Politics
Election 2012: Obama calls Romney’s ideas ‘extreme’ – AP Interview
The president was at ease but doggedly on script, steering even personal-themed questions about Romney and running mate Paul Ryan into answers about starkly different visions for helping the middle class.
Romney, a successful former executive of a private equity firm and one-time Massachusetts governor, will introduce himself to a TV audience of millions next Thursday as he takes the convention stage to accept his party’s presidential nomination. He has offered himself as a business-minded alternative to Obama and has seized on voter concerns about joblessness and the direction of the nation.
Nearly 10 weeks before Election Day, the race is remarkably stable and reflective of a sharply divided nation, with registered voters about evenly split on their choice and nearly a quarter of them unsure or still willing to change their mind. Across the interview, Obama’s messages often seemed directed at moderate and independent voters whose sway could make the difference.
Obama’s depiction of a Romney presidency grew most pointed when he was asked if his Republican challenger has no core, as one of Obama’s top advisers once put it.
The president suggested that whatever Romney really stands for in life is secondary to the promises Romney has made in the campaign.
In explaining his accusation of “extreme” positions, the president cited Romney’s call for across-the-board tax cuts that Obama said would mostly help the rich at the expense of everyone else and cost the nation US$5 trillion. Obama singled out Romney’s opposition to tax credits for producers of wind energy, the kind of issue that carries large political resonance in a battleground state such as Iowa.
And Obama alluded to the provocative issue of abortion, suddenly thrust to the fore this week when Republican Missouri Senate candidate Todd Akin said the female body has a way to “shut that whole thing down” when a woman is the victim of “legitimate rape.”
