Romney on marriage

Romney on marriage and those crazy Europeans who are destroying it:

He also criticized people who choose not to get married because they enjoy the single life.

"It seems that Europe leads Americans in this way of thinking," Romney told the crowd of more than 5,000. "In France, for instance, I'm told that marriage is now frequently contracted in seven-year terms where either party may move on when their term is up. How shallow and how different from the Europe of the past."

It should come as no surprise that he delivered these remarks at Pat Robertson's Regent University. I don't know who "told" Romney about these seven-year marriage contracts, but it's just wrong. Bradford Plumer has his theory:

There's an Orson Scott Card novel in which marriages actually are contracted out for seven years (don't ask how I know). And Romney is a big fan of sci-fi. So maybe that explains it. Except that most people don't, you know, confuse space tales with real life.

The straw that broke this camel's back

Ok, Mitt, I can accept that you switched your views on abortion, gay rights, and campaign finance reform. People change. But now you're backing away from your embrace of Battlefield Earth? I'm sorry, my friend, but that's one flip-flop too far.

Romney blunder on Muslim Brotherhood

Matthew Yglesias points out a major blunder by Romney in last night's debate:

While Mitt Romney impressed me and most other reporters with his presentation, it would be good for some to observe that he also put forward a completely insane policy idea on the leading issue of the day:

We’ll move everything to get him. But I don’t want to buy into the Democratic pitch, that this is all about one person, Osama bin Laden. Because after we get him, there’s going to be another and another. This is about Shi’a and Sunni. This is about Hezbollah and Hamas and al Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood. This is the worldwide jihadist effort to try and cause the collapse of all moderate Islamic governments and replace them with a caliphate.

To put it bluntly, the trouble here is that the Muslim Brotherhood just isn't a violent terrorist organization, and certainly doesn't commit acts of violence against the United States. It's an extremely traditionalist multinational civil society organization. It's true that a lot of violent types used to be in the Brotherhood and now they're in terrorist groups, but used to be is the key phrase here, they left the Brotherhood because the Brotherhood wouldn't sign on for their agenda. In one clause, Romney's just gone and broadened the war to include a huge new category of people who have no intention of waging war against the United States or even against Israel.

...

Mitt Romney displayed zero understanding of political Islam or global terrorism, none of his Republican opponents called him on it, and as far as I know, nobody in the press (the same press, you'll recall, that's concerned with the Pursuit of Truth above all else) bothered to notice.

I remembering being surprised when Romney mentioned the Muslim Brotherhood, but I just assumed he was tossing out the names of as many Islamic political organizations as he could and got a little excited. I don't think Romney would actually be dumb enough to make opposition to the Muslim Brotherhood one of the pillars of his foreign policy. The organization may not be secular like our "friend" President Mubarak of Egypt, but, unlike him, they are willing to work within a democratic system.

The winners (and the loser) in the Republican debate

Unlike the Democratic debate, I think this was a debate with clear winners and losers. One winner was John McCain, who turned in a vigorous performance, got the most laughs of the night, and delivered a forceful response to questions about his age. On Iraq he did about as well as he could, given that he’s defending an escalation of the war. He managed to distance himself from Bush by criticizing the mismanagement of the war. He also stood out by slamming pork barrel spending and vowing to clean spending bill, saving special criticism for cost overruns in military bills. (My only question: who exactly is going to “follow us home” from Iraq? The Shiites? The Sunnis? Al Qaeda? I think it’s clear that even if we pull out that neither the Shiites nor the Sunni militias would tolerate an al Qaeda mini-state in Iraq.) Nonetheless, a strong performance overall from the senator from Arizona.

The other winner was Mitt Romney. He just seemed presidential. As a Massachusetts native, I’m not a huge Romney fan. He ran for governor as a pro-choice, pro-gay rights moderate, and then flip-flopped to set up his run for president. But I will say this: he certainly is competent and charismatic, and it showed on stage. He did a great job defending the Massachusetts health care plan.

The big loser was Giuliani. His defense of a woman’s right to choose stuck out like a sore thumb in the Republican field. Props to him for not completely flip-flopping like Romney, but it’s going to hurt him. His more moderate positions might be an advantage in the general election but they sure aren’t here.

As for everyone else: Ron Paul did a good job representing the paleoconservative wing of the party. Tom Tancredo managed to differentiate himself on immigration without frothing at the mouth like he usually does. (Although I’m a little disturbed by how completely he conflates American and Israeli interests. I’m all for supporting an ally, but still… ). Tommy Thompson did a decent job, but how exactly does he think he’s going to implement his partition plan for Iraq? The Iraqis don’t want it, and last time I checked we handed control of the government back to them. None of the other candidates really stood out.

Overall, the level of the debate was higher than I expected, but I don't think the party-line conservatism supported by most of the candidates stands a chance against the Democrats come 2008.

What does Mitt Romney love about Battlefield Earth?

In case you missed it, Mitt Romney recently declared that his favorite novel was L. Ron Hubbard's Battlefield Earth. Jon Swift knows why:

I'm sure that Romney must have had great sympathy for these misunderstood aliens who were trying to fit in to their new homeworld while at the same time defending their values by any means necessary. It's not easy being accepted when you're a furry nine-foot-tall, 1,000-pound alien with talons instead of fingernails. Being the governor of a blue state, Romney must have felt a bit like an alien himself.

Believe it or not, I've actually read Battlefield Earth. The whole thing. The reason was that I was going to Mexico and needed a big ol' book to keep me busy. I wouldn't call it great, or even particularly good, but it's not as terrible as many people make it out to be. You can't even tell it was written by a crazy person.