As Obama defends "build that" comments, McDonnell to go on the attack

It was just a quick phrase, mentioned in President Barack Obama‘s stump speech in Roanoke early this month.

In case you missed it, here is what he said:

“If you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen. The Internet didn’t get invented on its own. Government research created the Internet so that all the companies could make money off the Internet.  The point is, is that when we succeed, we succeed because of our individual initiative, but also because we do things together.” - President Barack Obama July 13, 2012 Roanoke, VA

The GOP has seized on the first part of that section of the speech, specifically “you didn’t build that”.  They have held conference calls, cut web ads and pushed out TV commericals accusing the president of being out of touch with small business owners.

The Obama team has argued that the president’s words were taken out of context and that the American people understand that businesses are built and are successful with help from the government. But despite the spin from Chicago, there must be concern that the attacks are having an impact. Tuesday the campaign released an ad responding to the attacks, featuring the president himself speaking to voters directly.

In the ad Obama says “Those ads taking my words about small business out of context; they’re flat out wrong.”

Here is a look at the full ad which is expected to run in a number of swing states:

 

But don’t expect republicans to just accept the president’s explanation. They will continue to turn up the heat with an event Wednesday featuring Virginia’s highest profile Romney surrogate, Gov. Bob McDonnell.

McDonnell will join with two Richmond small business owners to respond to what they call the president’s “insulting” claim. McDonnell is still considered a contender as Romney’s running mate, but his stock has fallen quite a bit by many who track the Veepstakes progress.

It is debatable how much resonance the Obama comment has had on the race here in Virginia, but there is no question the race is tightening up. The Real Clear Politics average of polls in Virginia has the race within two points, but with a slight edge to Obama.

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