For the past few weeks I feel like I’ve been pulled back in time to earlier this year. It wasn’t too long ago that Newt Gingrich was attacking Mitt Romney for his experience at Bain Capital. Of course, when Gingrich did it, he took immediate heat for even thinking of bringing up Romney’s private sector life as a negative. Low and behold, only a few months later, Obama is pulling the same card – attacking Romney over his private sector record.

It wouldn’t be enough to just talk about Bain Capital though – because really there isn’t much to talk about. Bain takes struggling companies and turns them around. Sometimes that may mean laying off employees, but in the long run Bain and Mitt Romney created hundreds of American jobs. But that isn’t interesting. So let’s make some stuff up! “Romney kills jobs!” How’s that sound? Oh, wait – and Romney said he left Bain in 1999, but here he is in 2001 with the same company? Mischief is at hand!

The Romney/Bain record has been cleared repeatedly by numerous nonpartisan fact checkers. He’s clean. Sorry Obama. The real story here isn’t that someone lied, or that someone was trying to cover something up. The story is that someone – Barack Obama – is trying to divert attention away from his miserable record as President. Almost 4 years of unemployment over 8%, Obamacare (or Obama-Tax, as some are now calling it), and continued economic uncertainty. Obama has a crap record to run on, so he’s attacking Romney however he can, even if it means lying to the American people.

And Romney’s response… *crickets*. He’ll deny, and move the conversation back to the economy. Boring! I mentioned this when I endorsed Rick Santorum earlier this year – Romney will attack his Republican opponents but will refuse to do the same to Barack Obama. Romney attacked Santorum, Gingrich, and Rick Perry relentlessly for months. But now that its time to turn his attention towards the real enemy he doesn’t have the guts. This is exactly what I was afraid of. Come on, Romney! Grow a pair!

Perhaps his Vice Presidential pick (rumored to be announced as soon as this coming week) will be a better fighter. VPs traditionally throw harder punches than their Presidents. But once again, Romney has me worried. Will he go with a fighter like Marco Rubio or Paul Ryan, or will he settle for a bland milk-toast pick like Rob Portman. Ugh. I shutter to think of that. Then again, both Romney and his running mate will be made of the same stuff – wood.

Florida Congressman Allen West

Someone pulled a few strings over at the Drudge Report and managed to figure out that Condoleezza Rice was on Romney’s list of top VP picks. Once again – come on! Someone who hasn’t ever run for political office, has W. Bush baggage tied around their neck, and is Pro-Choice? Is this really who Romney would pick? I doubt it, but none the less it got a lot of attention recently.

I can only hope that Romney will start swinging for Obama’s head soon. Romney has the ability to tear his opponents to shreds, as we saw in the Republican primary. He just needs to use those skills on Barack Obama. If he continues to refuse to do so, he’ll need to pick a VP that will – someone along the lines of Rubio, Ryan, or Bobby Jindal. Personally I’d love to see Allen West fill the spot, but there are many great choices. The fight is far from over, and things are sure to get messier throughout summer into November.