Did Romney misstep with his Libya comments?

>>> mitt romney had a noticeable change of tone focusing on the loss of the diplomats, not accusing the president of apologizing and causing some of the problems. this after some criticism even from some republicans of the -- of mitt romney 's initial response to the crisis. joining me is vin webber , former member of congress. thank you, vin. good to see you.

>> always good to be with you.

>> there was a noticeable change of tone today. let me play a little bit of what president obama said to jose diaz -ballart on telemundo last night.

>> my obligation is to focus on security for our people, making sure that we gather all of the facts, making sure that we're advancing american interests, and not having ideological arguments on a day when we are mourning the loss of outstanding -- outstanding folks who have served our country very well.

>> there's a long tradition, vin, that you know welling bipartisan tradition, of in moments of crisis saying we have one president at a time, we mourn the death of our colleagues of our diplomats, and i'll have more to say about the broader issues of u.s. policy. i mean any number of ways. why do you think that governor romney responded as he did the night before last and then again yesterday, double down on it?

>> well, governor romney wrote a book called "no apologies" and his first response was to the terrible things that happened in egypt were a sense of outrage at american statement of apology. so i think that was his first reaction. i think it was a correct reaction, we don't want to change it. as you pointed out he's not campaigning on this for the rest of the campaign but it was an appropriate first react to what he thought was a mistaken response from our government which the administration itself nine hours later disavowed.

>> vin, vin, it wasn't a response. that's the point. he didn't wait long enough to get the facts. it was a preemptive statement and you can criticize the wording but it was issued by a press officer six hours before the protests, before the breach of the embassy wall. it was to try to quiet the situation.

>> right. and it's worth pointing out, it didn't succeed by the way.

>> correct.

>> i understand their explanation and take them at the word to tamp down the protests which were going on, they had not turned violent but protests were there, but it didn't succeed. an apology, as much, issued. may have had no impact, may have -- it didn't work. i think governor romney 's first inspitincts are correct.

>> perhaps he was feeling because everybody from laura ingram to rush limbaugh to the " wall street journal " accused him the day before not being tough a. enough, not running a tough campaign, if you can't win against barack obama in this economy, then we should, you know, shut down as a political party . i'm paraphrasing, i'm not quoting.

>> those folks are friends of mine , particularly laura, i like her a lot. we had jittery republicans not in the romney campaign but outside it because the president got a bounce out of his convention, polls show that he's taken a lead, that's beginning to fade already. but i would counsel my fellow republicans, the romney campaign's been steady for a long time, a patience strategy which has won them the nomination, put him in a virtual tie with the president of the and let's not get panicky five or sick wex weeks before the election.

>> i don't know the numbers, we'll have those on nbc "nightly news" with chuck todd at 6:30, but there has been in the last couple of days a trend of president obama opening up a lead.

>> i saw that, but i also has the rasmussen poll showed governor romney retaking the lead, i saw a poll governor romney widening his lead. i think the polls will bounce up and down for a while. the president got a boost out of his convention. i think it's going to fade after a while.

>> vin webber , thank you very