At ''bridge to nowhere,'' Romney slams Obama on economy

[WestVirginiaRebel]

Reuters:

(Reuters) - Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney returned to his economic message on Friday, highlighting a "bridge to nowhere" rebuilt by stimulus money and warning the U.S. economy could suffer a fiscal crisis like California's if he is not elected in November.

Rising in the polls this week, Romney is eager to follow through by hammering at the White House's handling of the weak economy.

He used the backdrop of a 1860s-era bridge in New Hampshire to illustrate what he called the wasteful government spending of President Barack Obama's $787 billion stimulus plan passed in 2009.

The stone bridge, rebuilt with more than $150,000 of stimulus funds, crosses a river but ends abruptly on one side with an 8-foot (2.4-metre) drop to a grassy field near a Ford dealership.

"This is the absolute 'bridge to nowhere' if there ever was one," Romney told a crowd of supporters. "That's your stimulus dollars at work - a bridge that goes nowhere."

A notorious "bridge to nowhere" that connected the Alaskan mainland with an isolated island became a symbol of congressional pork-barrel projects, spurring public outrage and leading lawmakers last year to impose a temporary ban on earmarks - special-interest projects added to major bills.

Romney, the presumptive Republican nominee, says he would cut spending and put America on the path to a balanced budget if he defeats Obama in the November 6 election. He pointed to the stimulus as an example of the president's failed leadership.

"It is, without question, the largest one-time careless expenditure of government money in American history," he said of the stimulus.

Supporters of the stimulus said it helped prevent the United States from slipping into a economic depression.

After two weeks of a news agenda dominated by gay marriage, bullying accusations, Obama's trip to Afghanistan and controversy over a conservative group's plan to make ads about Obama's controversial ex-pastor, Romney sought to refocus attention on the economy, perceived as Obama's main weakness.

PATH TO CALIFORNIA

The former Massachusetts governor warned that the U.S. economy faced a huge fiscal hole and high taxes like California's if he is not elected this autumn.

"There are only two ways to go: Like America in the past," Romney said. "Or like California, where they raise taxes higher and higher and higher. They scare away employers ... and they have huge deficits," he said in a telephone town-hall meeting with voters from four swing states.

The comments were a departure for Romney, who usually holds up Europe's economic troubles, not California's $15.7 billion budget gap, as an example of a doom-laden scenario for the American economy.

________

 

Romney shows where the path of Europeanism leads.