Iran

As discussed yesterday, Mitch McConnell went before AIPAC on Sunday and demanded the President move the nation toward war with Iran, and that Obama use “overwhelming force” in that war.

Mitch’s comments came around the same time Mitt Romney was on the campaign trail telling his constituents that if Obama is re-elected in 2012, Iran will definitely get a nuclear weapon.

This sort of insane speech misleads our allies, does not help the diplomatic cause, and does a disservice to the American people who might honestly believe that we should enter into yet another war for weapons a country doesn’t yet have while other options remain viable.

The number of Americans aching for war with Iran can’t be very high but it’s charming that McConnell, Romney and other Republicans are all speaking off the same talking points memo — Obama won’t go to war with Iran, America must go to war with Iran, so we must get rid of Obama so we can go to war with Iran. That’s what the Republicans say.

It’s like the Grand Ol’ Party got together and collectively realized attacking women and birth control was a really stupid strategy so they should move away from it and make people forget it by doing something even more stupid.

Senator Harry Reid responded to Mitch’s comments by calmly encourage the Senate Minority Leader to be “very cautious” when throwing around the word “war.”

“We have problems around this world that are so significant. We have North Korea, we have Iran, we have a situation with Syria, we have problems now in Egypt. So let’s just stop throwing the word ‘war’ around so casually.”

Others in Washington joined Reid in the collective “WTF?” aimed at McConnell, but perhaps the coldest slap in the face came from the President himself.

At his Super Tuesday press conference, Obama was asked about the comments coming from the Republican Party and specifically Mitt Romney’s nuclear prognostication.

Ladies and Gentlemen, The President of the United States of America:

Now, what’s said on the campaign trail — those folks don’t have a lot of responsibilities. They’re not Commander-in-Chief. And when I see the casualness with which some of these folks talk about war, I’m reminded of the costs involved in war. I’m reminded that the decision that I have to make in terms of sending our young men and women into battle, and the impacts that has on their lives, the impact it has on our national security, the impact it has on our economy.

This is not a game. There’s nothing casual about it. And when I see some of these folks who have a lot of bluster and a lot of big talk, but when you actually ask them specifically what they would do, it turns out they repeat the things that we’ve been doing over the last three years, it indicates to me that that’s more about politics than actually trying to solve a difficult problem.

Now, the one thing that we have not done is we haven’t launched a war. If some of these folks think that it’s time to launch a war, they should say so. And they should explain to the American people exactly why they would do that and what the consequences would be. Everything else is just talk.

You can watch Obama’s comments either in packaged news…

Or… in full Press Conference Context: