from
https://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/Biden-Romney-Russia-Obama/2012/04/01/id/434428/

Tags: Biden | Romney | Russia | Obama | Medvedev

Romney Stuck in 'Cold War Mentality' About Russia, Biden Says
Sunday, 01 April 2012 12:09 PM

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney is “stuck in a Cold War
mentality” when it comes to working with Russia, Vice President Joe
Biden said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”

Biden defended President Barack Obama’s “open microphone” remark to his
Russian counterpart, Dmitry Medvedev, last week, and focused on Romney’s
reaction. The former Massachusetts governor said last week that Russia
was, “without question, our number-one geopolitical foe.”

“He acts like he thinks the Cold War’s still on,” Biden said. “I don’t
know where he’s been.”

Microphones on March 26 recorded Obama asking Medvedev to let Russian
President-elect Vladimir Putin know that he needed to “give me space” to
deal with objections to the U.S.’s missile-defense plan.

“This is my last election, and after my election I have more
flexibility,” Obama told Medvedev.

“I understand,” Medvedev replied in English, adding that he would
“transmit this information to Vladimir.”

In his interview with CBS, taped March 29 and broadcast today, Biden
said that Obama “just stated the obvious” and that “it’s going to be
difficult” to work with Congress on further reductions of the U.S.
nuclear arsenal between now and the November elections.

Alarming Words

Romney, who has been criticized by his Republican rivals for shifting
positions, has accused Obama of having a hidden agenda for his second
term, calling the president’s words “alarming and troubling.”

“This is no time for our president to be pulling his punches with the
American people,” he said at a campaign stop in California. In an March
26 interview with CNN, after Obama’s comment to Medvedev was reported,
Romney said that Russia was, “without question, our number-one
geopolitical foe.”

Biden told CBS that Russia was helping the United States get supplies to
troops in Afghanistan and would increase oil supplies to Europe if there
was an oil shutdown in the Gulf.

“This is not 1956,” Biden said. “It exposes how little the governor
knows about foreign policy.”

Last week Medvedev said that Romney’s description of Russia as his
country’s enemy “smacks of Hollywood.”

The Republican candidates should “use their brains and check the clock,”
refraining from obsolete attitudes, the Russian leader told reporters on
March 27 at the conclusion of a two-day nuclear security summit in Seoul.