By Greg Sargent
One thing that’s getting a bit lost in the noise: Mitt Romney, after some hemming and hawing, firmly came out for the anti-union law that went down to resounding defeat last night in Ohio...The Obama campaign is now seizing on Romney’s embrace of Governor John Kasich’s law rolling back bargaining rights, and Ohioans’ landslide rejection of it yesterday, to underscore an emerging theme...“Middle class families are not going to stand for ideological overreach by Republicans when their economic security is on the line,” Obama campaign spokesman Ben LaBolt said in an interview.
“After contorting himself into a pretzel, Mitt Romney supported this policy 110 percent,” LaBolt continued. “It further exemplifies that his policies would not only fail to restore economic security for the middle clas, but would actually take away their seat at the negotiating table when their livelihoods are on the line.”
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But the fact Romney came to Ohio and equivocated about Kasich’s law in a way that created a media circus for days suggests that yesterday’s results could be a more prominent problem for him than it might be for any other GOP candidate. The Obama campaign seems to see these results as a clear sign of which way public sentiment is heading — and as potentially a major factor in a swing state that has historically decided presidential elections.
UPDATE: Romney spokesperson Andrea Saul responds:
“The very last thing the Democrats want to do is run against Mitt Romney. That is why they are focused on Mitt Romney and not the economy. The Democrats are continuing their campaign of deception in their strategy to ‘kill Romney.’ President Obama’s campaign is going to be very interesting to watch, but it’s not going to work.”
They're focused on you because you're Multiple Choice Mitt the clown!
Steve Benen:
Romney still lacks ‘the courage of his absence of convictions’<...>
Romney recently told Fox News he, as governor, would have “absolutely” backed an amendment similar to the “personhood” amendment on the ballot in Mississippi this week. Since the measure would have banned abortions, birth control, in-vitro fertilization, stem-cell research, and treatment of ectopic pregnancies, Romney’s position raised a few eyebrows.
He did not, however, explicitly endorse the Mississippi measure. In fact, Romney, whose cowardice is becoming increasingly obvious, refused to take a stand on the ballot question, even when reporters pressed his campaign for his position. One prominent supporter of the measure recently
complained, “We always seem to get two stories from Romney.”
Yesterday, voters in Mississippi rejected the “personhood” amendment — and wouldn’t you know it, Romney has suddenly decided he’s
willing to distance himself from it.
Mitt Romney’s campaign, seeking to nip a potent general election attack in the bud, says he’s being falsely characterized as supporting a proposed amendment to define a fertilized egg as a “person” that was badly defeated in Mississippi yesterday. <…>
Romney’s current position? He supports, per spokeswoman Gail Gitcho, “a Human Life Amendment that overturns Roe vs. Wade and sends the issue back to the states” — which sounds like something short of a federal abortion ban.
Romney’s campaign refused to take a position on the Mississippi question as
recently as Monday. But once voters rejected it, now he’s free to clarify his position on the radical plan.
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