Obama, Romney react to tepid jobs report

PITTSBURGH -- Poor economic news intensified the presidential campaign Friday, with President Barack Obama and rival Mitt Romney offering distinctly different views of the nation's economic trajectory.

Obama said job growth by private business "is a step in the right direction." Romney declared persistent high unemployment a "kick in the gut."

A standpat jobs report that showed a net of only 80,000 jobs created in June and an unemployment rate unchanged at 8.2 percent set a new benchmark for judging the president and for Romney to attempt to exploit just four months from Election Day.

"It's still tough out there," Obama conceded to a campaign crowd in Poland, Ohio. Still, he noted that the private sector jobs created in June contributed to 4.4 million new jobs over the past 28 months, including 500,000 new manufacturing jobs.

Obama was on the second day of a bus tour of Ohio and Pennsylvania.

"That's a step in the right direction," he said. But he added: "We've got to grow the economy even faster, and we have to put even more people back to work."

Obama criticized Romney for pushing economic ideas that, the president said, have been tried without success before.

Romney, speaking ahead of the president in New Hampshire, used virtually the same argument against Obama, saying he represented liberal policies that had been discredited.

"This kick in the gut has got to end," Romney declared, and he issued a biting indictment of the president.

"American families are struggling, there's a lot of misery in America today," he said, interrupting his vacation in New Hampshire to react to the jobs numbers. "The president's policies have not gotten America working again."

Romney was at his lakeside vacation home amid growing anxiety among conservatives that he was not being aggressive enough and was squandering his opportunity to win in November.

Republicans worry that Obama's attacks against Romney are taking their toll on the challenger, and right-leaning leaders in business and the media say he is presenting a muddled case for his presidency despite a weak economy.

"I don't say much to critics," Romney told reporters, noting that he has issued a 59-point economic plan to counter the president.