Romney fetes jobs strategy to eclipse rival

Mitt Romney is pressing to refocus the Republican presidential race on jobs and the economy in the sprint to Super Tuesday’s contests next week, looking to blunt Rick Santorum’s efforts to sow doubts about his record on social issues.

Romney assailed President Barack Obama’s energy policies and offered himself as the only Republican candidate with the business experience to create jobs. Santorum, his leading rival, raised questions about Romney’s core beliefs and commitment to socially conservative principles.

Both men were aiming for victories in the 11 contests this Tuesday, which together award the largest delegate haul in the campaign so far and could go a long way to determining the nominee in the Republican race.

A poll released by the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute in Hamden, Connecticut, shows the race tightening in Ohio, a Super Tuesday state expected to be a battleground in the general election. Santorum has a four-point lead in the poll, 35% to Romney’s 31%, with a margin of error of plus or minus 4.3 percentage points. The telephone poll was conducted Feb 29 and Mar 1 among 517 likely Republican primary voters.

The previous Quinnipiac poll in Ohio gave Santorum a seven-point lead, 36%-29%.

Romney, 64, a former Massachusetts governor, implored voters in North Dakota and Idaho, which hold caucuses that day, to participate in the contests.

“I don’t need a lot; I just need you to go out and vote,” Romney said in a high school gymnasium packed with about 1,000 people in Idaho Falls. “I want to make sure we win, we win solidly in Idaho, that I get the delegates I need to go on and win the nomination.”

Santorum, seeking to rebound from losses in the Arizona and Michigan Feb 28 primaries, appealed to voters in Georgia — the state that awards the most delegates next week — to “stand with the conservative” in the race.

Two thousand miles to the northwest in Idaho Falls, Romney said that he is “running against some good guys in the primary, but you know, they don’t have any experience in business.”

“To get America on track, to create good jobs, it helps to have a president who’s had a good job, and I have,” he said.

Romney strategists have attributed his win in Michigan’s primary to his economy-focused message and think the theme will be crucial to his chances in Ohio, which also has been hit hard by the downturn and high unemployment.

Still, Romney’s campaign is playing down expectations for a decisive victory Mar 6 that would solidify his grasp on the nomination, arguing the former governor is simply pressing to collect as many delegates as he can.

Romney made the pitch as he renewed his criticism of Obama’s economic record and blaming the president for slowing US energy development.

Obama “has tried to slow the growth of oil and gas production in this country, and coal production”, Romney said during an appearance in Fargo, North Dakota. “Far from taking credit, he should be hanging his head and taking a little bit of the blame for what’s going on today.”

He said Obama has halved lease rates and slashed drilling permits by a third, and is now trying to get the Environmental Protection Agency to regulate hydraulic fracturing.

The US public spreads the blame for higher gasoline prices, citing Obama, oil companies and unrest in the Middle East, according to a poll by the Pew Research Center in Washington.

Some 18% fault the Obama administration, 14% say oil companies are to blame and 11% cite the situation with Iran and in the Middle East, Pew said.

Discussing energy policy for the third time in a week, Obama said in a speech in Nashua, New Hampshire, that Republican critics are “licking their chops” at the prospect of rising gasoline prices as higher energy costs threaten to crimp the economic recovery.