5 Flat-Out Untruths in Romney's VFW Speech Posted by Heather Hurlburt

Marco Rubio, Chris Smith, Jon Huntsman, even Bill Kristol and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen can give speeches fiercely disagreeing with Administration foreign policy while sticking to largely-agreed facts.  Why can't Mitt Romney?

1. "Obama's billion dollars of defense cuts." Well, the Administration proposed $498 million over ten years, which Congress has not yet actually approved, and Republicans have attempted to up.  Meanwhile, the Budget Control Act negotiated by Republicans and Democrats would require $500 million more in cuts over ten years if Congress doesn't act by December. By that rationale, the military medals of that two-star down the hall from me are mine, too.

1a. "cuts have no strategy." Again, taking just the $498 million reduction in growth over a decade that the Admin proposed, it flowed from the strategy review that the Pentagon issued this past January. You could disagree with that strategy. But that would require you to offer a counter-strategy.

2. Allegedly bashing Israel at the UN. Romney didn't say which of Obama's annual UN speeches he was criticizing:  the most recent one, on which Israel advocates "heaped praise" for its opposition to Palestinian moves for statehood (and after which his popularity "surged" in Israel; or his first one, where he spoke eloquently to world leaders about Israeli hopes for security and peace.

3. "Apology tour." If only the Washington Post's Glenn Kessler for every time I mention his comprehensive debunking of this wholly untrue conservative favorite. In reality, being Barack Obama means never having to say you're sorry. (You get Secretary Clinton to do it for you.)

4. Supposed decline in our allies' view of us. Among the allies whose publics view us more favorably than in 2008 are Romney destinations Britain and Poland. Count for yourself.

5. Hugo Chavez "introducing" Hezbollah into the hemisphere on Obama's watch. Sadly, Hezbollah has been money laundering in the hemisphere since the 1980s and may have been involved in the Buenos Aires Jewish center bombing back then. Let's not give Chavez credit for stuff he only wishes he had been responsible for. It hasn't managed to pull off anything at all during the last four years -- as Obama pointed out recently.