The Empire Strikes Back: 1998 Obama Video: ZOMG REDISTRIBUTION!!!1111onesy

[CountDeMoney]

Mitt Romney shifts focus to Obama's '98 comments on 'redistribution'

After two politically treacherous days, Mitt Romney is trying to right-side his campaign by focusing on something President Obama said 14 years ago.

The Republican presidential candidate has been battered by relentless news coverage dissecting his assertion, caught on video, that "47 percent" of Americans feel entitled to government assistance. Now his aides believe they've stumbled upon a way to change the subject.

In a 1998 audio clip that surfaced online Tuesday afternoon, Obama is heard speaking at a conference at Loyola University, where he suggested that society needed to come up with a plan to "structure government systems that pool resources and hence facilitate some redistribution, because I actually believe in redistribution, at least at a certain level, to make sure that everybody's got a shot."

Romney pounced on those comments, which Obama made when he was an Illinois state senator, at an Atlanta fundraiser on Wednesday. Obama's speech, Romney said, indicated support for a European-style system that would never work in the United States.

"I know there are some who believe that if you simply take from some and give to others then we'll all be better off. It's known as redistribution," Romney told the crowd. "It's never been a characteristic of America."

"This idea of redistribution follows from the idea that if you have a business, you didn't build it -- someone else did that," Romney said, harkening back to Obama's "you didn't build that" line from a speech he made in July to point out that small businesses have relied on some government support.

Romney also brought up the 1998 speech in a Fox News interview Tuesday and in a USA Today op-ed published Wednesday, all part of a new strategy to raise doubts about Obama's economic theories, draw attention away from Romney's criticism of Americans who don't pay income tax, and perhaps also add the word "redistribution" to the list of well-worn, right-wing attack lines, including "Are you better off?" and "Drill baby, drill."

White House press secretary Jay Carney called the newest GOP assault the sign of a "desperate" campaign that is having a "very bad week."

"The charge based on this 14-year-old video sounds very familiar to one that was tried and failed in 2008," Carney said Wednesday. In 1998, "then-Senator Obama was making an argument for a more efficient, more effective government, specifically citing city government agencies that he did not think were working effectively. He believed then and believes now that there are steps we can take to promote opportunity and ensure that all Americans have a fair shot if they work hard."

The shift in campaign tactics comes just days after aides said Romney would begin offering details of his five-point economic plan, as voters become more attentive to the campaign and after polling data suggested they're eager to learn more about Romney's policy positions.

But in a memo to reporters Wednesday, Romney campaign manager Matt Rhoades said the campaign would now focus instead on the rivals' "starkly different visions" for the country.

"Mitt Romney's vision for America is an opportunity society, where free people and free enterprise thrive and success is admired and emulated, not attacked," Rhoades said in the memo. "President Obama's vision for America is a government-centered society, where government grows bigger and more active, occupying more of our everyday lives."

On the campaign trail Wednesday, Romney's running mate, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), even slipped a new attack line into his standard stump speech.

"He's going to try and distract and divide this country to win by default," Ryan said during an event in Danville, Va. "You know, President Obama said that he believes in redistribution. Mitt Romney and I are not running to redistribute the wealth. Mitt Romney and I are running to help Americans create wealth."

On Capitol Hill, Romney supporters aimed at Obama.

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), one of Romney's most prominent surrogates, said Obama's 1998 remarks give "more insight into what he views government's role as."

"This is a president who believes the government's job is to pick winners and losers in the economy," Rubio told reporters Wednesday.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) suggested that Romney should campaign more aggressively in key swing states, particularly Virginia.

"If we win Virginia and one of Ohio and Florida, we're going to win this thing," Graham said. "So, if I were Mitt Romney, no person in Virginia could go very long without meeting me."

Democrats appeared buoyed on Wednesday. Obama's campaign manager, Jim Messina, met behind closed doors with Senate Democrats for their weekly caucus lunch, a gathering described by participants as upbeat.

Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said Messina told senators that he expects the presidential race to remain close, but he also described polling data from key swing states that appeared to be solidifying for the president.

"What impressed me, as much as anything, was the pace of volunteers, calls, voter registration is dramatically larger than it was four years ago," Durbin said of the data.

In another sign of renewed Democratic optimism, House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) suggested Wednesday that Romney's dismissal of nearly half of the American electorate could work to swing key House and Senate races.

"I think what's happening is that the American people, particularly the middle class in America, are getting a clearer and clearer picture that the Democratic Party is on their side and the Republican Party is not," Hoyer said.

On the Republican side, that possibility was causing some concern among some GOP candidates, who were direct in seeking to distance themselves from Romney's video comments.

Sen. Dean Heller, locked in a tight race for reelection against Democratic Rep. Shelley Berkley in Nevada, became the third GOP Senate candidate to take issue with Romney's comments, telling reporters Wednesday that he has "very different view of the world" when it comes to competing for the votes of those who do not pay income tax or who receive government assistance.

And Mark Meadows, a Republican running for an open House seat in the Asheville, N.C., area, said that voters in his district don't fit Romney's description at the fundraiser.

"I'm concerned about all 750,000 people," Meadows said at a televised forum Tuesday night. "I am here to represent the people of this district."

The Marxist Leninist Stalinist Castroist Obamaist recording here, all 1:36 of it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ge3aGJfDSg4

[Admiral Yi]

I never did get Obama's comments about "making fatcats and millionaires pay their fair share so everybody can have a fair shot," and I don't understand this one either.  Isn't the whole point of redistribution that nobody will never have a fair shot?  Or is the fair shot he's talking about a fair shot at consuming like a rich person?

It's stuff like this which makes me doubt Obama's intellectual depth.

[Jacob]

I didn't watch the video, but my guess is it means something like this - have wealthy people pay a reasonable share of taxes to help fund (along with the taxes from the less wealthy) to provide a solid foundation for everyone to get their crack at the can. So, say, the kid of poor parents gets enough food that they don't suffer from malnutrition (and all the downstream results of that), that they get access to a decent enough education (that they couldn't afford if they had to pay for it themselves) that they have a chance to work hard and become well off themselves. Similarly, if someone's been working hard but larger economic trends leave them in a rough spot, say because their entire industry is outsourced or made redundant and their skills aren't transferable, there's enough of a support net to prevent them from losing the entire substance of their life immediately, and a process for getting them other skills so they can continue to work hard in a different industry.

I think that's what's meant by "a fair shot".

[Ed Anger]

They'll never find my coffee cans full of money buried all over the place

[CountDeMoney]

My wealth was redistributed to shareholders.

[Admiral Yi]

I think that's what's meant by "a fair shot".

I think you just made that up and don't have a clue what it means either.

[DGuller]

I think that's what's meant by "a fair shot".

I think you just made that up and don't have a clue what it means either.

I think he does have a clue, personally.  It seems like a standard defense of social democracy.

[viper37]

I never did get Obama's comments about "making fatcats and millionaires pay their fair share so everybody can have a fair shot," and I don't understand this one either.  Isn't the whole point of redistribution that nobody will never have a fair shot?  Or is the fair shot he's talking about a fair shot at consuming like a rich person?

It's stuff like this which makes me doubt Obama's intellectual depth.

due to the way certain incomes are taxed, a millionaire, even more a billionaire might very well end up paying less taxes in % of his total income than someone from the middle class.

If you give the very rich a free ride on public services and let the poor fend for themselves, it means that the poor have zero to no chances of improving their conditions.  Especially now that the government will help the really rich when they screw themselves and lose billions of $$. 

[Admiral Yi]

I think he does have a clue, personally.  It seems like a standard defense of social democracy.

That's sort of my point.  Social Democracy is not about giving anybody a fair shot at anything, it's about providing the necessities of life.

[Admiral Yi]

If you give the very rich a free ride on public services and let the poor fend for themselves, it means that the poor have zero to no chances of improving their conditions.

I don't see the connection between the two.  The US didn't even have an income tax before WWI.  Does that mean the poor had a negative chance of improving their conditions back then?

[Neil]

due to the way certain incomes are taxed, a millionaire, even more a billionaire might very well end up paying less taxes in % of his total income than someone from the middle class.

At some point, I'm not entirely sure that's a bad thing.  At any rate, everyone's personal income tax rate in the US is too low, especially if they insist on wasting money on the USAF and a non-public health care system.

[Neil]

I think he does have a clue, personally.  It seems like a standard defense of social democracy.

That's sort of my point.  Social Democracy is not about giving anybody a fair shot at anything, it's about providing the necessities of life.

The two are related.  Once your necessities are met, you have a chance to act like a human being rather than an animal.

[DGuller]

I think he does have a clue, personally.  It seems like a standard defense of social democracy.

That's sort of my point.  Social Democracy is not about giving anybody a fair shot at anything, it's about providing the necessities of life.

That's what you think it is.  I think it's about providing necessities of life so that every ordinary citizen can then maximize his potential instead of having material hardship waste it.

[Sheilbh]

Social democracy isn't about the necessities of life, that sounds far more like a more right-wing idea, basically of the state as safety net. Any attempt at social democracy goes way beyond that.

Also this is stupid by Romney. McCain attacked Obama for similar remarks to no effect. Far worse is that attacking a guy who's been President for four years over something he said fifteen years ago looks weak and sort-of weird.

[CountDeMoney]

Also this is stupid by Romney. McCain attacked Obama for similar remarks to no effect. Far worse is that attacking a guy who's been President for four years over something he said fifteen years ago looks weak and sort-of weird.

Particularly when the four year body of work offers no real demonstrable evidence.  But panic time set in a while ago.

And sorry, kids, but Obamacare doesn't really count.