RNC claims Romney wants to let 'every industry' in America go bankrupt

Actually, they didn't mean to say that ... but
what other conclusion can you draw from their
latest absurd attack on Obama?
  Well, to be honest, that headline's not really true. But if you were to deploy the same sort of logical chicanery used in the latest attack against President Obama from Mitt Romney and the Republican Party, that's exactly the conclusion you would draw.

Here's the story. Yesterday, speaking in Pueblo, Colorado, President Obama slammed Mitt Romney for wanting to "let Detroit go bankrupt," contrasting Romney's position with the successful auto rescue package. Obama said betting on America was the right thing to do, and now that auto manufacturing jobs have come back and now that an American car company is once again number one in the world, he wants to make sure that every American industry has the same sort of success.

Here's the direct quote from the president: "When the American auto industry was on the brink of collapse'more than 1 million jobs at stake'Governor Romney said, let's 'let Detroit go bankrupt.' I said I believe in American workers, I believe in this American industry, and now the American auto industry has come roaring back and GM is number one again." After several seconds of applause, the president continued. "So now I want to do the same thing with manufacturing jobs not just in the auto industry, but in every industry.  I don't want those jobs taking root in places like China.  I want them taking root in places like Pueblo."

That's pretty standard stuff, right? Unless you've got something against manufacturing jobs, what the president said makes total sense. Perhaps that's why in the many times that the he's made the same me sort of statement, no Republican has ever attacked him for it.

But this time is different. Both the Romney campaign and the GOP's rapid response team decided that the president's words represented a nice juicy target. Romney communications aide Brendan Buck tweeted:

Here we go again. President opens mouth, proposes bailout "in every industry." http://t.co/...
' @Brendan_Buck via TweetDeck And then the GOP's rapid response team put up a video making the same claim.

So apparently there's now something wrong with wanting America to have a prosperous industrial sector. If you want to see growth in manufacturing jobs, then you obviously want to bail out every industry. And if you like the fact that an American car company is number one in the world and want to see the same thing happen in other parts of the economy, then you're a socialist who wants to turn America in to Europe.

Their attack is every bit as absurd as "you didn't build that," but this isn't even a question of context: there's simply nothing in what Obama said that suggests anything along the lines of what they are claiming. Obama said that auto manufacturing jobs have come back, that an American car company is now number one, and that he wants every American industry to have the same success. That has nothing to do with bailouts: it's called believing in America.

But if we were to take these guys seriously and accept their absurd claim at face value, then the implication is pretty obvious: Mitt Romney and the Republican Party want every single American industry to go bankrupt. Just like they wanted Detroit to bankrupt.

That might be a totally ridiculous thing to say, but if you believe what they are saying, it's the only logical conclusion you can make.