Romney Tour, Sunday Edition

On ABC's "This Week," Axelrod continues to hit Romney as a flip-flopper, raises "question about what his core principles are."

Axelrod: "He was a pro-choice, pro-gay rights, pro-environmental candidate for office. Then he decided to run for president, did a 180 on all of that. So time and time and time again, he shifts. And you get the feeling that there is no principle too large for him to throw over in pursuit of political office."

Plays to OWS, adds he doesn't "think any American is impressed when they see Governor Romney and all the Republican candidates say the first thing they'd do is...let Wall Street write its own rules."

DAVID AXELROD ON “THIS WEEK WITH CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR” SUNDAY, OCTOBER 16, 2011

AMANPOUR: This past week, the president's jobs bill died in the Senate. You had...

AXELROD: Well, it took a setback. We're going to keep at it. It didn't die.

AMANPOUR: OK. But it's pretty much dead in the format, in terms of being approved...

AXELROD: As one -- as one entity, but now we're going to take it apart and we're going to go piece by piece. The American people support every single plank of that bill, and we're going to vote on every single one of them.

AMANPOUR: All right. But, you know, just last month, you said about this bill, that this is not an a la carte menu, and yet now, as you've just announced yourself, this is going to be an a la carte menu. You find yourself in this position.

AXELROD: Well, we hope to assemble the entire plan, and we're going to take votes on each one of them.

AMANPOUR: So what will be the first that you propose, then? Will it be the payroll? Will it be the infrastructure? What will be the first bits that you try to reassemble and get them passed (ph)?

AXELROD: That is -- I'm not going to -- I'm not going to discuss a legislative calendar here, but they will be done sequentially, and the sequence is being discussed right now.

AMANPOUR: And you think that you can get it all reassembled, then. But the millionaire's tax, do you really think that's going to go through?

AXELROD: Well, we'll see.

AMANPOUR: There's a lot of opposition.

AXELROD: Well, not among the American people. The American people strongly support it. And the American people are going to be heard on this legislation. I think so many Americans are just sitting there saying, "Act," to Congress. "Do something. Stop playing games."

AMANPOUR: So what about Occupy Wall Street then? Is this something that will benefit your party, benefit the president as he goes into re-election?

AXELROD: Well, that remains to be seen. Obviously, I don't think any American is impressed when they see Governor Romney and all the Republican candidates say the first thing they'd do is roll back Wall Street reforms and go back to where we were before the crisis and let Wall Street write its own rules. I think that will be an issue in this campaign...

(CROSSTALK)

AMANPOUR: Is it beneficial to the president or is it detrimental to the president? I mean, after all, some of them are saying, you know, the president himself has a lot of Wall Street in his cabinet, for instance?

AXELROD: You know, I don't know, and I don't know how to judge that, and I don't know that anybody does, and we tend in this business to try and treat everything as a kind of seminal event. And you see some of that around these Wall Street protests.

Now, I do know this: The American people want a financial system that works on the level. They want to get a fair shake. And they want to know that the dealings that are made are done transparently so that if there are problems, such as the ones we saw before the crisis, we'll be alerted to them and we can stop the whole economy from being -- from being turned over.

AMANPOUR: If the president can't work with Congress or Congress can't work with the president to get these things done now, how will it be different in a second term, when maybe both houses of Congress will be Republican?

AXELROD: Well, first of all, let's see what happens in the election.

AMANPOUR: But how -- how do you think it will get any better?

AXELROD: I think that -- I think that there -- I do I believe that, when the president wins this election -- and I believe he will win this election -- I think there's going to be an occasion for self-reflection on the part of the Republican Party, and they're going to have to decide, do they want to keep going down this road of obstruction, keep doing down this road of non-action, or are they going to work together to solve problems?

AMANPOUR: Well, let me ask you this. Mitt Romney, you had a conference call this week, basically highlighting what you want to see in the upcoming campaign. You're saying that he's a flip-flopper. You're talking about all sorts of ways in which you hope to be able to beat him to the post. Do you think that Mitt Romney is going to be the nominee who President Obama faces?

AXELROD: I really don't know. There was a poll out this week that showed him at the same 23 percent he's been throughout the race. Now, Herman Cain is leading the primary. The last poll, Rick Perry was leading it. Earlier, Michele Bachmann was doing very well. But Romney stays the same. Why? Because I think there's this question about what his core principles are. He's been running for office for almost 20 years, for senator and governor of Massachusetts. Then he was a pro-choice, pro-gay rights, pro-environmental candidate for office. Then he decided to run for president, did a 180 on all of that. So time and time and time again, he shifts. And you get the feeling that there is no principle too large for him to throw over in pursuit of political office.

AMANPOUR: Where do you think it's going to come down? I know you said I don't know who we're going to face, but you've mentioned Bachmann and Perry and Cain. Do you think Cain is going to stay at the top?

AXELROD: You know, I don't know. I mean, if you were -- if as a political professional you'd look at it and you'd say there are two candidates who are likely to be competing at the end, and one would be Perry, and the other would be Romney, just based on the resources that they have. But this is a funny year, so I don't know.

AMANPOUR: You just mentioned a two-man race between Perry and Romney, and yet Perry seems to be sliding in the polls. You still think that he could be a contender?

AXELROD: Well, I've been around -- Christiane, I've been around this business a long time, and I know that, you know, it's a very dynamic process. So the candidates haven't fully engaged yet. I mean, Governor Perry has been less than impressive in these debates. And I think there's a general consensus about that. He just introduced a -- what he called a jobs plan. It was an energy plan that was basically a Xeroxed copy of the oil lobby's wish list for America. But -- but nonetheless, he has a lot of resources. And he in his -- in his career has shone a penchant for going hard after his opponents. And -- and, you know, I think if I were Governor Romney, I'd be worried about all these changes in position and how that -- how that -- what kind of message that sends to voters, not just on the Republican side, but throughout the electorate.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

AMANPOUR: President Obama's chief campaign strategist, David Axelrod. And you can find more of that interview at abcnews.com/thisweek.

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