Sound Off: Did Romney Criticize 47 Percent of America?

On Monday, the progressive magazine Mother Jones released a series of audiotapes of former Massachusetts Gov. and Republican Presidential nominee Mitt Romney speaking at a fundraiser earlier this year. The tapes appear to have been made without Romney's knowledge.

The comments getting the most attention (in attached video) show Romney talking about what he says are the 47 percent of electorate who will: 

"vote for the president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it. That that's an entitlement. And the government should give it to them."

Romney later said his "job is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives."

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The "half the country pays no income tax" was a topic that came out in the last year and was repeated by groups who were critical of the country's tax system. Those critics implied that nearly half of Americans don't pay taxes. But, as The Washington Post pointed out today, that is incorrect. 

• Of the 46.4 percent of people who do not pay income tax, 28.3 percent—or roughly two-thirds—pay the payroll tax.
• Of the remaining 18.1 percent, 10.3 percent of those do not pay income taxes because they are elderly and retired.
• The remaining people who pay no taxes at all, do so because they make less than $20,000 a year.

The Romney campaign quickly released a statement that said, in part: 

"Mitt Romney wants to help all Americans struggling in the Obama economy. As the governor has made clear all year, he is concerned about the growing number of people who are dependent on the federal government, including the record number of people who are on food stamps, nearly one in six Americans in poverty, and the 23 million Americans who are struggling to find work."

The comments from Romney are reminiscent of those from Barack Obama, then a candidate in the 2008 Democratic primary, who said at a fundraiser that some "bitter" working class voters "cling...to guns and religion."

What do you think of Romney's comments?