HOUSTON — Mitt Romney drew boos, shouts and jeers from attendees while speaking here to the NAACP convention, who balked at his claim that he — not the country’s first black president — could best represent black America. 
 
 “If you want the president who will make things better in the African-American community, you’re looking at him," Romney said, as he was immediately met with loud shouts. 
 
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 reset Romney booed on Obamacare Mitt: See what's 'in my heart' 
 
 (See also: Romney at NAACP: Mission impossible?) 
 
 The Republican’s call to repeal the health-care overhaul — which forms a standard part of Romney’s stump speech — also drew loud cries that temporarily drowned out his speech, causing Romney’s reception by the group to veer from genial to borderline hostile. 
 
 “If our goal is jobs we must stop spending over a trillion dollars more than we earn,” Romney said, speaking to a community that has been hit hard by the economy. “To do this, I will eliminate non-essential programs like Obamacare.” 
 
 While the somewhat hostile reception is likely to dominate the cable news cycle and be used as evidence by Romney’s detractors that he’s out of touch with blacks and working-class Americans, the majority of the Republican’s talking points received polite applause, even in a period of heightened racial tension after the U.S. House recently voted to hold in contempt the country’s first black attorney general. 
 
 “I believe that if you understood who I truly am in my heart, and if it were possible to fully communicate what I believe is in the real, enduring best interest of African-American families, you would vote for me for president,” said. “I want you to know that if I did not believe that my policies and my leadership would help families of color — and families of any color — more than the policies and leadership of President Obama, I would not be running for president.” 
 
 Romney campaign aides dismissed the at times rowdy reception and said that “the door is open” now for Romney to make more inroads in the black community. 
 
 They cast the NAACP speech as an introduction to a community that they know is overwhelmingly expected to favor President Barack Obama in the fall — and a successful one at that. 
 
 “He had a standing ovation at the end. There was a lot more applause than disagreement,” said Tara Wall, a senior Romney adviser who was recently hired to reach out to African-Americans. “Obviously there’s going to be some disagreement. We understand that folks are not going to agree with us 100 percent. But at the end of the day, I think Governor Romney’s message was bold. He said what needed to be said.” 
 
 Wall said she didn’t believe Romney’s ideas were unpopular, even among the black community. 
 
 “I think again you may have been sitting in a different section than I was sitting in,” she told reporters. “I heard applause for a number of things that this governor communicated…I think coming in here he said there was going to be disagreement…You still at the end of the day are not going to back down to what he’s asserted all along when it comes to repealing Obamacare.” ||||| Mitt Romney told members of the nation’s oldest civil rights organization on Wednesday that he would be a better president for the nation’s black families than President Obama has been. It was a bold appeal aimed at some of Obama’s most ardent supporters and cast Romney as someone willing to forcefully speak his piece even in unfriendly territory. 
 
 But the presumptive Republican nominee’s speech here received the most hostile reaction from any campaign audience this year, and Romney appeared unsettled by three rounds of loud boos. 
 
 “If you want a president who will make things better in the African American community, you are looking at him,” Romney said. When the crowd booed and hissed, he said, “You take a look.” 
 
 Romney made a direct appeal for support from black voters, who polls show overwhelmingly back the reelection of the nation’s first black president. Romney said his policies would help black families succeed in a sputtering economy, with rising federal debt and poor schools. 
 
 He also highlighted his father’s civil rights legacy as governor of Michigan and tried to build a bridge with black voters by talking about their shared faith in God and support of strong families. 
 
 “I believe that if you understood who I truly am in my heart, and if it were possible to fully communicate what I believe is in the real, enduring best interest of African American families, you would vote for me for president,” Romney said. “I want you to know that if I did not believe that my policies and my leadership would help families of color — and families of any color — more than the policies and leadership of President Obama, I wouldn’t be running for president.” 
 
 Romney said that black families have suffered disproportionately under the Obama presidency, noting that the unemployment rate for African Americans rose to 14.4 percent last month, while the overall rate was 8.2 percent. 
 
 “If equal opportunity in America were an accomplished fact, then a chronically bad economy would be equally bad for everyone,” he said. “Instead, it’s worse for African Americans in almost every way.” 
 
 Romney asked black voters to give him “a fair hearing” and promised that if he is elected, and if the NAACP invites him to return, he would address the group next year and “count it as a privilege.” 
 
 “In campaigns at their best, voters can expect a clear choice, and candidates can expect a fair hearing — only more so from a venerable organization like this one,” he said. 
 
 The hundreds of African Americans in attendance at the NAACP’s national convention in Houston gave Romney polite although subdued applause. But he received a loud and sustained spattering of boos when he referenced his opposition to the health-care law he called “Obamacare,” when he said Obama’s policies are not helping to create jobs and when he said he would be a better president for black families. Many portions of his speech received reserved cheers, such as his promise to defend traditional marriage, and many black voters in the audience stood to applaud him when he finished. 
 
 Although Romney appeared surprised by the booing, a campaign aide said he took it in stride, and his advisers said they were not bothered by the reaction. Indeed, they considered the speech gutsy. One adviser said privately that Romney has presented the same agenda to every audience since the start of the campaign and did not back down from advocating policies here that he knew black voters generally oppose, such as repealing Obama’s health-care overhaul. 
 
 “We understand that folks aren’t going to agree with us 100 percent, but at the end of the day, I think Governor Romney’s message was bold, he’s said things that needed to be said, he’s said things he’s always said about ending Obamacare and about bringing this economy back,” Tara Wall, the campaign’s black-outreach adviser, told reporters. 
 
 Later Wednesday, at a fundraiser in Montana, Romney said he gave the same speech to the NAACP that he gives to supporters. 
 
 “I don’t give different speeches to different audiences, all right?” Romney said. “I gave them the same speech. When I mentioned I am going to get rid of Obamacare, they weren’t happy. . . . That’s okay. I want people to know what I stand for, and if I don’t stand for what they want, go vote for someone else. That’s just fine.” 
 
 Obama is not addressing the NAACP convention this year, although Vice President Biden is scheduled to speak to the group Thursday. The Obama campaign issued a statement arguing that Romney is “the wrong choice” for black families. 
 
 During the 2008 campaign, Republican nominee John McCain addressed the NAACP. Although President George W. Bush had declined invitations to speak during the first five years of his presidency, he accepted in 2006. In his speech that year, he lamented the Republican Party’s difficult relations with black voters, adding, “I understand that racism still lingers in America.” 
 
 On Wednesday, the Obama campaign responded to Romney’s remarks by issuing a statement saying that “African Americans can’t afford Romney Economics.” 
 
 It added: “At the NAACP today, leaders in the African American community recognized the devastating impact Mitt Romney’s policies would have on working families,” campaign spokesman Clo Ewing said in a statement. “He’d gut investments in education, energy, and infrastructure, and raise taxes on the middle class even as he gives $5 trillion in tax cuts weighted towards millionaires and billionaires. He’d put insurance companies back in charge, threatening the health of more than 30 million Americans who will gain coverage because of the Affordable Care Act. And he refused to use the opportunity today to finally lay out a plan for improving health care or education in this country.” 
 
 Romney — who met privately with NAACP leaders before his remarks — directly responded to attacks from the Democrats that he would help only the wealthiest Americans. 
 
 “The opposition charges that I and people in my party are running for office to help the rich,” he said. “Nonsense. The rich will do just fine whether I am elected or not. The president wants to make this a campaign about blaming the rich. I want to make this a campaign about helping the middle class.” ||||| Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney drew jeers from black voters Wednesday as he criticized President Barack Obama and pledged to repeal the Democrats' health care overhaul. 
 
 N. Scott Phillips of Baltimore, center, and others, listen as Republican presidential candidate, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney speaks at the NAACP annual convention, Wednesday, July 11, 2012,... (Associated Press) 
 
 Republican presidential candidate, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney points to someone as he leaves the stage after speaking at the NAACP annual convention, Wednesday, July 11, 2012, in Houston. (AP... (Associated Press) 
 
 Romney told the annual meeting of the NAACP that backing him over the Democratic incumbent, who won their overwhelming support in 2008, is in the best interest of their families. He acknowledged his Republican Party doesn't have a perfect record on race relations, but pledged during a sometimes rocky speech that, if elected, he would work with black leaders to put the country back to work. 
 
 "I am going to eliminate every non-essential, expensive program that I can find _ and that includes Obamacare," Romney said, drawing his first boos of the day. 
 
 Romney stood motionless with a reserved expression for 15 seconds before noting a survey from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce as support for his position. His rebuttal was greeted with silence. 
 
 Indeed, Romney at times found himself adjusting his prepared remarks _ with its typically business-oriented language _ for his audience and sounded like an like an instructor explaining policy. Once he noted the slow growth of the GDP, the Gross Domestic Product, only to quickly adjust by adding "the economy." 
 
 Romney received polite applause at several points during the speech. But he was interrupted again when he flatly accused Obama of failing to spark a more robust economic recovery. 
 
 "I know the president has said he will do those things. But he has not. He cannot. He will not. And his last four years in the White House prove it definitively," Romney said as the crowd's murmurs turned to louder groans. 
 
 Finally, he stopped amid loud jeers. 
 
 "If you want a president who will make things better in the African-American community, you are looking at him. You take a look," Romney shot back. 
 
 Romney, running against the nation's first black president, isn't going to win the African American vote. But he made a pitch with a major speech that also was aimed at showing independent and swing voters that he's willing to reach out to diverse audiences _ and demonstrating that his campaign and the Republican Party he leads are inclusive. 
 
 Looking to cut into Obama's support among African Americans, Romney called education the "civil rights issue of our era" and vowed to put blacks back to work. Citing June labor reports, he noted that the 14.4 percent unemployment rate among blacks is much higher than the 8.2 percent national average. Blacks tend to be unemployed longer and black families have a lower median income, Romney said. 
 
 All told, it's a difficult sell _ 95 percent of blacks backed Obama in 2008. But Romney's speech aside, Republicans and Democrats say he's making a statement just by showing up and speaking to the nation's oldest and largest civil rights group. 
 
 "The first thing you need to do is show up, so I ultimately think he's doing the right thing," said Rep. Tim Scott, R-S.C., one of two black Republicans in Congress. "What he's saying to everyone is that he's (running to become) America's president and not just those folks he thinks he can get votes from right now. I think that's a very important statement." 
 
 "You've got to get credit for showing up _ for being willing to go _ no question," said Karen Finney, a Democratic consultant who worked in the Clinton White House. "It's more about your actions than it is about what you say." 
 
 Obama spoke to the group during the 2008 campaign, as did his Republican opponent, Sen. John McCain. Obama doesn't plan to speak this year. Instead, Vice President Joe Biden will address the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People on Thursday. Obama is scheduled to address the National Urban League later this month. 
 
 Romney rarely speaks to predominantly black audiences at political events. One exception was a May visit to a charter school in Philadelphia, where he cast fixing the education system as a way to help blacks and other minorities. 
 
 In framing education as a civil rights issue, Romney is following in George W. Bush's footsteps. At a sweeping address to the NAACP in 2000, Bush, then the Republican presidential nominee, said the education system should "leave no child behind" and labeled the "soft bigotry of low expectations" as part of the problem facing black students. 
 
 Romney has a personal history with civil rights issues. His father, George, spoke out against segregation in the 1960s and, as governor of Michigan, toured the state's inner cities as race riots wracked Detroit and other urban areas across the country. He went on to lead the Department of Housing and Urban Development, where he pushed for housing reforms to help blacks. 
 
 In recent months, Obama has approached race from an intensely personal perspective. After the shooting of unarmed black teen Trayvon Martin in a Florida neighborhood _ an act many blacks saw as racially motivated _ Obama spoke directly to Martin's parents from the Rose Garden. "If I had a son, he'd look like Trayvon," Obama said. 
 
 Diminished enthusiasm for the president following the economic downturn could dampen black turnout, and that could make the difference in Southern states Obama won in 2008, particularly North Carolina and Virginia. 
 
 ___ 
 
 Associated Press writers Philip Elliott in Washington and Thomas Beaumont in Des Moines, Iowa, contributed to this report. ||||| Photograph by Eric Kayne/Getty Images. 
 
 Mitt Romney was booed. It was a good day for Mitt Romney. 
 
 John Dickerson John Dickerson is a Slate political columnist, the moderator of CBS’s Face the Nation, and author of Whistlestop and On Her Trail. 
 
 When the Republican nominee told the NAACP that he was committed to eliminating Obamacare, audience members shouted out. The negative reception might have been momentarily jarring to the candidate, but the moment had a political upside. It offered a chance for a candidate criticized for his malleability to look principled in the face of opposition. That might not have mattered to the audience in the auditorium, but as Romney advisers explain, this speech was not just aimed at the people sitting in their seats or African American voters in general. Like Romney's contentious visit to the largely African-American school in West Philadelphia weeks ago, this speech was aimed at rounding out Romney's image. “I believe that if you understood who I truly am in my heart, and if it were possible to fully communicate what I believe is in the real, enduring best interest of African-American families, you would vote for me for president,” he said. 
 
 Hearing this, swing voters might think Gov. Romney has a bigger heart than those mean Democratic ads claiming he sent jobs overseas. At the very least the speech, and the negative reaction it provoked, replaced the outsourcing of American jobs as the political topic of the day. That may be the biggest political benefit of all of Mitt Romney's NAACP speech: He changed the conversation. In an election that is so close, both campaigns seem less concerned about the substance of their argument than that the argument take place on favorable turf. On issues from health care to charges and counter-charges about outsourcing, both Romney and Obama are willing to endure boos, howls from fact-checkers, and even some cries of hypocrisy if it will keep the argument on the topics that do them the most political good. 
 
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 Romney was also applauded by the NAACP audience, as his supporters were quick to point out. True, but it's in their candidate's interest to get booed and to have that booing reported. Quiet golf clapping and even sustained applause would rob Romney of explaining how steadfast he is going to be in the interviews that followed. It would weaken the Daniel in the Lion’s Den story. Big deal Daniel, the lion's just purred at you. This is why, when candidate Obama in 2008 told of being grumbled at by auto executives for his position on auto emissions, he left out the part about how they gave him a standing ovation at the end of the speech. 
 
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 The boos are particularly helpful in building ties with conservatives who prize constancy in the face of opposition among all political attributes and who have specific concerns about Romney's commitment to repealing the president's health care plan. 
 
 It should be noted that the appearance of bravery is distinct from actual bravery. This was not a Sister Soulja moment, named for Bill Clinton's comments at a conference sponsored by the Rainbow Coalition criticizing a popular rap artist for contributing to the coarsening of the culture. Jeb Bush talking about his party's strict views on immigration is the closest thing to a popular GOP official challenging his base. 
 
 In this case, Romney was telling leaders of a community disproportionately lacking quality health care that legislation expanding the system is a bad thing. Romney asked the audience to see his heart, but after so quickly dismissing this policy that has deep consequences for the African-American community he offered no alternative health care vision or hint that he understood the depth of the need that Obamacare—as flawed as it may be—was trying to meet. (When Romney later suggested those who had booed simply wanted more "free stuff," that probably made it harder to see his heart.) 
 
 
 
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 Gov. Romney was also willing to endure a few uncomfortable moments when he recently declared that the individual mandate in the Affordable Care Act was a tax. That statement contradicted a senior aide who had labeled it a penalty and contradicted Romney's position as governor of Massachusetts. But it put him in sync with GOP Congressional leaders accusing President Obama of advocating a new tax. As one Republican official argued, the Romney campaign was happy to have an extended debate about the tax issue, even if it momentarily touched on Romney's possible lack of conviction, because all voters would hear was a debate about taxes. Any time the debate is about taxes, argue strategists for both parties, it's a good argument for the Republican candidate. Voters just tend to trust Republicans to give them lower taxes, which they'd prefer. Also, for Romney his pitch to independent voters who don’t like the law is that if he’s elected the tax will disappear. If Obama stays, it won’t. 
 
 President Obama is also willing to take his own hits to keep the argument on his turf. His campaign is running a variety of ads charging Romney with outsourcing jobs while the head of Bain Capital. A variety of fact-checking organizations have called the president on it, giving him the most negative ratings possible, challenging his assertions, and saying his campaign can’t back up its claims. Yet, the ads are still running. The Obama campaign is convinced the TV attacks are working because any conversation about outsourcing is one Democrats think they are going to win. The idea is unpopular and voters are likely to believe that the candidate who sells himself as a business guy and whose firm sometimes shuttered factories was the one involved in outsourcing. When Mitt Romney retaliates that Obama is the "outsourcer-in-chief," it's not likely to be that effective because voters are not predisposed to believe that of President Obama. (In addition to the fact that the charge is pretty weak.) 
 
 The Obama campaign is also running an ad making a claim about Romney’s position on abortion that is wafer-thin, as Time's Michael Scherer demonstrates. But a fight about women's reproductive issues is a fight Democrats are happy to have; it is more than worth enduring a few boos from the crowd. Though the president makes it sound like he is the overwhelming victim of negative ads, that's not so. President Obama is a long way from the 2008 candidate who used to inveigh against political game playing. Though, even at the time, Obama was willing to say one thing and do another, and his campaign ran more negative ads than any in history.
– Mitt Romney spoke to the NAACP national convention today, and most of the headlines are centering on the boos he got when he started talking about ObamaCare and the president himself. He endured three rounds of jeering in all, which amounted to the "most hostile reception of his campaign so far," according to the Washington Post. The candidate himself appeared "visibly unsettled," it adds. Politico, too, uses "hostile" to describe the crowd at points, though it adds that most of Romney's speech was received politely. The first boos came after this line, notes AP: "I am going to eliminate every non-essential, expensive program that I can find—and that includes ObamaCare." The New York Times says he also got some cackles for this assertion: "If you want a president who will make things better in the African-American community, you are looking at him."