Quotes from GOP debate
Quotes from the Republican debate Tuesday night:
SAM BROWNBACK
"The other thing we have to do: a much more aggressive political solution on the ground in Iraq. That has to take place, and that's why I've pushing a three-state, one-country solution, where you have a Sunni region, a Shiite region and a Kurdish state that already exists, within a weak federation."
Describing why he doesn't think abortion should be allowed for the case of a rape victim who became pregnant, he said: "Will that make the woman in a better situation if that's what takes place? I don't think so, and I think we can explain it when we look at it for what it is, a beautiful child of a loving God that we ought to protect in all circumstances, in all places -- here in the womb, somebody that is struggling in poverty, the family that's struggling, we should work and look at all life, be pro-life and whole-life for everybody."
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JIM GILMORE
"With respect to Iran, I think that there is no choice at this point other than to join up with people across the world in order to put on serious, mandatory sanctions against Iran and to do everything that is going to be necessary to try to bring them to the notion that it is better for them to give up this sort of plan rather than to proceed the way we are.
However, I think that we have to have an honest discussion with the American people about this. We have to ask ourselves this question: Are we prepared to have Iran have a nuclear weapon?"
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RUDY GIULIANI
"I think we can agree, all of us, on this stage, that we should seek reductions in abortion. I ultimately do believe in a woman's right of choice, but I think that there are ways in which we can reduce abortions. Abortions went down 16 percent when I was the mayor. Adoptions went up 133 percent during the eight years that I was mayor, compared to the prior eight years."
Responding to a hypothetical situation in which people in custody in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, have knowledge of an imminent terror attack, he said: "In the hypothetical that you gave me, which assumes that we know that there's going to be another attack and these people know about it, I would tell the people who had to do the interrogation to use every method they could think of. Shouldn't be torture, but every method they can think of. And I would support them in doing that."
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MIKE HUCKABEE
"That is the first thing I would love to do as president, put a 'Going Out of Business' sign on the Internal Revenue Service and stop the $10 billion a year that it costs just for them to operate. If we had a fair tax, it would eliminate not just the alternative minimum tax -- personal income tax, corporate tax. It would eliminate all the various taxes that are hidden in our system, and Americans don't realize what they are paying."
"We value the life of one as if it's the life of all. And that's why we go after the 12-year-old Boy Scout in North Carolina when he's lost. That's why we look for the 13 miners in Sago, W.Va., when the mine explodes, that's why we go looking for the hikers in Mount Hood. Because we value life. That's what separates us from the Islamic jihadists who are out to kill us."
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DUNCAN HUNTER
Responding to a hypothetical situation in which people in custody in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, have knowledge of an imminent terror attack, he said: "This would take a one-minute conversation with the secretary of defense. I would call him up, or call him in, I would say to sec def, in terms of getting information that would save American lives, even if it involves very high pressure techniques, one sentence: Get the information ... and I will take full responsibility."
"If we have border enforcement, we will be able at that point to start to regulate the internal problem that we've got, because as long as you've got a revolving door and you have no border -- and this 2,000-mile porous border, incidentally, is our biggest homeland security problem. It's not just an immigration problem. It's a homeland security problem."
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JOHN McCAIN
"I intend to lead. I don't intend to follow. I don't intend to block things. I intend to get results and I intend to work on the hard things, not the easy ones."
"We have procedures for interrogation in the Army Field Manual. Those I think would be adequate in 999,000 of cases, and I think that if we agree to torture people, we would do ourselves great harm in the world."
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RON PAUL
"Have you ever read about the reasons they attacked us? They attack us because we've been over there. We've been bombing Iraq for 10 years. We've been in the Middle East -- I think Reagan was right. We don't understand the irrationality of Middle Eastern politics. "
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MITT ROMNEY
"I've always been personally pro-life. I've taught that to others, it's been part of my faith. The question for me was: What should government do in this kind of setting? And the Supreme Court stepped in and took a decision, and I said I'd support that decision. And then I watched the impact of that decision as I was governor of Massachusetts."
"Look, I've been governor in a pretty tough state. You heard of blue states. Have you ever bought a suit and you looked at it and you can't tell if it's blue or black? That's how blue Massachusetts is. And in that state I've had to stand up for life and I have. I've had to stand up for traditional marriage and I have."
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TOM TANCREDO
"There are a million programs that we operate and that we pay for with the federal government that are far beyond the bounds of the Constitution. Follow the Constitution and you'll know what's necessary, and that's the defense of the country. That's it for the federal government."
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TOMMY THOMPSON
"There is no question that the al-Maliki government needs to step up and do what is right. The United States government has been there for four years. We've lost many individuals -- 3,400 individuals as of today. And it's time for the al-Maliki (government) to vote whether or not they want us in the fifth year to stay in their country or whether or not they want us to go home." 