Romney On Omitting U.S. Troops From RNC Speech: ‘You Talk About Things You Think Are Important’

By Ben Armbruster/Think Progress

In an interview with Fox News this afternoon, Mitt Romney shot back at critics who complained that he didn’t mention Afghanistan or praise U.S. troops in his convention speech last week, arguing that he focused on issues that are “important.”

Fox News’s Brett Baier told Romney that “several speakers” at the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte this week criticized the GOP presidential nominee for the omissions (actually it was right-wing foreign policy leader Bill Kristol who started the attacks) and asked him if he had any regrets. “I only regret you’re repeating it day in and day out,” Romney said, adding that his speech focused on things that are important:

BAIER: To hear several speakers in Charlotte … they were essentially saying that you don’t care about the U.S. military because you didn’t mention U.S. troops and the war in Afghanistan in your nomination acceptance speech. … Do you regret opening up this line of attack, now a recurring attack, by leaving out that issue in the speech.

ROMNEY: I only regret you’re repeating it day in and day out. When you give a speech you don’t go through a laundry list, you talk about the things that you think are important and I described in my speech, my commitment to a strong military unlike the president’s decision to cut our military. And I didn’t use the word troops, I used the word military. I think they refer to the same thing.

Watch the clip:

The war in Afghanistan and the sacrifices made by U.S. troops weren’t important enough for Romney to talk about them in his speech? His speech did mention the military, but only to say that he wants to “preserve” a strong military (incidentally so does Obama). But Kristol’s criticism was not that Romney didn’t mention the military but that he did not pay tribute to U.S. troops who fought or are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.

But what is Romney’s “commitment to a strong military”? He plans to increase military spending by $2.1 trillion over the next ten years (which the military does not need) without offering a plan to pay for it. That doesn’t sound too much like a strong commitment to the economy.