To Quiet Critics, Romney Puts 2012 Focus on Jobs

[alp227]

BARTLETT, N.H. — As Mitt Romney travels the country lining up contributors and influential Republicans for a second presidential bid, he is presenting himself as a ready-to-lead executive, gambling that a fluency in economic matters distinguishes him from other candidates and can help overcome concerns about authenticity that dogged his first race.

Mr. Romney makes the case, in private meetings with business owners and in appearances like a dinner speech here Saturday, that the halting economic recovery — even after solid job growth in February, the unemployment rate remains at 8.9 percent — provides a compelling rationale that he is the strongest candidate to create jobs and take on President Obama.

“I like President Obama,” Mr. Romney said, “but he doesn’t have a clue how jobs are created.”

The message is well suited to Mr. Romney’s background as a successful executive and former governor, as well as the man who rescued the 2002 Winter Games from financial trouble. But it may also be his best opportunity to try to steer around criticism over the health care plan he created in Massachusetts, which to many Republicans looks distressingly similar to the federal law signed last year by Mr. Obama.

And it offers him a chance to sidestep the concerns of social conservatives, some of whom question his commitment to their causes and are uncomfortable with his Mormon faith.

(...)

In his 2008 race, Mr. Romney shed moderate stances on abortion and gay rights to align with a conservative electorate, prompting questions about whether his positions were driven by politics or conviction. This time, a concentration on jobs and the economy signals a return to themes he struck during his successful bid for governor in 2002. Yet his record as governor also provides one of his biggest obstacles.

More even than his faith and his social-conservative credentials, questions about the health insurance plan he signed into law in Massachusetts have left him open to criticism from his party.

(...)

Mr. Romney defended the program again on Saturday night, saying that it was “unique to Massachusetts” and should not be imposed on other states. But his criticism of the national law — “I would repeal Obamacare, if I were ever in a position to do so,” he declared — has been overshadowed by his Republican rivals’ trying to conflate the two.

This story will be on the front page of Sunday's New York Times and is now .

[OHdem10]

1. Will someone please hold the GOP's feet to their. Do not let

talk in generalities as they did in the last election.
In the last election they criticized Obama and Democrats.
Never explained how and what they would do to get more
jobs??

If they say tax breaks, please remind them Business never
had so many breaks, waivers and subsidies. They created
jobs in China, Asia, Tehran, South America---and sent
American jobs there.

Where are the jobs, Mr Boehner.