Romney: Newt's Jobs Claim Akin to Gore's Internet Boast

SPARTANBURG, S.C. -- Speaking at an outdoor rally at Wofford College, Mitt Romney packed a new punch at rival Newt Gingrich on Wednesday, comparing the former House speaker's claim that he helped create jobs during Ronald Reagan's presidency to "Al Gore taking credit for the Internet."

"You know, the speaker the other day at the debate was talking about how he created millions of jobs when he was working with the Reagan administration. Well, he'd been in Congress for two years when Ronald Reagan came into office," Romney told the crowd of locals and students gathered outside the campus student center.

At Monday night's debate in Myrtle Beach, Gingrich was asked about his attacks on Romney's record at Bain Capital and answered that it was important to focus on job creation. "As a young member of Congress, I worked with President Ronald Reagan. We passed an economic growth package. We created 16 million jobs. The American people, within a framework that Reagan had established, created 16 million jobs," he said. "As speaker I came back -- working with President Bill Clinton, we passed a very Reagan-like program: less regulation, lower taxes. Unemployment dropped to 4.2 percent. We created 11 million jobs."

At the Wofford event, Romney laid into those claims. "That would be like saying 425 congressmen were all responsible for those jobs," he said. "Government doesn't create jobs -- it's the private sector that creates jobs. Congress taking responsibility, or taking credit for helping create jobs is like Al Gore taking credit for the Internet."

Romney was referring to a 1999 CNN interview with Gore, who was vying for the Democratic nomination for president at the time. When asked what distinguished him from another challenger, Sen. Bill Bradley, Gore said, "During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the Internet. I took the initiative in moving forward a whole range of initiatives that have proven to be important to our country?s economic growth and environmental protection, improvements in our educational system."

In Spartanburg, Romney didn't call out Gingrich by name, but dinged him for the recent Bain attacks. "I was disappointed the last couple of weeks to see one of my opponents attacking free enterprise like the president has," the former Massachusetts governor said, making a comparison his campaign used in a television ad released last week in South Carolina. "That's not the goal of the Republican Party; that makes us sad."

Romney and Gingrich are the top two contenders in South Carolina, which will hold its primary on Saturday. The RealClearPolitics average shows Romney with a 10-point lead.

Ahead of the Spartanburg rally, Romney's campaign released a Web video titled "Unreliable Leader," which describes Gingrich's behavior as "erratic." In perhaps another sign that the campaign sees Gingrich as a rising threat, two Romney surrogates -- former Missouri Sen. Jim Talent and former New York Rep. Susan Molinari -- held a conference call (the second such call set up by the campaign in as many months) to assail Gingrich's record.?

Source: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2012/01/18/romney_newts_jobs_claim_akin_to_gores_internet_boast_112804.html

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