position, bibi netanyahu. he doesn t have a serious challenger to his authority in israel. ahmadinejad president obama has an economic crisis in his hand. you have a situation where you have three players and only one player is in the strong position. it is, again, something that the opposition is going to use against president obama over and over again. as long as mr. romney is not asked what he would do instead. he s never really communicated what he would do instead. he s in the happy position where he can criticize without being challenged on what he s doing. he said similar actions and similar decisions to the president, which has been noted by many people. he hasn t said anything different than what the current administration is saying here. that s right. governor romney has, in fact, endorsed what the obama administration s policy is on iran in terms of building international pressure on the regime to come clean about its
under george w. bush and senator joe mansion. gentlemen, thank you for joining us. let s get to the point. what do you anticipate from the first, in a series of debates? do you expect political fireworks from the candidates? chris, we begin with you? well, here s the thing, i think is interesting about debates. everyone thinks they are about answering the questions and who comes up with a better policy response. but they are not. they are momes. who defines and wins the momes. if you are governor romney, you are going into this debate, you are behind in the key polls and behind in the national tracking polls, there is a lot of pressure to do well. he has to go in and be very aggressive. with the president, the problem that governor romney has, he is going to have to explain what he means by his policies. he hasn t been willing, for example, to give firm details or willing to explain what loopholes he would close. you can t refuse to answer the questions, that would be a
this 47% story and this tape that s been released and revealed? it s just a treasure-trove of anti-romney stuff. and it s worth pointing out that in many of the states where republicans dominate, that s where, you know, you have kind of a lot of these 47%. the southern states. right. so inas much as candidates can make clear that 47% he s talking about you, it seems like it would be immensely damaging. but it gives the democrats an opportunity on the stump to use this. this is who they really are. they ought to be able to peel away seniors, peel away at anyone who has ever had any kind of government assistance whatsoever. what about people who have been unemployed and have gotten an unemployment check in tough times and bounced back into the economy? there s a wide array of people that romney has has written off.
revealed? it s just a treasure-trove of anti-romney stuff. and it s worth pointing out that in many of the states where republicans dominate, that s where, you know, you have kind of a lot of these 47%. the southern states. right. so inas much as candidates can make clear that 47% he s talking about you, it seems like it would be immensely damaging. but it gives the democrats an opportunity on the stump to use this. this is who they really are. they ought to be able to peel away seniors, peel away at anyone who has ever had any kind of government assistance whatsoever. what about people who have been unemployed and have gotten an unemployment check in tough times and bounced back into the economy? there s a wide array of people that romney has has written off. alienated.
middle class in all of this? he hasn t been able to do that to this point. i don t know frankly. i really don t know. you re wearing the jeans doesn t seem to work. not wearing the tie doesn t seem to work. he doesn t have that sort of faculty, that sort of ability to connect with people on that level. now he s announced that he really doesn t care to do so, as a matter of fact. he wants to connect with the folks at that fund-raiser. nbc news just released a brand-new poll, and the numbers are very bad for mitt romney. the poll was taken before the fund-raising video surfaced. president obama leads by five points among likely voters. on the economy the president now ties romney. on looking out for the middle class, president obama holds a nearly 20-point lead. what do these numbers mean, and what s your reaction to how the president handled the 47% question from david letterman? i thought the president