JoeChalupa
12-12-2011, 05:59 PM
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1211/70322.html
MANCHESTER, N.H. — Presaging a brutal final stretch before voting begins, Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich traded mocking insults Monday that veered into the personal and made clear that any restraint between the two was all but gone.
In the sharpest and most personal negative turn yet of the Republican presidential campaign, the two leading contenders jabbed one another over how each got rich. Romney portrayed Gingrich as a Beltway fixer who cashed in on his access. The former House speaker returned fire by painting the one-time Bain executive as a reckless corporate titan who lined his pockets by killing jobs – the first time a Republican opponent of Romney has him that hard for his private-sector work.
The attacks came even as both candidates claimed they wanted to keep their exchanges above board.
Romney took the first shot, calling on Gingrich to return the approximate $1.6 million he collected as a consultant for Freddie Mac after leaving Congress.
“He was in the business of connecting folks with government,” said the former Massachusetts governor in a Fox interview at a diner here Monday morning, suggesting that Gingrich was like other former public officials who go to Washington “to serve the people and then they stay there to serve themselves.”
Gingrich, stumping just down the road in Londonderry, hit back even harder with a line that wrapped in the fire Romney’s been under for offering Rick Perry a five-figure wager at Saturday night’s debate.
“If Gov. Romney would give back all the money he’s earned from bankrupting companies and laying off employees over the years at Bain, then I would be glad to listen to him,” Gingrich jabbed. “But I bet you $10, not $10,000, that he won’t take the offer.”
The wealthy former front-runner poked fun at Gingrich’s own handsome payday for services he said he provided to Freddie as a PhD. historian.
“That would make him the highest paid historian in history,” Romney crowed.
The back-and-forth illustrated the urgency Romney’s campaign is feeling as it scrambles to confront Gingrich, who has staked a lead in Iowa and South Carolina and has narrowed the former Massachusetts governor’s advantage in New Hampshire.
Romney himself appeared hesitant about whether to launch attacks against Gingrich last week, both on the stump and in the debate Saturday. He even shied away from ownership of the tough shots taken by his hand-picked surrogates against Gingrich.
But Romney showed no such reluctance Monday to frontally attack his top rival and, in an interview with POLITICO, said twice that he would not “distance myself” from the comments of supporters like former New Hampshire Gov. John Sununu, who called Gingrich unstable.
And after refusing to swing at Gingrich Friday at an Iowa town hall meeting when a voter asked about Gingrich’s description of Paul Ryan’s budget plan as “right-wing social engineering,” Romney took a hack for the fences when he got a question about Gingrich at a town hall Monday afternoon in Madison, N.H.
Romney, asked if he’d hit the ground running the same way as Gingrich, blistered his rival for the Ryan comments and on his insiderism.
“Speaker Gingrich has spent the last 30 years in Washington,” Romney said. “If you think a background in Washington and connecting various people to government leaders and being in government affairs is the answer, then he’s your guy.”
--Those rich bastards!!--
MANCHESTER, N.H. — Presaging a brutal final stretch before voting begins, Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich traded mocking insults Monday that veered into the personal and made clear that any restraint between the two was all but gone.
In the sharpest and most personal negative turn yet of the Republican presidential campaign, the two leading contenders jabbed one another over how each got rich. Romney portrayed Gingrich as a Beltway fixer who cashed in on his access. The former House speaker returned fire by painting the one-time Bain executive as a reckless corporate titan who lined his pockets by killing jobs – the first time a Republican opponent of Romney has him that hard for his private-sector work.
The attacks came even as both candidates claimed they wanted to keep their exchanges above board.
Romney took the first shot, calling on Gingrich to return the approximate $1.6 million he collected as a consultant for Freddie Mac after leaving Congress.
“He was in the business of connecting folks with government,” said the former Massachusetts governor in a Fox interview at a diner here Monday morning, suggesting that Gingrich was like other former public officials who go to Washington “to serve the people and then they stay there to serve themselves.”
Gingrich, stumping just down the road in Londonderry, hit back even harder with a line that wrapped in the fire Romney’s been under for offering Rick Perry a five-figure wager at Saturday night’s debate.
“If Gov. Romney would give back all the money he’s earned from bankrupting companies and laying off employees over the years at Bain, then I would be glad to listen to him,” Gingrich jabbed. “But I bet you $10, not $10,000, that he won’t take the offer.”
The wealthy former front-runner poked fun at Gingrich’s own handsome payday for services he said he provided to Freddie as a PhD. historian.
“That would make him the highest paid historian in history,” Romney crowed.
The back-and-forth illustrated the urgency Romney’s campaign is feeling as it scrambles to confront Gingrich, who has staked a lead in Iowa and South Carolina and has narrowed the former Massachusetts governor’s advantage in New Hampshire.
Romney himself appeared hesitant about whether to launch attacks against Gingrich last week, both on the stump and in the debate Saturday. He even shied away from ownership of the tough shots taken by his hand-picked surrogates against Gingrich.
But Romney showed no such reluctance Monday to frontally attack his top rival and, in an interview with POLITICO, said twice that he would not “distance myself” from the comments of supporters like former New Hampshire Gov. John Sununu, who called Gingrich unstable.
And after refusing to swing at Gingrich Friday at an Iowa town hall meeting when a voter asked about Gingrich’s description of Paul Ryan’s budget plan as “right-wing social engineering,” Romney took a hack for the fences when he got a question about Gingrich at a town hall Monday afternoon in Madison, N.H.
Romney, asked if he’d hit the ground running the same way as Gingrich, blistered his rival for the Ryan comments and on his insiderism.
“Speaker Gingrich has spent the last 30 years in Washington,” Romney said. “If you think a background in Washington and connecting various people to government leaders and being in government affairs is the answer, then he’s your guy.”
--Those rich bastards!!--