The Obama campaign released a new ad hammering Mitt Romney for not releasing his tax returns asking whether he’s “paid any taxes at all” in some years.

The ad is running only in Pennsylvania.

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Nate Silver argues that because there are relatively few voters that are “persuadable” it would be “an upset” if the Obama campaign attacks on Mitt Romney’s ties to Bain Capital caused a huge swing in the polls.

That said, Romney’s campaign “has begun to behave like Bain Capital is more of a negative factor than a positive or even neutral one… Instead of being more forthright in his defense of Bain’s activities — a strategy that seemed to be roughly achieving a draw in the public’s eyes — he has been in damage-control mode, and has not necessarily been adroit at it.”

“That means it’s at least worth watching the polls over the next couple of weeks to see whether the attacks become more damaging going forward.”

Charlie Cook: “The strategic decision by the Romney campaign not to define him personally — not to inoculate him from inevitable attacks — seems a perverse one. Given his campaign’s ample financial resources, the decision not to run biographical or testimonial ads, in effect to do nothing to establish him as a three-dimensional person, has left him open to the inevitable attacks for his work at Bain Capital, on outsourcing, and on his investments. It’s all rather inexplicable.”

“Aside from a single spot aired in the spring by the pro-Romney super PAC Restore Our Future, not one personal positive ad has been aired on Romney’s behalf. The view that any day or dollar spent on talking about anything other than the economy is a waste has been taken to such an extreme that Romney has no positive definition other than that of being a rich, successful, and presumably smart businessman. People see and feel the reasons for firing Obama every day in the economic statistics and the struggle that so many Americans face daily. The Romney campaign seems focused on reinforcing a message that hardly needs reinforcing, while ignoring a clear and immediate danger to its own candidate’s electability.”

BusinessWeek: Mitt Romney’s wimp factor.

Mark Halperin: “Pause for two beats and pay Prizzi’s Honor-style homage to the ruthless killing machine that is the combined White House-Chicago operation.”

“They have parceled out their opposition research in a manner both strategic and tactical, selecting specific news organizations at times of their choosing to maximize the drip-drip-drip of the twin stories. They have used left-leaning Web outfits as recipients of over-the-transom gifts as effectively (cumulatively) as the Romney campaign uses Drudge. And they have seen the Boston Globe use its credibility to drive a ton of news.”

“The Obamans have dominated numerous consecutive news cycles since the last unemployment numbers came out. And there is more to come for sure. The Gang of 500 is confident it is just a matter of time before Romney relents and puts out additional years of tax returns, an eventuality that the Obama campaign will drag out for days. When some said that the Bain issue was burning out through its use by Newt Gingrich, Rick Perry, and others in the nomination fight, Chicago was quietly confident the matter could be easily revived with new information and heavy advertising — and Chicago was right. And, make no mistake, the Obamans are sitting on even more research that they will unfurl down the road.”

A new Quinnipiac poll in New Jersey finds Gov. Chris Christie (R) with a healthy 54% to 39% job approval.

However, New Jersey voters say by 53% to 40% that Christie would be a bad choice as the vice presidential candidate for Mitt Romney.

“I think it can now be said, without equivocation — without equivocation — that this man hates this country. He is trying, Barack Obama is trying, to dismantle, brick-by-brick, the
American dream. There’s no other way to put this. There’s no other way
to explain this.”

— Radio host Rush Limbaugh, quoted by Politico, about President Obama.

An advertisement released by Mitt Romney’s campaign earlier today which accused President Obama of cronyism and mocked his singing has been taken down due to a copyright infringement, according to the Huffington Post.

“The only person who has seen Romney’s taxes is John McCain and he took one look and picked Sarah Palin.”

— James Carville, interviewed by CBS News.

President Obama seized on a new report claiming that Mitt Romney’s economic plan would create jobs overseas to ramp up his attacks on his Republican rival, The Hill reports.

Said Obama: “Today we learned that Romney’s jobs plan would create 800,000 jobs. There’s only one problem: they wouldn’t be in America.”

A new Purple Strategies poll in four battleground states — Ohio, Florida, Colorado and Virginia — finds a stable presidential race with President Obama leading Mitt Romney by two points, 47% to 45%, the same lead as in June.

“The race is also steady among independents across these states. Romney retains a 5-point lead among this key swing constituency (47% to 42%), essentially unchanged from his 6-point lead in June.”

Josh Marshall: “The Obama team’s goal here is to make the entirety of Romney’s
professional life toxic and off-limits before Romney even gets the
chance to introduce himself to much of the public. And they’re off to a
pretty good start.”

David Frum: “Romney’s core problem is this: He heads a party that must win two-thirds of the white working-class vote in presidential elections to compensate for its weakness in almost every demographic category. The white working class is the most pessimistic and alienated group in the electorate, and it especially fears and dislikes the kind of financial methods that gained Romney his fortune.”

“Romney has a strong potential defense: Bain was in the business of making companies more efficient and profitable. Downsizing and outsourcing were necessary — and often indispensable — means to that end… However, it’s not an argument that appeals much to the voters Romney most intensely needs to win. Hence his unleashing of the war room — but in the end, there’s only so much a war room can do. And this time, by trying to do too much, the Romney war room may have blasted its own side with lethal friendly fire.”

When Mitt Romney signed a federal financial disclosure form for his current presidential bid, he stated under the penalty of perjury that he had not been involved “in any way” with Bain Capital after he left for Utah in February 1999.

Mother Jones reports that during a 2002 hearing to determine if Mitt Romney met the residency requirement to run for governor Romney said that “after he departed Bain in February 1999 he went through a transition period regarding his work in Boston.”

“When a lawyer challenging his eligibility asked Romney, ‘Did you remain more or less continuously in Salt Lake City from February ’99 to the end of the year,’ Romney answered: ‘Actually, there was some transition away from my work in Boston for the first few months and then I pretty much stayed there after.’ Trying to clarify this, the lawyer, after referring to this ‘transition,’ asked, ‘So from February through the end of the year you were pretty much full-time out in Utah, right?’ Romney replied: ‘Well again, the beginning of the year was a good deal of time back and forth, but towards the last half of the year it was pretty much exclusively in Utah.'”

Andrew Sullivan: “If there was a good deal of time back and forth in the first few months and some business conducted all the way through to December (‘pretty much exclusively’), and if Romney’s own lawyer tells an inquiry that Romney’s work for Bain ‘continued unabated just as they had,’ then it is incontrovertibly true that Romney’s statement under oath that he was not involved ‘in any way’ in Bain business after February 1999 was a lie under oath.

David Gergen disagrees that Romney lied: “I may be wrong but based on what we know so far, I would conclude that we do not have persuasive evidence to show that he has.”