During an appearance at a forum hosted by Univision, President Barack Obama was asked by the host what his biggest failure was during almost four years in office. Obama said he was disappointed that he was not able to change the tone in Washington.

“The most important lesson I’ve learned is that you can’t change Washington from the inside, you can only change it from the outside,” Mr. Obama said. “That’s how I got elected, and that’s how the big accomplishments like health care got done — was because we mobilized the American people to speak out. That’s how we were able to cut taxes for middle-class families.”

Then within an hour...

“The president today threw in the white flag of surrender,” Mr. Romney said at a large outdoor rally. “He went from the president of change to the president who can’t get change.” “I can change Washington, I will change Washington. We’ll get the job done from the inside. Republicans and Democrats will come together.”

Hoo boy, did the man running the most divisive political campaign, possibly ever, just say Republicans and Democrats will come together?!?

But I think the "strategery" is coming into focus, and it's called "Grasping at Straws." Anticipate a lot of these quick responses to anything Obama says that his staff thinks up a way to twist, between now and election day. This response is especially hilarious as it was one of the major themes of his 2008 campaign:

A spokeswoman for Obama’s campaign said “Once again, Mitt Romney is trying to take the heat off himself by taking the president’s words wildly out of context,” Liz Smith, the spokeswoman, said. “What the president said today is no different than what he has been saying for many years – that change comes from outside Washington, not inside.”

Ms. Smith added: “Mitt Romney apparently doesn’t believe that change comes from the American people. Maybe that’s because he has written off half the country in this election.”

Hat tip to Andrew Kaczynski for the videos.