Riley touts Obama, criticizes Romney
Charleston Mayor Joe Riley took aim at Republican front-runner Mitt Romney on Saturday before the GOP forum at the Sottile Theatre.
The city's longtime Democratic mayor also touted President Barack Obama's accomplishments during his news conference about a block away from the Sottile in Marion Square.
"I speak from a city and county where, four years ago, a majority of residents voted for Barack Obama as president," Riley said.
Surrounded by members of the S.C. College Democrats, many of whom were not born when Riley won his first term as mayor in 1975, he referred to a previous Republican president.
"Ronald Reagan in 1980 asked the question, 'Are you better off now than you were four years ago?' Let's ask that question now."
Young people should vote for Obama because the Affordable Health Care Act is encouraging people to stay in college, he said. Riley also credited Obama with a list of accomplishments, including reducing unemployment, helping turn the economy around and rescuing the auto industry from failure.
The mayor also aimed squarely at Romney.
"Romney's entire business career was about profits, not jobs," Riley said. He spoke of Romney's tenure at Bain Capital, a leveraged-buyout firm that at one time owned GS Industries, a former owner of Georgetown Steel, which eventually went bankrupt after cutting 1,750 jobs.
Outside the Sottile, about a dozen protesters with signs also targeted Romney. A man dressed in a suit like the greedy Gordon Gekko character in the "Wall Street" movie handed out fake cash and smoked a cigar.
Some protesters held up signs that read "Greed is Good ... Romney-Gekko 2012" featuring Romney holding up cash.
Tyler Jones of Charleston, who was part of South Carolina Forward Progress, said Gekko supports Romney because "he agrees that greed is good and that corporations are people."
Others revived an old story that Romney put his crated dog on top of his car roof for a 12-hour drive from Boston to Canada during a family vacation. A couple of people held up signs that read, "Dogs Against Romney."
