“I think that I\u2019ve learned some lessons over the last four years, and the most important lesson I\u2019ve learned is that you can\u2019t change Washington from the inside. You can only change it from the outside. That\u2019s how I got elected, and that\u2019s how the big accomplishments like health care got done, was because we mobilized the American people to speak out. That\u2019s how we were able to cut taxes for middle-class families.<\/p>\n
So something that I\u2019d really like to concentrate on in my second term is being in a much more constant conversation with the American people so that they can put pressure on Congress to help move some of these issues forward.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
That’s a pretty uncontroversial expression of respect for the American people and including them in the process of reforming government. And it’s something that Obama said since the beginning of his work in national politics. It is, in fact, what “Hope and Change”<\/em> was all about when he told supporters that “you are the change.”<\/em><\/p>\n Mitt Romney latched onto just seven words from the hour-long event and is attempting to attach a meaning to them that bears no resemblance to their actual intent. Those words are “You can\u2019t change Washington from the inside.”<\/em> Romney has added that phrase to his stump speech along with his promise to affect change ONLY from the inside. That’s not surprising since he has already written off half of the American people as those who “it’s not my job to worry about.”<\/em> It’s also not surprising that Romney is again exposing his raving hypocrisy, because he has previously said the very same thing about how to change Washington:<\/p>\n Let’s recap some of the other out-of-context moments that have become integral parts of the Romney campaign:<\/p>\n \u201cYou didn\u2019t build that.\u201d<\/em><\/strong> This is a deliberate misquoting of Obama who was actually referring to roads and bridges, not the private businesses that Romney has tried to imply were the subject of the remarks.<\/p>\n \u201cThe private sector is doing fine.\u201d<\/em><\/strong> This is another misrepresentation where Obama was correctly making a relative comparison of the private sector, which has grown over the past three years, to the public sector, which has been shrinking.<\/p>\n \u201cWe tried our plan and it worked.\u201d<\/em><\/strong> Here Romney deliberately asserted that Obama was referencing his own record and implying that it had achieved complete success. In fact, Obama has consistently said that more needs to be done and this comment was plainly referencing the success of the Clinton era policies as opposed to the failure of the GOP\u2019s years under Bush\u2019s policies.<\/p>\n \u201c[Obama] removed the requirement of work from welfare.\u201d<\/em><\/strong> Romney made this accusation that is directly refuted by the facts. What Obama did was to permit waivers for states that could affirm their progress in moving people from welfare to work, and allowing them flexibility to enhance their programs. It\u2019s a modification that Romney himself had requested when he was governor of Massachusetts.<\/p>\n “I actually believe in redistribution.”<\/em><\/strong>This was purposefully clipped from a much longer statement wherein Obama was praising entrepreneurs and the free market, while also seeking to improve the parts of government that provide services like schools, roads, etc.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Those examples illustrate the only consistent component of Romney’s campaign strategy: Rip soundbites from Obama’s speeches and build dishonest explanations around them. He uses this tactic because he has concluded that it is better than trying to explain his unpopular and\/or unworkable positions on the economy, jobs, Social Security, foreign affairs, etc. And he still refuses to release more than two years of his tax returns.<\/p>\n Look for more of the same in the next few weeks as Romney gets even more desperate for something to talk about that doesn’t result in his foot winding up in his mouth – again.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The GOP’s candidate of the of the one-percent, Mitt Romney, has built his campaign around a unique strategy: Take everything President Obama says out of context and then try to use it against him. This is a tactic that he has been employing repeatedly in lieu of actually telling voters what he would do were […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[152,1],"tags":[183,260],"class_list":["post-8069","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-election","category-general","tag-barack-obama","tag-mitt-romney"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4Ijg-269","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":7221,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=7221","url_meta":{"origin":8069,"position":0},"title":"Mitt Romney Gives His Tea Party People What They Want – Pigheaded Nastiness","author":"Mark NC","date":"6\/2\/2012","format":false,"excerpt":"From the start of the 2012 election cycle there was one thing that was clear and consistent about Mitt Romney's campaign: that he would be neither clear nor consistent. Romney has been on both sides of every major issue. Whereas he once bragged about his unwavering defense of Roe v\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Election"","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5839,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=5839","url_meta":{"origin":8069,"position":1},"title":"If All Political Ads Were Made Like Mitt Romney’s Ads","author":"Mark NC","date":"11\/22\/2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Yesterday perennial GOP presidential frontrunner-up, Mitt Romney, released an ad that contained an unambiguously dishonest soundbite. The ad played a clip of President Obama saying... \"...if we keep talking about the economy, we're going to lose.\" However, that clip was taken from a speech in 2008 where Obama was quoting\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Election"","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7754,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=7754","url_meta":{"origin":8069,"position":2},"title":"Mitt Romney Proposes Campaign Truce Where Obama Must Agree Not To Campaign","author":"Mark NC","date":"8\/10\/2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Mitt Romney clearly believes that he is above the rules to which the rest of us peasants are subject. He thinks that he can be as nasty as he wants, but if his opponent should respond in kind, then Romney pitifully demands apologies. Yesterday, in a monumental display of arrogance,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Election"","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7692,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=7692","url_meta":{"origin":8069,"position":3},"title":"The Hilariously Incompetent Campaign Of Mitt Romney And Friends","author":"Mark NC","date":"7\/31\/2012","format":false,"excerpt":"All the signs of utter collapse are starting to show. Mitt Romney's campaign is stumbling its way through the election season with embarrassing gaffes and blatant obfuscation. The American people know quite well that Romney is desperately trying to hide his record and run on attacks on President Obama. The\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Election"","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8271,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=8271","url_meta":{"origin":8069,"position":4},"title":"Oh The Humanity! Mitt Romney Blimp Crashes in Florida","author":"Mark NC","date":"10\/22\/2012","format":false,"excerpt":"This is just a little distraction in the build up for the third and final debate between President Obama and Mitt Romney. It may also be a prescient foreshadowing of what's to come for Romney.","rel":"","context":"In "Election"","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":8125,"url":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?p=8125","url_meta":{"origin":8069,"position":5},"title":"Mitt Romney’s Opponent In Wednesday’s Debate Is Not Pres. Obama","author":"Mark NC","date":"10\/1\/2012","format":false,"excerpt":"When Mitt Romney takes the stage on Wednesday he will be facing President Obama for the first debate of the 2012 presidential election. However, Obama will only be a subordinate target in the encounter. The real audience Romney will be addressing is the club of wealthy donors who have been\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Election"","block_context":{"text":"Election","link":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/?cat=152"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8069","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8069"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8069\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8072,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8069\/revisions\/8072"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8069"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8069"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newscorpse.com\/ncWP\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8069"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Mitt](\"\/Pix\/Campaign2012\/romney-inside-outside.jpg\")
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