her husband the prominent scientist and he says he was out of town at the time. she doesn't remember. we're digging deeper. i'm wolf blitzer and you're in "the situation room." -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com >> he's faced a barrage of attacks on his business record with democrats portraying him as a job-cutting corporate raider, but mitt romney is opening up about his time at bain capital and vowing to cut the jobless rate. let's go to our national political correspondent jim acosta and he has the latest. >> the way the day started it seemed that mitt romney was going to stay away from the subject of bain capital, but as it turned out he is taking the issue head-on. >> reporter: it was a day when mitt romney's campaign event, this one being a speech to a latino business group took a backseat to responding to campaign attacks on the democrats' favorite subject bain capital. >> the american people are interested in not so much the history of where i was at bain capital or that i have understanding of the private sector, but instead, as president, make things better for the american people. are they better off than they were four years ago. >> reporter: the gop contender defended his tenure at his private investment firm, saying that experience of taking over companies that succeeded or failed has better prepared him for the presidency and the man he replaced. >> the fact is i spent time in the private sector and that teaches you something that you don't learn if you haven't spent time in the private sector. he spent time in politics and as community organizer. >> reporter: he boldly predicts he will dramatically lower the nation's 8% unemployment rate if he wins. >> i can tell you over a period of four years we'll get the unemployment rate down to 6%, perhaps a little lower. >> reporter: ever since the obama campaign started hammering the bain issue, romney has been reluctant to talk about it publicly, avoiding the subject on his campaign plane. but romney can take comfort in this nbc/"wall street journal" poll showing it is largely about bain. >> so the campaign has released a web video accusing the president of trying to use bain to distract voters from the economy. >> it's personal and to a president -- >> after seeing the surrogates object to the bain attack, the president may be ready to move on, directing attention to two new ads featuring campaign promises to protect medicare and veterans. still the campaign likes to throw a punch, so it shows a video lecturing romney on foreign policy. >> the russian federation is the number one geostrategic threat. come on, think, that isn't the case. >> reporter: as for romney's talk of a 6% unemployment rate it turns out the congressional budget office has beaten him to that. the jobless rate will drop to around 6% over the next few years and something the president may want to take credit for, and wolf, as for the unemployment rate i want to point out just a few weeks ago that romney said at a campaign event that anything above 4% would be a disappointment so a 6% benchmark would be below that. >> we'll take 6%, but 4% would be better. a lot of unemployed people out there. thanks very much for that. is mitt romney going out on a limb? let's dig deeper with gloria borger and tim stengel. "time" magazine has an in-depth interview with mitt romney. you saw jim acosta say that he was getting more specific with the 6% unemployment. is he going out on a limb? is he goibeing risky? >> he i don't think he's going out on a limb. i don't think it's a dramatic reduction to go from 6% to 4%, and i think in some ways he's deflecting talk about bain by talking about the economy and accusing obama of being somebody who is so inexperienced on the economy that he won't actually have an effect. so i'm not trying to step on our own story, but i don't think the 6% is big news here. >> let's move on then. i want to play a clip, gloria. this is the exchange that mitt romney had with mark halpern of "time" magazine. >> you welcome the business records, right? >> mark, what i can tell you is this, the fact is that i spent 25 years in the private sector and that obviously teaches you something that you don't learn if you haven't spent any time in the private sector. if you were to say to me tell me what you learned from your schooling that would help you be a president, it's, like, how do i begin going through a list like that? you learn through life's experience. the president's experience has been exclusively in politics and as a community organizer. both of those are fine areas to endeavor, but right now we have an economy in trouble and someone who has spent their career in the economy is more suited to help fix the economy than someone who spent his time in politics and as a community organizer. >> so, gloria, you have a terrific column you just posted on cnn.com about whether or not the president's attacks on romney and bain capital could potentially backfire. what do you say about this? >> at this point, half the public doesn't have much of an idea. what the campaign is trying to do is to say we want to disqualify him on the business issue because, in fact, his experience has been bad and they're turning into a values issue by saying that mitt romney given his experience at bain capital does not have the proper values to run the country. i would argue that there is a danger here for the obama campaign and that is that the president is really well liked. one of the reasons over half the public likes him is because they see him as a generally genial person and sometimes above the fray. sometimes the adult in the room and when you get down to the nitty-gritty of campaigning, you know, the likability issue could potentially suffer. >> you know, someone, rick, that i thought i knew a lot about, i learned something in the new cover story that we have in "time" magazine. i want to put the cover up on the screen. there you see a 23-year-old mitt romney with his mom. a lot of folks don't know that she once ran for the u.s. senate. she had a huge impact on his life. talk about what you guys at "time" magazine have now learned. >> it's a great story and a lot of people know that mitt's father george was a three-time governor of michigan, a hard-driving guy who never liked to be told no. in 1970 after his father left his last term, lennor had been a hollywood actress in her youth and she was not cut out for the arena of politics and unlike her husband, she deflected attacks and she was very gracious and very quiet and yet she was obliterated on the campaign trail and one of the things that mitt learned according to our story is to avoid error. to not get into circumstances where a single remark or an untrue remark would get him in trouble like it did with his mother and once upon a time with his father, as well. >> he learned that from his father because when his father ran for the presidency within a nano second it evaporated after his father said we were brain washed in vietnam and that was the end of his father's presidential run. so the candor hurt his father. that's something that romney clearly keeps in mind every day on the campaign trail. >> terrific interview in "time" magazine. our friend tom halpern did the interview in "time" magazine. take a look at last week's issue, as well, the cover story on benjamin netanyahu, the prime minister of israel. rick, you spent a lot of time with prime minister netanyahu there and you've written a very terrific piece on him. read this week's issue and last week's issue as well. i thought i knew a lot about that subject, but i learned some stuff in the course of reading that article. thanks very, very much. >> thank you. >> president obama reminds air force academy grads that they have one less enemy to face. >> osama bin laden is no longer a threat to our country. >> president obama gets a chance to tout his own global leadership to the next generation of leaders and mitt romney said the main geo-political foe right now is russia, but colin powell thinks he's dead wrong on that. my interview with colin powell is coming up in the next hour. and a well-known scientist is accused of beating his wife. he denies involvement and she doesn't remember. we're digging deeper. ♪ oh! [ baby crying ] ♪ what started as a whisper ♪ every day, millions of people choose to do the right thing. ♪ slowly turned to a scream ♪ there's an insurance company that does that, too. liberty mutual insurance. responsibility. what's your policy? ♪ amen, omen >> jack cavery is here with "the cafferty file." >> joe biden's recent gay marriage gaffe, we love it when he does that. some are beginning to wonder if biden is the best running mate for obama in what's shaping up to be a close contest against mitt romney. republicans have made a strategy out of targeting biden, they're following him along the campaign trail hoping he'll slip up. they've told politico, biden say ticking time bomb, who knows what he'll say. they describe the veep as the chink in the armor. his remarks are legendary. remember when he called obama care a big f-ing deal on microphone? when he described then-candidate obama as clean and articulate in an interview, lovely. democrats insist romney is the best surrogate for the president. he connects with working class voters in a way that the sometimes aloof candidate just can't. the attack dog who goes after obama in a way they might not want to. >> romney's time in private equity didn't call him for the white house any more than being a plumber would. meanwhile, if you listen carefully, the calls for a vice president hillary clinton, they're out there. you can hear them. clinton's approval numbers are through the roof and some suggest that with romney possibly closing the gender gap and gaining among women, president obama should dump biden for the ticket. it probably won't happen, but stranger things have happened and it's politics. >> here's the question. joe biden, asset or viability for president obama. go to cnn.com/caffertyfile and post a comment on my blog or go to the situation room's facebook page. i love biden, but i can see where he makes the president's people nervous. >> even the president was ahead of the skis on the whole issue of gay marriage and had to force the president to accelerate. i think the president was going to endorse gay marriage at some point, but he obviously accelerated the timeline. in the recent interview he gave the vice president, he made it clear he is definitely on the ticket. he's not going anywhere. you know what else is possible out there? at least i hear it from sources at the white house is and elsewhere. he isn't even thinking potentially in 2016, running for president again. that would not necessarily be out of the question, jeff. >> you know what? he might even be electable and on the political landscape. the guy speaks in plain english and you ask him a question and he doesn't couch it in positions or political speak and to quote a phrase he's the guy i'd like to have a beer with. >> i've known him for a long time and he's a great guy and he'll be around for a while. >> oh, thanks very much. >> they're still talking in baghdad. lisa sylvester is monitoring that and other stories in "the situation room." what do you have? >> iran, including the u.s., are hoping to come to terms over the islamic republic's nuclear program. tuesday the head of the iaea said he would sign a path with iran soon, signaling to iran's possible openness of its nuclear facilities and officials tell cnn the talks will continue into thursday and iran's economy will be crippled by western sanctions and israel wants it to end all uranium enrichment and iran says its program is for peaceful purposes and the pakistani tribal court has handed down a 33-year sentence to this man. a doctor accused of helping the cia track down osama bin laden. shakil al fredi, was there and a bipartisan group of senators called today's sentence shocking and outrageous. >> and it still has no formal constitution, but egypt has taken a step toward democracy that's thousands of years in the making. for the first time in their history, egyptians are voting in a presidential election in which the results are not preordained. there are 13 candidates on the ballot and the voting takes place today and tomorrow, and if no winner there will be a second round in mid-june and they're only reporting minor violations and a historic moment in egypt, wolf. >> thanks very much. >> we're watching what else is going on and the next hour, my full interview with general colin powell. we'll be right back. up with a solid plan. wa-- wa-- wait a minute; bobby? bobby! what are you doing man? i'm speed dating! 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>> reporter: the president's address was a mix of pride and politics. he was talking about the u.s. global leadership and going through some of his campaign themes and he was seemingly countering some of the criticism from his likely opponent, mitt romney. >> a dramatic flyover capped president obama's commencement salute to more than 1,000 cadets in the u.s. air force academy where he touted their accomplishments and challenged them to become great leaders. >> you are dismissed! >> and celebrated the end. >> this is the day you finally become officers in the finest air force in the world. >> he spent most of the commencement address painting a picture of the landscape since the cadets arrived four years ago. the war in iraq over, the fight in afghanistan winding down, the killing of osama bin laden. >> osama bin laden is no longer a threat to our country. we've put al qaeda on the path to defeat. >> reporter: and when this iconic photo was snapped during the raid to get bin laden it was an academy graduate, the president pointed out, who was at his side, general brad webb, but big challenges remain each as the president spoke about the spread of democracy and the push to secure nuclear weapons. >> mobilizing dozens of weapons to secure nuclear materials so they never fall into the hands of terrorists, rallying the world to put the strongest sanctions ever on iran and north korea. >> reporter: the president enjoys strong support among americans for his handeling of foreign policy. in this recent poll, 51%, 42% disapprove, but his likely republican opponent mitt romney gives the president a much different score, accusing mr. obama of trying to make friends with some of the world's worst actors and criticizing defense cuts. >> i happen to believe that america's strength is the best ally peace has ever known, that america must have a military so strong no one would ever think of testing it. >> reporter: as predator tones were put on display behind the cadets, president obama acknowledged they would be leaner and no less capable of handling conventional and unconventional threats. >> cadets, as i look into your eyes, as you join that long blue line, i know you will carry us even farther and even higher. >> reporter: while the president was addressing the cadets here, he was also speaking to a much broader audience, military veterans. this is an important group that the campaign has been targeting. you heard the president talking about how his administration has been offering help and offering benefits. they believe this group will be important in the upcoming election, wolf. >> thanks very much, dan lothian in colorado for us. here's a question. who do women voters like more? 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