Film about Mitt Romney to be removed

WASHINGTON – Newt Gingrich is deservedly getting booed in South Carolina for his Super PACS’ “The King of Bain.” Meanwhile, South Carolina remains a state where political ethics and honesty got to die.


The New York Times has a unintentionally humorous story about one of the towns targeted by Newt Gingrich’s Super PAC, which depicts a place that didn’t know they were so much trouble.


Glen Kessler has bestowed on “King of Bain” the dreaded 4 Pinocchios. The CNN Money article below dissects “When Romney Came to Town.”


On Friday, Gingrich asked the group to either edit out any inaccuracies or take down the ad entirely.


Campaigns and PACs are prohibited from directly coordinating.


Winning Our Future produced the 28-minute Web video "When Mitt Romney Came to Town." It features people who say they lost their jobs because of Bain Capital.


"Mitt Romney and them guys," says one man featured in a much shorter TV ad culled from the film, "they don't care who I am."


The ad has been roundly criticized by Romney and the Washington Post for being inaccurate and misleading.


A Bloomberg News review of the film found it lacks a complete picture of Bain's record and takes some matters out of context.


Gingrich, who had pledged in Iowa to run a "positive" campaign after he was roughed up by ads bought by Romney's Super PAC, said he was living up to his previous promises.


"It's important why my campaign is different than some other people's campaigns," he said, adding, "I think ... somebody who wants to be president ought to have the courage to stand up for the truth, and ought to be prepared to say if something is false.


"I'm calling on them to either edit out every single mistake or to pull the entire film, but to not run the film if it has errors in it," Gingrich said Friday as he campaigned in Florida for the primary Jan. 31.


The pro-Gingrich committee has run only a 30-second ad in South Carolina that excerpts the film, according to New York-based Kantar Media's CMAG, a company that tracks advertising. The South Carolina primary is Saturday.


Although it's the age of the Internet and interested South Carolinians could surf a hundred political websites -- including the one showing the 28-minute film about Romney's time at Bain -- TV is still the best way to reach the undecided voter, said Ken Goldstein, who tracks campaign media spending for CMAG.