As Heather already noted, Willard made a big show out of making these outrageous and specious claims about Iran: We must not allow Iran to have nuclear weapon. If they do, the world changes. America will be at risk. And some day nuclear
February 23, 2012


[h/t Heather]

As Heather already noted, Willard made a big show out of making these outrageous and specious claims about Iran:

We must not allow Iran to have nuclear weapon. If they do, the world changes. America will be at risk. And some day nuclear weaponry will be used. If I'm President, that will not happen. If we re-elect Barack Obama, it will happen," he said at the CNN Republican debate on Wednesday night.

That he made such a claim comes as no surprise. After all, Newt Gingrich made this insane claim in the same exchange:

This is an administration which, as long as you're America's enemy, you're safe.

And let's not leave out Rick Santorum:

In the meantime, when the radicals in Egypt and the radicals in Libya, the Muslim Brotherhood, when they rise against either a feckless leader or a friend of ours in Egypt, the president is more than happy to help them out.

When they're going up against a dangerous theocratic regime that wants to wipe out the state of Israel, that wants to dominate the radical Islamic world and take on the great Satan, the United States, we do nothing. That is a president that must go. And you want a leader who will take them on? I'll do that.

Three outrageous claims in the span of six minutes, and a moderator who followed up with each of them asking what exactly they might do to stop Iran, a sovereign country, from arming themselves with nuclear weapons.

Oh, wait. No, John King said nothing. Nothing. No followup with Willard on his claim that he, and he alone would prevent that nation from arming. No followup with Newtie about whether he consulted with Gaddafi and Bin Laden before making such an inane statement. And no followup with Santorum about how he could refer to the United States as the Great Satan while claiming Satan was attacking the United States.

Crickets.

So let's be serious for a minute. Three out of the four candidates were calling for war against Iran even though we have no proof they are even trying to build nuclear weapons or want to. Only one candidate on that stage had a lick of sense, and his words were carefully parsed. Ron Paul said this:

The Iranians can't possibly attack anybody. And we're worrying about the possibility of one nuclear weapon. Now, just think about the Cold War. The Soviets had 30,000 of them. And we talked to them. The Soviets killed 100 million people and the Chinese, and we worked our way out of it.

And if you want to worry about nuclear weapons, worry about the nuclear weapons that were left over from the Soviet Union. They're still floating around. They don't have them all detailed. So we're ready to go to war. I say going to war rapidly like this is risky and it's reckless.

Barack Obama agrees with him, at least with regard to loose nukes and diplomatic solutions, though Ron Paul also stated our opposition to them having nuclear weapons is encouraging them to obtain one. Still, early in his administration he identified the loose nuclear weapons issue as the biggest threat to national security we have, and set to doing something about it. Here's what Jeffrey Goldberg at The Atlantic has to say about Iran and Obama:

There is another reason we have arrived at this moment of high tension: The Obama Administration, through its stalwart opposition to the Iranian nuclear program, has narrowed Iran's maneuverability, and forced the regime to make some obvious errors (the alleged sponsorship of an attempt to kill the Saudi ambassador in Washington, for instance). It is precisely because the Obama Administration has constructed a sanctions program without precedent, and because the Obama Administration has funded and supported multinational cyber-sabotage efforts against the Iranian nuclear program, that Iran is panicking and lashing-out.

It is not only Israeli leaders who have doubted Obama's commitment to stop Iran's nuclear program; Iran's leaders themselves didn't take Obama seriously. After all, George W. Bush labeled Iran's government a member of the axis of evil, but then did nothing much at all to thwart its ambitions. But Obama, while avoiding rhetorical drama, has actually done more to stop Iran than the Bush Administration ever did.

Why didn't John King force these warmongering bloodthirsty candidates to admit they want a war with Iran? They should have had to go on the record about it, because they would have discovered that only 17 percent of Americans think we should go to war with Iran, regardless of what Fox News says. And yet that's what each and every one of those candidates whose name is not Ron Paul was saying on that stage Wednesday night. They were standing up there saying that war with Iran is inevitable, and that President Obama is some kind of wimp for not engaging in that fashion.

Why was John King silent? Could it be because war is profitable for CNN? After all, their ratings soar when there's a war or breaking news. Or is he a collaborator?

Someone had better step up soon and force these candidates to actually talk turkey about what they think they will do as President. As long as they get to make sweeping pronouncements with absolutely no foundation or follow through, they just throw red meat to the bloodthirsty and then wear it like a badge of honor.

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