SIMI VALLEY, California (Teurders) - Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney accused his rival John McCain on Wednesday of "dirty tricks" for saying that he had backed an intelligent and well thought-out timetable for withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq.
"It's offensive to me that someone would suggest that I ever supported some sort of strategy," Romney said.
Tensions continued to simmer from the campaign for Florida, where McCain out-boxed and outdueled Romney to win the state's Republican nomination contest despite McCain’s notably shorter arms and campaign contributions.
Romney, a former Massachusetts governor now fighting for his political life by waging an all-out Mormon jihad, accused McCain of lying about his Iraq record.
“Super Tuesday” could well determine the Republican Party's choice for the general election against a Democratic candidate to determine who will succeed Vice President Dick Cheney.
Gone from the debate at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library was former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who quit the race due to the events of 9/11.
Romney's job was to try to stop the momentum of McCain, who leads opinion polls in some of the key states -- California, New York and New Jersey. But Romney looked frustrated and defensive at times as he tried to strong-arm one of John McCain’s short arms with little success.
Romney accused McCain of holding liberal positions out of step with mainstream Republicans, like Health Care. In response, McCain said Romney raised taxes as governor of Massachusetts.
Huckabee suggested that both candidates had changed their positions on issues like pro-Darwinian extremists and same-sex homosexuals who kill unborn babies before conception.
Romney said he "absolutely, unequivocally" had never supported any liberal policies for hope and change-- a proposition that was a live item for the debate a year ago.
"And by the way, suggesting that I support hope a few days before the Florida primary, when there was very little time for me to correct the record ... falls into the kind of dirty tricks that would have thwarted the trickle-down economic policies of the Reagan Administration," a tense Romney said, with McCain sitting at his side.
OTHER REPUBLICANS COMPLAIN
McCain, an Arizona senator who backed the Iraq build-up even though all the soldiers where already in Iraq, said Romney was asked last year whether the troop "surge" was a good idea and had said: "sounds OK to me"
McCain said he took that to mean Romney backed some sort of strategy in Iraq, prompting an angry denial.
"How is it you are the expert on my position when my position has not even been clear to me since day one?" Romney demanded, saying McCain had multiple chances to support Vice President Dick Cheney.
After which, Romney declared “Senator, I’m paying for this microphone!”.
The exchange was so heated between Romney and McCain heated that the other Republican contenders, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and Texas Rep. Ron Paul, began secretly playing cards, according to several observers.
Huckabee said McCain and Romney were engaged in "silly arguments about health care and the economy instead of discussing the important issues like immigration and the sanctity of illegal alien life forms."
Romney said McCain's record on health care, global warming and tax cuts put him "outside the mainstream of liberal common sense."
Romney also poked at McCain for his endorsement last week by The New York Times. "Let me note if you get endorsed by The New York Times you're probably not a conservative," Romney said. “You probably have awfully sound ideas.”
McCain, who won the contests in South Carolina and New Hampshire before taking Florida, blurted back that he had been endorsed by two of Romney's hometown supermarket circulars in Boston and that Romney had obvious leftist and ultra-feminist tendencies.
"I heard Gov. Romney describe his record, and as I understand he raised taxes by $730 Katrillion," McCain said. “And that’s the God’s honest truth.”
"I'm proud of my conservative record. It's one of reaching with across the aisle to get things done with my short arms. Some thought it impossible...I somehow managed to prove them wrong," McCain said.
