Mitt Romney: Dick Cheney Is 'The Kind Of Person I'd Like To Have' As Vice President (VIDEO)

WASHINGTON -- Mitt Romney doesn't yet know if he'll win the Republican bid for president, but he's already thinking of the type of running mate he'd choose: someone like Dick Cheney.

At a town hall meeting in Arizona on Wednesday, an attendee asked Romney if he would pick a Tea Party member as his vice presidential nominee.

Romney didn't directly answer but instead talked about the virtues of Cheney, who served as President George W. Bush's vice president and became known as "Darth Vader" during his time in office.

“I think it was last weekend, I was watching C-SPAN, and I saw Vice President Dick Cheney, and he was being asked questions about a whole host of issues -- following 9/11, the affairs in various countries in the world,” Romney said. “And I listened to him speak and said whether you agree or disagree with him, this is a man of wisdom and judgment, and he could have been president of the United States. That's the kind of person I’d like to have -- a person of wisdom and judgment."

In 2009, Romney also heaped praise upon Cheney in an op-ed in the National Review.

"Former Vice President Cheney seeks no political future. He speaks from the vantage of one who witnessed the killing of our fellow citizens, who deliberated and defined the strategy that would successfully prevent further murders of our fellow Americans. His address today was direct, well-reasoned, and convincing," Romney said, referring to Cheney's national security speech at the American Enterprise Institute.

Romney's town hall on Wednesday was held in Sun Lakes, a retirement community in Arizona. The former Massachusetts governor continued his attacks on Gov. Rick Perry (R-Texas), the current frontrunner in the GOP presidential race. He told attendees that "Social Security is not a Ponzi scheme," referring to Perry's remarks on the program during the first GOP presidential debate last month. The remark was met with "laughter" and "approval" from the audience, according to MSNBC.

"Social Security has worked for 75 years pretty darn well," Romney continued. "You guys have not taken advantage of Social Security; you contributed to it. It's a savings plan, a pension plan. There are no bad guys in Social Security, so I don't call it a Ponzi scheme."

The crowd was reportedly "consistently friendly" -- with the exception of one questioner who pressed Romney to admit that the Massachusetts health care plan he signed into law was a failure.

"As he put up his microphone, Romney was mobbed -- as if he were Justin Bieber and the crowd, preteen girls," reported MSNBC. "Autograph seekers with Romney's jobs book in hand, and seniors with iPhones looking for pictures surged around him, as he made his way towards the exits and a final evening fundraiser."

Comments

[Mattcat25]

05:01 PM on 09/21/2011

Cheney chose Mitt? to get him back to the Whitehouse???

[lessthanepsilon]

06:35 PM on 09/19/2011

unfortunately, this will not doom his candidacy, despite the fact that it should.

[michaele11111]

07:38 PM on 09/17/2011

Mitt, Mitt, Mitt and there I was thinking you were the closet thing to (but not) sane on the Republican side. You had to go and ruin it.

[Cecil Cain]

06:37 PM on 09/19/2011

That was like Howard Dean with his "yyyyyeeeeaaaahhhhhhhh!!!!"

http://www.obamaftw.com/blog/

[Helloise]

05:20 PM on 09/17/2011

In other words, Mitt would prefer that an authoritarian do the job for him so he could work hard playing the president.

[GetrealU]

04:26 PM on 09/17/2011

This Halloween I'm going to wear a Dick Cheney mask because it's the ugliest/ most frightening thing I can find. BOOOOO!

[rleb2002]

02:08 PM on 09/17/2011

He likes Cheney!! and he denies being a SURROGATE OF BUSH! and he likes all bush want to do, and did! despite his denied, he is like bush acts like bush, and if president will be the same as bush, So AMERCA be prepare for the next DISASTER!

[NHGranite]

01:14 PM on 09/17/2011

Is he kidding? Another run for a man who while intelligent enough, was so archly conservative he conversely thinks he can take away Constitutional freedoms to preserve our freedoms. That we can torture people and get false information that is for all intents, useless. That we can play the CIA against the world and not pay a price. God forgive him. I can't.

[Blackorpheus]

11:09 PM on 09/16/2011

Cheney advanced cruel, xenophobic policy for one dummy prez, there's no reason he can't do it for another dummy prez, old and sick as he (Cheney) is.

[jaborine]

10:41 PM on 09/16/2011

If you ever wondered how far the distance is between Left and Right in this country here we have
it in Romney's praise of Dick Cheney. This is as far as East is from West. The great American
Divide, is heads or tails-the horses' brain or his butt. What will you choose?

[phal4875]

06:07 PM on 09/17/2011

Romney is desperately trying to become president, and it is embarrassing to watch. His father never made it, so the good son has to make up for that failure. Mitt Romney is neither a natural Republican nor a natural Democrat. He is a natural chameleon who will change his opinions, policies, and beliefs because it is even slightly expedient and might give him ten more votes.

[hangdogit]

10:26 PM on 09/16/2011

Next, we'll here how Clarence Thomas is the kind of judge that Mitt likes -- useless Tea Party pandering -- and as phony-sounding as TPaw when he did it.

[Ron Simmons]

07:38 PM on 09/16/2011

Dick Cheney has wisdom? Shot his close friend in a hunting "accident" (no reporters) and never apologized, with his new book that's he promoting he threw his colleagues under a bus, president of Halliburton which is responsible for the "clean up " of the Iraqi War. There is more credible in Spiro T. Agnew than this knucklehead. Aaron Burr would have been a better Vice-President than Tricky Dick ll .

[hsf124]

12:19 AM on 09/17/2011

There is a connection between Romney and Cheney, however slight. When Romney was asked in 2008 why none of his sons (and I believe he has 4 or 5) are serving in the military, he proclaimed they have more patriotic duties to perform: getting dad elected president. Similarly when Cheney was asked why he avoided the draft during Viet Nam he proclaimed that he had more important things to do. What a great answer from a neocon war-monger. They are two doofi!!!!

[iLoveOldNY]

06:59 PM on 09/16/2011

I don't know what Romeney was thinking.

Obama may not be what we all wanted to CHANGE to, but we all seem to agree the Cheney is what we wanted to CHANGE from.

[GLCarmine]

06:46 PM on 09/16/2011

He wants Dracula to be his VP!?! If I were Republican, I would vote for the first candidate to come out and say "I don't know what the Hell to do. I'm just here in case you don't like Obama." At least that wouldn't be a lie.

[iLoveOldNY]

05:31 PM on 09/16/2011

These GOP candidates are all racing each other past the edge of the flat earth they live in.

[GLCarmine]

06:42 PM on 09/16/2011

Thanks for that. ROLTF LMAO! All he has to do now is come foreword and say,"I've never been serious about winning this. I'm just going to do this EVERY election year!"

[Jeff Bunting]

05:17 PM on 09/16/2011

He should have said: "Richard Nixon and George W. Bush are the type of presidents I'm aiming to be! But I'll even go further right and be even more corrupt than both these men combined. After I get caught I'll just blame Obama and the democrats and the idiotic media will nod their heads and agree with me like they do with everything else!"