that is different. he says he would be shaping events rather than letting events shape his policy but doesn t say exactly what that means. is he saying he would not have withdrawn from iraq and would rather that we were still there? the consequences of what he actually seems to be implying are not necessarily policies that would be popular with americans right now. think it makes it hard. he has the sweeping language about how he wants to project strength but won t say exactly what that that means. if strength means military force and spending more money on foreign aid that is not popular either. it is not clear what those actions would be. chris: i will pick up on that. even if romney s timing is wrong, there is certainly debate over the president s foreign policy. we had some today with ambassador rice and congressman rogers and i talked to top officials in the romney campaign and they said they have no plans for a major foreign policy speech in the next few weeks before the debate
way to look at it. he is not losing or hasn t lost. he probably has failed to take advantage of this moment of the really three weeks since naming the vice presidential candidate and into his convention. i mean the jobs report number a week ago on friday seems like a long time ago was something that his campaign thought would reset things. really didn t. so they had a hard time sort of i think resetting the race and gaining ground. i think it is absurd to say that he he has lost or is losing. i mean the cbs new york times poll last week showed among likely voters it is still a three point contest within the margin of error. that is with even what romney s own advisors will concede they have not had the smoothest of of weeks. this is still an even race and anything can happen. even in battleground states across the country the obama campaign seems to be performing a little bit better. chris: why this reluctance
right now and i think even the reaction this week to his statement was seen as an act of desperation. that is the way you cover a candidate that is losing. the romney campaign has to do something to turn around because right now it is not helping them. chris: bill, less than a minute left. i guess what confuses me is when pecked ryan as his running mate i tout that was a statement he would come forward with a bold affirmative positive agenda and be the candidate of reform and yet he has after naming him and getting a little bump in the polls and people getting excited he hasn t capitalized on that. maybe they will learn a lesson from the day he selected until the republican convention he narrowed the polls. it is back up to three points when they have gone back to the prehe ryan campaign. maybe shepard smith should the ryan pick which isllow up n positive. chris: check out panel plus where our group picks up with this discussion on our website
to give a major foreign policy speech when there is all of the criticisms that the policies favor the rich over the middle class, why not give a speech and explain? you can hear people clamoring for what are some of the things that he would do in tax reform that would hurt the rich? the overarching thought in the romney campaign is still that the election is about president obama and that they can win the election by the growing sentiment it is time to fire president obama. i m not sure that is right. they have to give it seems a lot of republicans are hungering for more of a reason romney. i m not convinced they won t give some kind of big speech. i don t know if it will be a foreign policy speech. they have seen the same information that everyone hear sees and talks about. they have to kick things up a little bit. even if this ends up being in effect a referendum on the president and his record, the challenger still has something that must be done. and that is to present himself
not only said that but reiterated it later after these event had unfolded. they doubled down ton. eventually the white house walked it back and so on but the next thing you know the white house is saying the same thing it is all about the video. my is sense is that he was on the mark. he might have timed it better or said it better. liz? i think it was a tricky week for both mitt romney and president obama and when you have a week when obama is being compared to jimmy carter and mitt romney compared to richard nixon it is not a week that either campaign is probably going to want to remember. that said, i think in the short-term romney s statements got more attention. and i think the problem that romney has in this situation is sort of two-fold. one was that he did seem political and seemed like he was acting more in the interest of his campaign than acting in the interest of the americans overseas who were in danger at the time. and secondly, it it has been hard for him to articula