Rove Calls Wright Attack Ad 'Stupid'; Ryan May or May Not Be in VP Talk
Karl Rove appeared on Fox News Sunday and called the proposed ad attacking Obama for his affiliation with Jeremiah Wright stupid. “Speaking from the perspective of the super PAC, you want to try to do things that you think will be helpful to the super PAC and not things that will be hurtful and, frankly, trying to dredge up Jeremiah Wright, right or wrong, after this issue was litigated four years ago by John McCain deciding not to litigate, it was stupid,” he said.
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Paul Ryan appeared on NBC's Meet the Press and wouldn't confirm or deny whether he's being considered as Mitt Romney's VP. “Look, I’m not going to get into the internal process of another campaign," he said. "I’m focused on doing my job here as a Wisconsin congressman, as a budget committee chairman. So I’m just not going to get into that speculation." He also defended his budget and argued that it's designed to prevent European-like austerity. "The whole purpose of our budget is to preempt austerity," Ryan said. Ryan called the economic turmoil in Europe "a cautionary tale," and said that the Senate hasn't done an official budget has “put us on a path to Europe-like austerity." "We’re not even really cutting spending,” he said. "We’re simply slowing the rate of increase.” He also pointed out that Europe has had to raise taxes.
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John Boehner was asked if he's confident he'll be back as Speaker of the House if Republicans can keep control of the House in November on ABC's This Week with George Stephanopolous. "I am," he said. He said he doesn't believe Republicans will lose control of house. "As a matter of fact, I think most of our members are doing very well. But again, you never know what's gonna happen over the next six months. My job is to make sure our team is prepared." When asked about the scraped plan by a super PAC to attack Obama over his connection to Jeremiah Wright, Boehner said, "this kind of nonsense shouldn't happen... The election's gonna be about the economy and getting Americans back to work. And I think Governor [Mitt] Romney's prescriptions are much better."
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Boehner was also asked about the JPMorgan trading loss and if any regulation would have prevented what happened. "There's no law against stupidity. No law against stupid trades," he said. "And as long as the positives, money wasn't at risk, and as long as there's no risk of a taxpayer bailout-- they should be held accountable by the market and their shareholders. And they are." Boehner said he doesn't believe any part of Dodd-Frank would have prevented the loss, and said he still supports repealing, or at least altering, the Dodd-Frank law. "There are big problems for this law, and it needs - it needs some big changes," he said.
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Karl Rove also went on a rant on Fox News Sunday and said that attacking Romney over his history at Bain Capital won't work. "The problem is this is Romney’s strength," Rove said. "We saw that in how the Obama campaign went after him: they put a grand total of $83,000 behind their attack ad, and everybody in the media lapped it up. But let’s look at the facts: Romney invested $180 million in the company, the company made money for a while and eight years later after a flood of cheap-end steel came into the United States – principally from China – it and a number of other steel companies went under – over two years after he left Bain Capital. Over time, I think, this is going to be okay for Romney, as long as he engages in it... And they did. They went straight back at ‘em and said wait a minute. Here’s the details about GST Technologies. And oh incidentally let’s give you another example to look at, which is we invested in another steel company that went from a couple hundred employees to 6,000 employees and is a going concern today."
David Axelrod appeared on CNN's State of the Union and criticized Mitt Romney's apology for the planned Jeremiah Wright attack ad. Host Candy Crowley asked Axelrod if he thought the candidate's religions should be off limits in the coming election, to which he responded, "Absolutely, and we have right along. we have said that’s not fair game... And we wish Governor Romney would stand up as resolutely and consistently, to refute these kinds of things on his side." He said that Romney only repudiated the attack ad "tepidly and reluctantly."
Newark Mayor Cory Booker appeared on NBC's Meet the Press and denounced ads attacking Bain Capital and ads attacking Obama's Wright connection. "It’s nauseating to the American public," Booker said. "Enough is enough. Stop attacking private equity. Stop attacking Jeremiah Wright... As far as that stuff, I have to just say from a very personal level I’m not about to sit here and indict private equity,” he added. “To me, it’s just we’re getting to a ridiculous point in America. Especially that I know I live in a state where pension funds, unions and other people invest in companies like Bain Capital. If you look at the totality of Bain Capital’s record, they’ve done a lot to support businesses [and] to grow businesses. And this, to me, I’m very uncomfortable with.”
Mitch McConnell appeared on CBS's Face the Nation and said he doesn't expect anything to come of the debt debate before the November election. "The timing will be determined by the president," he said. "They determine when to request of us that we raise the debt ceiling. We assume that will happen at the end of the year, early next year."
Nancy Pelosi appeared on ABC's This Week and said she thinks the Democrats have a good chance of taking back the House in November. Asked what she thought would happen if the elections were held today, Pelosi said, "I think it would be dead even." Pelosi said she thinks there are 75 seats that are competitive right now. She deflected a question over whether she'd run for Speaker if the Democrats took the House. "I just wanna come back with the Democrats in the majority," she said. "That's really what is important."
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