AP’s Feller: “The politics of Obama’s storm response are not overt. The point is to go the other direction and just be presidential. So gone, for three days and counting, are the rallies in which Obama expressly asks people to re-elect him. Instead, voters see images of Obama in charge in the Situation Room, or addressing the country from the White House briefing room, or assuring the hurting while visiting the American Red Cross that ‘America is with you.’ To the independent and undecided voters sick of the mess in Washington, Obama appears bipartisan and positively unconcerned about his own political fate. His best friend is suddenly a prominent Romney supporter, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, with whom Obama will tour damage on Wednesday.
“‘The president has been all over this, and he deserves great credit,’ Christie, a Republican, gushed in a TV interview. By contrast, when Christie was asked whether Romney was coming to help, he said, ‘I have no idea, nor am I the least bit concerned or interested.’”
AP’s Babington: “President Barack Obama put campaign battleground travel on hold to tour the ravaged New Jersey coast Wednesday, while under-the-wire campaigning resumed in swing state Florida that is critical to Republican Mitt Romney’s victory plan.”
