Mitt Romney in South Carolina. Photo credit: AP Photo
Gov. Mitt Romney penned an op-ed that was published in the Detroit Free Press which “welcomed” President Obama to Michigan late last week, asking the question all of us here in Michigan want to know….”Where are the jobs?” The following are some key excerpts:
“Dear Mr. President,
Welcome to Michigan. I have a simple question for you: where are the jobs?
As we enter the fourth year of your term, unemployment here is a staggering 9.3 percent. Nearly half a million men and women are fruitlessly seeking work. Many others have simply given up looking. They’ve given up hope.
I recognize, of course, as do all Americans, that you inherited an economic crisis. But you’ve now had three years to turn things around. The record of those three years is clear. Your policies have failed, and not only in Michigan, but across the nation. We have now had 35 consecutive months of unemployment over 8 percent, the longest such stretch since the Great Depression.”
Ironically, President Obama in his recent State of the Union address suggested that all is well and “America is back.” Really, Mr President? I don’t know everyone else reading this, but I am certainly no better off now than I was three years ago, nor is my wife, nor most of my friends. One out of every 5 people I know in Michigan has either lost their job, is underemployed, or is working a job that they are not satisfied with out of necessity because they can’t get back on their feet. The President himself actually admitted that Americans are not better off than they were four years ago during an ABC interview:
Interviewer: ”There’s so many people who simply don’t think they are better off than they were four years ago. How do you convince them that they are?”
President Obama: ”Well I don’t think that they are better off than they were four years ago.“
Gov. Romney agrees:
“The results are a continuing tragedy for millions upon millions of people. I’ve met too many Americans who’ve lost their homes to foreclosure, who’ve had to put aside retirement plans and take work at minimum wage, whose dreams of sending their children to college have been shattered, whose lives have been upended. This is not the way it is supposed to be in America. This is not the way it needs to be.”
Yet now we see President Obama acting as though “America is back” and all is well, despite the fact that unemployment has been above 8% nationally for nearly his entire presidency, and much higher here in Michigan. This all despite the administration’s promise that unemployment wouldn’t be above 8% if we all went along with their spending bills. Mitt Romney’s response to that is spot on:
“Mr. President, your promises now ring hollow. If you have brought new ideas to Michigan for creating jobs, why have you waited three years to unveil them? Have you suddenly had a revelation, or is it because 2012 is an election year? Whatever the case, what you are offering Michigan now is too little, too late. What Michigan needs, and what the country needs, is not four more years of economic mismanagement and failed leadership, but a fundamental change in direction. I was born and raised in Michigan at a time when our state was the pride of America. With new leadership, Michigan can feel that pride once more.”
Read the full op-ed letter from Mitt Romney here.
With the Michigan primary now less than a month away, its time for us to choose that new leadership. If there is anyone who is committed to Michigan’s cause it is Michigan’s native Mitt Romney. See Mitt Romney’s plans for restoring jobs and the American economy here, and be sure to show up to the polls on Feb 28th to cast your vote for Mitt!
