Dueling speeches: Obama, Romney offer different foreign policy visions

President Obama and Mitt Romney both spoke at the Clinton Global Institute's annual meeting in New York. Their presence showed the event's growing clout.

By Howard LaFranchi,?Staff writer / September 25, 2012

President Obama waves as he departs the stage with former President Bill Clinton after speaking during the final day of the Clinton Global Initiative 2012 in New York on Tuesday.

Adrees Latif/REUTERS

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Bill Clinton is holding court in New York this week at his Clinton Global Initiative, a high-powered event that drew both presidential candidates.

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President Obama was in town to speak Tuesday morning at the United Nations, and Mitt Romney made a quick stop before heading out on a campaign bus tour of Ohio. But both candidates acknowledged by their presence that the former president?s annual confab on global development, timed to coincide with that other Manhattan gathering of world leaders (the UN General Assembly), is now a must-do for presidential aspirants.

Former Massachusetts Governor Romney ? whose speech was almost simultaneous with Mr. Obama's UN address ? offered a blueprint for a revamped foreign aid program. When his turn came, Obama focused on the scourge of human trafficking and what to do about it. In both cases, the appearances were about projecting gravitas and vision in the realm of foreign policy.

The two candidates will meet face-to-face to spar on foreign policy in their final debate on Oct. 22.

Romney, reflecting his business roots, made the case for foreign aid that focuses on the private sector and builds entrepreneurship. In his speech a few hours later, Obama said it is time to call the scourge of human trafficking what it really is: ?modern slavery.?

In Romney?s critique of US foreign aid, the former CEO said Americans are generous and want to help the world, but have come to have little faith in foreign assistance. One reason the current model is not working, he said, is that it is designed for a world that no longer exists.

?Too often our passion for charity as a people is tempered by our sense that our aid is not always effective,? Romney said. ?Perhaps some of the disappointments are due to our failure to recognize just how much the developing world has changed.?

Romney said that a much larger share of developing countries today are growing democracies with better-educated people and entrepreneurial communities. And he said that the most effective thing the US can do is to tap into this change and foster the same spirit that drives America?s prosperity.

?The aim of a much larger share of our aid must be the promotion of work and the fostering of free enterprise,? he said. ?Nothing we can do as a nation will change lives and nations more effectively and permanently than sharing the insight that lies at the foundation of America?s own economy ? and that is that free people pursuing happiness in their own ways build a strong and prosperous nation.??

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/9GaEXeQx9AE/Dueling-speeches-Obama-Romney-offer-different-foreign-policy-visions

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