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Romney steps up economy attacks

By Seema Mehta, Los Angeles Times –

IRWIN, Pa. — In remarks that played on debunked assertions about the president’s birthplace, Mitt Romney on Tuesday said that President Barack Obama’s administration resembled foreign governments and one of Romney’s chief surrogates said the president needed to “learn how to be an American.”

The remarks — former New Hampshire Gov. John Sununu later apologized for the latter comment — came as Romney tried to change the subject from calls for his tax returns and questions about the length of his tenure at the venture company Bain Capital. Both issues have been under sustained attack from Democrats and even some Romney allies.

Standing before hundreds of supporters at a rally outside Pittsburgh, Romney compared Obama’s administration to those in foreign lands where the well-connected receive government handouts while the middle class suffers.

“That’s happening in this country today. I’m ashamed to say we’re seeing the president hand out money to the businesses of his campaign contributors,” Romney said as he stood in front of a large sign that read “Obama’s Upside-Down Economy.”

Romney has leveled the critique before about a federal loan guarantee to the Solyndra solar panel company, including once when he visited the companny’s shuttered headquarters. The company went bankrupt after receiving a $535 million loan guarantee approved by the Obama administration.

On Tuesday, he mentioned Fisker Automotive, a manufacturer of electric cars. And the Republican National Committee launched an attack around former California Controller Steve Westly, a major Obama bundler whose portfolio includes Tesla Motors, which the RNC says has received millions from taxpayers. “Crony capitalism does not create jobs,” Romney said. “I believe in free markets and free people.”

An Obama spokeswoman said the investments were made to support businesses whose success could benefit the nation.

“Mitt Romney’s campaign has already gone off the deep end today in an attempt to once again change the story line away from his Bain tenure and investments in foreign tax havens and offshore accounts,” said Lis Smith.

Smith was referring to comments earlier in the day by Sununu. In a conference call arranged by the Romney campaign, Sununu assailed Obama’s roots in the “political-slash-felon environment” of Chicago and attacked the president’s recent statement that business leaders who had succeeded had help from government, in the form of teachers or road construction workers, among others.

“These are the people who are the backbone of our economy and the president clearly demonstrated that he has absolutely no idea how the American economy functions,” Sununu said.

He added: “It is the American way, and I wish this president would learn how to be an American.”

Asked if he could clarify that remark, Sununu said Obama “has to learn the American formula for creating business.” He apologized on CNN for the initial statement.

Romney offered a similar critique, slashing at Obama as advocating a political philosophy that the Republican said wants Americans to be ashamed of their achievements.

“The course we’re on right now is foreign to us. It changes America,” Romney said.

He, like Sununu, seized on an altered version of Obama’s remark about businesses and called it “insulting to every entrepreneur, every innovator.”

Romney and his campaign have revived criticism of what he calls “crony capitalism” while attempting to ward off calls to release more of his tax returns. So far he has released his 2010 return and an estimate for 2011. Democrats also have mounted a weeklong campaign aimed at Romney’s differing explanations of when he left Bain Capital, the venture firm he co-founded and specifically why his name appears on regulatory filings as leading the firm years after he claims he left it.

The president’s campaign launched an ad in Pennsylvania about the tax matter Tuesday. Romney did not mention that or the Bain departure.

Obama, meanwhile, campaigned in Texas, where he skewered Romney as someone who would lead the country astray on issues such as abortion rights, Iraq, education and health care. And he reiterated criticism of Romney’s business career.

“His main calling card for wanting to be president is his private-sector experience,” Obama said of Romney. “So we asked the voters to examine that experience. He invested — made money investing in companies that had been called ‘pioneers’ of outsourcing. I don’t want pioneers of outsourcing in the White House; I want somebody who believes in insourcing. Let’s bring those jobs back home.”

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