / Associated Press; Associated Press (Reagan-Carter debate, Oct. 28, 1980); Shannon Stapleton / Reuters (Huntsman, June 21).

Obama's unauthorized war on Libya costs $9,421,000 a day: Are you getting your money's worth?

The Obama administration is spending almost $9.5 million every single day to blow things up in Libya because the president has determined that is in the country's national interest, this country's national interest, not Libya's.

You may not have noticed the $392,542 flowing out of the national treasury every hour, day and night, since those first $1.5 million Tomahawks flashed from the launch tubes back on March 19.

But Libya's dictator Moammar Kadafi has. Not enough to quit, mind you, because he can hide while his troops do the dying and killing.

Kadafi's military might has been degraded sufficiently by allied missiles and bombs to perhaps create a long-lasting stalemate with rebel forces in the desert conflict that Obama initially promised House members would last a matter of days, not weeks.

Thirteen weeks later Obama, who was elected running against the war in Iraq, finds himself also embroiled in an escalating constitutional conflict at home over another war that he started while touring South America with his family in March.

You may recall that nine days later the Real Good Talker did what he usually does when attacked; he gave a speech to address the outcry over the sudden conflict without meaningful congressional consultation.

"When our interests and values are at stake, we have a responsibility to act," the Democrat declared. The president made the case that Kadafi was a ruthless ruler, who vowed "no mercy" on his own protesting countrymen. Obama added:

We knew that if we waited one more day, Benghazi – a city nearly the size of Charlotte – could suffer a massacre that would have reverberated across the region and stained the conscience of the world. It was not in our national interest to let that happen. I refused to let that happen.

The trouble is that numerous bad guys are killing their own people all the time around the world. Syria comes immediately to mind as a place where government security....

First debate overview: A bunch of GOP colleagues get together to criticize President Obama

President Obama was the big loser in Monday night's New Hampshire Republican debate, the first with the frontrunner.

Obama, of course, wasn't there. The Democrat and his wife were on opposite sides of the country doing -- guess what? -- a packet of political fundraisers. She was in Los Angeles rounding up Hollywood cash and he was in Miami for a trio of moola events, en route to another fundraiser in Puerto Rico today.

In New Hampshire the existing field of seven Republicans had different missions going into the 120-minute rhetorical tussle. There was a bothersome hectic air about the show. Being TV, host John King was constantly stressing time, time, time, as if there weren't 14 months until the convention and 512 days until the 2012 election. And who cares if Anderson Cooper's show starts late?

So the candidates had a whole 60 seconds to explain various stands plus 30-second responses. Any depth was accidental. (The full two-hour transcript is available here. Good luck with that.)

For Rick Santorum, Herman Cain, Tim Pawlenty and Michele Bachmann, it was....