President Romney will return from his Martha’s Vineyard vacation this weekend amid withering criticism from both sides of the aisle and his lowest approval rating since taking office in January.
“The president is returning from vacation a few days early to better oversee the bombing campaign in Iran,” said White House press secretary David Miscavige, former leader of the Church of Scientology.
President Romney currently holds a 44 percent approval rating, his lowest mark since winning a shocking electoral victory last November in what observers deemed the “New Jersey Miracle.”
“I agree with Rand Paul. I’m disappointed with some of the things this guy is doing in the White House,” said New Jersey governor Chris Christie, whose criticism of former President Obama’s handling of Superstorm Sandy helped Romney win New Jersey’s 14 electoral votes last year.
Romney has recently been rocked by criticism from his own party, a scandal involving two of his sons, and high-profile public backlash to the implementation of the National Swear Jar, which requires U.S. residents to pay a $2,600 penalty for each use of inappropriate language. Thus far, only New York Rep. Anthony Weiner has faced criminal charges under the new penalties, according to the ACLU.
“Our position on Swear Jar implementation has not changed,” Miscavige said in a divisive press conference Thursday, during which two different journalists from Reuters were fined. “The words ‘hard,’ ‘heavy,’ and ‘lovemaking’ will not be tolerated by this administration.”
Romney instituted the Swear Jar by executive action in April after consulting with Treasury Secretary Michael Bloomberg.
President Romney has not addressed the public directly since last month’s acquittal of neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman in the death of unarmed teenager Trayvon Martin.
“I think this just shows, you know, that members of the minority population have a strong, um. A spirit comes over them during the nighttime hours that is problematic,” Romney said after the verdict while introducing his “Morning in America” program, which prohibits men in urban areas from going outside after dark.
“It’s not that, you know, they set out to cause trouble. I didn’t mean that. What I’m saying is, you know, it’s having to do with the moon’s effect on Americans in the minority population. It’s a physiological thing, is what I mean to say,” Romney said when pressed for clarification.
“I think the president’s remarks were deeply offensive and caused a good deal of pain for folks,” Obama said on his nightly MSNBC program “Change it Up with Barack Obama and Ezra Klein.” (RELATED: ‘Change’ the Channel: Obama Dips Below CNN in 18-to-49 Demo)
Romney may also face a congressional subpoena upon his return to Washington regarding his knowledge of the growing “LoanShark” scandal.
Though sons Tagg, Matt, and Craig have served as effective public spokesmen for their father’s agenda, two of the president’s other sons, Mutt Romney and Julio Romney, are under SEC investigation for their company LoanShark Global’s business dealings with onetime members of the Khmer Rouge.
“I think there are some lingering transparency issues here, revolving around, ‘why didn’t we know that the president had two other sons until he took office?,'” House Oversight chairman Darrell Issa said on last Sunday’s Meet the Press.
Republican Sens. Ted Cruz and Rand Paul, meanwhile, are still lobbing attacks at the president for his unpopular “Stand Up For Gun Rights” program, which Romney billed as a “compromise” between NRA leaders and gun-control advocates.
“By forcing all firearms to be stored on the top shelf of American closets, the Stand Up program is a direct assault on gun owners,” Cruz said, still refusing to acknowledge a Washington Free Beacon report that his and Paul’s new anti-Romney political third party, The Cowboy Justice and Freedom From Mind Control Party, employs a strategist with a history of anti-Semitic remarks.
“The mood in the administration is tense,” said a top aide to Vice President Paul Ryan, who recently distanced himself from the president by comparing Romney’s performance to James Taggart, the prominent antagonist of Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged.
The U.S. unemployment rate currently stands at 4.2 percent, according to a new jobs report.