They’ve dropped the auto bailout on us, but ... there’s only so long you can ride that one-trick pony, and they just kept pounding away at it, and so that’s baked in right now and we’re tied.

Here's how Mitt Romney's political director, Rich Beeson, describes the auto bailout as a campaign issue in Ohio:That one trick sure saved and created a lot of jobs , though, didn't it? And if the auto rescue is so easily dismissed as a one-trick pony when the political director is talking to ultimate Beltway pundit Mike Allen, then why is Mitt Romney himself bothering to fear-monger to Ohio audiences about Chrysler sending jobs to China?

When you consider the different audiences for these two different messages, it starts to look a little like the Romney campaign is trying to convince the punditocracy it's in a better swing-state position than it is, while grappling with the real truth of how much trouble it's in when appearing in front of actual voters. And, as Greg Sargent points out, this dismissal of the bailout as a political, not policy, issue shows yet again what a problem it is for the Romney campaign that Mitt was so terribly wrong on this issue.

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