Obama team's attack on Romney mirrors 1994 race
(CBS News) In 1994, Mitt Romney was a political rookie and the economy was booming -- a far cry from today's political and economic conditions. Still, President Obama's re-election campaign is turning to tactics used against Romney in 1994 to attack the Republican candidate in this year's presidential race.
The Obama campaign on Monday launched a multi-pronged attack against Romney's record as the head of Bain Capital, the private equity firm he founded. The line of attack is not surprising: It strikes at the heart of Romney's chief selling point -- his business experience and economic expertise.
Romney's record at Bain was subject to attacks during the Republican primary, but the candidate has been facing similar attacks since his 1994 Senate race against incumbent Democratic Sen. Ted Kennedy in Massachusetts.
In the ad the Obama campaign launched today, workers from GST Steel criticize Bain Capital for its takeover of the company. "It was like a vampire. They came in and sucked the life out of us," Jack Cobb says in the ad.
Professor Jeffrey Berry, a political scientist at Tufts University, said the negative advertising "had a devastating impact on Romney's senatorial bid."
"The polls showed that the ads were a turning point in the campaign and... forced Romney into a defensive stance," Berry told Hotsheet.
This year, the Obama campaign has the luxury of building on the negative image Romney's primary opponents established with attacks on Bain, calling the company a band of "vultures" waiting to loot failing companies. However, Berry said that means the attacks won't pack the same punch.
"This time around, people have a lot more information about Mitt Romney," he said. "In 1994, the Kennedy campaign was filling in a lot of blank space, they were helping to define him."
Still, the premise of the attack ads holds true, said Tad Devine, a former Kennedy adviser who helped produce the 1994 ads.
"Romney has made his record of job creation in the private sector the centerpiece of his campaign -- it goes right to the heart of his message," Devine told Hotsheet. Moreover, he said, "These type of testimonial attacks from real people who talk about how their lives were affected is very effective."
Obama camp attacks Romney's record at Bain Capital
Obama attack ad marks turning point in campaign
Obama camp says it's not attacking private equity
If anything, Devine said, the line of attack could be more effective in 2012 because of the public's distrust of Wall Street - especially from lower-income Americans struggling to find jobs as well as middle-income Americans hurt by the economic collapse.
"The country in 2008 went through a brutal economic downturn caused by the financial sector," he said. "I think people are a lot more suspicious of people like Romney who went into banking and made enormous profits at the expense of others."
Devine said the Romney campaign's response to the 1994 attack ads was "awful."
"I think Mitt Romney was stunned by the attacks and completely taken off stride," he said. Romney's unwillingness to meet with the workers of Marion, Indiana -- some of whom were featured in the Kennedy ads -- turned it into a free media story, Devine said.
During this year's Republican primary, the Romney campaign responded to the Bain attacks by calling them an attack on "free enterprise" and focusing on the jobs that Bain helped create.
"That's not going to fly in a general election," Devine said. "Certainly, Democrats won't accept that, and I don't think independents will either. They're going to want more information on his record."
In their response today, the Romney campaign said it welcomes the Obama camp's attempt to talk about jobs.
(Watch Romney's senior adviser Eric Fehrnstrom respond to Obama attack ad, at left.)"Mitt Romney helped create more jobs in his private sector experience and more jobs as Governor of Massachusetts than President Obama has for the entire nation," campaign spokesperson Andrea Saul said.
Turning the focus squarely on the president, she added, "President Obama has many questions to answer as to why his administration used the stimulus to reward wealthy campaign donors with taxpayer money for bad ideas like Solyndra, but 23 million Americans are still struggling to find jobs. If the Obama administration was less concerned about pleasing their wealthy donors and more concerned about creating jobs, America would be much better off."
Later in the day, the Romney campaign released a minute-long video featuring a Bain Capital success story: Steel Dynamics, a Ft. Wayne-based steel company in which Bain invested in 1993. The video, which features worker testimonials, is called "American Dream" and notes that the company now employs more than 6,000 people.
Berry said he would now expect the Romney campaign's response to be "less about Bain and more about the failings of the Obama administration," with a continued focus on monthly job figures.
While some conservatives charge Mr. Obama wants to avoid talking about jobs since it is a vulnerable issue for him, Berry said the president "has to dent the image of Romney as an economic fixer-upper... If Obama doesn't hammer away at Romney's record, it's political malpractice."
CBS News chief White House correspondent Norah O'Donnell reports on the new Obama campaign ad:
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Please note, however that "significant rules" do not HAVE to have that much of an impact. As just one example, if a new rule requires a business to store electronic information for a longer period (one of the primary areas of my consulting) it doesn't cost the business one red cent if they are ALREADY doing it. The OMB projection is based on costs to comply, it does not account for companies that effectively have already complied.
Now, to your arguments about job creation
1) Of course Washington under Obama has come up with a bunch of new rules - 5% FEWER rules than Bush in the same period.
2) New rules can add costs for many businesses, and do typically result in some extra time as well as expense.
3) Small businesses, however, are NOT THE TARGET of most "significant rules" - most of the major rule changes impact larger corporations, as a preponderance of federal regulations exempt small business.
4) The statement then "when they are thinking about new rules, they aren't hiring" is completely inaccurate. Fallacious reasoning, post hoc ergo propter hoc. In some cases, new regulations INCREASE hiring - hiring to comply with new regulations. But in the main, hiring is unrelated to regulations - businesses hire because they need to fulfill demand, and they lay off when they have a lack of demand. Regulations have little impact on the actual demand, and therefore little impact on actual hiring.
The bottom line is that Obama's presidency has resulted in some more regulations (more significant ones that Bush, less total than Bush) and not wildly different than any other 3 year period in recent history, and that the impact of these regulations on "job creation" is minimal as it is less than 0.1% of the GDP in costs even at the high end and real demand is far more impactful.
If we want more jobs created, we don't need less regulation - we need more demand. Demand comes from new products and services (out of Washington control), subsidizing American businesses to be able to offer American made products competitive to foreign products (not always desirable) and putting more money in the hands of the middle class and poor, because THEY SPEND IT.
"growth only happened under Clinton as a result of tax cuts" - conservative propaganda, 100% fact free. tax cuts do not cause revenue growth. This is "supply side" fallacious reasoning - "post hoc, ergo prpter hoc". The economy grew under Reagan because the cold war ended and because of the personal computer revolution starting in 1980. Nothing to do with tax cuts. The Clinton boom came from the Internet and personal computers in the home. Nothing to do with tax cuts. The "fake" boom under W Bush was due to the housing bubble - not tax cuts.
Tax cuts o not grow revenue. Tax cuts shrink revenue. Every econommist that isnt a conservative hack will tell you the same thing.
If ever there was a wolf in sheep's clothing, it's Mitt Romney; and, if elected, He'd be a disastrous choice for America!
Well let's see Obumma has put us in trillions of dollars of debt in the first year.
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Please list what spending you're referring to.
arthanyel- Obama's economy. he said unemployment wouldn't exceed 8% if the stimulus was passed. Over the past three years, Washington has issued more than 10,000 rules that impose an estimated $16 billion in new costs. His economy! Not Bush's.
----- cut here -----
Conservative propaganda, 100% fact free.
The statement that Obama said unemployment would not go over 8% if the stimulus was enacted is a "pants on fire" conservative propaganda lie. Check out the FACTS. It's not "Obama's economy" - perhaps you haven't noticed that the President DOES NOT CONTROL SPENDING or have the ability to MAKE LAWS, that's the Congress (where Republicans blocked everything the President wanted while they were in the minority, and ignore everything he has asked for while in the majority in the House). And it is stupid and foolish to ignore the history - Obama took over when the economy was in a freefall towards the second Great Depression, and thanks to several things (of which the stimulus is one part) that freefall was halted, turned around, and we have had a steadily growing job market and GDP for the last 3 years.
The statement that Washington has issued more than 10,000 rules that impose $16B in new costs is an unsubstantiated conservative propaganda statement . Would you care to provide ANY link that backs this up that isn't a conservative hack talking out of their fundament?
Here is another source: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-10-25/obama-wrote-5-fewer-rules-than-bush-while-costing-business.html where they state, "Obama Wrote 5% Fewer Rules Than Bush" and that the total cost to business may be only $100M
Try again, Faux News parrot
If you dispute ANY of them, you are welcome to post a link to any source other than a conservative propaganda site as a reference. I did - why is it so hard for you?
As for the lie about Obama saying unemployment "wont go over 8%" here is only ONE of the DOZENS of refutations of that lie: http://www.politifact.com/virginia/statements/2012/mar/02/eric-cantor/cantor-says-obama-promised-stimulus-would-keep-une/
Try again
Obama is truthful (statements that are at least half true) 72% of the time, is very truthful (statements that are mostly or completely true) 47% of the time and lies (statements that are mostly or totally false) 28%, and almost never makes statements that are "pants on fire" lies (1%)
Romney in contrast is truthful 60%, and very truthful only 33%, lies 40% and makes "pants on fire" lies 10% of the time.
Conservative propaganda organization Americans for Prosperity (Koch brothers) NEVER TELLS THE TRUTH (0%) and 40% of their statements are "pants on fire" lies. American Crossroads (Rove) is almost as bad, 80% lies.
Tea Party types (Michele Bachmann, as one example) are truthful 28%, very truthful 17%, lie 72% and "pants on fire" lie 23%.
So when people tell you that "the other guy" is lying to you, they are sometimes correct - butit is pretty clear that conservatives lie FAR MORE than Obama.
I am not pro-Democrat or pro Obama either. I am anti-propaganda and anti-ignorance. It's not my fault that this results in my posting more anti-conservative responses - conservatives lie more often and use fallacious reasoning more often.
These statistics are straight from a Pulitzer prize winning, non-partisan fact checking site - and there are a couple. They all clearly show that conservatives lie far moe often than "liberals".
If you believe ANY of these statements is not factual, please cite any reference that supports your statement. I cited mine - non partisan, fact checking source. Your turn.
And idiot Robmee is still spouting this same junk. Hey, works for him. They don't call Mitler Robmee for nothing you know.