Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus acknowledged Sunday that it was “probably not the best week” for the Romney campaign.
“It wasn’t the best said moment in the campaign and probably not the best week in the campaign,” Priebus
said on ABC’s This Week, reflecting on Mitt Romney’s comments to donors that 47 percent of the country is dependent on the government for support.
But Priebus, said it was a “defining moment” for both campaigns.
“I think both campaigns are crystallizing around a central theme which is going to be, ‘What Kind of future do we want for our kids and grandkids? What type of America do we want for this country?’” Preibus said. “Do we want the cradle-to-grave-life-of-Julia-Obamacare-will-take-care-of-you-from-preschool-to-death America? Or do we want sort of a return to opportunity, liberty freedom?”
Priebus added, “Barack Obama has made everything worse.”
Asked about Priebus’s comments on the program, Obama senior strategist David Axelrod said, “I don’t know what prism he’s looking through. Axelrod acknowledged that the country has “come through a difficult time. We know that. This is an ongoing project.”
Later on the program, as part of a roundtable, a panel of columnists debated how the Romney campaign can move beyond their perceived rough patch.
Conservative columnist David Brooks lambasted Romney, saying the GOP nominee "does not have the passion for the stuff he's talking about."
"He's a problem solver," Brooks said. "I think he's a non-ideological person running in an extremely ideological age and he's faking it. So if I were him, I'd go to what he's been for the last several years of his life: be a Powerpoint guy. Say 'I'm making a sales pitch to the country [and] here are the four things I'm going to reform. You don't have to love me but I'm going to do these four things for you.' And so I'd do a much more wonky and detailed thing than he's done do far.”
--This report was originally posted at 10:58 a.m. and last updated at 11:23 a.m.<
