This story just keeps blowing up and I don't think that it looks good for Obama to be out on the campaign trail.
I think there's a risk of it not looking good, particularly if things continue to break out or escalate and he maintains a full campaign schedule. It also doesn't look good for Romney and Ryan to so quickly seek to publicly undermine the President on this issue as the administration attempts to deal with this extremely challenging situation.
Agreed on political fallout for both. The petty bickering should stop and deal with the issue. Both parties need to seriously re-evaluate our policies in that part of the world. Anyone miss Hosni Mubarak yet?
I believe Romney's statement, which while it was a casaulity of unfortunate timing, is being validated by every new report. The statement from the Cairo Embassy was weak and did not convey anything but an apologetic tone. The White House needed to demand that there was some protection for the embassies when they felt there was a threat. While Romney is prominent, and can be criticized, he is not the President and at the same time the White House is looking very amateurish in their handling of the situation - prior, during, and after. What a shame that these people were killed and that their safe house was known to the enemy.
I'm no Obama fan but Romney really tripped over the starting blocks on this thing. I don't disagree with the premise behind it but he did it in a clumsy manner and hurt any credibility he might have had. I doubt the government of Libya, such that it is, is really capable of defending itself, much less our consulate. I'm as conservative as it comes when we are talking economics and tend to vote that way, but the Bush administration didn't do us any favors in that part of the world either. I'm not so sure I see the White House as "amateurish" so much as thinking the United States' policy is very misguided. Also, does anyone really believe this thing started over the movie? It was September 11. The radicals have always been very focused on anniversaries and the meaning of them. If anything, the movie was merely used as cover for it. It just didn't happen to get all this coverage on that particular day.