Can they still be called gaffes?

Because at this point, I just think he really is that stupid and unreasonable.

Can it still be a gaffe if you truly mean it and do not know a better way to comport yourself?

Libya and Egypt are two cuntries in serious flux. One would expect violence to erupt by different factions. A president must be smart and able to see the larger picture. Rmoney is neither of those things.

What is it with conservatives hatred of "apology?"

Do they truly believe foreign policy in today's world can be accomplished entirely with blustering, chest thumping, and cock swinging?

Calculated "apologies" can be immensely more effective than brash, egotistic bellowing.

Conservatives aren't stuck in the 1950's... they're stuck in pre-history.

Romney is playing his losing hand awfully early.

One can maneuver away from extremism after a primary much easier than in the middle of an election. His “Apologizer & Chief” rhetoric will only appeal to one extreme. This is a Hail Marry end of game move.

Not many people want to follow a leader who will stand by their own non-fact-based decisions no matter what & stack lies so thick a single sound bite couldn’t tear them apart.

@3
"Do they truly believe foreign policy in today's world can be accomplished entirely with blustering, chest thumping, and cock swinging?"

Yes.
Which is why they insist on spending so much on our military.
Having the biggest guns and itching to use them means never having to say you're sorry.
Which is also why we only pick on the smaller, weaker countries.
Which is why Iran is so intent upon getting a nuke of their own.

Ooops. Countries damnit.

The US provided $1 billion in military support of Europe's successful effort to overthrow the Gaddafi government, an effort that depended on aligning with Islamic extremists in Libya.

Can you say "blowback"? I knew you could!

Willard seems not to understand that Bush was re-elected, in large part, because we were in 2 wars and Americans are a bunch of jingoistic rah-rahs. You can't get to the right of a man who kills muslim insurgents by the score every day, and has the scalps of Bin Laden & Gaddafi to boot.

Way to go, Pastor Terry Asshole Jones.

@7: Damn straight. There was no violence directed against Americans or American interests when Gaddafi was in charge.

Never. Not once.

If I was the people who did this, I'd be a lot more scared of what Obama said he'd do than any flip-flop response from Mittens.

I just watched the avaialble trailers for the film "Innocence of Muslims" which is the supposed trigger for these riots in Egypt and Libya. What ever one may think of Islam, this movie stinks and is the dirtiest sort of bigotry. I don't believe that murderous rioting is a justifiable response, but I do beleive that the movie was made as a provocation.

@8 Thanks for mentioning the real instigator of this bs, which is a right-wingnut, the kind of lunatic that Romney is working so hard to pander to. If there's an ounce of sanity or reason among conservatives these days, I'd like to see it.

@3, Did you watch the Bush II administration at all? O_O

-------------------------
To Paul's blog piece:

"but it remains to be seen how patient the American people are going to be about this."

Uhm, not to sound crass or anything --and condolences to the families of the diplomats who died in a horrible way-- but I don't think the "American people" are going to even remember this next week. They were relatively nameless envoys to a war-torn land. Also, there's only so much justice you can dispense to a fire-toting mob once the smoke has already cleared.

Perhaps we should consider justice be wrought upon the makers of the film --if @11 is right and it's the dirtiest sort of bigotry and was in fact made as deliberate provocation-- then they have blood on their hands too.

@13: Well, it was partially financed by Terry Jones, as well as being directed by an Israeli who claims that Islam is a "cancer."

So yeah, I am guessing this is exactly what the filmmakers/backers wanted. They are the worst types of people, and deserve nothing but the worst life has to offer.

It was weird. I heard Romney's statement, and he starts out obviously trying to make the kind of statement that he'd make if he were president right now -- he's all dignified and saddened and the amazing part is that he's not actually doing a bad job of it.

Then he takes that right turn into Obama-bashing and any pretense toward statesmanship just vanishes in an instant. He sounds petty, partisan, ignorant... completely unpresidential.

@14: It's becoming apparent that "Sam Becile" doesn't exist under that name, and according to one of the "consultants" on the film is probably not Israeli or Israeli-American. I suspect this "consultant" - a right-wing nutjob in Riverside, CA named Stephen Klein - is about to have himself a chat with the FBI, since he's quoted as saying "we pretty much expected this [i.e. violent action] to happen", and it's looking more and more as if the Bengazi attack was premeditated.

All American adminitrations have been so naive. They've figured that if you remove a dictator's foot from off the people, those people will immediately, or at least eventually, create a democracy. Instead, the Arab Spring is turning into an Islamist Summer. Even the so-called moderate Islamist Muslim Brotherhood's Egypt president has said that women must not expect to be treated equally -- the treatment of women is an indicator of what will come. Romney's an idiot and doesn't understand anything, but various Presidents and the State Department aren't much better. Those who claim that these attackers are not X or Y or Z are simply hoping that they're not. We don't know where this will go, but we can guess.

@18,

All administrations? What about the ones that unapologetically supported dictatorships for years and years?

And all this is done in the name of God!
I believe that when all those people who preach hate and intolerance in the name of God meet him or her or what!
God will look them in the eye and say
" YOU did this in my name! what kind of an ass hole are you"!

Of course, we'll never see a discussion of how their sand-nigger-support enabled the murder of Americans in foreign nations. They don't see themselves culpable in the slightest. All they care about is the closing of some shitty sandwich shop and the opening of some shitty coffee shop on the corner.

Stupid self-hating, foreigner-loving, kike liberals.