Mitt Romney is out with a pretty solid new attack line, turning the S&P downgrade of US credit into a swipe at the president who did more than any other to make the downgrade happen.
“I’ll call it a triple D presidency. It’s been a presidency that’s associated with debt. And with downgrade. And with delay.”
Romney goes on to note that with 25 million Americans out of work, Obama shouldn’t be vacationing and playing golf on the vineyard. That fits with his campaign theme – Obama Isn’t Working.
Thematically, Romney is doing nearly all the right things so far. He flipped on global warming last week, but has steadily trained his fire on Obama’s economic record, which is the president’s greatest point of vulnerability. What Romney has not done well, though, is create media coverage and draw the blogs in to aid his attacks well. Every day it seems I could write four or five posts about Rick Perry without really trying, because Perry is so effective at forcing the media to cover what he’s saying. The latest example of that is Perry’s fairly obvious assertion that Social Security is a Ponzi scheme. Who hasn’t heard that line at least 10 times in your life? Who under 40 doesn’t believe that it’s actually true — because thanks to the size of the retiring Baby Boom generation, it is true? The media hears him say this and thinks “gaffe,” but everyday Americans hear it and think “Yup.” Knowing how the two very different groups will respond, Perry says what he says, the media goes a bit nuts about it, and he generates a whole lot of what turns out to be free positive coverage. And then he’ll get another day of lesser but still positive coverage as various experts come out of the woodwork to say yes, he does have a point here.
Romney has not been as effective at this. He just doesn’t seem to have the instinct for it. But this line, that Obama’s presidency is triple-D, should have some legs. It’s true and it’s easy to repeat and remember and turn into TV and radio ads.
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