PAWLEYS ISLAND, S.C., Oct. 18, 2007
Romney Calls The U.N. A "Failure"
GOP Candidate Says He Would Support "Coalition Of The Free Nations Of The World"
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Republican presidential hopeful, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney laughs in response to a reporter's question during a news conference at in Ohio on Wednesday (AP)
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The former Massachusetts governor said the U.N. Human Rights Council has repeatedly condemned Israel while taking no action against nations with repressive regimes.
"The United Nations has been an extraordinary failure of late," Romney said in response to a question at a pancake house along the coast of early voting South Carolina. "We should withdraw from the United Nations Human Rights Council."
Actually, the United States doesn't have a seat on the human rights council, which it has been boycotting.
Romney spokesman Eric Fehrnstrom later clarified the remarks.
"The governor believes we ought to withdraw completely from the U.N. Human Rights Council, and that means ending our financial support in addition to not seeking a seat on the council," Fehrnstrom said. "We should not legitimize the council, either with financial or diplomatic support."
Romney also said he would support a new "coalition of the free nations of the world and bring those nations together so that we can act together."
"We should develop some of our own — if you will — forums and alliances or groups that have the ability to actually watch out for the world and do what's right," Romney said.
Romney was sharing the political attention in this state with GOP rival John McCain, who is on his second consecutive day of campaigning here.
McCain, in an interview with The Associated Press on Tuesday, accused both Russia and China of causing gridlock in the U.N. Security Council and hindering the world body's ability to sanction Iran or address pressing matters in Darfur, Burma and other trouble spots.
If elected, McCain said he would form a league of democracies to circumvent the Security Council and enact tough sanction against Iran and other problem countries.
Romney, who has been criticized for his changing view on abortion, was also asked where he stood on the issue that is important to voters in this conservative state.
"I am pro life and I am proud to be pro life," Romney said.
The former governor also said he would oppose using federal dollars for abortions and would appoint Supreme Court justices opposed to abortions.
He said he opposes using cloning or practices that create human cells for stem cell research.
On Thursday, the Romney campaign also unveiled a Web ad featuring Romney's wife, Ann, praising Romney as a good father and husband against a video backdrop of family gatherings and horseplay. The ad, called "Our Home," comes just a day before Romney speaks in Washington to social conservatives at the Value Voters Summit. It also dovetails with Romney's recent pitch that the best way to guarantee the well-being of children is through two-parent families.
The Romneys have five sons and ten grandchildren. Of the leading Republicans in the presidential contest, Romney is the only one who has not been divorced.
"Mitt says his greatest success is being able to say 'I have been a good father, and a good husband,"' Ann Romney says in the ad. "Mitt says there's no work more important than what goes on within the four walls of the American home. And that's the way it was in our home."
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See all 28 CommentsLiberalism is dead
-Mitten Romney, a genuine dictator in the making. I have never voted for this neo-con in my native state. Shame on you Mitt!
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Posted by grazinggoat at 09:30 AM : Oct 19, 2007
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are you not voting for this guy because he is a republican or because he thinks that there are OTHER OPRESSIVE REGIMES OTHER THAN ISRAEL ..humm maybe palestine of some other middle eastern states?
-Mitten Romney, a genuine dictator in the making. I have never voted for this neo-con in my native state. Shame on you Mitt!
Posted by notblue at 04:08 PM : Oct 18, 2007
And don''t forget Rawanda a few years ago...and they finally made it to the Balkans after mass slaughter.
israel''s zionist politics is the root reason for terrorism world-wide. When the UK government finally came to the table with goodwill and concessions towards the catholic minority in Northen Ireland, the violence stopped, the terrorism stopped.
israel must return to her 1967 borders, pay repariations for the death and destruction she has reeked for 40 years on the Palestinians people, recognize the unwarranted attack on the USS Liberty and apologize for the deaths of over 40 US servicemen.
Posted by MityWhity at 04:09 PM : Oct 18, 2007
-If it''s a failure, it''a mainly due to our GOP attitude of protecting Israel''s defiant stance against all resolutions adopted by UN security counsel. Add to that the boycott our administration has adopted as a strategy to put pressure on the UN decision makers. The USA has, many times trailed the pack into UN budget shares attributed to our country, as a major contributor.
Still wondering why?
Translation - UN is worthless unless it bends over to the U.S. every single day. But for some reason it''s OK for the US to veto any bill it does not agree with, even if everyone else is for it.
Another US example of Democracy - do as I say, not as I do.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/757768.html
Israel Defense Forces has been rampaging through Gaza killing and demolishing, bombing and shelling, indiscriminately.
In large parts of Gaza there is no electricity. Israel bombed the only power station in Gaza, and more than half the electricity supply will be cut off for at least another year. Since there is no electricity, supplying homes with water is nearly impossible.
In the last two months, Israel killed 224 Palestinians, 62 of them children and 25 of them women. It bombed and assassinated, destroyed and shelled, and no one stopped it.
Israel drops innumerable missiles, shells and bombs on houses and kills entire families on its way to another assassination. Hospitals are collapsing with more than 900 people undergoing treatment. At Shifa Hospital, the only such facility in Gaza that might be worthy of being called a hospital, I saw heartrending scenes last week. Children who lost limbs, on respirators, paralyzed, crippled for the rest of their lives.
Families have been killed in their sleep, while riding on donkeys or working in fields. Frightened children, traumatized by what they have seen, huddle in their homes with a horror in their eyes that is difficult to describe in words. A journalist from Spain who spent time in Gaza recently, a veteran of war and disaster zones around the world, said he had never been exposed to scenes as horrific as the ones he saw and documented over the last two months.
The UN is a BIG failure.
The US should have gotten out long ago.
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africa, burma and the americas will disagree with you..the only one that does not the dictatorships that run those countries..without the UN, these dictatorships would not be able to shield themselves from an onslaught of world demands to step down..
oh by the way, i think the "americans" had given up on the UN a long time ago..
No shiit, Sherlock! If you promise to relocate the UN to Haiti, I''ll vote for YOU!
Oh, and by the way, Mormonism is a stupid religion.
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