Election 2012: Economy
Romney backs extension of low student loan interest rate
Updated, 3:40 p.m.
ASTON, Pa. — As the White House ramps up its push to woo young voters by urging Congress to head off a scheduled increase in student loan interest rates, GOP presidential front-runner Mitt Romney struck back Monday, throwing his support behind an extension of the current rates at a campaign event outside Philadelphia.
The former Massachusetts governor made the announcement at a press availability with U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, the first joint appearance of Romney and the Florida Republican whose name is often floated as a top choice for his running mate.
“There’s one thing that I wanted to mention, that I forgot to mention at the very beginning, and that was that particularly with the number of college graduates that can’t find work or that can only find work well beneath their skill level, I fully support the effort to extend the low interest rate on student loans,” Romney said at the end of a seven-minute joint news conference with Rubio.
Romney says Obama is ‘a president who by his own measure has failed’
SOUTH PARK TOWNSHIP, Pa. — On the eve of the Keystone State’s GOP primary, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney (R) delivered a withering critique of President Obama’s leadership on energy and the economy, telling a crowd of several hundred supporters who had braved unseasonably wintry weather that Obama is “a president who by his own measure has failed, and so he looks around for someone to blame.”
Mitt Romney smiles as the crowd applauds at the end of a rally at Consol Energy in Pennsylvania, April 23, 2012.
(Jason Cohn - Reuters)
In a 20-minute speech at the headquarters of Consol Energy, a Fortune 500 coal and natural gas company, Romney sought to place responsibility for the country’s sluggish recovery squarely on Obama’s shoulders. And he contended that Obama’s move to “blame Congress” is moot because for Obama’s first two years in office, Democrats controlled Capitol Hill.
“So he’s out of ideas, and he’s out of excuses, and in 2012, we’ve got to make sure he’s out of office,” Romney said to loud applause from the early-morning crowd.
Obama heads to N.C., Colorado, Iowa to push for low student loan rates
President Obama will travel to college campuses in North Carolina, Colorado and Iowa next week to urge Congress to keep interest rates low on student loans, the White House announced Friday.
Obama will also appear for the first time on “Late Night With Jimmy Fallon,” which will be taped Tuesday on the campus of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, according to NBC.
Congress and the campaign game (Monday’s Trail Mix video)
The Keystone XL oil sands pipeline takes center stage on Capitol Hill -- again -- as congressional and campaign politics collide:
Mitt Romney camp pounces on Axelrod for comments on economy
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s camp seized on a Sunday morning interview in which Obama senior adviser David Axelrod appeared to suggest that the country’s economic recovery is not on the right path.
“The choice in this election is between economy that produces a growing middle class and that gives people a chance to get ahead and their kids a chance to get ahead, and an economy that continues down the road we are on, where a fewer and fewer number of people do very well, and everybody else is running faster and faster just to keep pace,” Axelrod told host Chris Wallace during a contentious interview on “Fox News Sunday.”
Axelrod went on to argue that the country should “take that first route,” and later in the interview appeared to suggest that by “the road we are on” he meant “the same failed policies that were so disastrous in the last decade” and not the Obama administration’s current policies.
Still, the Romney campaign pounced on the comments and quickly circulated a Web video of the Axelrod interview under the headline, “Obama adviser David Axelrod makes the case for Mitt Romney for President.”
Romney attacks ‘Barack Obama’s Government-Centered Society’ in Wisconsin speech
APPLETON, Wis. – Seizing the mantle of the presumptive Republican nominee, Mitt Romney on Friday sought to frame the general election contest as a battle to restore America’s promise and said the sputtering economy is the legacy of “Barack Obama’s Government-Centered Society.”
(Steven Senne - AP)
In a formal speech here, the former Massachusetts governor delivered a passionate defense of America’s free enterprise system, which he said had been under attack by an administration that considered businesses as “the villain and not the solution.”
“In Barack Obama’s Government-Centered Society, the government must do more because the economy is doomed to do less,” Romney said. “When you attack business and vilify success, you will have less business and less success.”
Rick Perry needs to show some depth on foreign, economic policy
Is Texas Gov. Rick Perry ready to prove he has the policy chops to be the GOP nominee?
Perry’s uneven debate performances — struggling to explain his position on immigration, bungling a planned attack line against former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, giving almost incoherent answer on a question about Pakistan — have caused Republican strategists and his GOP rivals to poke fun at Perry’s knowledge and intelligence. And Perry hasoffered positions that are well outside the Republican mainstream, such as suggesting retirement programs run by states should replace Social Security, that didn’t seem fully examined.
Rick Perry at a press conference with American and Israeli Jewish leaders at the W Hotel Union Square.
(Michael Nagle /GETTY IMAGES )
His rivals have suggested Perry does not write his books or speeches and Bruce Bartlett, a former Reagan administration official, called Perry “an idiot.” And Washington’s Republican wonks privately say the Texas governor’s campaign has given little sign that Perry is determined to present a detailed policy vision as a candidate, as few of them have heard from Perry or his operatives asking them for ideas, in contrast to Romney’s campaign.
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Paul Ryan's tax returns are now up on the Romney camp Web site: http://t.co/imrNkjCz
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