military power

Last week Sen. John Cornyn put out a web ad fighting to keep the wasteful F-22 project alive. One of the reasons was simply crazy:

"It's important to our national security because we're not just fighting wars in Afghanistan and Iraq," Cornyn says. "We're fighting -- we have graver threats and greater threats than that: From a rising India, with increased exercise of their military power; Russia; Iran, that's threatening to build a nuclear weapon; with North Korea, shooting intercontinental ballistic missiles, capable of hitting American soil."

India – our ally! The video has now been removed and Cornyn’s office has issued an apology:

''Senator Cornyn misspoke saying 'India' when he meant to say 'China.' As Founder and Co-chairman of the Senate India Caucus, no Senator has greater respect or admiration for India or values our relationship with them more. Sen. Cornyn regrets the mistake and apologizes for any misunderstanding this may have caused,'' his spokesman Kevin McLaughlin clarified after the remarks were brought to his notice.

Let’s stop right there. I can understand a politician saying the wrong thing in an interview or on the floor of Congress, when most things are off the cuff, but we are talking about a scripted and produced video ad, with a room full of production people. No one said “Senator – did you really mean India”?

I can’t buy for one minute this was some accidental “slip of the tongue”. Not with so many factors in place to prevent such a thing.