Holding onto the Obama Firewall

>>> president obama is back on the road today for the final sprint to election day holding rallies in wisconsin , nevada, and colorado . if you can't tell where this race is, look at president obama 's schedule for the next five days and it seems to be all about ohio . joining me now, stephanie cutter . is it fair to say the schedule is more important to look at than the polling numbers? you guys are in ohio , wisconsin , iowa , colorado multiple times. those are the four most important states to you?

>> well, we are actually hitting every battleground state . and, you know, we feel good about where we are. he's headed out to wisconsin today. he has a solid lead there. colorado we're ahead. so, you know, things are coming together. we've got several different paths to 270. we've talked about it before. i think the path for the romney campaign are really dwindling.

>> you guys have talked about ohio with a lot of confidence and yet you are there four out of five days this week with the president. that doesn't -- that doesn't give off a sense of confidence.

>> well, chuck, i think it does. because we're hitting several different states each day. we have some time to make up. the president was off the road several days to take care of preparations and response to the hurricane you know and i know that republicans have never won the white house without going through ohio . we are up there and we are up there for a very good reason. just look at the conversation that's been had on the ground in ohio over the past three or four days. it's et all about whether mitt romney is telling the truth about the auto bailout. the papers are scathing and they are criticizing mitt romney because he's not being truthful about the auto bailout that. is not helpful in the last few days of a campaign. the people in ohio know the president. they know he says what he believes and does what he says and he is headed there to begin making his closing arguments.

>> can you explain -- the president the other day on " morning joe " talked about creating a new cabinet agency and the romney campaign is up with an ad about it called cabinet secretary called the secretary of business. what's the difference between a secretary of business and secretary of commerce?

>> well, you know, we did -- ano oned government consolidation project many, many months ago. i was still at the white house . it con sole dates all of the different agencies that deals with exports to make it easier for businesses to sell their products all over the world and grow and thrive here in the un. that's what the president was talking about. and i did see mitt romney 's ad putting somebody in charge who knows something about business. we'd love to have that conversation. mitt romney 's business experience. because as you know and as he admitted, it wasn't about creating jobs. it was about taking everything you could out of a company to make a profit for yourself but quite often leaving the company bankrupt and workers out of work.

>> i want to follow up about worker consolidation. a couple years ago when that program was announced that there were going to be different things, it never went anywhere. why?

>> well, i think that there is a proposal on the table. you need congressional action. i think that there are -- if i remember correctly -- dozens of different congressional committees and subcommittees that these issues go through. it's something the president is committed to. he's already put reforms in place in the government to consolidate programs and make them more efficient. this is about building a modern 21st century government, consolidating what we don't need and making it more effective and it's something that the president has committed to do.

>> we're not going to put david axelrod 's mustache on the line here but your final campaign is iowa , wisconsin , iowa , is your firewall going to hold?

>> yeah, it is going to hold. we feel good where we are. we are ahead in all of these states. i don't think they can point to a clear path way. the firewall is going to hold but we have many different option to the firewall. no one is talking about florida , chuck. we are tied or in some cases ahead in florida . florida could be in the obama victory column and we're counting on it.

>> all right. stephanie cutter , rich yesterday said florida double digits, you say florida could win. two very different visions from the campaigns. stephanie, we'll be talking to you. thank you.