Gov. Deval Patrick (D-Mass.) appeared to backpedal and claimed that President Barack Obama was never actually attacking Bain Capital, but was attacking Mitt Romney personally, during an appearance on NBC’s Meet the Press Sunday.
Patrick became the latest Democrat to back away from the Obama campaign’s demonization of Bain.
Newark, N.J. Mayor Cory Booker took considerable flak two weeks ago on the same program for calling the attacks on Bain Capital “nauseating”, but put aside his comments in a video he released the same afternoon in the wake of pressure from the campaign.
But Patrick’s spin stands contrary to the position that the Obama campaign took last month with its”vampire” ad.
“Bain Capital made a lot of money when they walked away with this plant,” an Obama-supporting steelworker says in the ad.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yhQlnx1NSUw&w=560&h=315]
It also contradicts the stance spokesman Ben LaBolt attempted to defend two weeks ago on CNN with Anderson Cooper, who slammed the spokesman for being hypocritical.
“Gov. Romney and his [Bain Capital] partners came in, they loaded the company up with debt, laid off all of the workers, forced them to reapply for their jobs as security guards bolted the doors,” LaBolt said regarding an Indiana company that Bain Capital became involved with while he was CEO.
The Obama campaign’s message on Bain Capital clearly wasn’t working for former President Bill Clinton also criticized its strategy in the past week.
“I don’t think that we ought to get into the position where we say this is bad work. This is good work. There is no question in terms of getting up and going to the office and basically performing the functions of the office a man who has been governor and had a sterling business career crosses the threshold,” said Clinton.
Host David Gregory suggested that Clinton’s comments undercut President Obama’s main criticism of Romney, but Patrick disagreed.
“It under cuts the spin,” Patrick said. “The president never attacked Bain. Bain is a fine company.
“Gov. Romney’s experience in creating jobs in the private and public sector is fair game.”
President Obama said Romney’s record would be fair game for the 2012 campaign when asked about it before the start of the current election cycle.
“This is not a distraction, this is what this campaign is going to be about,” Obama said. “If your main argument for how to grow the economy is, ‘I knew how to make a lot of money for investors,’ then you are missing what this job is about.”
Not only has the president openly has attacked both Romney and Bain, but according to The Hill, Obama’s campaign is actually looking to double down their attacks on Romney as his record at Bain in the upcoming days.
