for the washington post. great to have you with us. bob, let me ask you first. how damaging is this to romney? he better be mr. october if he s going to turn this thing around. i think it s really damaging. i think there s a thing called water cooler conversation, which is most people don t sit around paying attention to politics the way we do. there are things that breakthrough because they happen and you meet somebody at the water cooler at the office the next morning and you say, did you see what that guy said? it was callous and untrue, but it was a revelation of the real mitt romney. this is a guy that likes to fire people. this is the guy who ran bain. if you watch and listen to him in that tape, he s so much more comfortable sitting and talking to those people sitting there, paying $50,000 a piece and dumping on people who live a more ordinary life. eugene, there s no question that mitt romney went on the offensive today defending
strategist bob shrum tonight and eugene robinson. great to have you with us. bob, how damaging is this to romney? he better be mr. october if he s going to turn it around? i think it s really damaging. there s a thing called water cooler conversation, which is most people don t sit around paying attention to politics the way we do. there are things that break through because they happen, and you meet somebody at the water cooler at the office next morning and you say did you see what that guy said? what he was was callous and idiotic and untrue. this is the guy who likes to fire people and ran bain. if you watch and listen to him in that tape, he is so much more comfortable talking to those people sitting there paying 50,000 bucks aapiece and dumping on people who live a more ordinary life. yeah.
bob, let me ask you first. how damaging is this to romney? he better be mr. october if he s going to turn this thing around. i think it s really damaging. i think there s a thing called water cooler conversation, which is most people don t sit around paying attention to politics the way we do. there are things that breakthrough because they happen and you meet somebody at the water cooler at the office the next morning and you say, did you see what that guy said? it was callous and untrue, but it was a revelation of the real mitt romney. this is a guy that likes to fire people. this is the guy who ran bain. if you watch and listen to him in that tape, he s so much more comfortable sitting and talking to those people sitting there, paying $50,000 a piece and dumping on people who live a more ordinary life. eugene, there s no question that mitt romney went on the offensive today defending himself, but he looks incompetent. he looks unsure of himself.
is the proof that romney had operational control of bain capital past 1999? listen, if you are noted as the ceo to most individuals you re leading the company. megyn: that doesn t answer my question. operational control is different from on paper. let me put it another way. if he says he wasn t in operational control while was he sitting on boards of company has were basically managed by a bank? megyn: do they do that all the time michael graham in business when you are the ceo and yet you re doing something else and they like to use your name let me just add this. megyn: your connections. chris and then mike. this is the wrong look, the wrong conversation. fortune magazine and the washington post have already covered this. the story has been ripped apart. it s absolutely not true that mitt romney ran bain after 1999. everything you re hearing is a lie or misrepresentation. megyn: it s true it s not true. i was trying to set up the facts. we can t agree on the facts. here
whole bain attack. they think it s working. the polls seem to indicate it s working. but the reality of that? certainly if you look at the bain record during romney s time there, it had big successes and some failures. i think this is sensible for the obama campaign to promote. also, it s true that during the last year or two of president obama s watch, manufacturing has had some kind of recovery in the united states. whether or not he can take direct credit for that is a whole more complex issue. but this is the natural, anybody in the president s position would be making this ad. is it fair to attack is it accurate to attack mitt romney for outsourcing from his days at private equity? i know that s a complicated question. there s a couple things that the ad is problematic. one, there s a decision between offshoring where you send factories overseas, and outsourcing which can be to an i.t. company down the road. so the ad conflates those two things. the second thing is during