Barack Obama
Did not vote on a September 2007 Senate resolution calling on the administration to declare Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps a terrorist organization. Believes in using diplomatic efforts and would meet with leaders of Iran, Syria, Venezuela, Cuba and North Korea during first year of presidency. Would leave military option on the table.  Watch Obama speak about Iran

Joe Biden
Advocates direct engagement with Iran, first in collaboration with the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council (United Kingdom, China, Russia, France, and the U.S.) and Germany and then nation-to-nation. "In exchange, we should insist on firm commitments from those governments to impose serious sanctions if Iran continues to defy the U.N. Security Council by not suspending uranium enrichment and work related to plutonium reprocessing. ….Engaging Iran and sanctioning Iran are not only compatible, they are mutually reinforcing. Sanctions can provide leverage for negotiations," Biden said in July, 2008.

John McCain
Did not vote on a September 2007 Senate resolution calling on the administration to declare Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps a terrorist organization. Says military action is an option, but would consult with congressional leaders before taking action.
 Watch McCain speak about Iran

Sarah Palin
"Under the leadership of Ahmadinejad, nuclear weapons in the hands of his government are extremely dangerous to everyone on this globe" Palin said during an ABC News interview. Advocates using diplomatic pressure to deny Iran nuclear weapons. "We have got to make sure that these weapons of mass destruction, that nuclear weapons are not given to those hands of Ahmadinejad, not that he would use them, but that he would allow terrorists to be able to use them," she told ABC News.

Stated during the vice presidential debate, "Israel is in jeopardy, of course, when we're dealing with Ahmadinejad as a leader of Iran. Iran claiming that Israel is, he termed it, a stinking corpse, a country that should be wiped off the face of the earth. Now, a leader like Ahmadinejad who is not sane or stable when he says things like that is not one whom we can allow to acquire nuclear energy, nuclear weapons."