Mitt Romney's campaign released a new memo Wednesday charging that President Obama's vision for the country is one of a "government-centered society."
"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," Romney campaign manager Matt Rhoades writes in the Wednesday 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."
The memo highlights audio of Obama from 1998 saying that he believes in "redistribution."
"[T]he trick is figuring out, how do we 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 everybody’s got a shot," Obama says in the clip.
By contrast, Rhoades continues in the memo, Romney "knows that we need to foster growth and create wealth, not redistribute wealth, if our economy is to grow the way it has in the past."
"Mitt Romney places his trust in the American people, not in government," Rhoades writes.
Rhoades adds that "that Americans are not better off today than they were four years ago, and this race is a choice between two very different visions. In the next 48 days, Gov. Romney will describe the difference in these visions and what that difference means for our future."
Romney's campaign is putting an emphasis on this message in the wake of a leaked video that showed Romney telling a fundraising dinner that 47 percent of Americans don't pay the income tax, are dependent on government and see themselves as victims. The comments have drawn political fire from the left and the right and raised new questions about whether Romney can defeat Obama in November.
Romney wrote an op-ed in USA Today hitting on the dependency theme, and the campaign also released a new web video that splices together the audio of Obama saying he "actually believe[s] in redistribution" with quotes of Obama saying that "if you've been successful, you didn't get there on your own" — a remark with which Republicans have attempted to bludgeon the president. Republicans began highlighting the clip on Tuesday.
"President Obama simply does not understand what it takes to get our economy moving again," RNC Chairman Reince Priebus said in a statement accompanying the Web video. "He believes that redistributing wealth is what made the American economy work. President Obama is dead wrong."
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