Obama adviser on Romney tax plan: "hard to explain because of math"

(CBS News) In anticipation of the first presidential debate Wednesday night, Robert Gibbs, a senior adviser to the Obama campaign the and the former White House press secretary, joined "CBS This Morning" to discuss President Obama's objectives for the debate.

Gibbs expressed his surprise that newly re-released footage of President Obama's 2007 speech to victims of hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, in which some claim the president implies that the Bush Administration did not help victims of Hurricane Katrina because of their race, is making news.

Gibbs dismissed the claim, and said "the president said the incompetence that surrounded the federal government's response to Katrina was colorblind."

And, he added that he is a "a little amazed that ... a widely covered speech ... has somehow caused a kerfluffle five years later because somebody like Sean Hannity decide to re-air what was covered."

Turning to Wednesday night's debate, Gibbs said President Obama will have a conversation with the American people about what's ahead, with an emphasis on job creation.

According to Gibbs, Obama will focus on "retraining workers and bringing manufacturing jobs back into this country, hiring new math and science teachers to improve our education, doubling our exports ... all of those things that will help create jobs."

Gibbs also criticized the Romney campaign for not offering more specifics on their tax plan while defending the president's budget.

"If you look at the budget plan that the president has outlined, he has a $4 trillion spending cut plan making sure that our tax code is fair and that those on the upper end of that tax code are paying more," Gibbs claimed before firmly adding that Romney's "$5 trillion tax plan isn't hard to explain because of time, it's hard to explain because of math."

Gibbs also defended Vice President Biden, who said on Tuesday that the middle class has been "buried" over the last year.

"Let's be clear," Gibbs said, "the middle class has been buried for a lot longer than the time that we've been dealing with bad economic decisions from the former administration."