from washington the plop the american original for over three decades ñ?by at& issue one. romney roaming. in his first overseas tour since becoming the republican party nominee in april, mitt romney is visiting three countries, the uk, israel, and poland.

strong u.s. allies, all. first stop the uk in london. mr. romney witnessed the opening of the summer olympic games. romney oversaw the winter games in 2002 in salt lake city, utah as president and ceo of the salt lake organizing committee. so, he was asked on wednesday whether the olympics in london looked quote unquote ready to him. >> there are a few things that were discontinue certificating the stories about the private security firm not having enough people, the supposed strike of the immigration and customs officials that obviously is not something which is encouraging. >> he also met with top british officials including uk prime minister david cameron at 10 downing street, talking middle east peace, among other topics. but the subject of the olympics seemed to prickal the prime minister, who made this statement in a press conference prior to meeting with mr. romney. >> we are holding an olympic games in one of the busiest,

most active bustling cities anywhere in the world. and of course it is easier if you hold the olympic games in the middle of nowhere. >> mr. romney at the th cameron london organizing committee. >> question is this trip helping to define the direction of mitt romney's foreign policy when and if he becomes president. pat buchanan? >> yes, it is john. but the crack about salt lake city being the middle of nowhere was almost a religious slur, i think. i thought he almost had an anglo mormon war going on here. but what mitt romney is doing is he has picked three poor american countries, great britain, poland and israel and part of his thesis is obama has neglected them or treated them shall bely in trying to deal with america's enemies rather than america's friends and he is going to be a strong ally of america's friends. but he has a real problem john. i think this trip is a tremendous risk for him. let's take the israeli part of

this. he is going to get the benediction of netanyahu, his old buddy. but it could cost him, people will push him to say when he would strike iran, would he back up an israeli trying strike and he wants to maintain his flexibility and field dom of action. his father did not in 1967 on foreign policy and got himself into horrible trouble. >> romney and netanyahu were both giving counsel to bane correct? >> no before bane. >> they are business buddies from way back. i think romney went over there, trying to assert that he has special, special relationship with britain and that he, somehow, would do better getting along with our traditional allies. and he did not get off to a very good start. he managed to insult the british by suggesting they can't handle the olympics and they may not come together. in fairness he was probably

speaking as a mechanic who oversaw the logistics and the security of a previous olympics, but the british press has been unmerciful toward him, calling him the nowhere man, comparing him to sarah palin, wondering if they are in for another gaffe prone president, and he has to get back to the gentle person. so the trip is turning out to be exactly the opposite of what he wanted. he wanted to bask in the glow of the olympics. he is skipping the one event where his wife's horse is performing, because that is

>> package for israel to counter any rights. >> that's the name of me. >> okay. next stop, israel. israel is the country mr. romney says he'll visit first

if elected president. in direct contrast to barack obama, who did not visit israel in his first term. although, like romney, he did so as candidate obama in 2008. romney meets with president obama benjamin netanyahu, who he has been friendly with since 1976 when both worked for the boston consulting group as corporate adviso. week, poland, prime minister donald tusk and later polish icon lech. poland has agreed to be part of the missile defense system. last march, four months ago during the gop primary, romney called russia the u.s. number o political foe. question. how do you rate mitt romney's overseas trip thus far? >> well it's been a failure so far, but he's only just begun.

now he is going to visit two of our strongest allies, and they are two governments where i would say president obama's approval ratings are probably upside down. they are very republican- leaning governments. romney said he's not going to take any questions or do any press conferences. ''s going to count on the american people by inference to somehow feel he would be better with the constituents he's trying to woo. i think it's marginal. i think any time romney spends not talking about the economy is time wasted -- >> yeah. >> in terms of his presidential ambition. >> do you think he has really taken a higher position on the stage simply by undertaking the mental rigger, the danger, if you will, of the trip? >> the risk. >> not the physical danger. >> no, the political risk, frankly, should have been zero in england and zero in poland. the risk is really in the middle east. look, syria is exploding. there's talk of going in and

attacking their chemical weapons. you've got iran at what point when the negotiations fail does israel attack will america back them up? i think the idea of him going in there and saying nothing and listening and waiting till he gets home, but he's going to be pushed to say something. >> i want to ask you a question. >> sure. >> since you are a world traveler. why poland? >> poland. i love poland. >> thanks for that. >> i will tell you why i love poland. [ laughter ] >> we can build around that. >> i think it resonatesp. >> does poland love you? [ laughter ] >> poland was one of the great stallworths in the cold war in fighting off the soviet union, so sort of the cold war aspect of remnants of american conservatism. >> what about the place -- [ all talking at once ] >> the place where missiles did. >> yes. [ all talking at once ] >> so obama shut down the missile defense in poland and czechoslovakia. they said it was appeasing

russia. >> let me jump ahead. does this have anything to do with the selection of a vice president? who are we thinking of? >> it's the best selection in the news story? >> his best selection? >> yes, for vice president. >> pawlenty. >> is pawlenty polish? >> no, i think he's middle eastern european. >> principally polish? >> i don't know if it's vulcan or not. >> why poland? >> there are a lot of polish -- [ all talking at once ] >> i'm not deb any grating polish. you have france. you have germany. did he deliberately not go to germany? >> why would you go to germany? >> why wouldn't you? [ all talking at once ] >> obama went there and got 200,000 people. >> he would not -- >> harrison would shall -- [ all talking at once ]

>> romney could probably get a couple of dozen people in a broth house. >> what did you think of that? >> i'm not making fun of him. >> i said romney would have gotten 150. >> are you making fun of romney? >> i don't know that, but i know that he's not the character that obama is. >> 's not a celeb -- he's not a celeb. >> obama went to cairo in six months, and it was a famous speech. >> did it cause the youth of cairo to rise up? >> i think he caused expectations to rise that were not realize. >> exit question. what nation did mr. romney not visit on this trip possibly deliberately? >> afghanistan where there's more troops than anywhere else in the world right now, i believe. >> that's correct. >> he visited nowhere because

there was no place else that he wanted to go because he just wants to criticize president obama. he doesn't want to say what he's going to do, so virtually any other country enwent to -- >> germany is far more powerful. >> but germany, we just made the point -- >> there's money. >> we just made the point that barack obama candidate went there and you don't want to invite a comparison. he should have gone to paris. >> right. he doesn't want people -- >> that's the last thing you want him doing. [ laughter ] >> he does not want to deal with the new socialist leader of france. >> eleanor -- >> sorry. [ all talking at once ] >> i think he wants safe places with conservative governments to burnish his image as a foreign policy player, and he has not been able to achieve that. >> all right. >> were you aware obama has upset the population? >> do you think obama is trying

to say, look, we've had this china infatuation. we've had crossing the pacific. let's go back to our true friends. >> romney? >> romney's saying that, not obama. >> let's go back to our two friend where's we have a seasoned friendship. >> there is something about romney's foreign policy that is very 1982. i think there is a kind of nostalgia for that day, and that's why he's going to poland. that's yes' focused on russia as our number one enemy, which sort of no one quite gets but him. and i think it appeals, as you were saying to the cold war warriors -- >> john -- >> do you hit american people have taken the clinton secretary of state and the obama bait about going in a new direction? or do you think they're having second thoughts now? fundamentally isolationist -- [ all talking at once ] >> it is a friends first

policy. >> friends first? >> that's what romney is saying, and these are our friends. >> if you read romney's book "apology," he takes his shots, too. this is not about reversing the trend of foreign policy. >> i'm not saying reversing. are they issue two, back to iraq. 116 iraqi citizens dead. 300 wounded. bombings and shootings throughout iraq this week. it was iraq's deadliest week in two years. al qaeda claimed the ongoing horror on radical islamist web sites. al qaeda declares it has launched a new jihad against iraq, vowing to retake areas it once controlled, thus pushing iraq into civil war. the attacks hit mostly sunni-

dominated areas with ethnically and religiously mixed populations. and get this, these attacks have come during the holy month of ramadan, the muslim month of fasting, which began last week. iraq's bloodshed coincides with an intensifying conflict. and neighboring syria. despite the horrific continuing assault on iraq, al qaeda is regarded by iraqi officials as significantly weaker than at its peak in 2006 and 2007. yet the nation is far from carter notes how the horror is multiplying itself. >> first of all, the daily killings. the struggle between the shiites and sunnies increased iranian resistance, the resentiment left by 100,000 iraqi civili, who's it a model for?

>> so what's the answer to dr. brzezinski's question? is iraq a model for anyone? tim carney, you may have to go into the history of how we got into iraq and what we expended there. >> iraq it different from afghanistan in one direction but different from the west in another direction. afghanistan, we've had a much harder problem building up a state and civil society at all because there wasn't sort of anything to build on. iraq, before we went in and did the regime change there was a regime. there was a civilization. so we've built something more stable. we haven't been able to keep al qaeda out, obviously so then we look at future regime changes. what'd we do in libya? even in iraq that had such a history of itself being a nation, maybe this whole project of nation building is

too risky. >> hold on for one minute. the u.s. costs, the lives and dollars in u.s. cost. >> reporter: okay, blood, sweat and many tears in our u.s. nine-year liberation and defense of iraq. 2003 to 2011, we have lost 4,485 american soldiers. we have spent almost $850 billion. that's over three-quarte trillion dollars on iraq. >> so how will history judge the involvement of the united states in iraq starting in 2003 and still ongoing in 2012, pat buchanan? >> i think it's the worst strategic brunder in american history, john. al qaeda now is trying to start a civil sectarian were to split the sunnies and anbar away from the main country to get together with the sunnies and syria, you could have a sunni-

shia war from lebanon and syria and total disaster, and we ignited it. >> what do you think? >> huge mistake, but you have to accept -- >> did you oppose it at the time? >> i opposed it from the beginning. >> so did i and so did he. >> initially, but now we're looking at when's going on in syria and the fact that gnat maliki regime in iraq is aiding assad because the aloites are closely in line with the shiites. you have the saudis with the rebels and there's great apprehension at what's happening in syria and the bloodshed in iraq could spill out into wider sectarian wars which we have no business being part of. >> walt? >> well, what you have is an ongoing civil war in both iraq and syria, slow burning with al qaeda at the margins willing to use horrendous violence to stir

up trouble and make a place for itself. >> do you recall a famous journalist who once said if you really want to get your ratings up as a politician, you have to have a war? do you remember that? do you remember who wrote that? >> i don't. >> do you remember who said that? >> i think it was you, john. [ laughter ] >> what about that? [ all talking at once ] >> you have to get a war? >> it was hemingway. >> no, it was not hemingway. >> hemingway talked about war and . two solutions. >> i think -- >> i issue exposed, dismissed, and punished. >> this conduct is contemptible. it betrays or national interest. it compromises our men and women in the field, and it demands a full and prompt investigation by a special counsel. what kind of white house would reveal classified material for political gain? >> republican presidential candidate mitt romney in a keynote address this week to

the veterans of foreign wars, squarely accused the white house of leaking national security data to the media. notably, leaks that included data about the u.s.' involvement in cyber attacks on iran. and president obama's quote unquote kill list of terrorists abroad, and details on how the raid on osama bin laden's compound was executed. he invoked the chairwoman of the senate intelligence committee, democratic senator diana feinstein who had just said this to the world affairs council. >> i think the white house has to understand that some of this is coming from its ranks. >> reporter: senator feinstein a day later tried to walk back her remarks, "i was asked whether the white house might be responsible for recent

national security leaks. i stated that i did not believe the president leaked classified information. i shouldn't have speculated beyond that because the fact of the mattere the fact of the matter is, f the leak." mr. romney says it's time to know. >> whoever provided classified information to the media seeking political add haven'tage for the administration must be exposed, dismissed, and punished. the time for stonewalling is over. >> question,romney exaggerating the danker to u.s. national security caused by these leaks? >> yes, he's really on thin ice here with these overheated charges. he's essentially saying the president betrayed the country. that's an awfully tough charge to make. there are a lot of people in the oval office, apparently, or in the situation room when the president is selecting these targets. i think we knew lyndon johnson when he did much the same thing

during the vietnam era. i don't know that getting this out damages national security. and romney is in london bragging about how he cy, which anybody's public schedule, and it is not something you disclose. so woo hoo, he just discthis go and occasionally it's serious, but this time it's not. >> she mentions lyndon johnson in this regard, but lyndon johnson was very unorthodox. he had a hound dog wand would lift the dog up bodily by the ears. what kind of person does that. do you have soming to say on this? >> -- something to say on this? >> he, i do. president obama has persecuted and prosecuted leakers in his own administration and used the page act dense go midwestic leakers more than all of the other presidents combined. he repeatedly goes after guys

that he leaks things that he doesn't find to be helpful mean time he leaks things in his own. >> diana feinstein says put this malware into thesontry few. >> if iran. >> it caused 1,000 of them to self-destruct and damaged their program. they leaked out how it got in there, how it got out of there. this is a national security -- >> it was leaked by the white house. >> let me tell you something else. >> you don't know that. >> that's the charge. >> barack obama or donelan know who leaked this stuff. this is right out of the situation room, the kill list. >> did obama authorize the leaking out of the white house? >> if he didn't, why doesn't he call predictions, pat? >> outside of syria has given autonomy to its kurdish provinces out there. if he stay was that, the turks will intervene in syria.

>> eleanor? >> richard carmona, formerly george w. bush's surgeon general now running as a democrat for u.s. senate? arizona will be a featured speaker at the democratic convention, possibly a keynoter. >> and ted will be in the senate as one of the five most conservative as long with jeff blake of arizona, jim demint, mike lee and rand paul. >> paul? >> they are not all elected. >> etch will think the upcoming debates in october and the presidential candidates will be absolutely decisive because the race is so short or so tight, but it will have no effect on the outcome. >> u.s. economic stagnation even with new stimulus will continue through august, september, and october freezing september, and october freezing the 44th u.s. president to

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