And This Is How You Would Choose to Present America to the World?

The Republican presidential candidates held another debate Tuesday night. All of the "top tier" candidates and the "soon-to-be also rans" were there.

The guy who many Americans don't know what he's really about but who enjoys headliner status on the GOP side due to his fundraising prowess is former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney.

And what did we learn about Romney from the debate? Well, if you are worried about America's increasingly diminished respect on the global stage resulting from repeated policy and moral failures, then Romney isn't your guy.

Why's that? -- here's the New York Times' coverage of the debate:

The scenario presented to the 10 Republican presidential candidates was chilling: Three American shopping malls had been bombed, producing scores of casualties. Terrorists with detailed knowledge of another imminent and deadlier attack had been captured and taken to Guantánamo Bay, Cuba.

The question: How far can the authorities go in interrogating the terrorists to get information to avert a fourth attack?

...Former Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts said he would support “not torture but enhanced interrogation techniques." And taking a tougher line than President Bush and Mr. McCain, who have said they would like to shut down the detention center at Guantánamo Bay, Mr. Romney said he wanted the facility doubled in size.

...As they went through the doomsday terrorist scenario presented by the moderators, the candidates did not offer precise definitions of what they considered terrorism, though their nuanced responses suggested differences about how far they thought it was appropriate for interrogators to go to avert a terrorist attack.

Enhanced interrogation techniques, which Mr. Romney said he would support, refer to methods outside those allowed by the Army’s code of justice or the Geneva Conventions. The most publicly discussed technique that has reportedly been used on terrorism suspects involves what is known as water-boarding, where a prisoner is strapped down, head beneath his feet, as water is poured repeatedly on a cloth covering the mouth until the person thinks he is about to drown.

Voters will have to decide what type of America and what image of America they want in the world.

For Romney, he's probably fortunate that 99% of the country didn't even know there was a GOP debate Tuesday night.