The United States is in desperate need of a wake-up call, said former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney Thursday evening.
In a discussion and book-signing sponsored by Suffolk University at the Boston Public Library, Romney answered questions from moderator and Boston Globe columnist Jeff Jacoby about the notion of “American strength.”
Romney’s new book, “No Apology: The Case for American Greatness,” expresses the belief that America is on track to become a “second-tier nation” without increased national defense spending, substantial education reform and an affirmation of shared cultural values.
Romney outlined the differing governmental systems in the United States, China and Russia, and said one is ultimately bound to prevail.
“Of all the possible strategies, only one includes personal and political freedom, and that’s ours,” Romney said. “Only if America and the successful strategy of democracy remain strong can we guarantee that our kids and theirs will have a land that’s free and a world that’s peaceful.”
Romney explained that he has witnessed a weakening of the American strategy, which has only been exacerbated by President Barack Obama’s consistently “apologetic” tone toward the previous administration’s tenure.
“Have we made mistakes? Of course. Have we acknowledged those mistakes? Yes, we have,” said Romney. “But on the balance sheet of what America has contributed to the world versus the mistakes we’ve made, there’s no comparison. The idea of America’s president running around the world apologizing, consequently building his own popularity and adding fuel to the fires of those who believe that America has something to apologize for is a very misguided approach. Instead, let’s talk about where we’re going to go in the future.”
Jacoby said that during the 2008 presidential race most Republican candidates put the issue of terrorism “front and center” throughout their campaigns, as opposed to Democratic candidates, who he classified as “Sept. 10 people.”
Romney agreed, arguing that many Americans fail to recognize the scope of the “global Jihad,” and citing parallels between what he said was the nation’s overwhelmingly lax response to terrorism and the failure to take Hitler at his word in the early 1930s.
He also asserted that the best way America can protect itself is through extensive intelligence capabilities in order to prevent attacks before they occur.
“I don’t understand how leadership and the public at large can forget the threat of this issue. It’s been predicted that a major American city will experience an attack within the next five years,” Romney said. “This is a very real threat and must be a major focus of the President’s. I presume he doesn’t want to offend, but somehow it’s more important to tell the truth than worry about being offensive.”
Julia Whitney, a freshman at Suffolk, said she agrees with Mitt Romney on nearly all fronts.
“The idea of American pride in our national strength is very important, and like Romney I think that we’ve lost that along the way,” Whitney said.
Suffolk junior Alexander Rittershaus agrees. He said he appreciates the work that Romney has done for Massachusetts and admires him as a politician, but said he doesn’t think that Obama’s apologies are necessarily out of order.
“I diverge from the governor’s beliefs in that we should recognize more that we’ve done some really bad things in the past. We need to own up to those things. How we go about doing that is a different story,” he said.
Romney said he has not made any decisions regarding a presidential run in 2012, maintaining that his primary goal in the coming months is to get more conservatives elected to Congress in November.
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