“Under Obama’s plan, you wouldn’t have to work and wouldn’t have to train for a job. They just send you your welfare check."
So we're back to Welfare Queens? It's only been a month since Romney barked at the NAACP and told them that if they want "more free stuff," they should vote for the other guy.
What this ad doesn't tell you is that Republican governors, including Mitt Romney himself once upon a time, requested more leeway on welfare than the new rules announced by the Department of Health and Human Services allow.
In 2005, Romney and 28 other Republican governors wrote a letter to Congress requesting even more flexibility than Obama has offered, for the purpose of “[e]mpowering states to seek new and innovative solutions to help welfare recipients achieve independence.”
“Increased waiver authority, allowable work activities, availability of partial work credit and the ability to coordinate state programs are all important aspects of moving recipients from welfare to work,” read the letter, which was co-signed by prominent GOP governors like Tim Pawlenty, Rick Perry, Mitch Daniels, Jeb Bush, Haley Barbour, Mike Huckabee and Jon Huntsman.
Whoops?
Of course that's not important. What's important for Team Romney is the dogwhistle. Substance is secondary to the attack.